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| One bite, one fish - Bream |
Weather - 1800
Water - Clear, weedy
Method - Method & float
Total - 1
Species - Bream
Some last minute serendipity designed my first trip of the season to Eliburn with H. With the temperature hardly getting above 6 or 7 degrees for weeks, the forecast was for 4-5 degrees, a fair breeze and overcast conditions. It hadn't rained for a while at least so the water should be clear enough, but whilst it would be tough going, I was still quite confident in the Perch, Gudgeon or Roach to do their thing and accept some of my juicy maggots.
On arrival I was disappointed to see the water was really clogged up with weed, the arm of the lake being particularly choked. I was later informed there will be a clean up on the 16th March. If I can get the day off I hope to make my way through and help out. Whilst this appears to be necessary, as often is the case, I was a bit disappointed to see the amount of litter as well. While not horrendous, certainly not as bad as Pumphy Pond, this is a permitted water with Bailiff's/members patrolling it every day and yet the beer cans, crisp packets and obligatory floating Buckfast bottle make me question why I should have to pay for the privilege of cleaning up other peoples junk. A small section I was asked not to fish from last year, as it is supposedly a nature reserve, was as dirty and litter strewn as any other part of the lake. It is such a lovely little venue that, while not taking much to spoil, shouldn't take too much effort to maintain either.
There was only one other angler present, after the Carp, and doing it from my favourite peg. But not a problem. The trouble with fishing is if you find a good spot and reliable method, it makes you less inclined to try elsewhere and experiment a bit. So being forced to do so is a good thing if you embrace it.
We made for the double peg in the corner at the outflow. It seems as good as any. I went for the usual float, suspending maggots and varying the depth, an absolute banker of a method here and on my other rod, for the first time, tried a method feeder with pellets, then later on maggots. H opted for a float with some maggots on the bottom and a swim feeder incorporated into a helicopter rig. Generally I'm suspicious of getting too complicated. Half of this may be justified whilst the other half is probably just laziness. But fishing with H, who as I've said before, is a hardcore fishing addict, is usually an education of sorts and it's good to view different approaches up close.
Quite soon, despite his super fine bite detection system not showing anything, he reeled in and found, of all species, a small Perch had taken his swim fed maggots. It's always great to get the first fish on the bank and it showed that if nothing else, we would be snaffling a few of the many small Perch Eliburn holds. Ha, or so we thought. After a good hour of nothing at all whatsoever, not even a phantom bite, we were starting to scratch our heads a bit. Finally, my method rod began to go for a bit of a walk (my bite detection system is about 100% cruder than H's) and despite my clumsiness, when I picked it up, found the fish was still on.
It felt half decent, but nothing special and didn't seem too keen to shoot off. Then I seen a pretty big flash and hoped I'd connected with a Carp that was about to blast off up the lake, but realised almost immediately it was a Bream. Somewhat unexpected, but very welcome. It measured 16.5 inches and would be somewhere around 2 - 2 1/2 lbs.
But that was it, no more bites (I did get twanged once more, but suspect it was a line bite), no more small Perch and so we headed around the bank in pursuit of more action. At the inflow end, where I can absolutely guarantee fish, I was extremely surprised when we didn't get a single tap between us. Most unusual. We did however see a little bit of surface activity with a fishes dorsal and tail breaking the surface at one point, but nothing on or near our hooks.
After giving up, I decided to move round to the arm for a last blast and H decided to follow. After another 15 mins or so of absolutely nothing, I decided I'd had enough, withdrew my rods and enjoyed watching a wee Robin nick H's maggots when his back was turned.
H packed up his first rod and just as he went for his other rod, the float bobbled a bit, then disappeared and he was into his second small Perch of the day.
Pipped on the last cast by 2 fish to 1, I could at least be happy with my fish of the day. Despite the slim pickings, three fish between us, one a bit more of a rarity wasn't too bad for the conditions. It just shows how much of a difference the temperature and suchlike can make. At times here I almost suspect there is more fish than water in the lake, then on days like this it's as if they've all emigrated somewhere for the winter. Lets hope the clean up is a success.
Lastly, only once home and comparing photos, it may well just be a seasonal thing, however this Bream looks a lot more silvery than my last noticeably olive green coloured Bream leaving me wondering if the most recent catch is a Silver Bream? The pectoral fins look to be a different shape too.
Here is a photo of a previous Eliburn Bream for comparison. If you click on a photo, you can view all the photos per blog full screen.
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| Caught July 2011 |
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