Big river perch, in fact monster perch!

For the majority of the country's river anglers the winter just gone was incredibly frustrating, I kept telling myself that it was selfish to moan about not being able to fish while elsewhere in the country lives were being ruined by the incessant rain but deep down that didn't help, What compounded things was that my chub fishing had been going really well and I knew that I had located a group of fish that stood a good chance of giving me my target, but I just couldn't put a bait anywhere near them for week after week.

River Derwent chub - on a mission for a monster

I always used to class chub as my favourite species. I think that goes back to my youth when a bonus chub would be the highlight of a days fishing and at that time a good Soar chub would be 2lb plus. I remember well when my Dad caught a monster of over 3lb's several years after we started fishing the river and that really was something pretty special to us. I first cracked the 3lb barrier on the River Wreake near Sysonby, I guess in the mid 1990's, and I was chuffed to bits with that. I can still remember the swim and the drop back bite that showed that my piece of flake had been picked up. That was, in fact, the first time I had ever tried upstream legering, a technique that became a firm favourite years later.

My brother with a typical Soar chub from our childhood

My dad with a Soar monster!

Big river perch - the grand finale, kind of

After the cracking brace of stripeys shown in my last blog my end of season plans were set, I was just going to go hell for leather at the perch and see what happened. The nasty easterly wind was seemingly relentless and even when there was some sight of respite it came from the north, hardly worthy of digging the shorts and flip flops out for that's for sure. One saving grace was that the rain did hold off, mostly, and the river was more often than not fishable, which after the last twelve months was something to be grateful for at least.

During the penultimate week of the season I fished four sessions which again included one overnight stay in the van to fit in a dawn assault. Apart from finding what could quite possibly be the best chippy in Notts the week was a complete right off, it's a good job I'm so easily pleased isn't it!

So that left me with four days to play with up to March the 14th and I could fit in another three short sessions. One side effect of the lousy weather is that the gardening year is miles behind, in fact I'm writing this on April the 1st and we've just taken the dog for a walk and seen someone skiing, I kid you not! Fishing wise that meant that I had time to spare, unfortunately though fishing doesn't pay the bills but when opportunity knocks I'll not refuse.

Monday afternoon saw me setting up in a swim that I had fished last autumn but which had only produced one small perch to me in three previous attempts. When I arrived I had stood behind the swim contemplating whether or not I should give it a go and reflecting back on the winter's results. I had certainly had a perch season beyond anything I had imagined but it is easy to gloss over the journey and just pick out the destination. I have had a lot of blanks and done a lot of travelling for those fish not to mention putting up with what can only be described as an awful few months weather. The way I look at this perch fishing is that it is all about being on the fish, you are either on them or you aren't and from my experience it isn't always a case of dropping in a previously productive swim, I now think they move around a bit more than I had previously considered. If the conditions are right, meaning the water level and clarity are good, then I am pretty confident of getting a bite from any perch that lurks in front of me. Water temperature doesn't bother me too much other than sharp decreases and let's face it this year the water has been cold constantly, after all they catch perch through holes in the ice in Scandinavia don't they. As a rule I rate them as easy fish to catch, it's everything else that has to fall into place that causes the difficulties. So the question was were they in this swim today, only one way to find out.

Now I've fished in some cold conditions this winter but that afternoon took top spot in the brass monkey awards, the wind was absolutely evil and cut straight through several layers of clothing without trying. It's rare that I resort to a waterproof coat on top of my Snugpak jacket but it was essential in this case though once sat down I found that I did actually have an unexpected bit of shelter caused by a small hump behind me, which was nice. Being positioned between two near bank trees allowed me to fish a rod to each, the upstream one was set up on the bite alarm and bobbin while downstream I would concentrate on the quiver tip. As usual I got the bait dropper into action straight away and deposited a mixture of maggot and chopped lobworm and dendrobaena onto each spot.

With the upstream rod in position and fishing for itself I set about dropping the other rod into the same spot that I had fished previously only to find that the floods had dumped a snag there resulting in a lost rig straight away, not good. I tried casting a hookless rig slightly to one side and the other to check the extent of the problem but could still feel it clipping some structure so ended up fishing directly off the rod tip, not a complete disaster with a good ten feet of water under my feet.

The afternoon drifted by quickly, the sun was beaming down but slipped behind the tree I was fishing to well before dusk and so cast shade upon the area which made it look a whole lot more promising but that didn't do the trick. The light was fading fast when I had a single bleep on the bobbin rod, I took my eyes off the quiver tip but the bobbin hadn't budged at all. I then looked along the rod and noticed the tip was tapping so struck straight away and was into a fish. Why hadn't the bobbin moved? Because the rings had frozen up that's why. Unbelievable, in January ok sometimes I can accept that glycerine may be needed to keep the guide's ice free, this was supposedly spring!

After a brief scrap I bundled a chunky looking stripey into the net, fat as butter with spawn, the scales went to 3lb 6oz. I left it in the net in the margins for a minute or two while I set up the camera and then lifted it back out and into the weigh sling to carry up to the top of the bank for a few pictures. The change in temperature as I poked my head above that hump of bank was unbelievable, I'd go as far as to say physically shocking in fact! I put the tripod down and flicked the camera on, knelt down with the fish and was amazed to find that the weigh sling had actually started to freeze in my hands, I can assure that I wasted no time in getting those pictures done my hands felt like they were going to drop off.

That was my one and only bite of the session, on packing up I found that my landing net handle was frozen solid at ten feet long and it was touch and go as to if I would have to hide it in a bush until a later date. I can honestly say that I have seen enough cold weather now.

