Rutland adventure

This was a trip I'd been looking forward to for a good while, a few of us from the specimen hunting UK group on Facebook had organised a get together fishing for predators on the mighty Rutland water.

Having grown up in the nearby town of MeltonMowbray I had often visited Rutland on school trips and the like and I remember always wondering what it's vast and mysterious depths might contain. Little snippets in the angling press over the years told of huge Pike and Perch but more recently Zander seem to have come to the fore with large catches commonplace.

I've mentioned several times on this blog over the years that I really wanted to catch a Zed on a lure and with Rutlands pedigree I couldn't think of a place which would give me a better chance. Fishing such a huge expanse of freshwater would take me completely out of my comfort zone and I realised that I would have to learn fast. Boat control, fishing on the drift with a drogue and Techniques like vertical jigging are completely new to me so much research ensued.

I watched videos on youtube, read articles and asked for advice from anybody with previous experience of the place. I even went out and purchased a fishfinder and drogue especially for the occasion. Lurewise, i planned to use shads and another type of lure called a Kogut which comes from Poland and is basically a kind of jighead with feathers whipped onto it. Koguts are used very successfully on the continent to catch Zander and arnt available commercially in this country, fortunately I managed to acquire some through a Polish friend who knows a guy that makes them.

 

Kogut lures

 

The big day finally arrived and I pulled into the carpark at the fishing lodge to meet up with the lads. After a quick chat we bought our tickets and loaded the boats up. It was around 9am by the time myself and boat partner Phil found ourselves motoring out onto the lake and boy was it busy! Aswell as all the fishing boats being out there, we had sailing boats by the hundred and canoes aplenty, it was like an aquatic Version of the M1!

 

Phil at the helm, boats in the background were just the tip of the iceberg!

 

A couple of hundred yards out we decided to tackle up and setup the fishfinder. All went well and we were both surprised at the depth readings of 60-odd feet, this was gonna be like deep sea wreck fishing! We had a few casts to get used to working the lures in the deep water and we then upped sticks and headed out into the main bowl to hopefully find some fish and begin our first drift. After a few minutes we came across a huge plume of oxygen bubbles coming from the depths, obviously some kind of aerator perhaps to combat the blue-green algae I suspect.

 

A mammoth sized aerator for a mammoth sized lake!

 

The fishfinder showed a mind blowing 85ft but more importantly we had several fish signals on there so this was as good a spot as any to try. We quickly established that the drift in this area was pushing towards the dam wall end so we setup on the opposite side of the aerator to the dam and began our first pass.

I dropped the kogut in and around 30seconds later it finally hit the bottom. I twitched it gently up and down with a pause of a few seconds between each pull. After a couple of minutes I felt a gentle pluck and struck, the rod bent over for all of two seconds and the fish was gone. I cursed my luck but it was a good sign, at least we'd found a fish or two. This was confirmed when a minute later Phil bent into a fish which had taken his shad.

 

Phil in action

 

Although it was only maybe 2lb it proved to be Phils first Zander and set our confidence sky high! After finishing the drift we motored back around and setup for another. I managed to lose another fish and it wasn't until the third run that I finally caught one, a tiny fish of about a pound, I wasn't complaining though!

We tried a couple of other areas and although it was proving to be quite tough we still had a few pulls. It was soon apparent that catching fish from such great depths wasn't without its issues. I'd read about the bulging eyes and blown up swimbladders on the internet but seeing it in the flesh was actually quite disturbing. Torpedoing the fish back in was also something that was completely unnatural to me but it definately seemed to work as the fish invariably swam straight downwards. Not all the fish had these problems not by a long shot but of those that did I can't help wondering what the mortality rate of them is.

 

Average size on the day

 

Bulgy eyes, not nice :-(

 

At around lunchtime we were experiencing a bit of a lean spell and after a ring around the other boats it was apparent we weren't doing too badly as they seemed to be struggling to find the fish aswell.

