Canal Zander & Pike - My Quest for a Big Cut Zed - The Towpath Grapevine

Last year I got it into my head that high pressure weather systems and good zander fishing did not sit comfortably together, but this year I have gone out a few times under the typically still, often foggy and icy cold weather conditions it produces around this time of the year and apart from a blank last week with Lee out Bedworth way, have had run after run. So much for that theory then...



A foggy morning on the canal

Tuesday afternoon I went out fishing and had chats with a number of other anglers (between runs) one of whom not only recognised me from the blog but also backed up the monster pike story that is circulating round these parts with a second account that matches the first in some respects but has a slightly different location and a slightly smaller weight of 27lb. As always with gossip, the laws of chinese whispers apply.

The second had only just moved into the area and was checking out the walk from Longford to the Greyhound. It turns out that not only does he now live in the same village as me and just a quarter mile distant, but actually hails from the same road in the same town too, Brentwood Road, Romford, Essex and about a quarter of a mile distant...

The third and fourth were a couple of entertaining and loud old reprobates on their way back home from the pub who regaled me with ancient local fishy stories from before the time of zander. This is how the towpath grapevine propogates itself and flourishes. Luckily, no-one seems to have the slightest interest in making stories up!



Between all these conversations I had three runs in an hour and a half and put two fish on the bank, one of the ubiquitous schoolies and a nice fish of three pounds ten ounces who on release somehow got her front teeth snagged in the mesh of the net to her great frustration. Both fish were very well hooked in the very thin flesh in the scissors of the mouth as virtually all my recent zander have been.


Nice fish, mad hair, odd smile...

But, the most interesting snippet of info that I gleaned that day concerned the very object of this campaign of mine. Whilst walking the dog in the dense morning fog I picked up news from a most reliable source of a real double figure zander that was caught locally around September/October time. The witness, who's word I do not doubt, even gave away the precise catch spot, a spot where I'd fished three times over the same period without a single bite.

I was close though...

And I'm no longer chasing shadows!