Frustrations

After catching two superb roach in the last three or four trips, I chose to make hay whilst the iron was hot and went back.    Not good.   The four provisional swims I had mentally listed to choose from, were all full of carp anglers.    People who sit there for days labelling my roach as tench, whenever they rise and splash in front of them.    And this was Sunday evening.   You would think that they would have cleared off to watch some of the football.    Would you believe that none of them anticipated my arrival and left space for me?   One even sneaked in just five minutes before my arrival.  Have these carp anglers no shame?

But it gave me a chance to try another swim, one I have fancied but not fished before.  I blanked of course,

Great Tit and Two Young Pleaders.

spectacularly so, without any signs of fish rising, and nothing interfered with my bait, save for a cheeky robin and some young great tits.

The next trip was to be to one of my proven swims, but became an even greater failure.  I have now realized that blanking without a twitch is far more tolerable to blanking having had six bites.  I made mistakes.  Too many mistakes. The one bite on worm ( probably a tench) was struck too soon.   Years ago when I float fished lobworm for tench under a long piece of peacock quill, I let the float move at least five feet across the water before striking.  Tench have fair sized mouths but a large lively wriggling worm is difficult to engulf when one has no hands and ones' pectoral fins do not quite reach ones' lips. So I struck too soon and missed.    I also missed one bite on hair rigged paste of some kind...krill... I think.    No explanation for that miss. A third bite was missed whilst dealing with the aftermath of this next photograph. The resident pair of swans have 

Silly, Stupid, Semi Submerged Swan.

five cygnets this year, recently hatched.  The parents were shepherding them across my swim, and I was mentally thanking them for keeping far enough out, that they did not swim through and interfere with my lines.  I had recently, writing elsewhere, stated that swans do not feed their young. These swans decided to prove me wrong as one upended, and came back up with a strand of weed which it then gave to its young. Unfortunately weed was not all the swan came up with:  it came up with my line half hitched around its neck.  Stupid bird.  And of course the bait runner went mad, giving out line as the bird tried to disentangle itself...unsuccessfully. When I picked up the rod and clicked the baitrunner off, the line was still firmly in place like a hangman's noose, and every half second or so was jerkily giving way a little more.  I realized that the line was slowly moving as the swan moved away, rotating around its neck, and it was obvious that eventually the feeder and hook would gradually get nearer to the bird, causing a disaster, or even decapitating the swan .  The only thing I could think of doing was to strike hard, so as to break the line.  It broke at the bird's neck, and the swan seemed to be completely unharmed, which was a great relief.  I was still worried that the other part of the line, that with the feeder and hook, might be attached to the bird, but an hour or so later I reeled the end tackle in, having snagged it with another line. So the swan had a lucky escape, and my guilt dissolved.  But having broken the line I had to re-tackle, and whilst I did so, after four hours of inactivity, I had a bite on rod number two.  Missed it due to messing with rod number one at the time, tying on a fresh hook.

My worst errors were the other three bites, which came on 2 maggots topped with three casters.   These bites may well have been roach, possibly very big roach.  My mistake here was to try and fish such baits when I was far too tired to sit and hover over the rods.  The indicators were moving about 12 inches and then stopping. I should have been hitting these bites sooner, before the guts had been sucked out of the casters. Legering casters for stillwater roach is an artform, and I am fairly convinced that I was metaphorically asleep in Tracey Emin's unmade bed... if not actually asleep... which I also may well have been.  I was just too tired to fish in that way.   Maybe shorter sessions chasing these  roach might be better tactics?   Trouble is that after a long drive, I don't really want to fish for just three or four hours before facing the motorway again.

On the way back, I stopped to look at a club pond that was more or less en-route. I had heard that it held great crested newts, and hoped to be able to photograph one.    No chance.    But I did see quite a decent fish stir in the rushes that encircle this very small pond. It is no more than 40 yards by ten, at its maximum dimensions.   So I determined, next morning to have a go for the fish, and also to have another look for the newts.    4am start, because I actually managed to wake up...and get up when the alarm rang,   cast out a float with my light Avon rod, and 4 pound line, expecting that the fish would be a carp of four or five pounds.   I don't often target specific fish, but it seemed a nice challenge for the morning.   Three six inch rudd, brightly lit little fellows took the breadflake on the first three casts.  Then I saw a good sized fish cruise across the pond to my left, heading in towards the rushes.  I predicted (OK, OK I guessed) that, on reaching them it would turn left towards me, and so cast six feet nearer to me and about eighteen inches out from the bank.   After just a minute the float started to glide away, and I struck into a heavy fish.   A heavy sluggish fish, and I was at first quite confused.

