Hit and Miss

Saturday saw me venturing off to fish one of the big reservoirs for zander and hopefully pike. But there was a issue, a storm front was heading our way.

I arrived like most nice and early to find the gates still locked even though we have been advised to get there early. But this wasn't any issue because it gave me chance to catch up with fellow Pikers Pits members Predator and Mickey D, who just happened to be on the water the same day as me.

Finally, the gates opened and we were soon paying for our tickets, loading the boat, and despite being one of the first on the boat, we we the last to get out (Martin brought everything including the kitchen sink).

We finally ventured out and got ourselves sorted and headed for the iconic tower.

After anchoring up we got to work with the lures, Martin was jigging, whilst I preferred to work crank baits through the depths.

The crank soon worked its magic and I was battling with a reasonable size fish to the boat, but alas the fish shook the hooks lose at the surface. I suspect it was a large trout, but we'll never know.

Martin then score with the jigging and was soon scrapping with another fish, this one didn't throw the hooks and a nice size brownie was netted.

A quick snap and the trout was returned.

We then decided to move closer to the tower as we'd see a couple of anglers boat fish.

Once we have finally anchored up (after undoing 7 knots that had reduced the anchor rope by 5 feet) we started fishing again. The crank bait was soon in action again and I felt a number of hits as it came up the water column. As the lure it the surface, a large zander crashed out of the water missing the crank by mm.

We worked the tower for a good hour, but nothing materialised so we went for the first drift of the day.

To sum up the day, we drifted, we anchored up and we searched the water for more fish, but alas nothing else came to the boat. I did have a number of his on bottom bounced shads, but most resulted in shad loosing there tails.
But 3pm, with the storm nearly upon use, we headed for shore. Just in time really because by the time we had put the boat in, the swell was dangerous. The rain lashed down and the wind was up to 50mph.

The drive home was colourful, which main roads being flooded and visibility poor. I was happy to be in that night.

Big Water!!!

Went out for a day out on the boat with the lads from the Lure Anglers Society, of which I'm a member.

The day was spend afloat on a vast sheet of water on a trout fishery in pursuit of pike, zander and perch.

I arrive in plenty of time and after some car park capers, I finally met the lads in the fishing lodge to pay and get our boat number.
My boat partner (BP) was on the drag, but soon arrived and we eagerly loading the boat with rods, tackle, lunch and fishfinders. Once we had gotten the tackle stowed, the outboard was spring into life and we left for the moorings onto the water. But where to start?

After a brief chat with BP, whilst bopping about we decided to head in the direction of the other boat and become a sheep (baa!!!)
We set anchor in 30ft of water and I decided to start with the pike gear whilst BP did some vertical jigging for the zander and perch.
After an hour of nothing (well to our boat) we lifted the anchor and decided to do some pioneering of our own (to infinity and beyond) we motored to the southern end to try and locate some fishing.

This end of the water was quite different, slightly shallower, but with some weed and undulating bottom. We decided to drift with the wind whilst casting the lure about so we could cover as much water as possible.

For a number of hours we had nothing, not a sniff, but all of a sudden BP was into a fish. Acting as gillie, I soon slipped the net under a good sized perch.

Nice fish to start with, so we sort of marked the spot and started another drift.

After countless drifts and venturing into bays without even the hint of a fish, we decided to head back to the tower to try our luck.

We must have tried every lure in the box (well in my box) but still nothing, so we upped anchor and tried a new area of water beyond the tower. We made three of four drift and I did manage a follow by a pike and a hit from a trout, but nether were hooked.

We started the last drift of the day and with the sun starting to set, I had another follow from another pike and another hit from a trout. It just wasn't meant to be.

So with the sun setting, and time running out we head for home.

We later found out that the day had been hard for our party and appart from a large pike and a couple  of decent perch, most boats returned empty handed.

But we will be back!!!