River Trent perch fishing - Finding my feet?

Thursday the 11th of October

After the previous days result I was keen to get back to the river for another crack at the perch and arranged work so that I could be bankside for 4pm. I had been thinking about my tactics overnight and had decided to fish both rods on the bobbins this time the thinking being that when using a quiver tip rod a bleep on the other rod always draws the eye to that set up and opens up the possibility of missing a bite on the tip, I thought that two rods fished side by side would be more efficient.

With a bed of bait applied by dropper both feeder clad rods were swung out three rod lengths or so to the near side of the crease and recast every twenty minutes with a top up of maggots. With the light levels already ebbing it wasn't long before a bobbin twitched indicating some interest before steadily climbing towards the rod. The strike was clean and so was the hook, I missed it which seemed a little strange considering that the bobbin was definately still climbing as I lifted the rod. Not to worry I thought and sent another little package of goodness out into the depths. Ten minutes later and the same thing happened again, a very confident bite was missed leaving me scratching my head and wondering what on earth was occuring. I lifted the rod rests up slightly to allow a longer drop on the bobbin in case I wasn't hitting the bites before resistance was felt and hoped that may help, the rod tips were pointing virtually straight at the rigs so I didn't think that rod pressure was the issue. Very soon another bite was indicated and this time I was into a fish, not huge at maybe a pound and three quarters but satisfying after the two missed affairs and it left me thinking that I may have solved the problem. I wasn't thinking that for long though as up until I packed up I missed two more cracking bites which left me more than a bit frustrated and cursing myself for not fishing the tip as I am certain that I would have converted most of those bites into fish, you live and learn. Nevertheless it intrigues me to know what was going on, without a doubt the bites were struck as the bobbin was moving which naturally makes you think that the bait was still in the fishes mouth, interesting but as I have the upmost confidence in converting bites on the quiver tip then I decided that would be my approach from now on.

Week commencing the 15th of October

I'm going to condense four short trips into one write up here, the river was up and down constantly and despite my best efforts, bordering on madness to be honest, it was never going to be a greatly successful week's perch fishing to be honest.

Monday was my most successful day, once again I only fished the last two or three hours into dark and using the tip rod this time I turned three bites into three fish. Although the largest was only maybe a pound and a quarter it was good to be landing fish rather than missing bites.

Tuesday evening was a right off, the river was on the up and the autumn leaves knocked from their perches by a feisty wind were coming down the river in hoardes making fishing a nightmare, if it wasn't a leaf catching the line I would wind in to find one impaled on the hook.

Wednesday saw me making the morning rush hour trip to the river only to take one look and turn around, are you starting to see some signs of obsession creeping in yet? A check of the EA river level website late in the evening seemed to indicate an improvement so another trip was on the cards for Thursday.

Thursday morning saw me on the bank before first light, in the gloom of dawn I thought things looked quite promising but stark reality hit home as time went on and more and more rubbish was seen making its way downstream. I poked a stick into the bank at water level for some reason even though it would only tell me the obvious and it did just than, an hor later and the water had crept up its length. The river was getting more coloured at quite a rate and I reluctantly decided to call it a day after three hours, not before a jack pike had given me the run around though.

Sometimes you really ought to just leave well alone and wait, unfortunately this addiction that I suffer makes that hard to bear though after a week like that I do look back and wonder about my sanity.