We headed up the north arm towards the tower as it seemed a bit quieter boatwise. After a short while we heard a cheer come from another boat nearby and were surprised to see a huge perch being hoisted aloft for photos, after a quick conversation with the two lads afterwards they told us it was over 4lb, nice!

We couldn't buy a bite in that area ourselves so we headed to the mouth of the north arm to try the shallower margins in the hope of maybe a pike or two. In the event, no pike were forthcoming but Phil did manage a lovely brown trout of around 3-4lb.

Shortly after that we had a phone call from Andy on one of the other boats to say that they'd found a stack of fish around a plateau further up the north arm. We didn't need telling twice and within minutes we were over there setting up a drift. Andy and Dave were bending into fish seemingly every five minutes! The finder showed an initial depth of 60-66ft which shallowed to 45-50ft over a very short distance before deepening off again to 60ft+. On top of the plateau there was fish signals everywhere.

 

Found ya!

 

We started getting pulls and taps straight away, my problem was keeping them hooked. I had several drop off before I managed to land one, Phil on the other hand was fishing shads still and his hookup to fish landed rate was far better than mine for some reason. I stuck with the koguts though as I had great confidence in them.

 

More kogut success

 

Eventually though all good things must come to an end and darkness soon began to descend, it was time to head in. I was amazed at how long it took us to get back, we weren't that far up the north arm yet it still took a good twenty minutes to get back to the lodge even with the motor on full bore.

Overall it was a real day to remember, certainly very different to my normal fishing and I really quite enjoyed it. Many thanks to my boat partner Phil for helping to make the day what it was, I shall certainly return to Rutland at some point without a doubt.

 

 

 

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September mixed bag

Since catching my Barbel PB earlier this season something slightly odd seems to have happened to my fishing. I can't quite put my finger on it but It's not the fishing itself that's changed it's more like my attitude and approach to it which has altered slightly I feel. It's almost as if that Barbel was a catalyst or a switch which has allowed me to pass through to a new chapter in my angling journey.

Over the last few weeks my fishing has felt so much more relaxed and natural, the pressure feels well and truly off now and this has allowed me to enjoy my fishing so much more. Although I didn't realise it at the time I now see that I was putting way too much pressure on myself to catch fish, not just in the early part of this season but throughout the last 3-4years. Don't get me wrong Ive certainly enjoyed myself and caught some cracking fish but I now realise that sometimes I was taking it all a bit too seriously when there really wasn't any need for it.

Anyway, now I've got that off my chest lets get back to the fishing and,carrying on in the same vein where my last post left off, I've carried on with the carp fishing. I'll begin with an evening trip on a local club water and when I arrived I was surprised to find the place packed with other anglers. This was unusual cos normally the place is practically empty from one week to the next! As a result my swim choice was extremely limited. On this particular water I like to fish to marginal features but due to the size of the pool and the underwater topography there are only limited options and in this case there seemed to be somebody setup next to each and every one!

After a couple of laps of the lake and much deliberation I settled on a swim where casting to my marginal feature involved a tricky cast from between two bushes across the front of an overhanging tree to a few wisps of bulrushes which were in about 4ft of water. It took me a few casts to get it right but once it was there I decided that it wouldn't be moved until it either went or I packed up, I really didn't fancy trying to get it back on the money once darkness settled. The other rod was cast towards a couple of showing fish out in open water.

The hours passed by with no activity other than one or two fish crashing over the deep water in the middle. All the other anglers slowly dwindled away and before long it was dark and just myself an Phil still fishing. The activity out in the lake noticeably increased once it got dark proper and we both started to get a few liners yet couldn't understand why we both remained fishless.

As packup time fast approached I went next door to phils peg to discuss when we should reel in. As we talked I suddenly became aware of a funny hissing noise coming from somewhere in the darkness, then it clicked, it was my baitrunner, I'd forgotten to switch my alarm on! It was the margin rod and I was on it in seconds. After a steady battle a nice upper double common was soon netted.

The next trip was an evening chucking bits of metal and plastic about on my local stretch of soar. My daughter Charlotte came along and I was hoping she would get the opportunity to nail her fish lure caught fish. She didn't disappoint either and had a succession of small perch. I managed a couple of jacks and had some really exciting follows which I was glad Char got an opportunity to see, she reckons we should be on river monsters now!

