Tales and Pastures New

Zander have been on the menu lately and I'm still catching but the biggy I'm after still eludes me. One of my last sessions was a bit of a catastrophe, I'd gone to Itchy for a late afternoon/evening session, the rods had been left tackled up after my last Zandering trip so I was ready to go, that's what I thought until I reached for one of my bobbins, it was missing and must have pinged off the line somewhere en route to the canal, these bobbins are little treasures of mine, one offs that can't be bought. What was going to be a peaceful session turned into a mini disaster as I walked the stretch from where I'd been dropped off to where I was fishing searching for a little glow in the dark. Devastated, I botched together another bobbin so I could carry on with the now shortened session. Despite the problems, it was a gorgeously clear night with a star filled sky which more than made up for the mini disaster and lack of bites, I wished on a few shooting stars and left fishless. The lost bobbin was later found at home, few!

 

A Frosty Start.

The following morning was a frosty start at a new venue, for several years, I've seen plenty of tantalising glimpses of this lake from the nearby road and I've always liked the look of the place. A couple of weeks ago, after a reliable recommendation, I visited the lake for a bit of a recce, it's very urban, it contained the target species we were after, Pike, so it had to be worth a go. There were plenty of signs of previous angling taking place and the lake looked tired after years of being fished by NED's and the E.E.F.E.D (Eastern European Fish Eating Disease) I suppose we have to expect this from such an urban site and it's what puts a lot of anglers off fishing such places but it still had an appeal to it with plenty of features to fish to, there wasn't any fishing pegs as such just sections of clear bank trodden bare by plenty of fishing feet. We started off at the far end of the pool and made our way down the bank to a couple of spots in amongst the frost covered reeds, it was shallow, so uncomfortably shallow that I think the local canal is deeper, we gave it a go regardless.

 

Settled in.

A few other anglers were working their way around the pool, all spinning and all local, we asked a few what the fishing was like and a picture of the lake became a little clearer, it contained plenty of smaller species like Roach, Rudd and Tench so plenty of food for a population of Pike. A few non angling passersby told tales of the lakes bigger inhabitants and where they were seen being caught (not where we were fishing) we nodded in agreement like we knew about the place, gave it ten minutes and made a move to the 'fishier' end of the lake. The tales continued as we chatted to other locals, angling and non angling, we both gave each other a smiling glance when we heard one dog walker tell tales of at least one 'Grandad Pike' residing here, that's got to be worth a good go this winter.

We kept at it, biteless, all session, I'm not sure if I can use the frost and the bright sunshine as a good enough excuse but the place looked dead, as I write this now the temperature outside is a little more favourable and overcast which I would have preferred but we can't book the weather can we? As the sun reached the horizon and the chilly breeze eased, parts of the lake looked as though it was being rained on as loads of small fry dimpled on the surface, a few larger fish topped here and there and we felt that a bite had been earned and was well overdue. Barry's rod was soon away as a little toothy critter made off with his deadbait; it didn't take too long to get it in the net, unhooked and released to sulk in the margins.

 

The small toothy one and his Pike!

Once again, I remained fishless but a new venue is a bit of a learning curve so role on the next session and watch out that Grandad Pike!