Improve Your Coarse Fishing (UK)
SILVERFISH ACTION
Chris Gadsden extols the virtues of his local River Blackwater, a tiny waterway home to a surprising number of quality silverfish
The River Blackwater is a tiny waterway but, as Chris Gadsden proves, it is home to some quality silverfish
AT A mere 17 miles in length, the River Blackwater is at the shorter end on the scale of UK rivers. Narrow, shallow and full of features and character, you can walk from one bank to the other for most if its winding course through Hampshire, Surrey and Berkshire before emptying into the Loddon, which ultimately finds its way to Old Father Thames. Often obscured by a canopy of bankside trees, it’s too easy to blink and miss this suburban venue. But for those who set out to find it, some of the finest small-river fishing around is to be found, as Chris Gadsden knows all too well. By his own admission, Chris is somewhat ‘old school’ and loves nothing better than to get into the margins of the Blackwater with float rod in hand, before sending a handmade stick float on a short journey downstream. “It’s amazing what you can catch in as little as 2ft of water here! My main targets are roach, which regularly top 1lb and I’ve had two over 2lb in the past 12 months, and decent chub. Just last week I weighed a bream of 6lb 1oz on my float rig. It’s also home to some clonking dace, a few barbel and customary pike. My friend and I have had some 2lb-plus perch recently too. The Blackwater is my local river now and my friend Keith Arthur put me onto it when I moved to this area five years ago. I made a few films for Tight Lines down here with him. Keith has told me how polluted it used to be, but its recovery has been amazing!” enthused Chris. IYCF arranged to meet Chris at one of his favourite parts of the Blackwater in the Camberley area. Rather than cart a mountain of gear to a single peg for the day, he likes to have the option of mobility, so he simply mounts a small tackle bag, a couple of rods and his landing net on to a platform barrow and off he goes. With float rods already set up, he can be fishing in a matter of minutes. “This isn’t the sort of place you can roll up at 11am! I was on the bank at 7am this morning and it was barely four degrees. If the river is low and clear then you’ll find that the best of the action, especially from the big roach, comes early in the day or in late afternoon when light levels
are low. Bright conditions can often put the fish down in the middle of the day. “When you get to a swim you like the look of, it’s really important to make as little disturbance as possible so close to the fish. It’s only shallow so slip into the river as quietly as you can. I like to stick a baitwaiter attached to a bank stick next to me, and a keepnet too,” he said. The keepnet is especially important on the Blackwater, not that Chris uses one for very long. He says that if you return species such as roach and chub straight back to the swim, they’re likely to spook the rest of the shoal and severely limit the amount of bites thereafter. With his gear in place in a smooth, wooded glide, Chris assembled his 11ft match rod, quite a short rod by river standards. However, with trees overhead and only a short flick of the rig required, a longer rod would probably prove more of a hindrance on this intimate waterway At t the business end was a wire-stemmed stick float with some strung out shot beneath. Out it went with a sideways flick, followed soon after by a small ball of liquidised bread thrown downstream. Bread is his favourite bait for a guaranteed few bites in normal river conditions here, a timeless classic for big roach. “If you fished maggots you’d get pestered by small perch and gudgeon! I remove the crusts from a white loaf and run the slices through a liquidiser. I’m looking for a really fine texture that canal anglers would use! The idea is to provide plenty of attraction but not fill up the roach. There’s no need to put in loads so I chuck in marble-sized balls I’ve squeezed together with one hand,” advised Chris. The yellow top set off down the Blackwater as an ever-enthusiastic Chris paid out line from his 2500-class reel. He repeated the process, with a 7mm piece of punch on the hook and another tiny ball of bread out to accompany it. On his third run down the float approached an area of slightly deeper water in the shade of the trees
where it was promptly yanked under in a very positive fashion. Instinct kicked in and Chris’s strike was met with a decent curve in the rod tip as the fish jagged in the current. “Roach!” he suggested and he wasn’t wrong as an immaculate 10oz fish came to the surface shortly after, a lovely opening to his account. “That’s a fairly typical fish here and where there’s one there’s usually a few more,” he added. Two hours later and his keepnet contained several nice redfins, including a couple topping a pound. As the sun began to break through the canopy above exposing most of the riverbed to the naked human eye, bites unsurprisingly became harder to tempt. It was time to move to a deeper section. He posed for a quick photograph with his impressive autumnal catch before releasing them and loading his barrow. Back to the car and a five-minute drive saw Chris arrive at another stretch, Shepherds Meadow. Here the river is slightly wilder with overhanging trees and big rafts of streamer weed – chub and barbel country – as Chris settled into a deeper glide down to a footbridge. “There’s a chance of a chub here,” he said, again employing his favourite trotted bread tactic. An afternoon here produced a second tidy bag of fish, although the roach were of a noticeably smaller stamp than before. He did connect with a couple of chub, although at 8oz a piece they were smaller than average for this river. Although he’s had bigger fish here, his two nets were more than proof that the Blackwater has bags of potential.
“Chris’ strike was met with a decent curve in the rod tip as the fish jagged in the current”