Weekend the 12 & 13th of March

[Banana Steve]

A couple of weeks before the 12th I received an offer from L-Man for which I could not refuse, a day’s fishing at Chew Valley of the bank. With this offer I couldn’t wait to go and when the day arrived I was up with the Larks and on my way to pick L-Man (Lee) from his home along with his son Sam. We arrived at the lake at around 7:30am to be greeted to a flat calm lake and with my anticipation nicely poised the day beckoned me to the lakeside.

By 8:15 both Lee's and my rods were out and the waiting game began.
Lee setting up his rigs


By 10:00am the wind had picked up and was blowing straight into our bank, Lee at this point was getting a little concerned that neither of us had got a bite, when suddenly Lee’s Bite Alarm screamed off. Lee raced over to his rods and lifted the rod up and waited and then stuck only to strike into nothing as the line on his reel had snapped. Lee was not amused, on looking at the line it looked as if the line had been weakened, we came to the conclusion that it may have been caught by one of the boulders that are in Chew Valley.

As the morning wore on into the Afternoon the wind really picked up and the water started to get very choppy. At this point the local sailing club came out to play, and for some unknown reason they decided that they would play in front of us for most of the Afternoon.

Local Sailing Club


As the rest of the day progressed the wind started to become cold and extremely stronger. Lee did have another bite, but on striking nothing materialised apart from a half eaten Smelt.
By 5pm we called a day as the wind was becoming unbearable and it was even stating to rain. On packing up and talking to a boat angler they said that no one was catching anywhere on the Lake, that made Lee and I feel a little better, at least Lee had two runs.

One the nicest thing I saw on the lake was Hawk hunting on the Bank behind us and Hawk even posed for us.

The Hawk




The 14th saw Simon Nutley and his partner Cindy and I returning to Todber to the lower lake on the area known as Whitepost. On arriving at the Shop at Todber I was slightly knackered from the day before and whilst waiting for the shop to open I found myself falling to sleep in my car. Simon and Cindy arrived at around 8:10 and we purchased our day tickets and headed off to the lake. By the way the new Tackle Shop at Todber is very good and well worth a visit.

Once we had arrived at the lake and chose our various swims we started to fish, I opted for the Waggler. ( I know I tend to opt for this option 9/10) I set the float up so it would get to the bottom of the lake quicker than normal by adding 3 number 8 shots to the hooklength and reducing the bulk shot around the float , by add the number 8 shots instead of my normal 2 no10’s still gave me the sensitivity and showed the bites if the bait was taken on the drop.

With feeding maggot and micro pellet I started to get some nice roach on the drop, some touching 10-12ozs. As the day progressed I started to catch some F1’s which on the light set-up was good fun.
I ended up with just over 18lb of fish, Cindy managed 14lb and Simon who fished the pole had a good day with over 30lb fish including a nice Koi

My Catch


Cindy’s Catch


Simon’s Koi


Simon’s Catch


Overall the two days fishing were enjoyable, just need the weather to warm up a bit more and start enjoying the Spring fishing.

[pingu]

unlucky on the pike there guys

and yep steve you do look proper shattered in this pic

but a nice social fish

dave

[northern eye]

Nice bags of fish there - and some great pictures. Roll on the warm spring/summer days eh?

[Simon N]

Fantastic Fishing On The Lower Lake At Whitepost, Had The Lake To Ourselves. Shame The Crucians Didnt Show.