The 24th of September was the day I reached the grand old age of 38 and as such I decided to book the day off work and head back up the a50 to the little carp pool I fished in my last blog entry. As before I had the whole lake to myself although it was a lot breezier this time around so I picked a swim with a bit of shelter from the elements which still gave me good command over a sizeable area of water.

The weed was hideous and seemed to be everywhere I cast so I switched over to choddys and had a bite within minutes. Unfortunately the hook pulled after a few seconds but I took the early action as a positive sign and was more than hopeful of a good day.

Another lost fish around half an hour later had me investigating my rig and,after changing the hook pattern and size aswell as the length of the chod slightly, I felt way more confident. This confidence was well placed because a short while later I landed my first fish of the trip and it turned out to be a repeat capture of the wood carving mirror in my last blog entry!

I fished on and over the course of the morning I went on to land four more carp aswell as losing another so all in all it was a nice productive session. I can't believe more people don't fish the pool as it's not difficult it's just very weedy but the carp are a good average size, my smallest was around 13lb.

Another quick lure session on the soar filled in the angling void between my birthday and the weekend. It was pretty tough going and although I had a couple of hefty tugs which I missed , it was a good hour before I finally hooked something. This turned out to be jack which absolutely smashed my savage gear eel.

I wasn't sure what to do on my Sunday session and it wasn't until I woke up that morning that I decided what I would go for. If truth be told I was getting slightly bored of both catching carp and lure fishing so I opted to have a morning on the Trent, Chub fishing with bread.

I had a surprise on my first put in when, within seconds, the tip slammed around and I found myself connected to a lively Barbel. It gave me the proper run-around before going to ground in the streamer weed, my 4lb hooklink never stood a chance.

After that I struggled for a bite despite trying a couple of different swims. After a dull start the sun was now out in force and the river being low and crystal clear didn't do me any favours either. Eventually a tentative pluck on the tip had me striking into solid resistance which turned out to be a sizeable Trent Bream of around 8lb.

After trying a couple more of my usual swims for nothing more than a couple of tiny taps I decided to head downstream to a much wider shallower area. This turned out to be a good decision as this was where the Chub seemed to be lying. Two decent fish in quick succession cheered me up no-end and I packed up just as the sun hit it's peak around midday.

 

 

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August in pictures (mostly)

The early part of the month was lost to work but I had a whole week booked off and set aside for fishing at the end of August and I had some big plans. One advantage of working so much over the first couple of weeks was a bulging bank account and this allowed me to purchase some new rods in the form of a couple of Scope offerings from the Nash stable. At 10ft long they are shorter than the carp rods I'm used to but seeing as most of fishing is on small waters and rivers they seemed a logical purchase.

Obviously I couldn't wait to get out and use them and to this end I had been baiting a couple of swims on my local bit of river soar with Carp and Barbel in mind. Groundbait, boilies, in fact anything I could get my hands on went in over the course of a week or so.

 

The Friday night which signalled the start of my week off finally arrived and I was down the river like a shot. It didn't take long to get a response either, after about an hour my reel went into meltdown. After a solid tussle my first Soar Barbel of the season was banked and at over 9lb it wasn't a bad fish either.

No more action occurred and I was left somewhat puzzled, surely that fish can't have been the only one mopping up all the bait I'd put in? I resolved to visit the area again ASAP. The new rods had behaved well anyway. A day later I was back down and other than a couple of crayfish type knocks nothing happened whatsover.

I needed some fish under my belt so a spot of lure fishing was the order of the day and my next trip to a very misty river soar had me chucking all kinds of bits of wood and metal about.

It was tough going to begin with and I was struggling to coax much of a response from the fish, even the perch weren't obliging. The mist began to burn off and after having a couple of follows on an ondex I decided to weight it to make it run deeper. The response was practically instant and a succession of jacks fell to the lure over the next hour or so. Seemingly every swim I tried had a hungry little croc waiting for me.

