Shit Happens...

There's not a lot of positive things to say about my last week's fishing attempts and scanning through numerous other blogs I see the story of angler's woe is not mine alone to tell. I tried to get out on that day last week when it was really warm, you may remember it? and I think we all should try because I have a sneaking suspicion that that was the last we'll see of the warmth till May next.

No Trouble at' Mill

The fishing challenge is reaching a very interesting stage with Keith having all but run out of easy targets and now confronting the tricky apex predators, the curiously elusive ruffe and the all but impossible catfish, grass carp and eel. Only grayling is now an easy ride for him but the rest of us still have plenty of the less difficult species left on our plates, and I have the most of all to do with just eight points on the board so far. With three and a half months to go, the end result is anything but a forgone conclusion.

Seeking Silver

I thought I'd get out for a couple of hours up the canal and after silver bream, as I do need to get the challenge point for them at some point between now and New Years Eve. It's a particular stretch that holds these fish, and I've never caught them elsewhere on the cut. I just wanted to establish that they were there, still swimming around at the place where I'd last encountered them in springtime.

Commercial Sense: The Sweet Smell of Relief

The air thickens with the faint sweetness of decay as I make my way down the track and through the woods to my chosen swim. As I amble through the glimmering thickets, my upper consciousness notices the inner dialog of my quotidian self veer suddenly off track

Commercial Sense: The Improved Art of Floating Crust

I knew just as soon as I got out the door on the morning dog walk down the cut that I'd be having another crack at the carp of the local commercial fishery, as the weather was just perfect for the approach and likely to remain that way the whole day long.

On The Turn

I've been trying to replicate an accidental success with turning casters that I had a couple of months ago. I left some out in the yard by accident, forgot about them and then it rained heavily, filling the bait tin with water. When I found them, all the maggots had turned into perfect sinking casters that stayed sinkers as they turned dark. Quite what happened I don't rightly know as my latest attempt ended with half floaters, half sinkers.

One Up, One Down

Isn't it usually the case that the perfect tip off comes along just after you really needed it?

Saturday last I made use of another of the family's girly shopping trips to Stratford (including a return trip to Brum this time) for another shot at the bream challenge point. What could go wrong? The water would be down after the recently small floods, I had more than five hours available depending upon how involved in the wonders of Accessorize (the female equivalent of Tackle Shop) they became, and if the right swim was open, because at Lucy's Mill I'm thinking it really has to be just the one for the bream, then I should sew it up comfortably.

Mal de Mer: The Monster from The Deep

Keith came over to the canal for an evenings jawing and fishing last weekend. We had a few hours after ruffe, in which time Keith had three good hand sized perch, I had one about the size of my thumb. The canal is that zonal. The ruffe were elsewhere, of course, though I have caught the baby grand total of three from the stretch in the past, and then we went a'zandering, which I find, for some unfathomable reason, an exciting prospect. We failed with them as well, though.

He now thinks that I'm 'not right in the head,' after regaling him with my salty doggerel about the recent charter trip after tope, in which I visibly and audibly enjoyed the fruits of triumphing over the monster from the deep, the horror that is sea sickness.

Commercial Sense: The Forgotten Art of Floating Crust

Summer is but a month from its inevitable end and I have still to catch enough of a number of the summer species to earn myself challenge points for them. Tench are still outstanding despite a couple of concerted efforts for them, as are king carp, who, I have to admit, I have avoided thinking about. I'd a venue in mind, and an approach too. These had been in place since January but I'd never acted. Now it seemed I'd have to...

Commercial Sense: A Quarry Query

Imagine that Fred Flintstone and Barney Rubble are now a couple of old geezers who've given up the golf and ten pin bowling and now like to fish with poles made from of the rib bones of dinosaurs. Rockhead Quarry, where they once worked, has been closed these past thirty years, has become overgrown in the meantine and lately turned into a fishery and it's the place where Fred and Barney like to go catch carp on a sunday afternoon.