Improve Your Coarse Fishing (UK)
Bob Roberts
My monthly fishing diary...
Week one...
It recently dawned on me that I’m pretty much a straight up and down angler. It’s the norm for me to travel south to fish, occasionally north, but seldom do I drive any distance east or west. Fishing somewhere new is always a gamble and probably why I was bemoaning the lack of decent local tench fisheries to Brian Skoyles. Now Brian’s least favourite fish is the tench, probably because old tinca has sprung too many of his carefully laid carp traps over the years. On the other hand, it means he’s more clued up about Yorkshire tench than I am. “Why don’t you have a word with Derek Pye at Hull and District?” he suggested. Several of the Hull waters hold good sized tench, especially by Yorkshire standards (where genuine six-pounders are as rare as additions to the Leeds United trophy cabinet). So I did, and Derek was more than happy to give me a steer in the right direction. For several decades Hull’s betterknown carp lakes have draped a cloth of invisibility over what amounts to a wealth of fantastic coarse fisheries, lakes that a senior like me can fish for a bargain £26 a year after paying an initial £10 joining fee. Plus, the ticket includes rivers, drains and canals. How brilliant is that? Now I have a ticket it would be madness not to try and make time to work my way through the various waters, many of which have been fenced against otters and offer secure parking behind locked gates. The first water I aimed for was a clay pit of around six acres. The regulars welcomed me but asked that I didn’t mention it by name so I won’t, but join the club and the ‘secret’ will be revealed when you flick through the membership book. In any case, there are potentially bigger tench, and certainly more of them, in several of the club’s other waters. Anyway, even after that glowing buildup I blanked on my first trip. Nary an indication of any sort but a bloke just up the bank from me had four bream, two of which were eleven pounders! I photographed his smallest fish, a slab of 8lb-odd. What was really weird was Dean Roberts not only had the same surname as me, he drove the same model vehicle in the same colour. Spooky! Dragging myself out of bed at 4am two days later I covered the 50 miles on deserted roads. The morning was decidedly chilly beneath clear skies and the sun practically scorched my eyeballs. The lake looked completely dead and not a single fish showed on the surface. Two hours later I was resigning myself to a second blank when the right-hand rod rattled off. My ultra-cautious approach of fishing critically-balanced corn with a PVA bag of 2mm pellets deliberately cast out once, and once only so as to cause minimum disturbance, had paid off. Not only was it probably my biggest-ever Yorkshire tench, it was a male to boot. I left it in the net while I set up the camera and, blow me, the other rod was away. Extraordinary when you realise one rod was fished at close range, the other at 40 yards. This one was a cracking female. Maybe the fish had switched on and I was in for a red letter day, but no, I never had another bite. Weird. On the way home I called in for a look at Motorway Pond, a Hull and District water that has a rich carping pedigree. It’s also on my new ticket and, according to everyone I spoke to, is full of quality tench running to 7lb-8lb. I shall be giving that one a go, too.
Week two...
Picking the brains of several anglers on the Hull waters about tench fishing invariably led to discussions about that other northern rarity, crucian carp of a decent size, and had I tried for them in Scunthorpe AA’s Yaddlethorpe Ponds? This is another bargain ticket costing seniors just £31.50 per year and includes several fantastic stretches of the Trent plus umpteen lakes, canals and drains. Eat your heart out you hard-done-by southerners! Better still, I already had the ticket so it was all systems go. Just had to find where the lakes were and it turns out I’d driven past them several times this past winter without the penny dropping. That had to be rectified, so I set the alarm at an ungodly hour and pointed the car in an easterly direction once more. I didn’t get the classic golden dawn I was hoping for with whisps of mist eddying around the pads. No, I shivered inside a hoodie and my winter top coat till past 10am before the sun shone. With right-thinking anglers still tucked up in bed and the whole lake to choose from, I settled on a swim which presented multiple features – a small promontory sticking out, overhanging bushes to the right, a small reeded island directly ahead and pads everywhere. Using a pole offers precision plumbing and perfect presentation. Boy did it come in useful. The depth was all over the place, up and down like a fiddler’s elbow, but I soon identified two clear spots in the pads around 5ft deep where I could drip feed 4mm Bag ’em expander pellets using a small pot. A light float was set at dead depth with the bristle dotted right down. Anything breathing on the bait would give an indication – crucians can be the most delicate of biters. It wasn’t long before the float slid away and a small male tench led me a merry dance around the pads. Another followed and then I hooked what I’d been hoping for. A ‘certified’ cruey of near-on 2lb. Job done, if I didn’t get another sniff I would still go home happy. But sport was only just starting to warm up. As noon approached and with the sun shining, the fish decided on a munch and I ended up with eight fantastic crucians, each the size of dinner plates. And only 40 minutes from home. Bliss.
