steady as she goes

baitmaster · #1 11-27-2006, 12:52 AM

i received a call saturday evening from my good mate gary (the lure meister )
to see whether i was up for a session sunday evening (well what a silly question to ask me

).
i agreed and a time was set to meet up then we would have a look at where we fancied to go .
in no time at all i was at the fens and gary must have been keen to as he was all ready waiting where we had arranged to meet .
we stood on the bridge of one of the smaller drains and we watched the small fish dimpling on the surface while we caught up on the last few days and compared his luring to my bait fishing i remarked that the barometer reading was over a thousand now and rising it was around 1005mb .
soon we had made our minds up where we were going to head off to and set off on arriving at out venue we had a look round to see what was about i noticed the grebes way down the drain and we headed off towards them to see whether we could spot the silver fish as we walk along the top of the bank i noticed there was a pull on the drain not fast like it can do when the sluce gates are open but more of a steady flow fishable but i might need to add weight to my bobbins .
there was a stiff south westerly blowing down the drain which we both did not mind as this put a good ripple on the surface .
we had picked our area we were going to target this evening and soon the rods were made up and ready to cast out .
i been very confident with the tactics i,ve been using lately and have seen no need to change them as the zeds have been coming steaderly so my rigs were again kept the same with one in the middle and the other two less than a third out .i was feeling confident of a good evening and cast my first rod down the margin and then sent my next out to just about the centre of the drain on a stabbed dead bait .
i picked up the third rod and went to bait it when my alarm sounded on my dead bait i look across to see my bobbin speeding up towards the rod i quckly scramble across and struck and felt the fish it fought well in the steady flow but soon it was on the surface and gary came across and netted the zed for me we soon had a few pics of the 5lb 10oz fish and it was released .

great start i thought as i quckly rebaited with another dead bait and sent it back out soon i had all rod out again and settle down .
the kettle was soon sending steam out of the spout and a very welcome coffee was soon being drank by us .
as dusk fell my margin rod decided to come to lif and soon the bobbin was heading toward my rod and i soon was down on to the rod and struck i felt the fish and watched the tip arch round and i changed mt position on the bankto get a better footing but doing this allowed the fish to get some slack and it parted company with the fish .
i soon had the rod back out thinking it turning into a good session again
it was not long before i had another take but this time on my right hand rod which i had recast further over .
i struck into a good fish and againit stayed deep in the flow i slowly gain on it being very carefull not to bump this one soon gary was down be my side with the net and slid into the water in wait for the fish which niether of us had seen yet ,it them surfaced and shook its head angrily trying to dislodge the hooks which were holding firm it dived trying to escape and the water boiled in front of us .
gary pointed his torch downwards towards the bank and not at the fish to try and cast some low light so we could see the fish and in the low light which came from his head light a good fish could be made out thrashing on the surface gary scooped it up quickly and we peered into the net and we could see a very plump zed in the bottom once again it was unhooked quickly and weighed and a weight of 10lb 8oz was recorded and this was the fifth double of the season i was well pleased gary once again did the honuors and took the pics .

this was soon released and my rod was back out there no sooner had i put the bobbin on when the rod next to me alerted me that some thing was trying to get the roach i soon hit into it and the tip dipped over gary brought the net down and he wait patiently to see the fish surface it stayed deep and i could not seem to get it up now whether it was a pike or not it was not making life easy for me and i applied more pressure and i could feel it shaking its head down in the water below and againi felt the line go slack as the fish made its escape i check the hooks but they were fine they just probably did not get set into the zeds mouth properly .
i rebaited it and sent it back out and sat back with gary and had another brew and wondered if this was how it was going to continue through the evening it was now just turning 7pm and i all ready had banked two and lost two but i was hoping gary would get amongst them time was getting on and around 9pm the steady flow was stopped and the bobbins started to drop a couple of inches .
suddenly gary got a good take on his margin rod and we headed down to investigate and gary struck and connected with a fish it was soon banked and we unhooked it by the waters edge and release it straight away it was a pike of about 6lb but its stopped a blank .
i then got another run and i was soon on it but again after a few seconds it was off this sadly was the last action for the evening and again gary has not banked a zed on the bait rods but niether of us were dissapointed and he was as pleased as i was with the double as it was a good looking fish .

tightlines
kevin