Summer Piking

Greenheart · #1 08-01-2011, 06:33 PM

Thought i'd give our clubs new stretch of rive a go for pike last weekend (Saturday). Got off to a late start & was down on the river by 10am. I'd had a go at spinning & plugging one evening during the previous week without success, so this time i'd decided to fish deadbaits. My chosen baits were Lamprey & Mackerel fished hard on the bottom in one of the deeper pools.

My baits had only been in the water for about 5 minutes when I had a screamer of a run that almost took the rod in. The culprit was a feisty little pike that weighed in at exactly 8lb. A lean mean fighting machine that tail walked down the river & had me hurriedly slacking off my reel clutch to stay in control....

A quick photo, & he swam off strongly. Shortly after, another club member, also called Ian showed up to try for pike & chub. Ian started off loose feeding some floating crust as the previous evening the local chub had been going mad for floating bread. Sadly, today they showed no interest, so Ian set up a pike rod baited with a tiny brown trout. He also had some plump Herring to try. Things went quiet for a couple of hours with only the local cows & Kingfishers to watch. Then I noticed one of my rods bending round & the freespool turning. Strange, i'd been busy talking to Ian, but hadn't heard the bite alarm. Once again I had a spirited fight with more acrobatics from the pike. This one was a little smaller at around 6lb

A quick check of the bite alarm revealed i'd forgotten to turn it on...

As I had a barbecue planned for later in the afternoon, I decided to call it a day & packed my gear away. Just as I was saying goodbye to Ian, his rod pulled round & he struck to find this nice hard fighting fish attached....

A great day nicely rounded off with a barbie & a few pints of cider.

On calling Ian later on, I discovered that he'd hooked & lost another pike. I think our new bit of river has loads of potential for pike & I shall definately be having an Autumn / Winter campaign to try for some of the upper doubles that i'm sure this river contains..... Both my fish were caught on Mackerel tails. I'm not sure what Ian caught his on.