The next day saw me in another swim I had tried before, this one with more success. It was certainly a more pleasant day to be next to the water that's for sure. Once again I only had one bite and it was from a fish of 2lb 14oz, not to be sniffed at and this time last year it would have been a fish I was very pleased with but now the bar has been raised. My final attempt was on the Wednesday and was a complete blank, not a sign of a bite and in a way a bit of an anti climax but you can't book the productive days in advance and if you could who would go on the blank days eh?

And so that was my perch season over. I've had a great winter and have really enjoyed my fishing but I'm now ready for a change and that's the beauty of fishing for lots of different species, there's never time to get stuck in a rut and become bored.

Big river perch fishing - a bracing result

After returning to blighty from far sunnier climes I had two weeks of the river season ahead of me and I really wasn't sure what to do with it. I had fully intended to leave the perch alone but it felt a bit late to start getting stuck into something else and, after all, those perch were only getting fatter. Common sense said hold out for another couple of weeks, in all honesty I was becoming a bit bored of the same old style of fishing but soon enough there would be lots of options for something different and so I decided to push myself and stick at the perching. Bored of fishing? Well that isn't really a fair description, ready for a change is more apt, sometimes though persistence is what catches you fish. And so within a day of stepping off of the plane I was once again digging for worms. The downside of the holiday was that my back had once again started to play up and that became more obvious when digging. Sitting static for six hours in a cattle wagon with wings followed by a good dose of sun lounger seizure and another helping of cramped plane to finish off with didn't do me any favours, not what I want just as work should, in theory, pick up after the winter very soon.

My first session was to be a dawn assault, miraculously the weather had settled quite nicely and although the easterley wind was bitter the ground was relatively dry and it was actually possible to get some work done, three hours fishing could be fitted in first though.

Dry, kind of

I had decided on trying a swim new to me a little further along a stretch that I had fished before Xmas, a big willow drooped into the water at various points and along with other now unattached branches protruding up out of the water it looked like perch heaven. I had miscalculated my timings and I was still racing east along the dual carriageway as dawn broke in front of me, not what I wanted but it was too late to do anything about it now.

After several months of fishing in the same manner everything is set up and ready to go in no time and the dropper had deposited a bed of perch breakfast just on the downstream edge of the branches. The thing with early perch sessions is that I tend to think that my chances diminish as times goes on and the day becomes brighter, fishing later in the day the opposite happens and confidence grows. When the tip hadn't moved by 7.30 I was starting to think that my chances were slim, the sky was virtually cloud free and shafts of sunlight beamed through the hedge line behind me. Beneath the tree remained in shade though and thankfully the perch were still happy with that as one picked up my lobworm just before 8am and pulled the quiver tip sharply round. The fight was slow and plodding indicating that something decent was on the end of the line and I wasn't disapointed when a big stripey flank broke the surface, that would do very nicely. Fat as butter in its pre-spawning state the scales pulled around to 3lb 11oz and what a cracking looking fish, I was certainly having one great winters perch fishing.

3lb 11oz

I quickly got another hook bait into position but I was on borrowed time, my cut off point was to be 9am and then I had to leave no matter what. With fifteen minutes to spare the tip knocked a couple of times before sweeping round and I was in again. The fight was a pretty pathetic affair but then that isn't always a bad thing with these perch, the smaller ones tend to fight harder more often than not and that theory was proved right as another good lump of a stripey came to the net, at 3lb 8oz it made for a stunning brace and I didn't grumble at having to pack to get to work after that result.

3lb 8oz

Well I was understandably fired up after that kind of morning. I couldn't get the thought of a return trip out of my mind while I was working and went flat out to get done, I was going back that evening, considering that I was finding the fishing a bit stale I had managed to change my mind pretty quickly! Now the round trip to this particular stretch is probably about fifty miles from home but seeing that I now have a van big enough to sleep in there was nothing to stop me kipping over nearby and fishing at dawn again the next day, that sounded like a plan.

Something told me to try a different swim for the evening, I'm not sure why but I just had a hankering to fish this particular spot. Sometimes these hunches pay off, this time it didn't. The swim was big enough to accomodate two rods and I set them both up on bobbins and alarms, as I had no need to rush off I decided to fish on well into dark and see what occurred. The hot period at dusk came and went without a sign of a bite but I stuck to the plan and kept the baits in position. Perhaps an hour after dark the left hand rod gave a couple of bleeps before the bobbin cracked into the rod quick time. I struck almost instantly and the rod was wrenched down hard as the fish felt the resistance, whatever this was it wasn't a perch. I struggled for maybe thirty seconds to gain some kind of control but I couldn't do a thing with it and inevitably the fish ploughed straight into the nearby tree before snapping my hooklink. I'd like to know what that was, possibly a big chub or maybe even a carp perhaps, I'll never know.

Nothing else happened during the evening and after a cosy night in the van I was up at 5.15 am and stuck the kettle on for a quick brew before dawn. I've been accused of being mad for stopping out all night without a rod in the water but to me it beats getting up even earlier at home, losing more sleep and getting moaned at for waking the mrs up too, it's a no brainer. After packing up the previous night I had decided to try a swim that had produced a few fish for me before which was situated close to a car park further downstream but on pulling up I found a carp angler already in situ so that plan was scuppered. With no time to mess around I headed back to the same swim I had caught yesterdays brace from and got stuck in.

It was tough going, not the slightest indication on the tip from dawn till 9am. I was just about to consider calling it a day when I hooked a fish which gave me the right run around, as I said often the smaller ones fight harder and at 2lb 8oz that again proved the point. I pushed my luck and gave it another hour but that was my lot. Some you win some you lose but one thing's for certain, if you don't try you definitely won't win.

