Jubilee - On the fly!

Cycled up to Jubilee on Friday afternoon to do a spot of fly fishing for Carp and try to christen my new Fly rod after breaking the other a few weeks ago. The BBC weather forecast could not have been more wrong and I spent most of the short session sheltering from the rain and thunder. Waving a carbon rod around during a thunder storm does not encourage long life expectancy, however, in-between the heavy downpours I did manage to get a biscuit fly on the water and fool one of the Carp into taking it, rod christened, result!.


Saturday afternoon/evening was much better, warm and sunny. Peg choice on the horse shoe pool is a bit limited at Jubilee as you need a good amount of clear space behind you for the back cast, arriving in the afternoon meant I could pick the pegs as the anglers left and I managed to secure a peg I normally fish, started to feed biscuits and set up the fly rod. I've been filming these sessions as I'm hoping to put another film on You Tube soon about fly fishing for Carp, when looking back at these films I've noticed that my casting has improved greatly and I'm now able to present a fly without thrashing the water to foam. The Carp have become very wary of slightly odd looking biscuits and it can get a bit frustrating watching the Carp swim up underneath the fly only to nudge it and swim away. I did manage to get three fish on the bank, nothing massive but great fun on a fly rod. One of the fish was very familiar as I've caught it twice before this year.

It has a distinctive curve to the spine (Should call it 'the hunchback')

New film on You Tube!

Hi everyone, just a quick one to let you all know that I uploaded a new film at the weekend. Called 'Ryton Carp - An Evening Session', I filmed it last Autumn and because of problems with my computer, it's taken ages to get it finished. Here's the link to You Tube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HzMqdePEtqk

Enjoy!

A week at Westward Ho! - Part two.

The following morning was terrible, the wind got stronger over night and had swung around so it was blowing straight onto the rocks, not good for fishing. I did a bit of asking around at the local tackle shops and had a few alternative venues to try later in the day once the tide had turned and started to fill the Torridge estuary where the recommended spots where. I purchased some Lugworms to use as bait, the estuary is full of sandbanks covered in the worm casts at low water so I thought this might be the best bait to try to tempt a bite. My trusty old Zziplex Bass rod was put in the car ready for later and we headed out for a days sightseeing at Great Torrington and nearby Bideford where I was to fish.

Once the tide had turned and eventually started to flood the estuary at Bideford we finished the day with a sort fishing session about a half mile up-stream from Bideford bridge where there's a bend in the estuary with easy parking and the spot looked good for a bite when we passed earlier and the tide was out. It took a good few casts to find a spot clear from the weed flowing in with the tide, as soon as one was found the bites started. They were from small school Bass which hit the lugworm bait with such speed you'd think they were much bigger but sadly they weren't but they were good fun.

Later in the week and after finding the bait that catch the local Bass I thought another go at Grey Sands at the mouth of the estuary might produce some Bass of a better size than the ones at Bideford. I managed to find and land several more Bass but sadly they were all a similar size to previously caught.

The weather improved towards the end of the week and I was able to get back onto the rock marks and try for some more dogfish or something a little better, I'd heard of some Smoothhounds coming out from these spots so I fished with the hope that I could connect with one of these miniature sharks. The bait was Sandeel but the catch was to be all dogfish and lots of them.

When the weather is this good, any fish will do!

A week at Westward Ho! - Part one.

I've just returned from a weeks holiday at Westward Ho! in north Devon and being a sea side village it gave me a chance to go back to my fishing roots and do a spot of sea fishing. The weather last week was a bit 'hit and miss' with a couple of wet day's through the week and an unfavourable change in wind direction at the beginning of the week making fishing the rock marks unsafe. A heavy swell was already rolling a good surf onto the beach pleasing the local surfing community, however, for the angler this heavy swell had also torn lots of weed from the nearby rocks and reefs and this was being carried in the tide. The first evening was spent at the mouth of the Taw/Torridge estuary learning about this weed, moments after casting out my rig it was brought in covered in the stuff and rendered useless for catching fish with and after a few more casts I gave up.

The nearby rock marks were the next days target spot but a local match meant that the best spots were taken. One angler was kind enough to put me on a spot that would catch me fish but the whole of this part of the coast is heavy on tackle and a good cast of 80 metres was needed to put a bait on clear ground away from the tackle thieving rocks, the weed was also another problem. A couple of casts later I did manage to catch a couple of Dogfish which put a smile on my face, I only had one sand eel on as a bait but with a pennel hook arrangement, one dog had taken the hook at the bottom of the bait the other the hook at the top.

During the morning the tide turned and brought with it a fresher, stronger wind and as the tide rose the waves started to turn over and roll across the rocks, as other anglers began to leave I called it a day.