Unpredictable

Buoyed by my eeling success I've made three more evening trips to the same water. When I first cast a worm into the place a few years ago it was bootlace city. As darkness descended the bobbins were hardly still. When I did connect with a bite it was invariably an eel under a pound.

These three sessions, admittedly short but at the right time (I think) have resulted in one dropped take and two or three single bleeps. I've fished two worm rods, one off bottom, and a piece of squid each time. Elsewhere these two baits have always attracted eel attention. It's perplexing. But that's eels for you.

Has something changed? Well the lake has been successfully treated to reduce the weed. Perhaps that has reduced the invertebrate population and the small eels have skedaddled. Maybe I shouldn't have fished a different swim each time. Maybe it's the moon. The only thing keeping me going is that the one eel I have landed has been a decent one. But given my three blanks and out 'rule' it's time for a change of venue or species next time. There were plenty of fish bubbling in front of me yesterday evening. I could try for them, whatever they were. The problem is I'm in predator mode. I'm almost itching to do a bit of piking!

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Slimed

That trip to the river didn't manage to enthuse me but somewhere along the line I got a belated burst of enthusiasm for some summer predator fishing. I think the heatwave a couple of weeks ago must have given me a fever.

First of all I got the urge to catch a catfish after a break of nigh on twenty four years! This lead to a frantic search through my tackle museum (the mess of rig stuff I keep in various boxes around the place) looking for suitable hooks and hooklink materials. A search which proved fruitless on the hook front. I'm sure I must still have the original Cox and Rawle Uptide Extras I used to use. Somewhere... At least the Quicksilver doesn't appear to have rotted.

Next I embarked on a period of research. Thanks to the interwebs finding out about catfish waters and catfish tackle is a lot easier than back in the old days. What became obvious is that there are lots more waters available to catfish anglers than there used to be, and the size of catfish in them is much larger. Along with my cyber-searching I looked back through some early Pike and Predator magazines in which my old catting partner, Geoff Parkinson, wrote about venues where a thirty pound cat was a possibility. Nowadays a would-be cat angler wouldn't entertain a water that doesn't hold forties or bigger!!

While there is certainly more readily available catfish tackle there isn't much choice. When it comes to hooks, the things I lacked most, I couldn't find any that I really liked the look of. I ordered some on-line which had been recommended to me on The Pikers Pit, but when they turned up I thought they looked a bit on the small side for what it said on the packet. A rummage around in the remains of my pike-fly tying gear found me some sea hooks I'd bought but which proved to be a bit on the heavy side. They looked bob on as catfish hooks. The barbs were a bit rank though. Checking out current prices I wasn't surprised to find that sea fishing hooks similar to catfishing hooks are considerably cheaper.

Despite the passage of almost a quarter of a century catfish rigs haven't altered much. Mind you pike rigs haven't changed much in even longer. I thought I detected the hand of the carp angler in a lot of them, though. The needless addition of bells and whistles to what should be really simple rigs. I thought I'd stick with what I know and make up a version of my popped up livebait rig which I'd originally developed for perch fishing.

The only change I made to it from the past was to use Amnesia for the hooklink and Mason Hard Type Mono for the polyball link instead of Quicksilver and light mono respectively. This, I hoped, would eliminate tangles. Two other changes I made were to use a tiny swivel instead of a Drennan ring to slide on the hooklink, and to finish the link in a loop to allow the changing of polyballs (to suit varying bait sizes) with a pellet stop to hold them in place. The weight, instead of being attached directly to the run ring, was tied to another hard mono link. This can be altered though if the bait is to be kept closer to the bottom. For safety's sake a paper clip was used as a weak link for the lead.

My deadbait rig is the same leger set up but with a Quicksilver hooklink without a polyball link. A third rig would be used to fish the dreaded halibut pellet. Actually four of them on a hair, 'snake' style like I use with smaller pellets for barbel, also using Quicksilver as the hooklink. The dumbbell rig was new to me as the idea of fishing subsurface baits for cats hadn't really caught on when I last fished for them. It should go without saying that I made my own dumbbell rather than buying one in case I fancy giving it a go.

