Last weekend I
helped a customer with tactics in approaching a new venue for tench.
The venue is big, around 30 acres and unfortunately the tench were
reluctant to feed so we decided to head back the following week, yet
when Saturday dawned the first thing I had to do was scrap the ice of
the cars windscreen. The wind had also tuned a gain to a chilly
easterly and although the skies were blue and the sun shone I was
still happy that I was wearing thermals. We fished from 7am to 1pm
and apart from an aborted take the highlight of the morning was
listening to the first Cuckoo of the year. I’m sure Steve will get
to grips with the lake once it warms up, yet as they say if the fish
aren’t feeding, you’re not going to catch them.
Monday was spent
in the company of another Nash Peg One consultant and although
meeting late in the morning and fishing till around 3.30pm he still
managed to put together a great bag of bream, hybrids, tench and
perch using helicopter rigs, maggot and the Nash Ballmaker.
Tuesday was an
early one and this time I headed south in the early hours to a
favourite day ticket water, Mill Farm Fishery in West Sussex with the
hope of catching a monster silver bream. Arriving at 7am I headed for
the Specimen Lake and hoped for a swim that I had never fished
before. It was as if I had a sixth sense. Starting on maggot proved a
non-starter so a switch to hair-rigged 6mm Pineapple Squidgee bought
a instant response from a dozen or more carp to 21lb 10oz plus a few
silvers around 10oz. Playing the numbers game and continuing to cast
every ten minutes with a cage feeder filled with 2mm Scopex Sticky
Pellets to build a swim finally bought a bigger silver weighing 1lb
7oz, however from then on they slowly got bigger. The carp had risen
to the surface giving time for the bream to find the bait and what
followed has to be what’s classified as a red letter day as silvers
of 1lb 14oz, 1lb 15oz, 2lb, 2lb 10z, 2lb 2oz, 2lb 6oz, 2lb 9oz and a
massive one of 3lb 1oz 8drams followed. I even let my girlfriend’s
father use my rods for half an hour and he had silvers of 2lb 2oz and
2lb 9oz plus a 4lb tench! What I could have achieved if I had stayed
till closing time is mind blowing yet due to a pressing engagement I
had to reluctantly leave at 4pm.
In the office on
Wednesday I completed part 2 of ‘Approaching a new water for tench’
for CAT as well as a ‘First Trial’ on an expensive Shimano reel
for Anglers Mail before getting the tench gear ready. Arriving later
than normal I managed to secure the same swim and deposited a kilo of
hemp plus some dead maggot, small pellets and crushed and whole
boilies to the gulley in front at around 50 yards as well as in
close. With all rods positioned, now fishing Monster Squid boilies in
one form or another, I settled down to await events. The Tufftie
Ducks are well on our bait but they seem to leave the boilies alone
so I’m quite happy for them to be cleaning of the spot. A couple of
times they came up quicker than normal, obviously spooked by fish and
a good fish rolling gave me confidence that the baiting has started
to work. Just into darkness the middle rod flies off, obviously not a
bream this time, but the expected tench turns into an immaculate
stockie but at least it’s a bite. Nothing happens in the night, yet
at first light a repeat performance sees another carp landed as well
as a big aborted drop back a few minutes later. I stayed a couple of
hours into daylight as it was really misty but nothing happened.
Back home I was
really in two or should I say three minds what to do. Should I head
back to the big southern gravel pit and have another go at the bream,
maybe I should return to the tench lake, yet this hasn’t woken up
yet or should I head back down to Mill Farm Fishery knowing jolly
well that there was a very good chance of a British Record silver
bream. In the end I decided to get on top of the paperwork, have an
early night and set of before dawn in hope of a big silver. This
freed up some time on Thursday and the standard nine holes of golf
was fitted in with my mum as well as completing yet another article,
this time for Nash.
The alarm sounded
at 4.30am on Friday and come 6am I was pushing the trolley to the
same swim as fished earlier in the week. The weather was completely
different with rain in the air and a chilly north easterly blowing. I
did doubt my position come six hours later, not for fish in general,
as loads of carp, tench and silvers up to a pound were regularly
falling. In fact I reckon l must have landed sixty or more fish
before a big silver showed. Out of the blue and completely unexpected
one of 3lb 8drams appeared and as I was organising the camera kit
another comes along, this time 2lb 9oz. Half an hour later another
graces the landing net, this time exactly 3lb yet after working the
swim for more than nine hours and with an hour of inactivity I decide
to call it a day totally knackered. 
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