Children With Cancer UK

Yesterday saw me driving diagonally across the country to join Keith Edmunds and the LAS gang at Suffolk Water Park for the annual fundraiser for Children with Cancer UK.

Before we go any further this is a fantastic cause and if you haven’t already how about making a donation here ? – only takes a moment!

https://www.justgiving.com/Keith-Edmunds2

The day started with a full English breakfast and a large mug of coffee in the café on the site – always a great way to fuel up. I got there a little late and Kev and Wayne were already on their Hobbit style ‘second breakfast’!

The water looked fantastic – a large horseshoe shaped lake with easy access, nice open swims and dotted around with reed beds – it looked very fishy.

Pegs were drawn so that we started the day spread out and after 20 minutes we could wander at will.

I drew a peg at the end of the shallow arm of the ‘U’ and had a fish in the first few casts – a plump low double that looked to be still carrying spawn. Not quite the first cast curse but not far off. Vince kindly did the pics and he hadn’t even wet a line.

After half an hour or so I wandered to the other side of the narrow peninsula to find Ditchy and Steve having a chat in Steves swim. ‘Mind if I have a chuck Steve’- ‘No mate as long as you don’t pull out a 20!’ Well a little bit short of 20 – but nice to poach one from under Mr Denningtons nose.

I spent the day wandering around pretty aimlessly and spent a fair amount of time chatting to Makka and Wayne and many others. Almost every part of the lake saw some fishy action and I ended up with 7 or 8 smaller fish, loads of hits and misses and even more lazy follows. 

The big fish weren’t really playing – a few mid doubles came out and Jamie had a nice upper double at the end of the day. No monsters but a load of fun. Some of the gang...

Chris looking rugged...

Wayne looking cockney!

Pete in profile!

 Mukhled in full flow

Wayne going for the biggun!

One of Waynes on a home made jerk bait

A peek into Waynes armoury

My favourite pic of the day - Paul about to launch a big softbait

At the end of the day we gathered at the café for the raffle – there was a fantastic selection of tackle from the many donors.

I came away with this beautiful hand-made lure designed by and made by ITO Engineering which was very kindly donated by BMJ – as was the promissory note for 6 of his spinner-baits built to my specifications! I also picked up some Fish Arrow lures which I’m going to try the on my trout at the weekend and an  UL rod!

All in all a fantastic day in great company – thanks to all the staff at SWP for making us so welcome, to Keith for organising and running the event and to all those individuals and companies that donated prizes – and last but not least all the guys that turned up and made it such a success.

Tinkering

Always looking for an edge - Savage Gear Monster Slug mounted in a lipskull (after Phil Blakey!)
Cut down lip so it doesn't dive so deep - for a shallow weedy venue, added eyes to the skull and a few touches of red using a sharpie! May not make the slightest difference other than I will fish it with more confidence!

Swiped

I started the day exploring a new stretch of one of the tributaries of my main river. This is way up the valley and is a very thin, rocky spate river. The fast shallows only seemed to hold the small fish but the deeper pools were stuffed with fish around a pound with the odd one or two up to about 2lb to be seen.
It was amazing to see groups of fish following the lures in and often competing to get at it first.
I lost count of the number of times the trout followed right along side the lure and took a sideways swipe at it.
Even trying lures with a single tail treble or cranks with two sets of hooks made little difference!
I moved onto the big river and had a few more but was getting pestered by nuisance chub so gave up - after the 16th  June these 'nuisance' fish will be my main quarry during the dogs days of summer as the brighter and hotter it is the more they like it.

Spent the last hour watching the river from a bench at the top of a salmon pool.

A fantastic days fishing with sheer numbers of fish to make up for the lack of big fish!

Vice Squad

Been having great fun and getting some good therapy at the vice tying some salmon and sea trout flies..

..the famous Falkus 'Surface Lure' sea trout fly - designed as a wake fly for use at night...

..the classic Medicine sea trout fly

Size 5 Partridge Salar silver hook, silver tinsel body, palmered black cock hackle, fine silver wire rib, squirrel tail wing and real jungle cock eyes.

..a salmon fly for coloured water..

Just need to spend as much time fishing them as I have tying them!

Night and Day

Having spent all day Saturday decorating (for a change!) I decided I'd try a first go at fly fishing in the dark in preparation for the main sea trout run. I got to the river about 7pm and fished well downstream of the area I intended to fish in the dark. I hooked a lively trout on the medicine fly which turned out to be a foot long green thing with loads of nasty teeth -it had very nearly chewed through the mono leader!.

Had a play with the macro function when I spotted some saphire beetles getting jiggy with it!

As the light started to fade I made my way upstream to the tail of a pool with a short riffle to the head of the next pool. I have no idea yet where the sea trout will be found but figured this gave me a few options of different types of water to practise on.

I'd forgotten insect repellent and had to resort to smoking a rather nice Cuban cigar to ward them off !

It was hard to be patient and follow all the advice and wait until it was fully dark before making a first cast - but the scenery certainly helped.

As I sat waiting I spotted a splash way downstream and thought at first it was just some ducks - I got the camera and realised it was an otter fishing its way upstream and heading towards me! All of a sudden it popped up on a log in the middle of the river - and was quickly joined another! The light was fading fast and the camera did a good job of compensating for the low light. I managed to capture this at almost maximum zoom.

I didn't really fancy my chances as this pair swam right past me and on up through the pool but I waited until the first star appeared before having a go.

It was interesting to say the least casting without being able to see the line and relying solely on feel. Wading in water when you can't see the bottom is a tad scary too!

I only fished for an hour of darkness as, if you are not off the car park by 11pm, you have to stay until 7am!
I had two tentative plucks from something but didn't manage to hook into anything. I discovered that retying a leader even with a headlamp is not easy in the dark with my gozzy eyes - particularly threading the line through the eye of the fly!
I did hear a couple of splashes as fish crashed out - somewhere out in the pitch black so maybe I'm in the right area but who knows?

Sunday morning saw me back out with the lure rod - the river has been painfully low and clear for weeks now - the last small lift was just before I caught my salmon. I decided to have a look at the last unexplored stretch available on my new club card - and what a fantastic stretch - it has everything, deep pools and bends that look very pikey/perchy and fast pocket water and even paced long glides that look very chubby - I can't wait for the coarse season to open.
I managed a few brownies all around 10-12oz and as usual bumped a few too.

The' Lancashire Trout' were properly on it today and I had a string of four pounders before this one at a shade over 5lb. The law is an ass when others can happily catch chub from still waters whilst I have the edge taken off these captures because they are out of season - it just makes no sense to me at all?

I gave up as the trout went down and despite trying all the lures I thought the chub might ignore they were just hitting everything - my nightmare is bagging one of the monsters and having a PB that doesn't really count.
I contented myself taking a few pics and enjoying the sun.

Roll on the 16th!

OCD Demons

Production line for the double/treble mounts- a bit OCD with the rear trebles - all my lures have the tail treble with the two points down - so 'set' these that way too!

A couple of my own 'Demon' variants..

..and a bushy bumble for the top dropper..

Just hoping the river is right at the weekend now !!!!

Need a GoPro!

It took me 55 shots to get one OK and three near misses!