It had been nearly three weeks since I had last been fishing and I had just taken my wife to yet another appointment when I asked her what I should do for the rest of the day. “Why don’t you go fishing? You haven’t been for a while and it is a nice day.” Well, you don’t turn down a suggestion like that and she was right about the weather. After days of grey cloud the sun was showing through and making me feel more cheerful so it was a quick trip to the local tackle shop for some maggots, a bite to eat and I was off!
Where to go? I thought I wouldn’t go far as I didn’t have many hours of daylight left and ended up at a lake about a mile away from home. I have been there a couple of times before and had some luck so was looking forward to it. When I arrived there were only a couple of cars in the car park and on my way to my swim I passed a guy who was playing a fish. I stopped to chat, as you do, and he said that he had had a few in the couple of hours he had been there and shortly after landed a nice looking common of about ten pounds. I thought that it was a bit of a coincidence as before when I was at this venue on the smaller lake I stopped and chatted to a young man who was playing a carp but I didn’t do so well with just a perch and a roach. Thinking that at least the fish were biting I carried on to my swim and set up my usual carp rod and decided to have a go with the float rod for silvers. It was then that I found that I had left the bag with my maggots, flask, snacks etc in the car so it was a walk back to collect them.
I soon had the float rod out and found that I had a problem. There were lots of leaves floating on the surface and being a calm day there was the reflection of the trees on the opposite bank, both of which combined made it almost impossible to see the float! Back to the feeder rod which was still set up with the swing tip then it was time to sit down and relax and reel in the fish! That was the plan but the fish didn’t seem to have read the script and nothing seemed to be happening and that’s how it was on both rods. The carp rod was stubbornly quiet with only one beep on the buzzer and the swing tip remained still. Then the swing tip swung and I was into a fish which turned out to be a small perch but at least I had not blanked!
Time passed, I had a cuppa, continued to cast out my feeders and enjoyed being on the bank in the sunshine. Then I started getting movement on my swing tip, it would slowly lift then fall back again and do this a few times but not develop into a take. I didn’t know what to make of this so left it for a while then got a more positive bite which turned out to be a roach. I was hoping to catch more members of its family but it was not to be, the swing tip would slowly rise then fall back and if I struck I didn’t connect with anything. I didn’t think that it was a line bite as these seem to be much quicker and something was definitely sucking my maggots! Then the other angler walked up to see me. He was packing up and wanted to know how I had been getting on. He hadn’t caught any more fish and was going home before dark and I told him that I would wait a bit in case the fish started to feed as dusk came on.
I kept getting those timid bites and eventually struck and felt a fish. It shot off sideways and I could tell that it was some size then the hook pulled and the line went slack. I said, “Oh dear, oh dear!” or something similar then cast out again. I had a few more of those gentle bites but didn’t hook into any of them and eventually decided that it was getting too dark to see properly and packed up. I used my head torch for the first time and was pleased with how good it was and how much easier it made things as I didn’t have to hold it and it would shine in the direction that I was looking. So, a perch and roach again after seeing an angler playing a fish while I was on my way to a swim, next time that happens I think I will just turn around and go home!
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