If I get round to actually fishing for catfish this year rods won't be a problem. I have plenty to choose from, rods which customers have landed cats over 80lb on. So I should be okay on that score! Likewise I have reels which are up to the task. I might need a bigger net and mat though. It'll all depend on where I end up fishing. Then again it might have to wait until next summer. At the moment finding time to get away is the main problem as there are no prolific catfish waters within short session range. And I'd like to ease myself in with a few chances at least. In the meantime I can scale things down and get some eeling done.

Doing more reading up it was apparent that quite a few of the commercial catfish waters don't allow livebaits. The next best, easy, option would be a bunch of worms presented off bottom. The worm rigs I Googled all looked arse about face to me and tangle disasters waiting to happen. A variation on a Dyson or Bellars rig seemed a more sensible option. Eel anglers like these rigs, more than the pike anglers for whom they were developed seem to, and eels share more behaviour traits with cats than do carp or pike to my way of thinking. I can't see a reason catfish anglers haven't taken to these rigs. Or maybe they have. More likely those coming from a carpy background have never heard of them.

Playing about with rigs is always fun but the temptation is to get carried away. The more time you spend fiddling the more bits get added to them. I reckon that's why carp rigs are so complimacated - too much time spent fiddling and not enough spent catching. It's easy to get lured into thinking that the reason you aren't catching is because your rig is rubbish. More likely it simply isn't in the right place at the right time.

All I wanted was a rig that wouldn't tangle which presents a free running bait. Over the last few summers I've tried Dyson/Bellars variations for eels and had trouble with tangles on the cast. The Dyson can also be a pig to cast accurately. Analysing how the rigs worked it seemed to me that the key is making the hooklink dangle away from the lead link. Paternoster booms do that. I use them for paternostering deadbaits and on a long casting rig when pike fishing. After much messing about I thought I'd extend the tube of the boom a little and slip a polyball on the 'leg'. The tail rubber neatens things, holds the polyball in place and slightly extends the leg. Once more I used hard mono for the link. The hard mono terminated in a tiny swivel to allow me to add either a paper clip or a length of weaker standard mono should I want to present a bait further off bottom.

I found a hot, muggy evening irresistible and decided to try the off-bottom worm rig locally for eels. If it catches eels it'll catch catfish. I was also interested to find out if fishing worms off bottom might avoid the attentions of the tiny eels which have plagued me in the past on the water I had in mind.

The baits were out and being ignored by twenty to eight as the sky clouded over keeping the temperature up as the sun set. It felt like it would be a good night for eels - if I didn't have to leave when it got dark. No bad thing in the circumstances as I had to be up early the next morning and being tempted to stop 'one more hour' might have proved irresistible.  The lack of twitchy bootlace takes to the worm rod was encouraging. The piece of squid (this time on a hair rig type set-up I'd come across when looking up catfish rigs) on the other rod was also being left alone. Around nine thirty I missed a run to the worm rod. The rig was working. Not quite half an hour later the worm was taken again. This time I connected and the 10ft Torrix stalker I was using was hooped over. Looking down on the eel as I laid the net in the margins it was clearly my biggest from the pit. One of those thickset eels, and pleasingly long.

As this was only a short session I'd taken my Korum Multi-Mat to carry the rods, net and bait bag. With its raised sides it proved useful as a retainer for unhooking the eel which was free to writhe around without being able to escape while I grabbed my camera. The fold in the padding also proved useful for laying the eel on it's back. The scales didn't lie and my biggest eel for a couple or three years was soon returned.



The Multi-Mat, I now discovered, has one fatal flaw. While it is handy to throw a jumper and fleece in when walking to a swim on a hot evening, it's not so good for holding those items after an eel has slimed it up! I kept the fleece on and sweated my way back to the car.

One eel on a rig doesn't prove much, but it has given me the urge to try it some more. So while the weather remains summery I'll be sneaking a few short evening sessions in, I think. There are a couple more eel/catfish tricks I want to try out. And the eels will have to be the guinea pigs for the time being.

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It's all white

It's not that I'm a perfectionist, in the usual sense of wanting everything to look perfect, but I do like things to be functional and will fiddle about with them until they are. Things that are designed to be functional usually look right. There's a design adage that says form must follow function and it's one I try to follow when rod building. Certainly when it comes to my own rods. The less fittings I can have on them the better.