River perch - when your luck's in

I really fancied getting another session in while the snow was still on the ground but it was a bit of a toss up as to what species and where due to the conditions. In the end I decided on perch but my first choice of venue, the Trent, was a no hoper due to the water level and so I decided on the River Derwent. I bought a new ticket this season that gives you the best part of ten miles of the river to go at but to be honest I've hardly fished it bar a few barbel trips last summer and a few perch trips in the autumn though it had given me some quality fish so I decided to give it another go for the perch. The main roads weren't a problem after several days of gritting but when I turned off into the narrow lanes I started to think twice as in places they were just a sheet of ice. I made it through to the fishery in one piece though the car park was like an ice rink too and I did wonder if I would be sleeping in the van for the night, I'd deal with that later though, at least I had got there ok.

I found a swim between a couple of trees that looked the part and cleared enough snow out of the way to allow me to set up comfortably. There was enough room to fish a couple of rods in this spot so along with the usual quiver tip set up I rigged up another running feeder rig to be fished on the alarm and bobbin. Half a dozen droppers of chopped maggot and a couple of chopped worm were positioned in a little line between the two trees and I flicked the worm baited bobbin rod to the upstream end and the quiver tip rig to the downstream. I was late in arriving at the river and within an hour the light was just beginning to start fading as the bobbin started to creep up slowly before I hit into a fish. I had actually thought that my best chance would be at the very last minute due to the snow causing such bright conditions but I was proved wrong. It felt like a good fish from the start and put up a good solid fight right under the rod tip, diving back down to the bottom several times before I could bring it to the net where it certainly did look to be a hefty old perch. As I usually do with fish I want to photograph I unhooked it and weighed it before returning it to the water in the landing net while I set up the tripod and camera. The scales made it 3lb 10oz and I was chuffed to bits with that especially in the snow, this was going to make a cracking picture. Once everything was set up I lifted the fish out onto the mat and flicked the camera on, I pressed the button to activate the intervalometer and then the shutter release to start the timer. No sooner had I started to pick the fish up than the first shot fired, no problem as it's set to repeat continuously, I was just about ready for the next picture when it fired again and I was about to adjust my position a bit to get it spot on for the third shot when the camera turned itself off with a flat battery! I popped the perch back into the water while I tried to sort the camera out, I stuck the battery in my pocket for ten minutes to try and revive it but eventually had to accept that it wasn't happening, the cold had just killed the remaining power, my fault for not having to charged to the maximum in the harsh conditions. I've only ever had that happen once before and that was when perching in the snow too funnily enough, as soon as I got home I was going to buy a spare battery and make it a rule to keep it in my pocket in very cold weather in future. Fortunately the second shot was just about reasonable.

3lb 10oz

The result of a dead battery from a year or two back, snow joke!

I decided that I was going to go home after that, I wouldn't have been chuffed if I had caught a monster with no camera to record the event and I was more than happy with what I'd had anyway so no problem there. I managed to drive out of the car park without too much bother and was tootling along down the lane nicely when the back end of the van slid out and I ended up pointing back the way that I had come, that was too close a call I can tell you, especially in a new van.

Chubbing in a winter wonderland

I'm thirty eight years old going on ten when it comes to snow, I just love the stuff. It can change the entire world overnight, everything looks wonderfully crisp and clean and I like just being out in it but that isn't the main reason I love it. I think what I really love about snow is that it turns life into a bit of a mission. Everything becomes a big adventure to me and it's great, I quite often have a big daft grin on my face at the first sign of the white stuff when it seems that most other people past their teens can't wait for it to melt. When the forecast said that we were due a good dose of snow overnight I was running around the house looking out of the windows at every opportunity and by late evening the first flurries had arrived which made me even more animated. I awoke in the night to be greeted by a lit up room that told me that a good coating had settled which fired me up to the extent that I had trouble getting back to sleep and as soon as the alarm went off I was up and gawping through the curtains to see what had happened. There was maybe an inch or so hiding the world, not loads but a good start.

The wife's last words as she left the house were "Do not go down to the river". Well I didn't reply so I couldn't actually be accused of ignoring her advice could I, I would just pretend that I didn't hear. I had it in mind to visit the Derwent for a crack at the chub but while having breakfast the TV weather report came on and even I had to admit that it did look a tad dodgy. I was in two minds but in the end decided that if I ended up stuck I would never hear the end of it and so decided that I would pay a visit to the local brook again.

I drove out of the town to my usual parking spot to find a van already occupying the only piece of hard standing available, I started to pull onto the verge instead and then thought better of it as once in position I may have never got back off. The only option was to drive back into the town and walk to the stream. I don't know why but I felt very out of place walking the few hundred yards to the footpath with fishing tackle. In any other place I wouldn't even think about it but it just seemed odd in my own town, I tucked my chin into my chest and picked up the pace. I decided firstly to have a look at a stretch which I had never visited before with fishing in mind. The snowflakes blasted into my face as I wobbled my way along the footpath with every step risking my backside meeting the ground quick sharp. No one else had ventured along the track and it became my own private world. After a round about loop of the best part of a mile I decided that I didn't fancy my chances much, the slightly deeper areas were very small and difficult to get at and the one tasty spot below a mini weir involved the risk of a steep slide into the drink which didn't fill me with joy. I headed back towards the main road through the ever deepening snow, opening my coat and a couple of zips to let out a bit of heat as I went. It isn't easy to balance your clothing in these conditions when you are likely to spend a lot of time static between long walks, ideally I would carry some layers while on the move and put them on once I'd stopped but that would mean taking a large rucksack and I didn't fancy that at all so it was just a case of putting up with it.

