Hail Mary

As a member of 'The Bake Brigade' (Robbie's imaginatively gifted name for our group of fishing friends), I naturally have great love and affinity for Bake Lakes in Trerulefoot, Cornwall. Robbie runs the place as a family venture with his Dad. It's a simple commercial Fishery really that gives the tourists, who travel down to East Cornwall in their thousands in the summer, something to do when not getting their pasty nicked by a seagull. It's a place not known for 30lb Carp or 8lb Tench (yet) but it's a place where if you do things right you will always catch a fish.
It has a variety of lakes ranging from the large - Luxor, to the small - Canal. It caters for the child on his first ever cast and the experienced old hand who's making his hundred thousandth. Personally I have caught all the species there to catch including some lovely Tench and a personal favourite - Gudgeon. The Gudgeon in Luxor particularly grow to near record size, admittedly that isn't a large fish but to anyone who's caught these delightful fish in a natural river as a child, these fish that gorge on the feed intended for Carp are of a superb average size.

So, to my most recent fishing trip on home ground so to speak.
I had a rare half day at work and finishing early I was determined to go fishing. I had been really quite ill for a week or so and another day in front of the TV was not a desirable option. I packed up the carp and float gear and made my way to Bake along with my long suffering girlfriend Ellie. We arrived just as a very heavy rainstorm was passing through, not inspirational. Blue sky was on the horizon though so we set up on Luxor as the rain dried up. I baited up the margins either side of our peg with pellets and boilies and put one rod in each spot. Ellie had the left and I had the right. I see a lot of people cast out miles on Luxor and catch very little, the fish are not shy in there and feed more readily from about a metre out. I find this is the case with many commercial fisheries. Probably as a side effect of so many anglers chucking left over bait in the edges when they finish. We also had a float set up each with Red Maggot to keep us occupied in the cold. Soon we were catching lots of Rudd and Roach as predicted, warming up our chilly limbs. The weather decided we weren't quite cold enough though and hammered it down with hail. Ellie ran to the car, I decided to stay and see it out (persistent if not very clever!). Just as the hail reached its peak the left rod's alarm made that beautiful sound of a running fish, I picked it up and with the hail bouncing off my jacket and making the water boil, I played my first Mirror Carp of the year. It was a humorous exercise, I laughed out loud at myself for how crazy I looked, soaked and freezing cold with a plump little Carp tearing around in the water before me. I got the net under it after a spirited fight and with the fish still in the water I called Ellie. The hail was easing now and she came up to take a photo. Frozen, me and the fish posed, it was around the 5lb mark, not a remarkable size but the conditions had made it very memorable and I was a happy man.

We proceeded to catch numerous small fish including a couple of those specimen Gudgeon I love so much. My right rod then went and a slightly larger fish was landed, I lost another soon after. The hail soon returned though and after a couple of hours fishing we headed home, truly frozen and dripping wet. It was a hugely entertaining afternoon though and added another sub-species to my Challenge list, taking me up to 9 now.

Thanks for reading as always.

A Hint Of Spring & A Family Outing

Its been a little while since my last post, that's mainly been because of a lack of fishing exploits to talk about. The last couple of weeks have involved a couple of impromptu Wrasse fishing attempts on lures (blanked both times, I was slightly optimistic at this time of year!) and an hour fishing LRF around Plymouth Barbican & Mount Wise (another blank, really haven't mastered LRF yet but its one of my targets for the year). Though with the weather settling down and sunshine showing its glorious self, it was time for my first carp session of the year.

I am not a die-hard Carp fisherman by any stretch of the imagination, the level of commitment and (dare I say it) madness involved in Specimen Carp angling is something that I can only admire in others. I will say for the record though that I think many Carp Angler's habit of calling large Tench & Bream nuisance fish gripes me a bit, but I'm a 'jack of all trades' angler so maybe that's just me.
The small farmer's lakes my Dad & I planned to fish have a good head of large carp, mainly Commons up to 30lb. The larger lake had the big fish in along with Pike to keep the small fish population down. The upper lake is smaller and has fish to under 20lb that had been transferred from the larger lake. Last year I had a stunning buttery Common from the smaller lake, not a massive fish, but at 14 and a half pounds it is my largest Carp so far and easily my prettiest. The larger lake is renowned as a difficult water so with only a day available I decided to fish the smaller one.
The day before I had the surprise of my sister Zoe arriving back from Australia unannounced and she was excited at the prospect of fishing with me and my dad.  With my girlfriend Ellie also wanting to fish it became a family outing! I had slight concerns of boredom setting in with the girls since Carp fishing in March is not always hectic stuff, so I made sure we packed the Lure rods to target the Pike if the Carp wouldn't show. It's lucky I did because indeed the Carp were not interested. We fished for three hours with nothing to show for it. Luckily enough Spring had decided to announce it's arrival that day. With sunshine on our backs, the occasional Bee buzzing around our heads and good conversation we were in good spirits. I decided that the Pike in the other lake would probably be more receptive on such a day so we set up with the Lures. If you have read my other posts you will know that Ellie has been desperate to catch on her new Rod (she calls it 'Mitch' after the brand Mitchell it's made by), within five minutes she had a tiny little Jack on and was ecstatic. The lake is full of them as - due to a lack of regular food - they dont grow much bigger. I was extremely keen to catch on my LRF rod with a tiny Roach Fry swimbait. I didnt have to wait long. With a twitchy retrieve the lure flashed in the sunlight and another little jack aggresively lunged at the lure right by the bank. Unfortunately these tiny Pike arent known for their fighting abilities and I easily subdued him. But as I held him up in the Spring sunshine, his green and gold scales glinting majestically, I didnt care he was only about thirty centimetres long, he was my first Pike on my LRF rod, a special little fish. Zoe obviously then wanted a go and Ellie very generously let her use 'Mitch'. She then proceeded to catch three fish in quick succession! The largest only being just over a pound and a half but she obviously had the technique. I had a good fish of around seven pounds miss my lure at the bank - now that would have really tested my ultralight tackle! But it wasn't to be. We tried for the carp for another few hours but still they weren't biting. In the larger lake the big fish teased us by sunning themselves at the surface.  There really are some giants in that lake that will certainly bring me back to try for again.