The action tailed off as the sun got up proper so I headed home and decided to get the carp gear sorted for an evening trip to a local club water.

This again proved to be hard going although I think a lot of it was self inflicted as I just couldn't settle. I moved three times before I was happy with my swim choice and within an hour I found myself playing a sizeable common, certainly well over 20lb. It weeded me up and after some tense moments I finally had it in open water under the rod tip. Suddenly disaster struck and for some unexplainable reason the hook pulled! Gutted I was and after no more action that trip I decided a return session the following day to even the score was much needed.

I already had an idea where the fish were as they had been showing the night before and and I was well prepared to attack them. It took a while to get some action but after two nice fish in quick succession I felt vindicated for losing the fish the day before.

Whilst down there I got talking to another chap about some lakes a short drive away which I'd not fished before. I didn't need any convincing to go and explore and at first light the following day I was getting lost in Staffordshire looking for a tasty sounding little irrigation pool he'd told me about.

It didn't take too long to find and I was pleasantly surprised at what an attractive little pool it was. The water was crystal clear and the second I walked through the gate I was confronted by two mid-double commons mooching about in the margins. A circuit of the pool revealed quite a few more carp and lots of weed with very few clear spots apparent. I picked a swim and decided to have a lead around to see if I could find anywhere fishable.

Everywhere I cast there was weed but there was one area where it seemed just a little bit thinner and there was just about enough room to squeeze a couple of rods into it. After playing about with a couple of rigs I settled on chod rigs with bright yellow popups and this seemed to do the business as I went on to catch five double figure carp and a bream over the course of the morning aswell as losing three other carp. The colours on the mirrors were stunning.

After a couple of successful days carping I decided to spend the following morning withe dropshot gear back on the soar in a different area for a change. Unlike earlier in the week the Perch were much more obliging and a load of little ones plus a rogue pike were soon landed before the rain descended and I was forced to head for home.

An unsuccessful evening of soar Carbelling followed and other than a tiny chub of about a pound which managed to hang itself I had no action to speak of.

After a conversation with Phil the following day we decided to head to a carp runs water for what would hopefully be a mad day of action as we'd not had a day like that for ages. Earlswoods engine pool was to be our destination and although neither of us had been there before we were well confident of a good bend in the rod.

In the event it proved to be a tricky day and although I managed five Carp to mid doubles I got plagued by bream as I'd made the mistake of filling it in with ground bait. Phil managed a couple of carp but we were later informed by the bailiff that the place had virtually switched off with the majority of other anglers on the lake blanking altogether. One or two others were bagging however and I think the key was bait quantity, it was no coincidence that the guy who was spodding virtually all day caught one after another, bet he was knackered though!

We enjoyed it there anyway and it's certainly another one to remember for some action when times are tough. That pretty much sums up my fishing for August, no big fish action but it was nice to get some action. I'm not overly fussed about the barbel after catching that 14lber the other week so for now I'm content to just get out and enjoy my fishing for a while, certainly until the first frosts arrive anyway and I can embark on my winter chub and pike campaign. I think I'm going to leave the perch alone this year as their pursuit has taken me away from too many other things I've wanted to do over the last couple of years.

Anyway, until next time, tight lines!

 

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July back end

As the title suggests this little update is about my fishing in the latter part of the month. We've been experiencing something of a heat wave of late which, for someone who despises the sun like myself, has made for some pretty uncomfortable fishing.

First up was a session on a new stretch of Trent and although it was a daylight trip I was still hopeful of a barbel as the area is known for producing one or two in the day and recent rain had caused the river to rise and colour up a little.

Small pellet hook baits on fluorocarbon hooklinks were to be my main line of attack and it was apparent from the start that this was highly attractive to the local roach and bream population! No barbel were landed but I did get plenty of bites from a succession of nice roach and a couple of bream.

 

 

My next trip out was an afterwork evening trip to one of my favourite bits of Trent with Phil and the lure rods. After a slowish start we started to get a few however, both opening our accounts with a pike apiece.

