December-January Review.

blackwater · #1 01-26-2012, 03:16 PM

Hello Everyone,

I hope everyone had a great Christmas and have set themselves some fishing related targets for the new year!

First of all I will upload some photos that I have been waiting on in near a year! They are from a trip up the Mourne Mountains last year in the hope of some very wild brownies!

We started up that direction... somewhere!

Trust me... there is a trout in that photo if you can find it

Is there anything more perfect in fishing than a wild brownie? I really doubt it!

Sorry about the photo overload but its such nice scenery it deserves the photos.

This year for Christmas i treated myself to a 9wt fly rod for some pike fishing, its a Sonik sk4 9ft with a matching Sonik reel. I am more than pleased with the rod and reel, it really is a lovely piece of kit to work with.

On my first trip out I blanked, not for want of trying, i had many small jacks follow the fly in to near the boat but obviously i was doing something not just quite right.

A few trips later I managed to break the set up in! I headed to a new venue that I had been recommended to try. I packed my float tube in hope that i could get a cast of 2 with my new fly rod! The day started well with pike of about 9lbs falling to smelt ledgered tight to the bottom in approx. 30ft water.
The action was steady from the bank with fish falling to smelt and lamprey whereas the mackerel tail wasn't even having a sniff! I have found that alot recently, its been declining as a bait, maybe its just me or is anyone else finding this?

I filled myself up with bacon from my new stove, its a new thing for us to cook when fishing and all i can say is that it is AMAZING!!

This photo should have a health warning

After i got filled up i blew up the tube as there was a lull in the wind and i headed for the shallower bays in the lake. armed with a rabbit strip style fly with a red head and white tail i began casting close to the reed beds, after a few casts i hit into my first pike on the fly, it was a hard fighting fish of around 3lbs.

This fish was followed shortly after by one of a similar size.

I kept at it and i felt like my casting was improving with cast. so i was confident of a little more action and that's what i got! I ended up with 2 fish around the 10lbs mark. They don't look like it in the photo but it's not easy working a camera and a pike when you are floating around on the lake.

The fight i got with both of the above fish was incredible! Anyone who has caught pike and think they fight hard on spinning or deadbaiting rods then you have felt nothing 'til you hook one on a fly rod... and on a float tube!

I fought both for, I'm sure 10 mins and i loved every minute of it!

I headed in and waited to dusk for more action from the bank, we had a few more and that was that. A very enjoyable day, with 11 fish from the bank and 4 on the tube I went home a very happy person!

There were a few more sessions but none were really too exciting, I can't remember blanking so that cant be a bad thing! This is the report from tuesday's session.

I went on Tuesday morning fishing on my own which is fairly unlike me, walking through the fields in the dark isn't something I particularly enjoyed but it had to be done! Every movement in the hedge sounds 10x louder at 6.30am

I set up with my trusty, smelt and lamprey tight on the bottom at my local.

Fishing was steady until around 11am with 6 pike, none huge but all were very welcome. The fishing picked up again around 3 and that's when I had a nice pike and the first double of the season. It came to lamprey and was just under 14lbs. Luckily my friend had just arrived to take the photo of me and the fish!

That's all for now, but I hope to get out within the next few days before I have to head back to Uni for another semester!

Cheers,

JC