Grass Carp

Grass Carp Head

  Too heavy to be a chub, roach, rudd or bream, and too slow to be a carp.   And I was surprised that, although it maintained its depth well, it seemed to have no wish, or ability, to take line.  The fight was all taking place no further than 4 or 5 yards from me.   I found it quite easy to turn the fish, several times.  Of course I had not expected that it would be a grass carp.   Two other grassies I caught last year fought very poorly too.  But this one was far bigger, and a personal best, out of the three members of the species I have now landed in total.    It weighed thirteen pounds seven, and was a very pleasing fish.  A handsome fish but it was never one that was going to go to a second round with Tyson. You might have thought that a fish that was shaped very much like a salmon, might fisght something like one. But no. The head, around the eyes and mouth area is fairly featureless,  leading me to gain the impression that it is a quite gormless creature.  Anyone else think that this is a fish that looks to have less than the usual quota of intelligence?

I was in a bit of a "job done" situation, so decided to return to the other pond I fished recently, to do some bit bashing.   It was still only 5am.  As I nearer the other pond I realized that, in my euphoria, I had completely forgotten about the newts.   Another time maybe.  Pond 2, after a slow start fished well for small fish, and  by eleven o'clock I was starting to get a little bored.  the score stood at about 20 small tench, 15 small crucians, the odd mini carp and F1, a couple of small roach,  rudd, and what I think was a tiny ide.   The largest fish was a two pound crucian/goldfish cross...or maybe it was simply a brown goldfish.   Not sure which.  I was nearing the last cast stage when I had a tangle around the spool.  The 4 pound line has done some serious work, gaining a few twists in the process, and as a result of the tangle, my float dropped quite short, nowhere

near the baited area and the mass of small fish in and around it. I was helped in untangling the line by a fish pulling at the rod tip. Tangle now gone, this fish was putting up a considerable scrap.  I was having trouble keeping it from a close in snaggy area in which I had lost another fair sized fish earlier in the day.  The fish was moving around the swim at speed, always seeming to stay around mid-water, but just would not reveal itself.   On the 4 pound line and Avon, this was quite exciting stuff.   Eventually, after quite a long time, the fish was mine.   I don't usually like carp much, especially mirrors, but this was a common carp that was quite lovely, even by tench standards.  Probably spot on ten pounds, with a great looking tail, and perfect scales.

And see. Blogger has done it once again, rotating my carp this time. 90 degrees anticlockwise.   Well I am sorry, but it is far easier for you to rotate your head, or turn the screen on its side than it is for me to fix this.  I have tried four times, but Blogger keeps beating me, and four attempts is enough. I give up!

Not having had enough of ponds yet, and needing a short session, I visited yet another small club pond.  I had seen the pictures on the club web site, taken in Winter, and it was nicely shrouded by trees, and with very clear obstruction free water.  I nearly decided NOT to fish it because the water itself looked fairly featureless.  What a mistake that would have been!   The pond is now, in high Summer, absolutely lovely, full of lilies, both common yellow and fancy whites.  It was also an "Oh My God" moment, as I realized that hooking anything of a size would present serious problems.

Lilies...Everywhere.

Pristine Mini Tench

Not a Silver Bream

 