I like to think my Isotube is a functional solution to a small problem.  The ones on my own barbel rods have only the section of tip where the tube is painted white, but some customers like to have their rod tips painted down to the first ring. In the past I have whipped both ends of the tube in whatever colour thread the rings where whipped in. That was until I bought some white thread on a whim. I also bought some dayglo orange thread at the same time, but so far I haven't plucked up the courage to use it on a rod!

The white thread, to my eyes, gives a more functional look to an Isotube when used to whip over the bottom end. It also makes nice distance markers on a plumbing rod. In time I might well find other uses for it - and maybe even for the fluoro orange!

In other news, I recently got handed an ancient fibreglass Milbro float rod to fettle. I wasn't sure if I'd be able to match the thread colours, so I surprised myself when one of the shades of red I have in my box of threads came pretty close. I was doubly surprised to find a shade of green to match the tipping colour. I think the rod had more sentimental value for its owner than anything, and he was a happy chappy to have it looking improved. Given that the Dural butt is bent I doubt that the rod will be fished with in anger. Although it might be handy for fishing round corners!

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The same but different

Having achieved my main target for the summer I lost motivation, and damp evenings didn't encourage me to snatch short sessions among a heavy workload. With work slowed down I'd been twiddling my thumbs a bit until yesterday when I suddenly, and unexpectedly, rounded up my barbel gear and headed back to the river for the first time in a little over five years. The river was dropping according to the on-line level gauge which would mean I'd be able to get a reasonable look at how things had altered since I'd been away. It woudl also be in reasonable condition to give me a fair chance of catching.

As I got close to the river a few things had altered in the surrounding area. A few new houses and silage clamps. My biggest surprise was that there wasn't a car in the car park at seven fifteen on a pleasant July evening with the river still carrying some extra water.  Had the fishing gone down the pan? At least it meant I had the pick of the swims. I walked to the bank without my gear and found more changes. Difficult to describe them but the bank itself had altered somehow. Sort of eroded and flattened out compared to how I remembered it. The opposite bank had also eroded somewhat but the flow patterns looked familiar. My starting point was obvious. The old banker swim.

Although this wasn't quite the same as it used to be it was still reasonably comfy to fish. I got the rods out of the quiver, put the sticks in either side of my low chair and set about removing the five year old, now rock hard, baits from the hair rigs. I didn't bother retying any knots (that's braid for you or sharpening any hooks. I just popped on fresh (as in five year old but not dried out) baits, attached mesh bags of  fresh (as in bought recently) pellets and cast out to where I thought I should. The  I settled back to carry out the river ritual of filling PVA mesh with pellets.

Downstream the bank looked strange. When I realised that an old tree was missing I understood why. Age and gales must have finally taken their toll. What hadn't changed was the birdlife. Probably not the same birds, but the same species. Mallard families dabbled in the margin, goosander departed the scene, a buzzard hung on the wind high above the trees on the high bank where swifts swirled and screamed.

It wasn't long before my confidence was boosted by a short chub rap on the upstream rod. There were fish about other than the sea trout jumping splashily. It would only be a matter of time before I was in action. It was about forty minutes in fact. After starting out with two boilies on the hair I'd chopped one in half after a couple of chub raps to put the baits further from the hook bend. I just don't like having a bait tight to the hook.

The bite was the usual stop-start drop back indication. What I connected with felt reasonable and I was convinced it was a barbel until I got sight of the fish. Well, I was almost convinced because although it felt like it was resisting it didn't do much swimming away. I think it must have had it's gob open to act like a drogue in the flow. However, for a chub it was nice looking one. Unusually brassy and not tatty looking. I overestimated its weight through lack of practice, but still snapped it's portrait on the mat.

As I paddled in the edge to release the chub I spotted something part buried in the silt. It seems that one sad fact of river fishing doesn't change. Barbel end up dead. Hardly surprising considering some of the inadequate gear that gets used and the length of time that leads to people playing them for. I can never understand why some feel the need to fish as light as possible, or to make statements that they can land 'anything' on their gear, when they could use stronger tackle and catch just as many fish without them being knackered when they are put back. My ranting won't do any good though.

In the next hour I had two more drop backs, both of which resulted in the rig being snagged. After much pulling from  various angles the first time I got everything back bar the lead. The faithful paper clip had done its job. The second time I wasn't so fortunate and the hooklink got severed. I think it was a combination of the river bed altering and me having forgotten where to cast in the swim to avoid snagging up that lost me two leads. Mostly the latter because when I altered my aiming point I lost no more.

