kennet and Avon Report

[Banana Steve]

With Ruffe and Tench on Greenhearts list still to go on the species hunt and me needing a Ruffe as well, we hand arranged to fish the canal at Devizes for Saturday.

I picked up Ian at 8am and we set off to Devizes Tackle Shop “Bernie’s” we purchased the necessary’s for the day and off we went. We arrived at “All Cannings” to find the wind howling down the length of the Canal.
Ian didn’t fancy fishing the canal with the wind blowing along the canal, I didn’t mind where I fished as this time I didn’t bring my pole, as I had decided to fish the waglar on the canal. So it was a change of area, so back in the car and searching for a newer stretch. Ian saw a turning for Allington and instructed me to follow the sign for Allington. A quick right turn took us down a rough track to a canal bridge.
On inspection we saw a lovely stretch of canal, the wind at this point was across the canal rather than along. So we decided this is where we going to fish.

As we walked along the canal, there was no sign of this area has been fished, and this was confirmed to us by a Narrow Boat owner, who stated that he has never seen any one fish this part of the canal before.

Ian set himself up by the bridge and fished the pole,

Where as I went further down towards on of the narrow boats.



My fishing consisted mainly fishing the Waglar, I decided to fish at depth and try and catch the better fish, however before I started I was not really expecting anything at all, and I thought that I may even blank. How wrong was I, the bites on the waglar were so positive which was nice.

I was hooking good quality skimmers and roach. The day was plodding along quite nicely and even the boat traffic wasn’t too bad. However, as the day moved on, the wind increased making fish both the Waglar and the feeder nearly impossible as the wind would drag the float right into my bank and the tip would just keep bouncing around, so I looked defeat in the eyes and said “Ok wind you Win”
When I brought my keepnet in I was happily surprised, a nice catch of around 5-6 lb of Skimmers and roach.


I packed up and wondered down to see Ian who was fighting the wind and looking for those illusive Ruffe and Tench. We both agreed that we would come back to this stretch again but hopefully on a calmer day

[Fishing Forum Admin]

Looks a cracking little stretch of water , might hold a carp or two ?

[Twiddler]

Looks like you find a good spot at canal.....some quality roach there, well done........so I guess the ruffe hunt will continuous for all of us!?

I really wonder what has happen to the canal.....there are a few things I have noticed....a there a less hybrids, less of the tiny tiddlers and the ruffe seem to have gone. All the very little stuff seem to have vanished.

I have 2 suspicions.....either the pike and perch population has drastically grown in the last year, or maybe the canal suffered some kind of pollution which might have killed the smaller fish off......or we just rubbish at catching ruffe lol

[Norfolkboy]

Looks a lovely spot guys

[mithrandir]

That looks like a spot we fished a couple of years ago, did the guy offer to make you a cup of tea, he was very friendly when we were there, and there were a load of living on barges people the other side of the bridge, and I remember a steep little bit of muddy climb to get to were I parked the car.

Glad to see you had some luck, the weather was not the best for float fishing, but glad you found a nice little spot. The ticket gives you 15 miles of the canal to choose from, not bad for £3 is it.

[Banana Steve]

Mike they have gone raised the day ticket to an extortionate rate, wait for it!
£3.50 for a days fishing.

seriously, it's well worth the day ticket price.

[Twiddler]

Haha, I can't afford to fish the canal ever again.....not with a 50p rise

[fishypaul]

nice little stretch of canal there and a good catch in the circumstances,well done

[Greenheart]

As Steve has already said, the K&A Canal has some fantastic fishing in beautiful surroundings. For what it costs, I really don't understand why more people don't fish it. It's the perfect match venue. It's a shame that Anglers these days seem to be pre-occupied with commercial Carp venues. The only thing that spoiled our trip was the gale force winds, that made bites almost impossible to spot. We both had some cracking quality Skimmer Bream, Roach & Rudd. I also lost a 2lb+ perch. I think this was due to the fact that my Pole was still loaded with fairly heavy Carp elastic & I was using barbless hooks. This meant I bounced a fair few fish off. However it was still a great days fishing.

[jack ruby]

Nice spot and 3.50 a whip.It can be up to 40 quid up here to fish for lumpy stocked rainbows in a dug out hole with no sceinic views.Well done!