I reached the road and once again picked up my speed as the traffic passed, every occupant no doubt questioning my sanity. Thankfully I soon reached the bridge where I slipped, literally, down the embankment to the waterside. This piece of water I do know well and I headed straight for a spot that holds one or two chub and where I caught from on my last visit. A little bit of crumbled bread was plopped out into the flow at the top of the sweeping bend and I moved down to the bottom of the feature so that I could flick the single swan shot rig up into the hot spot. The snow was coming down heavier than ever and within a few minutes I noticed that my rucksack was coated which prompted me to look at my coat and find that I was starting to resemble a snowman, instant camouflage. Half an hour in such a small spot was more than enough without a bite and seeing as that was my banker swim I wasn't very hopeful of a bite elsewhere to be honest. I was in two minds whether or not to head for home but I was enjoying being out so I carried on downstream through the fields with each step feeling heavier than the last through wading in the powder. I could just about make out the footprints of a dog walker that I had seen ahead of me as I entered the field less than an hour before so I knew that a good amount was settling and as I left the tree line and broke into open ground I was blasted full on in the face. I got my head down and hurried on towards the wood ahead. Once in a little bit of cover I stopped for a minute to dry my face and attempt to clear my specs, what a mess! At that point I had the option of carrying on along the stream or returning along the far bank, I thought about it for about two seconds and went for the return leg, I had no idea where the next deep pool was and could have walked for miles for nothing.

Getting to the opposite bank was easier said than done. I tried to cross the water in several different places but at each attempt the water looked just a little bit too deep or the jump too wide. I made my way back to the bridge just downstream but a deep ditch had been dug that made that route just as treacherous, it was either retrace my steps or go for it though so I went for it. All was going quite well until I started to slip backwards after landing. I had no choice but to grab at a root with the hand holding the rod which could have spelt disaster but I was lucky in that respect, not so lucky in that I ended up with a foot in the ditch full of water. I was hopeful of finding some tasty looking pools that hadn't been accessible from the other bank but all I found was some very hard going, thick beds of reeds and undergrowth half buried in snow are not easy to negotiate as I now know. At one point I hit another ditch and had no choice but to jump it, what appeared to be the other side turned out to be a layer of snow on foliage and my foot went through into the water again though somehow on both occasions I had managed to avoid a soggy sock which was a bonus. The snow storm was now a virtual white out, I couldn't see the hedgerows surrounding the field at all and I was loving it! I ducked into a hollowed out tree for a few minutes at one stage to try and get myself dried off and to take a breather. As I stood there I noticed an unusual looking white bird a little further along which I guessed might have been a little egret, someone had mentioned that they were in the area now but I'd never seen one before. As I moved off I spooked it and could confirm that that was exactly what it was, apparently they are a relatively recent addition to the country and are gradually moving further and further inland and it's always nice to see something new.

Eventually I ended up at the bend that I had already fished and as I was running out of options it had to be worth one more go. From that bank I was on a steep bank more or less directly above where I wanted my bait to settle so snow or not I was going to have to crawl up to the edge. There was no point in putting any more bait in so I just swung a bit of flake out and settled back with the rod resting on a thistle. Two minutes later the tip twitched a little bit, go on lets have one I was thinking, another couple of minutes and the same again, they were really not very enthusiastic were they. Finally I got a strikeable pull and hit into a fish. I had dug out an old 9ft Silstar matchpicker for the first time in years and it was perfect, with it being designed to snatch little fish the chub of a pound or so bent it double and that's what it's all about, great fun.

A million miles from a monster but who cares!

There wasn't a cat in hells chance of another bite from that swim and I knew that nowhere else was worth bothering with on the journey back so I decided to take a shortcut away from the course of the stream. In retrospect the short bit would probably be better replaced with long. Firstly I got stuck in a seemingly hedge bound field and had to jump another ditch to squeeze through a tiny gap, of course I got a wet boot again but this time the whole lot went under and I was well and truly soaked. In the next field I took a diagonal in what I thought was the right direction but ended up at the junction of several hedgerows and had to admit that I was lost, a mile from home in a white out blizzard! It took the gps on my phone to work out where I was and send me through three more fields with the deepest tractor ruts I have ever seen in my life complete with snow hidden, iced over, puddles until I finally made it back to the road. It was only then that I realised just how much snow had come down, the road was white over and my van had the best part of three inches on the screen all in the space of three hours, perhaps the Mrs was right after all.


The weekend was mostly spent messing about in the snow, I didn't realise that sledging could cause you so much pain, obviously old age is setting in. By Monday I was itching to get out again but I had a big pile of paperwork that had to be done so if anything it had to be a quick hit and run session so the River Soar was the perfect venue.

Only one set of faint tracks were visible in the snow which told me that it had been at least two days since anyone had visited and even then they had been nowhere near my intended spot which was good news. The local foxes hadn't been so shy though and the field was criss crossed with their prints, in fact I even spotted one running across the next field. That's something else that I like about snow, you can see the evidence of what has gone before you so easily when at all other times you wouldn't have a clue.

Magical

I quickly rigged up an open ended feeder to hold my mashed bread and tied a size 6 hook onto my 4.6lb low diameter hooklink before pinching on a bit of flake and sending it across to the far bank just upstream of a tree. That tree has always been a cracking spot but due to the last twelve months worth of floods it is now even better as more limbs dangle subsurface, chub central. The swim is one great big eddy and the feeder started to bounce around slowly in the flow with the quiver tip pulling back and forth all over the place. To a newcomer in the swim that would be a nightmare to read but I've fished it so many times that I know exactly what happens and what to look out for. After perhaps thirty seconds the rig settled and the tip bent round double and held. Another thirty seconds and it dropped back straight as the line fell slack due to a chub moving the feeder and I was in, that fish was probably about 3 3/4lb's.