Occasional knocks were coming to both rods, the downstreamer fishing three small pellets on the hair. It was the boilie rod that produced the second positive take though. This fish felt more like it. It managed to get upstream a little and pulled back once it hit the shallows. My estimate of its weight was much better though. I was back on the barbel beat.

It was dusk proper when the pellet rod produced a fish. A chub which started out fooling me into thinking it was a barbel by taking some line from the baitrunner before I grabbed the rod (I was filling more PVA at the time) before morphing into a writhing eel when I first felt it.

As it got dark and the isotopes glowed more faintly than they used to do the bites dried up. The river felt like it was shutting down. My confidence ebbed. Sometimes it's like that. The witching hour arrives and leaves its spells behind. At eleven I wound the baits in and left pondering whether I'd enjoyed the session or not. It had felt pretty much like going through the motions, just as it had done when I left the river alone. There's not much to this sort of fishing. It's easy, and it works. Perhaps I need to try some stretches I'm not so familiar with to get me interested?

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Before and after

Sometimes you'd think it would be easier and cheaper to buy a new rod than have a very old one refurbished. Particularly when they are in a severe state of disrepair like the Edgar Sealey boat rod  I've just spruced up. But I guess some people get attached to rods for reasons which defy common sense.

Despite offering a cheaper choice of lined Fuji rings the rod's owner wanted to go for the Diamite option. At least that maintains the original vibe of the rod.

I'm not sure what had been used to repair the rod in the past, one ring seemed to have been neatly whipped with string, another untidily done with the rod whipping thread.

Selecting the thread colour was my biggest concern, but I guessed right first time and once sealed it was a very close match, albeit slightly translucent. I had no obligation to redo the decorative whips above the handle, but when doing refurbs I like to get a consistent look to the rod.

The finished article isn't quite 'as new' but it looks a lot better than it did.

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Dreams and nightmares

Despite the carp not being difficult to catch at the Railway Pond the challenge lies in trying to avoid the small ones. With that in mind Monday evening saw me arriving as the rain began to ease off determined to fish bottom baits as there had always been too many ravenous micro-carp attacking anything that floated on the surface. Feathers, weed, bits of plastic with hooks in them. Anything. Sorting out a better fish off the top was a lottery.

Needless to say when I scanned the water there were carp cruising and basking in one corner. None of them the micro-carp. Where was my surface fishing gear? At home... I'd have to stick to plan A. It didn't go to plan though. The rain had coloured the already coloured water even more so I wasn't able to fish my baits on the line where the bottom disappeared, which is where the better fish seem to cruise. But I did my best by fishing close to the reeds with baits that were too big for the micros to get in their tiny mouths and too hard for them to whittle away. It didn't deter the not-quite-micros. A couple of takes were aborted, one fish was hooked ad landed. It wasn't the size I was after, but I hadn't blanked.

Tuesday saw me itching to get out  fishing and feverishly checking the weather forecast to find the driest window for an overnighter. Tuesday looked the best chance. I fancied a tench session but without any hemp, and leaving it too late to go get some I had a last minute change and swapped the tench rods for the carp rods and threw a bag of 6mm halibut pellets in the bait bucket.

It was getting on when I pushed my barrow to the Petting Zoo, my swim choice being made on the basis of comfort as much as anything. Comfort and an overhanging marginal bush to my left. The bush spot got liberally laced with pellets and the sure-fire pop-up plastic pellet got dropped over them. More pellets went out by catty to my right, a little further out, and to buoyant grains of plastic corn were swung out there. The middle rod had a wafter on the hair and a small bag of pellets on the hook. This was cast straight out as far as I could manage simply because a daft carp had jumped out of the lake a couple of times in that direction.

The air was still, the lake flat calm, roach were topping, grebes chasing each other. A kingfisher flashed by. A family of mallards, the ducklings tiny, avoided me. These were nice to see as only the other day I'd been thinking I'd only seen a couple of ducklings this year, and they were only seen once. Were there predators at work on the lake? Fingers crossed for this brood.