At one point I managed to find a real perch hotspot and lost count of how many I caught from it! Every cast was a coconut and I reckon I must've had somewhere around 12-15 from that one swim alone!

In another swim I hooked a very good pike indeed, certainly upper double figures and I realised my net wouldn't be big enough to land it. In these situations I usually glove the fish out but the swim I was in was on a very high bank and I couldn't see an easy way down to it. The fish was well beaten but as I faffed about trying to clamber down to it a final flare of the gills dislodged my tiny lure and it made good it's escape, gutted I was!

Soon it was too dark to carry on and I was well happy with three pike landed and a ruck of perch in just a couple of hours fishing, shame about losing that big one though.

My most recent trip was a late evening rendezvous with some Trent barbel. I didn't arrive at the river till 8pm as with the hot sunshine I didn't see the point in getting there any earlier. I planned to stop till around 12-1am seeing as that covered the hours of darkness when most action seems to occur.

I wasn't to be disappointed either, at bang on 10pm, just into dark and right on cue, I landed my first barbel of the evening at 10b4oz. Another followed exactly and hour later at 11pm which went 10lb12oz and I thought to myself how strange a coincidence it would be if I caught another at midnight.

In the event it was 12.15 when I caught my third and final barbel of the evening and although it very nearly pulled my rod in on the take it proved to be my smallest of the season so far at 6lb4oz, in fact I think it's the smallest I've had from the Trent for a good couple of years, always nice to see the next generation of doubles coming through though.

 

 

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Monsters under a full moon

My most recent night session on the Trent started just like any other, no indications till dusk and then the river came alive. Phil rang me to let me know he'd just taken an early doors barbel from his spot a mile upstream of me and as we talked I noticed a couple of taps on my downstreamer. Within seconds of hanging up, the rod went into meltdown and my first barbel of the evening was duly landed. It was still nearly daylight and the barbel were feeding already, surely this boded well?

 

Darkness soon descended properly, well as properly as it could with the moon being as bright as what it was. If it wasn't a full moon it was near as dammit and I didn't even need my head torch to bait my hook and tie up pva mesh bags. A short while later I had another three foot twitch on the downstreamer and found myself playing another barbel. My chosen swim had no snags or weed so the fish gave me few problems and a nice 9.12 was soon posing for a pic.

Two fish landed within the first hour of darkness was a good result and I started to think I could be on for a good nights fishing. Past experience told me that early action generally means lots of action in the area of Trent that I fish and hopefully that theory would be proven out as the night progressed!

It was around 11.30pm when I received the next bite and upon hitting it I knew it was a good fish. It chugged off downstream on a powerful run and then stopped abruptly and held itself in the powerful current like a dead weight. I almost thought it had picked up a load of weed because it wasn't doing a great deal as I pumped it back upstream towards me. The big nods on the rod tip as it shook its head gave me a few tense moments as I was expecting the hook to pull at any time. I've been using fox ssc hooks and so far I've not had a single hookpull with them but there's always a first time and you can bet your life that time will be when you've got a monster on the line!

Back to the battle and eventually I had the fish underneath the rod tip, I was amazed to see there was no weed on the line whatsoever and that the dead weight was purely the fish! The fish had really woken up now and made a series of short powerful runs, I'd had a good look at it by now and was fully aware of what I was dealing with and I gotta say my heart was in my mouth! The relief of getting the net under it was immense and I paused for a moment to compose myself.

The net felt snagged as I lifted it out of the water due to the weight of the barbel within and there was no doubt in my mind that this was a new PB, the fish was colossal! It's mouth was big enough to swallow a tennis ball and the size 8 hook embedded in its bottom lip looked tiny. I was shaking like a leaf as I hoisted it up on the scales and I wasn't surprised at all when the needle sailed past the 14lb mark. After three weighs to be sure I settled on 14.8, a new PB and a very good fish indeed for the upper Trent, I was over the moon!