The next two casts to the same spot gave me two more chub with the best making 4lb 6oz's but then I had a bait sit static without a touch for perhaps fifteen minutes and so decided to put a cast across directly at the tree.

The change worked straight away and I was in again, this proving to be the best of the session at 4lb 11oz which is a pretty typical top end Soar chub. More fish seem to be creeping just over the 5lb mark each year but a fish of that size is still far from common on the river. At that point I decided to call it a day, an hour and fifteen minutes on the bank and four nice chub to show for it was just the tonic I needed after wading through the dreaded paperwork.

Best of the day

Big river perch - a dream come true

River levels were finally starting to get somewhere close to normal and about time too. There was never much doubt as to what I would be angling for when the opportunity arose and in preparation next door's garden had been dug yet again and the bait bucket was topped with a more than respectable helping of lobworms in anticipation. As I wrote in a blog a couple of months ago the perch fishing had become hard work for me to the extent that it had become a grind, now I've put a lot of effort into my fishing over the years and will continue to do so but when it gets to that stage it has to stop. It wasn't the fishing itself that was getting to be hard work. I can, and do, blank with the best of them and that I can handle but the continual driving back and forth through heavy traffic day after day for sessions of only two to four hours was becoming very tiresome. As it turned out my self imposed break turned out to be considerably longer than I had intended due to the persistent rain but absence makes the heart, and determination, grow fonder and I was raring to go again.

My first session back left me a bit disappointing as soon as I arrived, for some reason I didn't expect to see the Trent carrying as much colour as it was and these preconceived ideas can so easily dent your confidence before you start. However I wasn't about to turn around and go home so I just got on with it, baited up via the dropper as usual with maggot and chopped worm and sent a lobworm on a feeder rig out into the depths before allowing my mind to linger on the water conditions. The irony is that it was almost certainly that self induced state of mind that caused me to miss a bite, what an idiot! Even more annoying was the fact that it was the only bite of the session but it was a certain indication that the clarity had not totally scuppered my chances. I would have put money on a perch being the culprit, an initial tap tap followed by a short pull on the quiver tip which held for a split second before pulling right round, how is it that I can relate that bite so precisely and yet still miss it?

What a trip like that tends to do to me is make me itch to get straight back to try and put things right and that's exactly what I did and so the next afternoon saw me going through exactly the same process but with a totally different outlook. Isn't it strange how something as brief as that one bite can change things completely, my confidence was so much higher than twenty four hours previously and as I've always said in this game confidence can be everything. You approach a session with no confidence and you are off on the wrong foot straight away, quite often I find that one thing leads to another and I've packed up and gone home more than once because of just that. So with me being raring to go I knocked the perch for six and bagged up, right? No, I didn't have a bite. It's enough to drive you insane this fishing lark.

A couple of days later and I was heading north once again, arriving at the river for 1.30pm. I had decided on a change of swim before I left home but not on a specific one just in case it was occupied, to be honest there are plenty of likely looking spots anyway so no matter what I would certainly find somewhere that looked good. As it happened I ended up in a peg that I had caught perch from before that gave a reasonable 6ft or so of water close in next to an overhanging tree quickly dropping down to 8ft plus within a few feet. The water clarity had improved somewhat and something told me that I had a better chance today. The dropper was hooked on to the rig and out went half a dozen drops of maggot followed by two of chopped worm smack up tight against the outer branches. I then unhook the dropper and clip a feeder on to the paternoster link. Leaving the feeder on while using the dropper can cause the whole lot to tumble and lose you accuracy let alone what effect it may have on the door opening.

An hour later and doubts were starting to creep in, the light levels looked ideal due to the low cloud base making for a murky day but the tip wasn't moving. I was just starting to wonder if I should have gone in another swim when I noticed a small tap that got my attention and I was looking at the rod end intently when it wrapped round and a fish was hooked. Within a second my thoughts were that this wasn't a perch, it ploughed up and down in the deep margin like a thing possessed and I was pretty sure that a chub was responsible. At one stage I even had to lock up and apply side strain as the fish heading back into its snaggy home so when it finally tired and a stripey flank popped up I was more than surprised. It wasn't a monster perch by any means at two ounces short of 3lb's but blimey it had certainly had three Weetabix for breakfast I've never had a perch fight like it.

Well as we all know once one fish has seen the inside of your net it becomes all systems go. I had returned the perch a couple of swims downstream and as soon as I got back to my kit I put six more droppers of bait in, possibly a brave move but if one fish was willing to have a go then the chance were that it wasn't alone. Half an hour later and I was proved right as the tip danced again and I was attached to another striped warrior. This fish was much chunkier and was obviously 3lb's plus, in fact the scales made it 3lb 7oz's and it was a cracking looking fella. It's strange how the colours vary on these fish even though they are living under the same conditions. Perch in constantly coloured water tend to be pale in general but I wouldn't have thought that so much difference would be seen as is apparent in these ones, with a bit of practice you can also pick up different patterns in their stripes too although individual fish are more easily recognised due to blemishes and damage to fins I find.

3lb 7oz

Again the fish was returned downstream though this time I held back on the dropper and relied on the small blockend feeder to top up the swim, time was getting on and I didn't want to push my luck too much. I settled back down in my seat and adjusted the tip by backwinding slightly while noticing that the isotopes were starting to become more apparent as the first signs of dusk crept in on me. Time to dig out the headtorch I thought and then in the next click of my brain I knew exactly where that headtorch was, sitting on the side in the kitchen while it's batteries were on charge. Of course that didn't stop me rustling through the rucksack with my left hand while the right hovered over the rod but no matter how I tried to wish it to appear it wasn't going to happen. Ah well not to worry these things happen I thought and at the instant round the tip jagged again in three steps, bang bang bang, if I hadn't of struck I think it would have just kept going to be honest it was that violent an attack. I played the fish out while enjoying the half light, what it is that makes those twenty or so minutes at either end of the day so much more special is hard to say but it always adds something to the atmosphere doesn't it. Again this fish was definitely in the very respectable weight range and it registered 3lb 6oz's on the balance, great stuff that was a trio that no one would be disappointed with. There was enough light to manage the pictures without having to resort to propping my phone torch up against the tripod but only just and after slipping the fish back I decided that it would be sensible to call it a day.