The pond was like an estate lake, but made 15 or 20 times smaller, whilst retaining every last clump of lily.  There were hundreds if not thousands of white lily flowers, what my Chinese friends would call lotus flowers.  The place looks absolutely fabulous, and I cast my float into one of the gaps between the lily beds.  Not too long before something took the bread, and the first of a dozen or so tiny immaculate tench came to hand.  I had read, in the club handbook, that the pond contained silver bream, and to be honest their presence was the main reason I chose to fish the pond.  It was not long before the first of a few immaculate but tiny bream joined the tench.  A couple of small and also immaculate rudd and perch were to take red maggots later.  The bream were however, as far as I can tell, just little common bream, and I suspect that their bright shiny condition may have confused other anglers who have caught them in the past.  There MAY also be silver bream in the pond, but somehow I doubt it.  All the while I fished, the wildlife was up and about.  A fox slunk away just outside the pond fence soon after I arrived.  It is probably a fit and healthy fox, for there were many pheasants nearby.  I regularly heard their double croak, followed by that quick fluttering noise of wings that seems to follow each croak.  A small predatory bird was flitting about over and around the pond. I feel it was probably a sparrowhawk, but did not get a good enough look.   The not good enough look was disturbed by my rod suddenly trying to leap into the pond.   I had taken my eye off the float, and a good fish had grabbed the bait, and was diving deep into the lilies.  The light line broke before I could pick up the rod.    Not the first time bird watching has lost me a fish.   The odd carp was now moving, and so I lobbed out a piece of anchored crust, some six inches to the right of the densest lily bed. Having travelled light, the 4 pound line and light rod was all that was available to me, and it was with some trepidation that I chose to fish with floating bread.  After just a couple of minutes a carp showed interest, and following three unsuccessful attempts to slurp in the bread it succeeded and the hooked carp did exactly what I did not want it to do, by diving straight into the thickest of the lilies, just a few inches away. It went in deeper than just the peripheral floating leaves. The densely packed vertical leaves were disturbed too.  Luck was however greatly on my side, and I managed to persuade the fish back out into open water, and after a few more hair raising moments a six pound mirror was netted.   At this point I decided that I could not trust to get such luck again, and packed up. No real point in risking the certain loss of other fish.  Another trip to the same pond would need to be backed up by heavier gear.
But for the moment I feel the need to go greet a grayling and meet a minnow or two....Bye.

Pond Problems

Because of the laziness mentioned in the last blog, I now have a lot of outstanding  ( as in "not yet done", rather than as in "very good" ) rubbish to write about.  Sandwiched between the tench sessions, have been a few short trips to local ponds.

So I will try to split these trips, pond by pond, and will begin with the scrapyard pond, which has continued to produce the odd surprise. I desperately wanted to catch one of the pond's tench.   I had seen photos of tench caught by others...actually mainly by one particular angler, and although none of those I saw were particularly big, being little more than a pound or so, I still wanted to catch one myself.  The challenge you see.

Because of the location of this pond, in a very run down area, I was shocked to find there were any fish at all, let alone carp and tench, but I set up my float gear, with bread flake and occasionally maggots, and waited.  The first fish was of course NOT a tench, but a carp.   Only about four pounds, but a very good looking, well proportioned common carp. I very nearly like commons.   They seem to fight far better than the mirrors and look just as fish are meant to look,  not like some artist's invention of what a fish should look like.    Mirror carp...or most of them at least...are the Tracy Emin's unmade bed of the fish world.   I concede that one or two do look very good indeed, but most...no sorry, they should be removed from the UK, and wild carp used to replace them.   Size does not matter.  Speed though, does!

As punishment for my thoughts my next fish was a small mirror.  Still no tench.     The next evening trip

Pond Crucian

produced a sail away bite, a very uncharacteristic bite for the culprit, which was a crucian carp.    I had never heard of a crucian being taken before in this pond.   But 50 years ago, in this area, all of the rivers were dead, there were few large lakes, and so most angling clubs revolved around weekend matches by coach, and small local ponds.   And in those local ponds, be they farm pits or JCB holes in the ground, were very often crucian carp.     True crucian carp, for back then few knew how easily they would cross breed with goldfish and carp....both of which were quite rare fish at the time.  The crucian I had caught was a bit of an old warrior, but it weighed two and a half pounds, a very welcome fish indeed.  And I wondered whether there were any more, and were any as big or bigger than this one?   The hunt for a tench became a hunt for crucians, a hunt that remains equally unsuccessful, although the campaign did finally produce a tench of about a pound and a half.  All the tench that have been caught here seem to be about this size, and I think a single year class might be involved, from one fairly good breeding year.   Which prompts the question;  "Are their mummies and daddies still swimming around in the pond?    And if so, how big are they now?    The crucian hunt continued to produce fish: if not crucians. Two bream, each about six pounds.  One a male, dark, ugly, thin, rough and covered with breeding tubercles.   A horrible looking fish.    The female was  by contrast fit, healthy looking, fat and a light gold in colour. Two more different fish of the same species would be hard to catch, but excellent size for such a small venue. I have been left wondering whether all the dark fish are male, and all the golden fish female.   I have always caught fish of both types.   I am going to ignore, for this discussion, several two tone bream that I have caught over the years.  More small carp have followed, two I think, none over four pounds, but commons again.  One or two roach, which leaked milt in my hands.