“It wasn’t long before the float slid away and a small male tench led me a merry dance”
Week three...
Each spring I do my best to wangle a guest session at an under-the-radar Midlands carp syndicate which, as well as being home to some superb specimens, holds good numbers of quality tench. Unfortunately, the tench fishing has gotten progressively more challenging due to the creeping menace that is Canadian pond weed. Raking helps but my recent results are well down on the past. The frustrating thing is you know when the fish are in your swim because patches of bubbles come fizzing to the surface as they root around. Fish are feeding but I suspect the hookbait is getting masked by weed. The first day of my two-day trip resulted in a complete blank. Not a single bite was had but the fizzing and occasional rolling indicated that the fish were at their most active between 11am and 1pm. That evening I raked the swim, set the alarm for 4.30am and had a good night’s sleep. At dawn I raked hard again in an attempt to create a couple of clear spots. I then baited up with maggots and then fished for a few hours at the opposite end of the lake while the swim rested. My only action came from a couple of eels. At 11am I was back in my swim and guess what? Tench were fizzing away, right on cue. Ten minutes later the red tipped float moved gently to one side. At no point did it go under but something was afoot. A swift lift of my 14ft Tournament match rod set the size 16 hook. The fight that followed was pretty hairy but once the fish had been steered away from the mass of reeds and debris to my left the result was never really in doubt. It was the only tench on my annual trip but a truly memorable one. The final of my Club Match Angler Championship was fished in challenging conditions under a blazing sun and no ripple whatsoever. Now in its 43rd year, 20 anglers had fought their way to the final by first winning at club level and then winning a section against other winners in the semi-final. Every finalist had earned the right to take part on merit but Kevin Parkes stood head and shoulders above the rest and was crowned top dog for a record fourth time. Four wins in 14 years is one hell of an achievement. Although his tackle might look a bit scruffy, his attention to detail at the important business end was amply demonstrated as he emphatically led the entire fifield. field.
Week four...
A couple of days before the season opened I gave a new club member the full guided tour of our waters showing him access points, permitted parking locations etc. It was the first time I’d set foot on the Trent’s banks in 90 days and it looked glorious, though the water was as clear as I can ever remember. Pebbles were easily visible 4ft down which enabled us to see several groups of barbel and chub. Typically, there was one big female barbel at the head and a few males rubbing alongside her, or playing follow the leader on the shallows. In 48 hours the mat police would be descending on the river in their droves harrying these fish round the clock. That doesn’t feel right to me. I would much prefer the season opened on July 1. Coincidently, I hosted a gathering of angling friends that same evening and the general consensus was they would be targeting other species rather than barbel in the first few weeks. I enjoyed a lie-in on opening day before driving down to see Brian Skoyles who was hosting a junior carp coaching event. He was well chuffed as each one of his charges had managed to catch a carp. I left them mid-afternoon and headed off to a stretch of the Trent that I hoped would be quieter than many. My plan was to run a waggler through and I’d be telling porkies if I said I didn’t hope to catch an accidental barbel, well away from potential spawning areas, of course. The wind was more than tricky and bites at a premium but I did catch a smattering of superb roach which might bode well for the summer ahead. There were a few acrobatic barbel around, one leaping nearly 3ft clear of the water just downstream of my swim, so later on I chucked a pellet feeder over the waggler line. This also attracted roach but eventually the bite I was hoping for practically ripped the rod out of my hand. My mistake was to strike on the tight line and we instantly parted company. It was an amateurish mistake. Brand new 10lb line parted like cotton but my suspicion is that it was probably down to the wrong choice of swivel. I was trying out a helicopter-style rig using a micro swivel and I think the small diameter of the wire cut through my mainline, or it could have been a mussel shell, a pike, or... I now needed to catch a barbel just to regain my sanity. Just the one. It had been a long time since the last one so now I would return and sit things out on a boilie until I got the bite I needed. One bite would be enough and, sure enough, when I caught my target I then packed up and went home. I shall be back on their case in a few weeks after the crowds have gone and the fish are fully recovered from spawning. I’m all in favour of a closed season provided it is timed to protect our key species when they are most vulnerable. The whole of May and June would be a damn good start. It’s good to be back though. Tight lines.