3lb 6oz

 That evening I had perch on the brain, the wife suspiciously said that I was being nice after I had made her the second cup of tea so I made sure to leave it for at least another hour before mentioning that I would be getting up early the next morning, I don't miss at trick me! Suspicious or not I got away with it lightly and my kit was left just inside the door ready for a quick getaway.

The alarm had been set for 6.15am but that was a wasted effort as by 4am I was wide awake and in fishing mode, brain constantly turning over different scenario's and not a hope in hell of getting back to sleep. I gave up trying at 5am and got up, by 6.30 I was opening the gate to the fishery and making my way up the track. There was no chance of fishing straight away as I couldn't make out the edge of the branches but I was in no hurry in fact I felt strangely calm which was a contrast to my normal rushed start to a fishing trip, somehow something just felt right. I took my time setting everything up and then had a wander along the bank listening to the birds wake up until I saw the sky start to lighten in the east signalling that it was time to get back.

There was just enough light to make out my target area and the half dozen bait droppers full of maggot followed again by two of chopped worm were soon laid out perfectly. The tail end of a fat lobby was nipped off with the scissors and the hook slipped into the cut end before being pulled back out through the side giving a perfect presentation with hardly any chance of the point being obscured and then the loaded feeder was swung out into place.

I had only just got myself comfortable and started to settle in when the tip jabbed and then whipped right round. I wasn't going to miss that bite even though I must admit that it did come as a bit of a surprise straight after disturbing the swim with the bait dropper. The fight was pretty pathetic though before I saw what was on the end of the line I had a gut feeling that it was a big fish, often their bulk makes them poor fighters and blimey I wasn't wrong. I looked down into the net in the margin and knew that I had a personal best. I lifted it out onto the mat and turned the torch on, now I knew that this one was going to be close to the magic 4lb. I started to get a bit jittery them so I unhooked the perch before lowering the net back in to the water and securing it with the rod rest while I got myself together. I was rooting around in my rucksack when I panicked and dropped everything just to make double sure that the net was safe and the fish couldn't escape, dear me what a mess! With the sling wetted out and the scales zeroed the fish was hoisted back out and I parted the mesh to have another look, I wasn't so sure now, maybe it was a big 3lber. I popped it into the sling and lifted it up to hook on to the scales, I don't know I thought, it does feel heavy. I paused for a second just to contemplate what was happening and to consider that this could be the fish that I had been chasing for a long time and then bit the bullet and slipped the hook through the loops. I swung the scales round to face me and peered at the dial, just to prolong the agony the lens was all smeared up but when I wiped away the muck a great big fat smile spread across my face and I shouted something out, I haven't got a clue what! 4lb 3oz's of lovely fat stripey perch, a long standing ambition achieved and I was flying. I popped it back into the water for a while I let daylight develop for the photographs and just sat there grinning away like a lunatic. Then I decided that I may as well cast back out, two minutes later I decided that I didn't need to cast back out so wound in. Five minutes later I thought don't be daft cast out again, another couple of minutes of fidgeting and I wound in and gave up, I just didn't need to fish.

Once the light was sufficient to make a decent job of the pictures I quickly got those done, just me and my perch sitting in the wet grass without a care in the world. I walked it back down to the margin and held it flat in one hand just above the surface before letting it slowly slip back in to the water and watching it waddle off into the depths.

Simply stunning

In all honesty I should have gone home there and then but I stayed and I enjoyed being next to the water even if my heart wasn't really in the fishing. I did have another fish mid morning, a chub of three and a half pounds odd, but I spent more time wandering and nattering to other anglers than I did fishing. Late afternoon I saw something that did make me glad that I had stayed though. An angler along the bank asked if I would photograph a chub for him, not any old chub but one that weighed 6lb 12oz's. Blimey it must have been the day of the big fish, what a cracker that was and maybe that will be what fires me up next.

River Soar chub fishing - using my loaf

Although bitterley cold the weather had at last become dry, for a while at least, and the rivers were finally starting to get close to normal levels. Tuesday had seen me head for the River Derwent after the perch but a blank was the result, the water was holding a bit more colour than I would have liked and still a little bit too much flow, the stripeys would have to wait.

The two rod perch trick, watching tip and float at the same time, efficient but fruitless this time

The forecast for Wednesday was bright and sunny with temperatures possibly just creeping above freezing point at best but I've never known that to stop the chub feeding and that's what I fancied fishing for. The Soar was to be the venue and I am usually confident of a bite or two on my local river. I did consider picking up a few pints of maggots but I wasn't sure just how much water was on, it wouldn't take much to make maggot fishing very difficult and so I settled on a bucket of mashed bread with another loaf for hookbaits, a lump of cheese paste went into the bag as a reserve.