Last year a couple of young ladies were eating their lunch one sunny day by the pond.   They mentioned that great crested newts were present.   And whilst fishing this Spring, I have indeed seen quite a few newts, including what was probably a pair, one being much darker than the other.    But they seem much smaller than the great crested newts we used to see everywhere 55 years ago.   And so I think these must be common newts, although I have not managed to see one up close yet.    Wonderful to see any newt species locally though.

I have not spent too much time by the Sunday challenge pond, two Sunday challenge sessions for a typical three ounce tench, a two pound common, a tiny perch and a small rudd.   The pond is exceptionally clear so

The Two Grass Carp

Grassies

far this year, the handful of 4 and 5 pound carp seems to have lost some of its fingers, but the two grass carp, the only two in the pond, and which I caught in two consecutive casts last year, remain.    And still look a lot like chub as they swim along.  There seems to be a very tame crow lurking around the venue.   A couple of times it came within a yard or so of me.   I threw it some bread, which it looked at in disgust and then ignored. I must return, camera in hand some morning.

Quite how a clear shallow pond can seem so empty of fish at times is a mystery.   Today I could see one five pound mirror, and a shoal of 30 small rudd.  All the many smaller carp, the roach, bream, crucians, the two grass carp, the tench and perch were invisible.  But they are there...somewhere.

The third pond:

There is a TINY, TINY pond down near the Mersey, so tiny that I have always assumed that it held no fish at all.  Largely weeded up with reedmace and rushes, its open water is maybe 10 yards by 4, with some of that clogged with Elodia. But it is another place where I have seen a few newts. A true wildlife pond.

I was walking, and looking for newts when I spotted, at the surface in an Elodia clearing: a fish!  

Golden Orfe

A crucian no less, maybe 6 or 7 ounces.  I kept looking and was sad to see a bulbous red and white fantail goldfish emerge from the weed too. Later in the day I saw a couple of golden orfe and 4 small rudd.   Maybe the rudd and crucians are natural, but the orfe and goldfish have been dumped of course.  Whatever happened to the good old days when unloved goldfish were flushed down the toilet when the kids were not looking?

So next morning I went down, minimal gear and some bread to check for crucians.  

Got into a spot of bother because it was very early and, as I approached the pond, past the chain mesh fencing of a small company I saw a couple of railway porter style trolleys and a black bag on the ground in the bushes not too far from the Rugby club. Just a few yards from the pond.  I looked at them, heard someone the other side of the fence and thought something was up. Then saw a guy in a balaclava on the path immediately before me. Asked me what I was doing... "going fishing". he seemed unconvinced and so I mentioned it being quite odd to see the  trolleys there. 

He said it was his fishing trolleys and he was fishing " just along there". Unlikely thinks I. Then for some inexplicable, daft reason, I followed him as he claimed he was going to his rod. There was a small iota of "hope he is not in my swim", but in the main I suppose I was curious.  He circled around and then disappeared down near the river. As I walked back, there were now two 10 gallon plastic containers, full of liquid, near the trolleys. And the guy came back up behind me. I told him I had already called the cops, because he was now looking rather threatening towards me. 

" Gimme your phone" he said. "No way", said I, and walked on. He grabbed the hood of my jacket and tried to stop me, demanding the phone again. I refused, and he spun me around, throwing me down an embankment towards the silted up part of the pond. Ripped my jacket.  I was not hurt, so I surreptitiously  tucked my phone inside my fishing boot and climbed up the bank. If he had asked again I would have said I dropped the phone in the fall. I walked on and a second guy, also in a balaclava asked me why I phoned the cops. "because I think someone is stealing something". "Stealing what?" " I dunno" said I. 