So a bit like the rest of this year & challenge so far, great fun but no real show-stopping fish to write about. Fishing to me though has a brilliant social aspect too, despite it's popular image as a game for lonely patient habit men trying to escape their wives on a weekend - though that's not without it's merits! 

Rumours, Myths and Legends.

There is a place in the South-West of England, a water where monsters bring terror upon their wary prey. Where brave men (and women) descend every week to do battle with the creatures of their nightmares...

OK I'm sensationalising a little, eyeing up a job with the tabloids, but joking aside as I fished the very famous Exeter Canal on Saturday, I really felt that the place has an almost legendary aspect to it.
It began with a visit to the rather excellent Exeter Angling Centre to buy our day tickets. This time it was myself, Will, Olly and my girlfriend Ellie indulging in some Lure fishing for our favourite predator. Our intention was to try the River Exe instead of the Canal as we had never tried it before. It turned out the River was a little awkward for lures racing through as it was, so we moved quickly onto the canal. This is a slight problem with social fishing especially if you are all of different skill levels. Myself, I'm no expert but I've been fishing for over 15 years now so I know a few things. My accomplices that day had only really got into it fairly recently or were new to freshwater fishing in the case of Olly. This puts a slight pressure on myself as I want to put us in the best swims where we all stand a good chance of hooking up, unfortunately there are no guarantees in fishing. So with that in mind I went for the easier option - the Canal. Now when I say easy, I mean easy to fish, not to CATCH fish. The access is superb but the Pike are well fed and regularly fished for. I haven't had much success on it before, a fish of 7lb being my best from the water but there is plenty of talk of monsters. The rumours that drift up and down the canal are fantastic and you never know who to believe, but the important thing to know is there really are giant Pike in that water... Somewhere.
We started off near Double-locks Pub but quickly found the amount of Kayakers and dog walkers to be a real annoyance to our fishing. I decided that we should try down the far end of the Canal by Turf Locks as Will had seen a huge Pike miss his lure there before. We arrived at the car park and first cast Olly was in! He couldn't quite believe it as the take had been barely noticeable. When he got the fish in it was clear why that was, the Pike had engulfed the Lure which meant he had hit it straight at Olly on the slack line, hiding the take. It wasn't an issue to unhook though (exactly why forceps are a must!) and as Olly held up his biggest ever Pike of around 3-4lb it was obvious what a beautifully conditioned and well-fed fish it was.

This emboldened us all and in the late Winter sunshine we marched along the Canal all in pursuit of our own Beast Of The Canal. Unfortunately after that we had absolutely no hint there were any other Pike in the water. That was until we made it down near the Turf Locks boat moorings. There we spoke to a friendly Pike Fisherman who was deadbaiting. He told us he was having no luck this year despite the same tactics serving him superbly before. He also gladly informed us of a couple of 20's that had been caught recently by the Boat Moorings. The legends continued. At the entrance to the moorings as we started fishing we saw something that I haven't seen in years, bait fish exploding out of the water being chased by hungry Pike! The water would just erupt with tiny roach trying to escape their toothy deaths. We cast all manner of lures into the fray but received nothing but disappointment. It's quite frustrating to see Pike so clearly on the feed yet ignoring your lures. Sometimes you just have to admit you can't imitate exactly what they are eating and just admire the show. It was a privilege to watch and I witnessed the back of a huge fish breach like a whale in pursuit of the prey. A Carp angler came along and told the tale of a young lad who had caught a 27lber on a tiny Perch Imitation lure only a couple of weeks ago. He didn't seem the wind up type so it only added to the mythical nature of the place. We fished it the best we could but nothing would take. So digressed to the pub.
I'll admit after a couple of pints by the fire none of us were feeling inspired. The monsters were resigned to stay Myths and Legends to us. I did manage to get one fish of a similar size to Olly's on the way back though which boosted my spirits but it was a shame that Will and Ellie had to make do with a blank.

I will be back soon and try again to turn rumours into reality.

As always, thanks for reading.