Dancing to the rhythm of the Zander!

After a disaster of an afternoon/evening session at Long Itchington on Saturday where I'd spent a fishless few hours wandering the canal from Bascote bridge to the Two Boats pub, I decided to try for the toothy little critters a bit closer to home along the stretch near Tusses. There were a fair few boats moored up along the stretch I fancied but I carried on beyond these before I cast the first baits. Floats were dispensed with as casting very close to the brambles and features on the far bank can become a tad costly after a few over casts, I just used a single treble on a trace and a sliding lead on the main line to cut down on friction when a fish takes and I borrowed an idea from Barry with the bite indication but I'll talk more about this again as I'm still experimenting.

The plan was to walk the stetch casting to every fishy looking hole and feature and giving the baits a good fifteen minutes, or as long as I got between boats, before moving along the bank a few yards. After the second move I had the first fish pull the line up tight and after a short thrash around it was netted, processed and released.

It took a good few hours to connect with the next fish, the bobbin lifted a couple of times before before the line drew it up tight to the rod and I struck into a good heavy weight, at first I thought I was stuck fast in the tree roots the way the Avon was hooped round but then I felt the head shakes from a good fish. Netting was a bit tricky because of the overgrowth along my bank but it was in on the second attempt and a nice fish of around four pounds lay in the mesh.

The light levels started to drop so I headed back and tried a couple of zeddy looking spots I'd tried earlier to see if the change of light might stir some feeding activity, at one spot I cast the first rod hard up against a damson bush, set the rod down and attached the bobbin, I only turned away for a couple of seconds to get a fresh bait for the second rod and the bobbin had already pulled up tight to the blank, whatever was there had dropped the bait further into the snags beneath the bush and I had to pull for a break.
After a brief piscatorial chat with one of the boat owners I tried another spot beneath an overhanging tree, it looked too good to just walk past and not try. Within a few minutes the bobbin was dancing to the rhythm of a Zander take and a few moments later I had the final fish of the day on the bank.

A very enjoyable session.