I arrived at the swim I fancied at about ten am and after putting my kit down threw in three good hand fulls of mash straight away, once that job was done I could take my time setting up knowing that the swim was building. I had bought one of the Marco Cortesi centrepins a couple of years ago, more because it was a bargain than anything else to be honest but it certainly does seem to be a cracking reel for the money. The daft thing is that it had yet to see water and I thought it really was time that I had a go with it, there was no wind to speak of so that wouldn't cause me any grief so why not. I rigged up a 2 1/2 swan shot chubber with the 4lb mainline straight through to a size 6. A few practice casts were always going to be needed but a few ended up being about twenty and no matter what I tried I wasn't getting the range required to send the float along the far bank tree's, there was no point in fishing short of the cover so the pin came off and on went a fixed spool, the pin can wait until I fish a bit closer in.

With the trusty Carbomatic now in place and a dose of Mucilin applied to keep the line floating I was ready to go. The first few trots down were ignored but I gradually increased the depth until the float vanished after a few yards on one cast and a fish was on. I don't float fish anywhere near as much as I should and I tend to forget how much better the fight is without a feeder or weight on the line, the chub wasn't much more than 3lb's in weight but was good sport nevertheless.

A little un for starters

The next cast produced another fish proving that they were hanging near the bottom and wouldn't come up even for a tasty lump of breadflake., This one was a bit bigger and after returning it well upstream I introduced more mashed bread and sat down for twenty minutes to rest the swim. A few more casts gave me two more chub with the best 4 1/2lb's odd and again the swim was rested after being baited. I watched a fox work it's way across the frozen field, scratching away for anything it could find no doubt in the harsh conditions and it occurred to me that being caught isn't actually too bad a price to pay for a fish when it has had a good feed thrown in for it's trouble.

The fish were now definately starting to become a bit wary after four of their mates had gone missing and it took a good half dozen runs through apiece to bag the next two, the last one coming to a cast as far over as I dare let the float run. I knew I was starting to push my luck at this stage particularly as I had to limit the session to four hours but I gave it another rest and managed to scrape out one more small chub before deciding to move upstream for the last hour to fish the tip.

My favourite banker swim on the stretch was the obvious place to visit but I knew that it might not be a viable prospect with the extra water on and I was proved right. The chub in that swim hang right over the far side in a big back eddy, the main flow pushes through the inside and even with the rod as high as possible it wouldn't be possible to hold the line out of the turbulence resulting in the rig being constantly dragged out of place. There was one more possibility and I heaved the rucksack back on and trudged on upstream.

That swim was looking more like it, a few surface boils were visible on the near side of the crease but I was sure that I could get away with an medium sized open ended feeder. First cast resulted in a great big drop back bite and a good old scrap under the rod tip before a fish of maybe 4 1/4lb's was in the net.

 
It took a while to get the next indication but eventually I landed chub number nine before stopping for ten minutes to chat to a bloke walking the field who told me about the otter he had seen in his swim at the weekend. That is getting to be a very familiar tale this season and I wonder how much longer we have left before we notice the barbel population start to suffer. I had said that I was going to hang out for fish number ten but time was running short and I ended up bottling out on that one, nevertheless I'd had a cracking days sport when not many would have bothered to have left the house.

Small stream chub fishing

Well what a year it has been weather wise, when you think that it couldn't possibly rain any more it comes again with a vengeance and the ground is so saturated that even a small amount of the wet stuff finds its way into the rivers in an instant. I had finally sorted myself out with a new van on Saturday and was raring to get back at those river perch but there wasn't a cat in hells chance. The rivers looked awful and every time a glimmer of hope shone in my direction another cloud drifted across and blotted it out.

I was getting seriously fed up, without my fix of angling I get tetchy and restless, something had to be done. My stillwater options were limited to two venues that I wanted to fish, one has only just returned to lake status after being joined to the Trent, the other is chocolate brown from the massive influx of water, I fancied my chances on neither. Then a thought occured to me, why not have a go on the brook that runs through my village, I had fished it a couple of time previously and for such a tiny watercourse it held some nice fish, nothing of specimen proportions but nevertheless great fun and something very different.

The brook flows through a reservoir before meandering along the fields and beside a housing estate then back out into farm land as it heads towards the nearby town. There was always a population of small rainbow trout present when we were kids, no doubt from the reservoir though I've not seen any in recent years I should imagine they are still about. There are certainly some lovely little brownies though and I caught one of a pound and a quarter a couple of years back. The same day I located a shoal of perfectly conditioned roach in a tiny pool between fast runs and took fish to almost 8oz's though a mink kept popping his head up from amongst a pile of wood on the far bank and I feared for their well being. Fishable spots are few and far between, most of it's length is fast  and turbulent and so narrow as to be jumpable in places. A conventional rod would limit those fishable spots even more due to the bankside foliage and so I dug out an ancient Silstar match picker tip rod, at only 6ft in length I could poke it in to the smallest of gaps.

My first port of call was the pool that had given me those roach previously. The approach across the fields was waterlogged and as I neared the bank the amount of debris that had been shifted in the flood was incredible. Great piles of sand had been deposited in places, obviously scoured from the stream bed, and foot thick rafts of crop stubble lay in curved banks where the water and driven it. The water was still well up and quite coloured but I still rated it as good for a roach or two. The pool in question is I would guess twenty feet across at its widest point and is formed by a bend where the full force of the flow pounding into the far bank has eroded it over the years. This has created a fish holding spot on a stretch that is so shallow for several hundred yards both up and downstream that only the smallest of trout, maybe sticklebacks and the odd bullhead could survive. With the increased flow the majority of the swim resembled a washing machine but a back eddy on the inside of the bend right under my feet looked to have potential and I flicked a few bits of bread flake down the edge before setting up the rod with a simple link ledger rig. The piece of fishable water was at the very most eight feet long by a couple of feet wide and I gradually covered the entire area over the course of a dozen or so casts without an indication from anything other than a considerable amount of debris that was being circulated in the eddy. If the roach were there I would have expected a bite quickly and I couldn't imagine anywhere else in the swim that they could be sitting until I spotted a piece of slack water tight in to the far bank, totally unfishable from my bank but certainly big enough to hold fish. I decided that it was time to move on and I hoped that the roach were still there and didn't get wiped out by the mink between my visits, I will go back for another go soon so we shall see.

