A day to re-boost my confidence

[Banana Steve]

After the three days at Crockerton, my confidence was a little low, so after deliberating where would be the best possible place to go to re-build my confidence, I opted for Todber Manor.

So on Tuesday the 6th of April, I headed off to Todber. I arrived at around 9am ish. The first port of call was the tackle shop. Needed to find out what and where was fishing well. On speaking to Ki in the shop he recommended Park Lake, as it was fishing well at the moment. So armed with a few supplies and bait I headed to Park Lake.

On arrival the lake was empty, but there was a strong wind coming from the west {and not from me} the West bank has a few conifers that help as wind break. So using the natural break I set up on a corner of an Island and decided to fish two styles. The float rod with a “Still Water Blue” dotted right down. This option was set up to fish just of the island. I set the float as normal, but the hooklength was not as long as would normally be, this time the hooklength was around 6inchs in length. The reason I did this was to avoid catching the island as I casted out, when I cast I tend to tap the spool on the reel, this then throws out the hooklength in a forward motion and with my normal hooklength’s at 8+ inches that would have placed it in the undergrowth. I used a size 18 B911 barbless hook with a 0.13mm hooklength which came in at around 3lb. My main line of attack would be maggot with the odd grain of corn. {Note to self, for normal corn buy it from grocery shops from now on, paid £1.47 for a can of corn, because I forgot to get some. Not the tackle shops fault but “Van den eyde” who you kidding.} My second option was to fish in the margin this time with the pole, I set-up my 6mtr margin pole with a number 18 elastic {A bit harsh so stepped down to a No10} the rig was a very fine that took 3 No10 shots to settle it down. The hook was a size 16 Preston PR16, they look like a question mark, but I find them perfect for Corn and Soft Pellets. This swim was to be feed with Corn and Pellet and the hook bait was to be Corn and a hookable soft pellet.

I started on the Still water blue and within the first cast I hooked my first fish. A small Roach of around 2ozs, it was a fish and I didn’t have wait for hours to have the bite. {Confidence up one notch} Next cast saw me catch a Rudd of 6 to 7ozs, the thing I have noticed with these fish is the deep red of their fins, seems to be a trait for the Todber fish.


Whilst I wasn’t catching every cast, I was getting bites nearly every cast which helped raise that confidence even more. To my left another angler turned up and I think she was in the same mind as me “get out of the wind” she settled herself down in the next peg where she set herself up with a float rod, and fished close in using bread and she did very well on it as well. When I went to have a chat I noticed that the rod she had was the very first proper rod I ever owned a D.A.M minor match, boy did that bring back memories. Any way I digress, whilst catching well on the “Still water blue” I swapped over to the pole and with a minute of placing the rig in the water I hooked a small F1` of around 8 to 10ozs. This where I found that the Elastic that was in the top sections was a bit heavy, so onto the No10 elastic, but even that was a tad heavy, as the biggest fish I hooked on the pole was no more than a 1lb. I even lost a few due to bouncing them off including a Golden Tench, {points, no lost points} I fished the pole in 10 minutes stints and the float rod in 15 minute stints this then gave me chance to rest the swims.

When I went back onto the float rod, I started to hit into the F1’s which on my light match rod gave me some real fun.
The average F1


I had been at the lake about 3hrs when a another Angler turned up with his two sons, they too headed in my direction but thankfully they didn’t fish in the peg on my right, they went round a bit further. It’s true what they say anglers attract anglers. By the time I left there was 6 anglers on the whole lake and they were around where I was.

Anyway back to the report, whilst fishing the float I hooked into a zoo creature, I couldn't do anything with it, when I noticed that there was a birds nest in my reel and with the fish taking line I had to sort the mess, there I was trying to free up the birds nest, with the fish pulling it tighter, I don’t know how I did it but I sorted it, so it was back to playing the fish then suddenly the hook pulled and a plume of slit rose to the surface. “Bugger” or words to that effect.
So it was back onto the pole and the first put produced me a smile a small but perfect little “Golden Tench” as they count as normal Tench this was 1.5 points for the hunt.


I fished on for another hour and by 2pm my confidence had got back to its normal state, so whilst on a high I called it a day. I am going to give my club waters ago tomorrow, not certain which one but I will be going and I will most probably fish the pole. So here’s looking forward to that.

[paul p]

Nice one steve

[blackwater]

well done, lovely golden tench..

BW

[JustMark]

Glad you got your confidence back Steve. It was never a lack of skill or determination. Merely a lack of fish.

[ben lee]

Well done steve nice tench. Good luck tomorrow.

[Greenheart]

Well done Steve. Pretty little Tench that....

[pingu]

very informative report there steve and sounds a lovely day

dave

[Simon N]

Well Done Steve Great Little Tench

[BoldBear]

Nice report steve.

[mithrandir]

Originally Posted by Banana Steve

, whilst fishing the float I hooked into a zoo creature,

I have only fished Park lake the once, and there is something in there that likes to snap you off, I had heard there were some still water barbel in there, it could have been one of those.

Nice report and good to get some confidence back, I was half thinking of going to Wadmill this saturday to see if I can remember what a fresh water fish looks like.