Big river perch - stunning stripeys

Tuesday the 20th of December
Time to have another crack at the new section of the Derwent with perch in mind, last visit had produced plenty of fish but all small so hopefully this time the better fish would show.

Armed with maggot, dendra's and lobbies I dropped into the same swim that I fished on the last visit at about 1pm, first job was to get a bit of bait down there and in 8ft of water a small bait dropper was the way to go, five of those filled with chopped dendra's and grubs went in straight away next to the marginal tree and I then got tackled up. After destroying my favourite perch tip rod I've been in a bit of a quandry over which rod to use, I initially picked up an old Silstar matchpicker which is a lovely sensitive rod but then thought on, at 9ft it didn't give me much leverage should I have to pull a good fish from bankside snags and to be honest it is a bit soft to risk using for proper big perch. Instead I ended up taking a 12ft MAP stillwater tip rod that I bought from a mate several years ago and have used once since, much more grunt mid rod but still with reasonably sensitive quiver tips, it turned out to be the perfect weapon for the job which was something of a relief as I could really do without buying yet another rod. Reel wise I use a Shimano Match, I got that reel free when buying a set of baitrunners in I believe 1992, give most carp anglers one of those nowadays and they would hang it from their rear view mirror! Its a cracking little reel that has caught me god knows how many fish over the years, I have improved it with one small modification in adding a double handle. In most circumstances I hate double handles on a reel but when fishing the tip and wanting to minutely adjust the tension I find them perfect in that they tend to keep the rotor positioned where you want it instead on constantly moving and upsetting the quiver tips position. Mainline of 6lb down to a simple link leger set up is about as complicated as my quiver tipping rigs get, a snap swivel goes on the link section so that I can easily change from feeder to swan shot if required and the hooklink is attached loop to loop. More often than not for my perch and chub hooklengths I use Clarkes (AKA Silstar) Matchteam mono in 4.6lb, if you've never come across this stuff it's the business, in higher strains I use it for surface fishing and have taken carp to over 30lb's on it, for a pre-stretched line its about as near to "proper old rope" as your likely to get. Hook wise my way of thinking in all of my fishing is go as big as you can get away with sensibly, with a lobworm hookbait I want that hook to still have some gape showing and not to be totally obscured by worm, my normal choice is a size 4 Drennan Specimen, they've got a nice round bend that suits worm fishing perfectly.

By about 1.30 I was all set up comfortably and making my first cast, actually more of a swing than a cast, against the feature to my left. The tip was tightened just enough to show a drop back should one occur and the rod butt rested on my knee with the reel without easy reach for a quick strike. Every now and then a small lift of the rod twitched the worm back a few inches, quite often that provokes a bite but not today, on one hand I was quite pleased that I wasn't being plagued by small fish but with conditions being promising I was a bit surprised that nothing at all was happening. As dusk started to descend I became more alert as always, I find the intensity of this time of day when perch fishing almost stressful in a strange kind of way, the emphasis is on keeping a bait in position and on being ready primed ready to respond to a bite but I can never help rushing things just a little bit too much and as they say more haste less speed. On this occaision that saying came to fruition with a rig neatly planted in a branch above my head, with a great deal of luck the rig was retrieved intact and on inspection was not damaged. Dark was fast approaching now and were it not for the pair of isotopes fixed to the quiver I would have been packing up which is never a good move when perching, always stick it out until the death. As has happened so many times before the only bite of the session came at the last minute, envelopped in darkness but for two alien glowing objects in front of me I had become transfixed on those all telling lights only to be snapped out of my trance by one of them taking a dive towards the water. A subconcious strike was stopped after a few feet by something pulling the other way and for a couple of minutes the perch gave a good account of itself before I scooped it up. On the scales it went 2lb 13oz and was a lovely looking creature as is often the way with these river fish, dark in colouration with big bold stripes, there are some cracking looking species out there but for me I don't think you can beat a perch.

Thursday the 22nd of December
It was back to the Derwent for another go today, I fancied trying a little further upstream on this visit and with so many over hanging tree's there was no shortage of options so I just picked a swim randomly as they all looked as good as each other. The river was carrying maybe twelve inches of extra water from Tuesday and after an hour I so I came to the conclusion that the swim choice wasn't right, the full force of the flow was coming through the inside line and it just didn't feel right, I decided on a move back down to the swim I fished on Tuesday with a small back eddy providing some shelter from the current. Five small droppers full of chopped worm and magggot went straight in and I settled in to see if I would have to wait for dusk yet again.

After an hour or so the tip twitched before steadily pulling round and a fish was on, not a monster at maybe a pound and a quarter but nice to get a bite early on and a confidence boost, I thought that might indicate a few more bites but only one more came my way as the light faded from the sky and this one was smaller still