The next fishable spot that I remembered was another three or four hundred yards downstream but I followed the course of the brook anyway just in case the flood had created a new area, nothing was quite fishable as yet but a couple of bits had future potential. The swim I had in mind was a U bend which sooner or later will cut through to create an oxbow. The last time I had fished it I had sat at the upstream end of the curve but the flow was too powerful on this occasion, the point where the bend began to open up was perfect though and would let me fish upstream into a nice steady run. I mashed up a slice of bread and fed it into the fast water to allow the flow to send it into the potential fish holding areas below before settling down in my little nook, possibly a spot never before fished and it isn't often you can say that is it.

I flicked the two swan shot link the required few yards and took the slack out of the line allowing the tip to find it's own curve. If the opportunity presents itself I will always choose to fish an upstream ledger, it offers much less resistance to a biting fish and the bites are normally much easier to hit. Within thirty seconds of the rig settling the method proved itself as two small taps were followed by the tip springing straight and I almost rolled over backwards as I tried to pick up the line with the tiny rod, maybe I should take the eight footer next time. With a rod designed for scratching small fish out of canals the fight from anything even half decent was always going to be fun and the chub of not much more than a pound had it hooped over double as I attempted to keep it from burying itself amongst the nearside foliage.

I would normally return the fish some distance away to save spooking any others in the swim but finding somewhere suitable would have meant a long walk so I had no choice but to slip it straight back. Mind you that didn't seem to make too much difference as after throwing in some more free offerings upstream the next cast produced an identical bite instantly. This fish ran towards me so quickly that I had to wind down before I could bend in to it right under my feet where it gave me a right old run around before I scooped it up, a bit bigger this time at pushing two pounds I suppose. I thought the chances of another bite after that were pretty slim but that wasn't going to stop me trying. I was right in my thoughts though not for the reason I had in mind as just after I had plopped the rig out the far bank collapsed with a mighty crash destroying any hope of a bite, I didn't see that coming!

I decided to call it a day at that point quite happy at having had a couple of fish and knowing that the next promising area was probably a mile distant. I squelched my way back along the hedgerow accompanied by a flock of Redwings leapfrogging ahead of me making the most of the berries and turning my thoughts to what might lie ahgead weather wise. Cold to any extreme I can cope with, so long as the rivers keep flowing and I can get to them I am confident in catching fish, rain however I have seen quite enough of for one year thank you very much.

River Trent Perch - Back at the big girls

Wednesday the 10th of October

I had a hankering to get back at the river perching and after my zander session the Trent was the venue I had in mind, some friends have had some excellent results recently proving that the river holds a good head of perch and plenty of good sized fish over the 3lb mark and beyond. Three pounds plus is my benchmark for stripeys with a 4lber my ultimate target but I'll never complain at a "3", when perch get to that size they really do start to look big and though it's a tough decision I think they have to rate as my favourite species and rivers are by far my favourite place to catch them. My biggest perch came from a commercial stillwater and those venues are now well established as producing specimens. The downside is that the water in these venues is invariably constantly coloured due to the high stock levels of carp and as such the perch that live in them lose a lot of their vivid colouration, river fish rarely show this. River perching also usually means close in fishing which brings some intimacy, you can't beat watching the tip go round or float sink and then bending into a good fish right under your feet.

I didn't get to the river until about 4pm and with dusk falling at around 6.30 was anxious to get into a swim as soon as possible though I bumped into the bailiff just as I was about to leave the car park and ended up nattering for twenty minutes or so, another ten minutes walk to my chosen area followed and by the time I was set up and swinging the bait dropper out to the edge of a near bank tree time was getting on. On the smaller rivers I usually fish a light link ledger rig but with this swim being deeper and the current a little stronger I plumped for a blockend feeder which I filled with red maggots on each cast, chopped worm having already been introduced with the dropper and a lobworm impaled on the size four hook being the main course. I had my other rods that I use on Swithland with me and so decided to flick out a second rig which would be fished on an alarm and bobbin, that was positioned slightly further out on the edge of the flow.

I was feeling a little bit wound up after rushing to get to the river and then getting delayed but on the first cast the quiver tip knocked and then pulled round steadily and the stress soon forgotten as I hooked into a fish. A lively little tussle under the rod tip for a minute or two told me that it was a half decent fish but I wasn't certain that it was a perch until it surfaced right under my feet and allowed me to slip the net straight under it, at 2lb 9oz it was a good start in a new swim and a lovely looking fish too. I fired off a quick photo and slipped it back then got a bait back into position.

I was expecting more action from the tree but time passed by without so much of a twitch, then the Delkim on my other rod gave a few bleeps and I looked down to see the bobbin steadily rising, a small perch of about a pound was the culprit. To be honest that took me by surprise a bit, the quiver tip rod was in what I took to be by far the most likely spot to produce perch and the other bait was more of an afterthought. I kept both spots topped up on a regular basis but dusk passed without any other positive signs and it was fully dark just after 7pm when I checked my phone and started to think about getting packed up as I was sure that my chance had gone. The brolly was down and I was just putting the lids on the bait tubs when the bobbin rod signalled another bite and I struck into something much more energetic than the last fish. Another couple of minutes and I would have been on my way home but the flash of a substantial stripey flank in the torch light made me very thankful that I wasn't, the scales were pulled around to 3lb 1oz and again it was a cracking looking perch that put a smile on my face as I made my way back over the fields to the van.