No more Blankety Blank, thank you

[fullcreel]

We woke up to Brass monkey weather, every thing frozen solid, about 2 inches of ice on the water tank at work. Here's a snap of the strawberry patch.

We left a tad late, and made our way to Steve's Tackle in Warminster to get the tickets, and some hot saussage rolls to keep the chill out, we arrived at the bank by 12.
I settled in my usual spot just upstream of the bridge, there was another angler in the free swim downstream of the bridge, who had no bites all day. Jp settle in a few yards upstream of me, with the idea of fishing an upstream feeder, and I put a feeder down stream, by a tree which I know to be a nice holding place, last time I had some nice chub from there.
Any way here's my first swim.

JP's swim upstream of me.

We both fished small maggot feeders, thinking that due to the very cold night the fish would prefer a static bait, this was coupled with fine hook lengths and small hooks, in my case it was a 20 fine wire hook to 1.5lb hook length, the rod was my fave the Sigma Wand, very delicate.
We both cast out within moments of each other, and had bites within seconds, JP had a nice small roach, and I a small perch.


We had a series of small fish, JP and I both had a brace of brown trout, and a tarty little perch.
Tarty Perch.

I'm not going to pst each fish here, but we did wel, and as soon as JP finds a sea fishing partner he's going to enter the species contest. TJ and I will be Team B.A.W.D again, and we got a few poinrts, JP has more in the bank, as I did not get a roach, or a minnow. But I caught more chub than him.
We did some leap frogging upstream, after a very aerobatic trout spolit the swim, (it was on my line).
I changed to lob worm tipped with maggot and had some fine brown trout. The downside to this was the lobs which had been in my shed/workshop ha dfrozen, still the put some trout in the net, none larger than 1lb, but fun on light tackle.
As soon as Team B.A.W.D's been registered I claim some ponts, and I'll be sorting out JP's point pics when he gets a partner and a name.
Tigt lines for 2010 everyone.

[fishypaul]

well done on braving the cold matt, nice stretch of river

[Jolly Piscator]

I think Matt forgot to mention that we were on the Nadder at Tisbury, a very pretty stretch of river that usually fishes well in the winter months. It was a very enjoyable afternoons fishing even if the hoped for ' lady of the stream' didn't show - very fickle those posh girls ! just sitting on the bank in the sun and still air was a treat after recent conditions.
Ps. As Matt says I will be joining the species hunt this year so looking for a sea going partner for this .

[blackwater]

well done both of you...

BW

[pingu]

lovely looking place, and well done

dave

[Twiddler]

Well done guys.....fishing seems pretty tough at the moment, so any catch is a bonus

[fullcreel]

And a few points too, although our teams are not up yet.
Not that our catch was unusual, I expect many more roach and baby chub this year. What was pleasing was the brown trout, waited 12 monthes to catch one last year, and get soem on my first trip to the river this year.

[BaggieRich]

Well done gents. A nice afternoon's fishing!