And the two guys, luckily, then moved off, now with 4 ten gallon plastic containers, of what I thought were chemicals. Anyway I then really did call the cops, who suggested it was probably diesel. Anyway I am unhurt, slightly ripped camo jacket, but otherwise fine. Oddly, although I was shaking a bit, I realized I had quite enjoyed the whole  incident. I have no idea why I decided to have a go in this way. I have always thought that if I should see a poacher, I would never think of tackling him, not at my age, yet suddenly here I am having a go at sorting two thieves on an industrial estate. Silly me. Coppers took their time...they went to the wrong rugby club! Their dog found nothing, but they could see someone had been climbing the fence.  I am told they got away with about forty gallons of diesel.

Had I had more time, been thinking more clearly, I would have backed away on seeing the trolleys, and if I had not been seen, phoned the cops from some hidden spot, and watched the process.    But   nope: I just dived in!

And I caught nothing.

Gull With Minnow

Walking back along the river I saw a black headed gull fishing in the weirpool.  First I have ever seen perched on a branch, although this branch has been long dead.   It was catching minnows, male fish in full breeding colours.  There are many, many minnows in the river.  Not too much else post cormorants, but many minnows.

More Buses

I live on the busy A6, between Stockport and Manchester.  Apparently it has the most frequent bus service in the UK,  approximately one every three minutes.  And this would appear to be true, and is very convenient for those of us fortunate enough to have free bus passes.   Unfortunately I cannot use the pass on weekdays before 9.30AM, which makes it a bit useless for fishing.   The "one every three minutes" is of course an average, and sometimes I may wait ten minutes.  To compensate, there are many times when two come at once, and the record that I have observed was no less than FIVE 192 buses, nose to tail. The old adage about buses is indeed accurate.

But it is not only buses that can come in such strangely timed fashion, fish can do exactly the same.   Before my 30 odd year break from fishing, it was unheard of for carp to be caught in UK rivers.  The one exception was the Electricity Cut on the River Nene, near Peterborough, which was famous for its big, hard to catch carp.  So, on my return to angling, I had never seen a river carp, and certainly had no expectations of ever catching one.   But, on the Trent last season, two came along at once,  two mirror carp in successive casts,  landed within five minutes of each other.  Had I been in Liverpool, I would have been gobsmacked, but in the more gentile Midlands, I was very surprised. Not many weeks later I had a third, from a local spate river, a common of maybe ten pounds or so, hooked whilst fishing for gudgeon on three pound line, with the river going like a train.  Quite a fight ensued before I landed it...by hand, as I had not considered a landing net to be needed for gudgeon.   Silly me.    

Today, I was warned by the wife that I have to "do something" with the compost heap.  For some inexplicable reason she wants to use some of the soil it has generated over the last couple of years for planting flowers.  Not wanting to miss out on fishing altogether, I decided to have a couple of early morning hours on the "Sunday Challenge Pond". And yes: I know it is Saturday, not Sunday, but the only other option was the flooded river, or a 25 mile trip to one or another tench water. So I arrived at the pond, with minimal tackle, rod, folding stool, three slices of bread, the packet of hooks that my wallet always contains, a float, shot, and a small bucket of groundbait I had left in the car for a couple of sun-warmed days.   Being already moist, the groundbait was fermenting badly and the smell in the car was quite unpleasant, even by my standards for a fishing car.  I also took an empty bucket, as I wanted to see if I could catch another crucian carp or two for the garden pond.  Didn't bother with the landing net, instead left it in the car, as I know the pond to contain small tench to maybe 3 oz, carp, mainly under 12 ounces, small roach, rudd and perch.  There are a few carp around five pounds but, in the small, yard wide gaps between thick Elodea Canadensis weedbeds, they are uncatchable on crucian carp gear,  they bolt  irretrievably into the weeds within a second or so of being hooked.  Nothing you can do. So my mainline was set at 5 pounds breaking strain, and a small float, capped with a starlight was thrown out at what I hope would be a gap in the weeds, at about half past four.  A couple of handfuls of sloppy boozy groundbait was added to the mix and thrown at the float. Set at about 2 foot 6, the float was a fair bit overdepth in this uniformly very shallow pond, and the light atop the float was soon seen to be moving sideways along the surface, as a rudd of a couple of ounces took the breadflake.  That is a good rudd for this water.   The next cast produced nothing, until I reeled in to find a fish attached.   A crucian carp of five or six ounces.   Ideal for the pond it went into the bucket, along with water and a pile of fish calming weed.   Crucians are not shy biters, but they have a habit of not moving off with a bait, leading to little or no movement of the float.  Maybe, had I waited, I should have seen a bite, but then again, possibly not.   Daylight now, and the next cast hooks into something far bigger.   It made the thick banks of weed fairly quickly, and the light tackle did not allow me to stop it.   Another carp lost in the weeds.   I think that is the third I have lost in such fashion over the last dozen trips to the water.  But I was not fishing for carp, and to use suitable tackle for them would probably put off the crucians.   The water is so weedy that even half pound carp usually get tangled up in the weed, and I often pull in a ball of weed, and then search it to find the carp, or the small tench that it contains.     However I did nip back to the car for the landing net.  Who knows, maybe one of the carp might behave itself and swim around in small circles for me.   Fat chance!   

