You cannot beat after work fishing!

I just love this time of year, the weather is just getting right and the fish are turning on, and you get just enough time after work to catch 'the witching hour' on the bank.

Tuesday after work I flew to Rixton clay pits with Tench in mind, but when I arrived there was no room on the car park! There were even a few cars on the road outside so I decided to pop over to Cicely Mill. By the time I had set up it was half Seven but I thought that I'd caught it just right and was on for a few fish. Unfortunately, after nailing a 1lb 6oz Crusain around 8pm I was plagued by what I assumed were bites from small fish. On a good evening the reed beds on Cicely are alive with fish but there was no movement what so ever. A small Roach a while later confirmed my suspicion's and by the time I packed up it was so cold my fingers had packed up and I couldn't get in the van! I wasn't a happy camper, but I cannot complain catching such a nice Cruey on a school nite!



Tonite looked better, we had more cloud cover and it was still really warm, so I managed to get out of work handy and on Rixton before the crowd showed up. I had cracking sport from 10 or so skimmer Bream to 1lb, I could have had many more I'm sure but I refuse to drop below a 5lb hooklength and a size 16 on Rixton because those Tench can show up at anytime, I've had them in the middle of January! Its a good job I didn't as this cracker showed up about 9.20pm. I thought I'd come close to beating that PB, the fish was huge, a good 7lber I thought, but the scales only went round to 6lb dead. I felt a little deflated at first but when I picked her up to return her back to the water and realised what a magnificent fish she was, it was smiles all round! She was all spawned out so a couple of weeks ago she could well of shook that PB.

Cicely Mill 09/05/10

I'm sitting some prity important exams at the moment and after nearly cracking up last nite I decided to have a quick bash on Cicely Mill this afternoon. I knew my mate Tim would be on there having a pop at the Carp. I arived at 2pm and left at 3.30pm but a quick hour was all I needed to clear my head.

Tim had set up down the far end of the lake, so with the wind blasting down that end I set up three pegs down from him. Plus there were about 12 other anglers set up side by side at the car park end not catching. I fished a simple helicopter rig with groundbait feeder and corn/soft pellet on the hook and managed 2 Roach/Bream hybrids within the hour, both about 1lb and covered in spawning nodules. I had quite a few nudges and plucks but couldnt connect with them and I'm confident if I'd taken maggots with me I could have had a good bag of smaller silver fish.

All in all not a bad result, Cicely fishes hard during the afternoon/daytime and one of the lads said as I walked off that none of the lads fishing the car park had caught anything in a couple of hours!

Anglers Paradise 2010

Every year me and a group of lads from work head down Devon to the fabulous Anglers Paradise fishery. Its a fantastically run fishery and the fishing itself is always top notch.

The owner, Zyg, is a great Host and stocks his lakes with a whole host of unusual fish from huge Golden Tench, Rudd and Orfe, the most beautiful fully plated Mirror Carp you have ever seen, and monster Catfish! There are lakes to suit everyone so if you've never been, take a look, it comes highly recommended!

For the first few days I decided to unwind on the pleasure lakes catching Golden Tench to a couple of pounds and the Orfe and Rudd, took a rook of small Carp on the Beginners Carp lake, just bagging up really. I planed to have a good go for the carp this year but for what ever reason they didn't seam to be coming out. So after a bitless 24hrs on the main Carp lake it was time for a re-think. Earlier in the week I had a big Cat chafe through 15lb braid like it was Cotton on Octopussy Lake, and my mate Gary had taken a 50lb Cat from the main lake, along with a 40 and a 30lber, so it was off to the tackle shop for some 45lb quicksilver!!

The first big 'un came at about 2.30am Wednesday morning, after a blistering run and a spirited scrap, 10 minutes late my first ever Catfish lay in the net. As it glided over the cord I thought 'Good fish, 17lb maybe?' but after seeing her tail and trying to lift her out the lake I realised I'd seriously underestimated her. At 25lb I thought that this would be a long standing PB.



Happily I was wrong! After a not so good kip I was lay on my bedchair lazily dozing in and out of consciousness and BANG! 10am the right hand rod is nearly pulled in and I'm into a good fish. This one fights even harder than the first and about 10 minutes later my first ever 30lb fish is in the bag. Had a couple of mates to help with the pictures this time!



I rounded off the week pleasure fishing on Mystery lake with Tench and Rudd aplenty, before showering up for the award ceremony in Zigy's bar, that's Two bottles of his finest vino coming my way for each of those Cats, result!





Me and the Boys at Anglers Paradise.

A Successful start!

Right, seen as this is my first post I thought I'd let y'all know whats been going on this season.

I like my river fishing but and having spent the whole of last winter on lymm dam with only one pike to show for it (But man what a fish!) a bit of River Dane therapy was on the cards. Unfortunately the river ran high and cold in Jan due to the snow, then very low right up until March 14th meaning only three fish in four visits on what is usually happy hunting grounds for me. Bad times!



A trip to Woodshaw in early March was much better. Roach to over 1lb, a Crusian, loads of Rudd, a Dace, my first stillwater Chub and a little Perch made up a great mixed bag. Also, towards the start of April, after a poor morning on Blundells I droped on Rixton for a couple of hours. A wise move as I had 4 skimmers, 2 Roach and this fine 5lb 8oz early season Tench to show for my efforts. Wouldn't mind beating my Tench PB this year 'n all....



Other than that my efforts have been concentrated on quick overnighters on day ticket waters to dust of my Carp gear ready for my annual trip to Devon and Anglers Paradise. The best fish of the handful I managed was this fine 13lb 10oz Mirror Carp out of Avoca lake on the Browing Cudmoore complex. That equals my Common PB from the same pool.