I almost never bothered recasting after that as I really didn't feel the need to but seeing as it wasn't even midnight yet I decided to drop it down the edge. It took an age to calm down and get into a sleepy frame of mind but just as I was nodding off my recast rod was away again. A turbo charged 8lber was soon thrashing it's way into the net to give me barbel number 4.

Unbelievably barbel number 5 came to the same rod in the same spot within 10minutes of recasting and was near-on identical in size aswell. Both went 8.10 and 8.12 respectively and after that I decided not to recast that rod as I badly needed sleep!

I must've drifted off eventually because it was starting to get light as I was awoken sharply when my other rod registered a blistering take. This fish pulled in a very similar fashion to the the lump I'd landed earlier and I was tempted to think that maybe , just maybe, lightning had struck twice? I soon got a look at the fish and it was clearly another big one so I began to play it a little more gingerly. A few heartstopping moments later and the landing net did it's job. I was gobsmacked to record a weight of 13.2 which made for easily my biggest brace of barbel ever, what a blinding session!

After that fish I literally packed my rods away and hit the sack as I was too tired to carry on. A few hours later I packed up proper and headed upstream to pick Phil up. Turns out he'd had a good night too landing four barbel including two 11lbers. The fish had certainly fed well, not 100% sure why though? maybe the full moon had something to do with it?

 

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A quick catch-up

Since the first week of the season I've not been out much due to work but I've still managed to snatch a couple of quick trips here and there. An afternoon on the Dove proved to be quite a disappointment as the area I chose appeared to have had an awful lot of pressure in the short time it had been open. Swims were worn to bare earth and several anglers were already roaming the banks when I arrived. Finding a quiet unfished swim was definately not on the cards but seeing I'd driven so far I had to make the best of a bad lot.

I actually managed two bites over the course of the session and landed just one chub of around 4lb for my efforts. More anglers had turned up to replace the afternoon shift as I packed up and I made a mental note to avoid the area like the plague until later on in the year when it becomes a bit quieter.

A Saturday morning lure session on my local river soar was my next bankside adventure and once again it was a little disappointing. I expected the fish to be queuing up seeing as the weather was overcast with a slight drizzle but after failing to tempt a bite in my first couple of swims I was a little puzzled. The area looked like it had seen some serious angling pressure of the wrong kind with empty trace and dead bait packets littering the bank not to mention the beer cans everywhere aswell.

I did find a few perch in the end however but I had to scale down to a tiny mepps no2 to even get a pull. It was pretty tough going but a nice fish of well over a pound brightened things up no end.

 

A night chasing barbel on the Trent was my next port of call and I headed to a new swim which I'd already been and cleared with the strimmer a couple of weeks previously. It's a spot I've had my eye on for a couple of years but the impenetrable foliage always made it a tough proposition. I was in the area clearing swims the other week so I seized my chance to clear it out and now I was ready to try it out.

The recent rain had brought out the flies and mozzies en-mass and just setting up was proving to be a most uncomfortable experience indeed, the bloody things were all over me. A liberal dose of jungle juice seemed to beat them back a bit and soon enough I was settled in for the night.

A massive firework display at a nearby hotel didn't help my cause and it was nearly midnight before I had my first proper bite of the session, a bream of around 6lb.

I drifted in and out of consciousness over the next three hours and had all but given up hope of a barbel. Phil, fishing upstream, had caught a couple so there was a few feeding out there somewhere just not in front of me!

At exactly 3.30am I was jolted into action when my upstreamer suddenly burst into life. This was certainly no bream and after a few dicey minutes I was soon slipping the net under a nice barbel of 9lb2oz.

It was already starting to get light by now and my hopes of another barbel were fast fading. My downstreamer gave me another bream just as the sun was rising and I headed to bed to try and get a couple of hours kip before packup time.

At around 6.30am I had a fast bite on my downstreamer and hit into something unstoppable. Despite my best efforts to make an impression it headed around the corner downstream of me with the power of a truck and the hooklink parted. God knows what it was but it was big and I was gutted at losing it! Soon enough it was time to pack up and I headed home satisfied at finally catching a barbel from the spot I'd drooled over for so long!

 

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