A roach of 4 ounces is the next visitor, once again, a good fish for the water.  No tench today, which is a shame for I love the little, hand sized tincas that the pond holds. Next up was a bream, always a surprise in this shallow clear pond.   At 6 ounces it was no monster but still seems to be out of place in this water, long ago abandoned by the club that owned it, as being a waste of time.  They were unable to control the poachers, both kids and adults, who thronged around it, dropping litter by the bucketful.    Today, unusually,  it seemed to be litter free, and I know that one or two conscientious locals do clean it up occasionally, as do I.    The pond also holds perch which is the main attraction for the kids., Small, with pretty stripes, red fins and easy to catch, I have never caught a perch here myself, but a few minutes with a maggot baited hook would soon solve that one.   Rumours abound of a few chub being present, which is reasonable considering the proximity of the pond to a local river. With anglers there is always someone wants such and such a fish in such and such a water.

The next bite was a sail away and I hooked a decent sized fish,  which scrapped a bit, but not like one of the carp.   In the still poor light I could see it was a chub, and quite a good one too.  But as it struggled and came nearer the net, that which I had luckily recovered from the car, it looked odd.   Was it.....surely not...but yes, it was a grass carp!  Bloody hell!   I had never before even seen a grass carp.    All I really knew of them was that they were introduced into the Lincolnshire drains round about 1970, in order to keep down the weed growth, and help control flooding. I have no idea how well that plan worked.  It was believed at the time that they would never actually take an angler's bait, and so would never be caught.  Obviously a theory put about by the same guy who said cane toads would only eat the pest species in the Australian Maize fields.  I was equally amaized by my catch.  I'm sorry, honest I am!    Interesting and good looking fish, the grass carp,  fights very much like a chub, if mine was typical of the species. Visually it looked very much like what I imagine a chub/wild carp hybrid might look like, with maybe a touch of grey mullet about the lips. I was wearing just the detachable lining of my fishing jacket, and as I keep a number of things in the main jacket pockets I was unable to weigh the fish.  So I decided to wrap the fish in a mass of weed, and leave it in the landing net, in the water, and hoped that another angler, with scales, would arrive soon.  

Another roach was landed, again about four ounces.  Good looking roach these, the clear water means that the fish are very colourful, and an inexperienced angler could have easily mistaken this fish for one of the rudd that are also present in the pond.  Another bite, and another good fish is hooked. To my utter, jaw-dropping amazement, it was another grass carp. Two in the landing net now, together with a mass of weed. I could hardly have been more surprised had a hippo strolled out of the woods opposite, and sauntered into the pond.

 Photographs, camera phone: too casual a trip to have brought the SLR.  But as I took the picture I realised that the pocket, in which I keep my scales, is in the jacket liner, and not the main fishing jacket.  The two 192 bus route grassies weighed 5-8 and 4-12.  I put them carefully back, pack up, and am home by eight AM.

I wonder whether the rumours, of chub in the pond, have been created by people who have seen these grass carp swimming around in the shallow water, and mis-identified them as chub?    Might I have done the same, had I seen them? The grass carp certainly did not come from the river though!  And no-one to whom I have spoken, has ever mentioned grass carp.  Where were they from? Another mystery.  But surprises like this are a lot to do with why I enjoy my fishing so much.