Everything was in place and the kettle on by nine thirty. Still warm enough for just the t-shirt it was feeling muggy. Thinking there might be a chance of rain I'd taken the Groundhog. Not much food though. My intention being to pack up around eight in the morning. Grub consisted of a Mars bar and four Northern Energy Bars (Chorley Cakes!). There was an emergency tin of beans and sausage just in case the fish fed like mad and I had to stay on longer than anticipated.

Roland came to see me, picking up pellets I'd dropped by the rods. He didn't keep me awake and I was dozing by twelve thirty when an alarm woke me. It was one of those go up and hold, drop back, go up, hold bites that Brenda and Brian give so I took my time getting to the rod. Sure enough Brian had picked up the corn and was too lazy to move the three ounce lead.

A quick refreshing of the pellets and back to the Land of Nod. When I awoke I was wondering why I wasn't at the lake I'd just caught two small carp from. Coming round I realised debating whether they were worth weighing before I slipped them back had all been a dream. Almost four and the dawn chorus was in full voice. Brew. Energy Bar. Get up, rebait and recast.

Try as I might I couldn't get back to sleep. The grebes were still being aggressive to each other. They can't half shift when they swim just below the surface making a bow wave. They also make a hell of a racket running along the surface to escape! The sounder made a bit of a racket just after five thirty when the middle rod came alive. The rods were angled down and it's tip pulled up as the baitrunner spun furiously. The weight on the end of the line felt as lively as a bream but considerably heavier. The fish did nothing all the way in then went daft in the margin fouling the line of the corn rod. I had to cut the line on the wafter rod and wind the corn rod in. Ending up cutting both lines and starting from scratch after weighing and returning a mirror with a nasty round lesion on one flank. With the mess sorted out I got everything back in place.

Half an hour later I pulled out of something that had picked up the wafter. Forty minutes later that rod produced a three pound plus roach/bream, which felt rather like the fish that had come adrift. By now I could see plenty of bubbling in the area the three bites had come from. Not the sort of bubbles that come up without assistance from the bottom, but clouds of fishy bubbles. It had to be worth putting a second bait out there. I wound the corn in and swapped it over to a pop-up boilie on a rig that no self respecting carper would use.

 Less than half an hour after casting the two longer range baits out the wafter was off again. A repeat performance ensued with the double figure common coming to life in the margins. It really fought above its weight. I was knelt by the rods trying to drag it into the waiting net when... ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ.
Nightmare. The pop-up had been picked up and definitely not by Brenda!

The gloves came off and the common netted. With one foot on the landing net pole I picked up the right hand rod and began to drag the offending fish in. It went solid. I kept the pressure on. It wagged its tail and came free. The weed is coming up now, sparse and grassy at the moment it's easily broken out of. There was no messing about with this fish. The hook was a big 'un so I could give it some stick without worry. Although this one felt a bit heavier it didn't get a chance to do the margin dance. Head up and in the net at the second attempt. It would have gone in first time I'd I hadn't misjudged things. Thankfully the common had sunk down low and was sulking. Lift the net and inspect the chaos. No option but to cut both lines and lift the pair on to the mat.

A quick weigh for the common and slip it back. The fat mirror was going to have its photo taken when I'd got things back to normal.

I got the baits out and put the kettle on for a brew to chill. That lasted until two tench in ten minutes or so created more chaos. Baits back out and finish the brew. Right. Set the camera up, wind the rods in, take the photos. Simple. The tripod and mat were in place, I'd taken a test shot. One rod was wound in. The second was off again! If the camera hadn't been ready to go I'd not have bothered taking a selfie with that tench, but it would be practice for the carp.

Wind the third rod in and struggle with the fat, slimy bugger. Check the photos on the screen. Wipe the muck off the lens and take a couple more. Watch the fish waddle off and get the rods out again.

I have the feeling that while I was messing about with the camera the feeding spell had ended. A light breeze had sprung up and was ruffling the surface. At least I got some peace. The eight o'clock deadline was already passed, so I extended it until ten. That was until another bream came along, this time to the wafter, as I started to tidy things up. One more brew then off at ten thirty unless the fish thought I should stick around for lunch. They didn't. With one of my targets for this summer ticked off I can get the eel rods out now. Or I could get myself some hemp and have another go for the tench. They don't look to have spawned yet.

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