Opening Day

Today, Good Friday, was the opening day of the trout season here in Yorkshire. So, armed with a new rod, reel and line, I set of to the river. Given the extent off the recent flooding and the fact it was still carrying nearly a foot of extra water I wasn't expecting much. I was surprised to see most of the colour had now gone and, as I wondered round, the few riffles and pools were still in the same place.

My initial plan of attack was to fish two nymphs below a sighter. The two flies were both PTNs the upper one being a gold head to get them down. I also intended to fish a couple of spiders through the faster sections.

My casting proved to be somewhat rusty as I got used to the new outfit. It eventually dawned on me that it wasn't just getting used to the new set up that was the problem, I'd forgotten to give the new line a bit of a stretch. Once I'd done that things got a lot better in the casting front. Not that this impressed the trout at all. Nor were they impressed with worms either, as a natter with another angler revealed. He'd just had a couple of grayling on the lower stretch.

A move to the upper end of the fishery don't prove any more fruitful either. but I did see my one an only flying insect of the day. Not sure what it was as insect identification is not one of my strong points.



A miss cast late in the day produced my one and only fish of the day, a small chub. It grabbed a GRHE complete with a bit of bank side debris just as it hit the water after I'd tugged it of the bank. It has to be said, this is not a particularly prolific trout fishery. Most of the trout I caught last year were taken on lures or while trotting maggots for other species. Still, it was nice to out on the only decent day over Easter.

Final Day

As I couldn't get the 14th off today was the last day of the river season for me. With the river now carrying just 1m of extra water and a lot of the colour gone from it i decided to give it one last go with the lure rod. There was one more problem, though. Would the banks be accessible after weeks of floods depositing mud all over them.

On arrival at my chosen length it quickly became apparent that no angling activity had taken place for some time. Even the dog walkers appeared to have given the area a miss, as the only  footprints down the bank were from the wildlife, rats, dusk, heron, otter, and deer.

Deer Tracks

After a few hours of slipping around on the banks and chucking lures it into the eddies and slacks along the bank I eventually latched on to a nice hard fighting double. This would have done me, but nest cast produced a smaller fish grabbing the lure on the drop. sadly it wasn't the hot spot I'd hoped it would be and no more came out. As the next section is heavily tree lined with very few swims I returned to the car quite happy and headed of to another section.

10lb 5oz

This section, despite been easier to access, also showed no sign of angling activity nor did it produce any fish either. It did highlight another danger after floods. A collapsed undercut bank, that I would have stood on to fish as it would have made a large slack easily accessible.

I'll be back on the rivers in a couple of weeks when the trout season opens.

A Strapping Pike

With the rivers still a bit high Friday saw me down at the Aire and Calder Canal, for the first time in many years. It was still  as I remember it, long stretches of apparently featureless iron clad banks punctuated with with the occasional locks and bridges.

My first port of call was a lock complex as this at least provided some features and variation. I started of with small jerk baits which failed to elicit any form of response, nor did a selection of noisy crank baits.Deciding the fish were may sulking on the bottom I then bounced an E-Sox Jell-Ignite slowly along the bottom and was soon rewarded by a near 7lb pike. Buoyed up by this  I continued on. Fishing around the couple of bridges, where the channel narrowed and close to the side along the rather featureless stretches.

I only saw one other angler, who was jigging for perch, and struggling. He told me that it had been hard work since Christmas with the fish not shoaling up as usual. He had heard of a few pike taken on another stretch though. So I decided to give it a try.

A last cast below the lock, before moving off saw me latch into what initially felt like a fish as it swung about in the current created by the out-flow. After a bit of a struggle it turned out to be a mussel covered strap from a lorry.

At the new stretch, which apart from a bridge appeared featureless I wandered along chucking a larger jerk or two, but failed again to elicit any action.

With only a couple of days left til the end of the season I'm hoping the rivers are get low enough to allow my to at least get down the banks to fish them rather than stood at the top of the flood bank.

Pike Takes My Bait

With the rivers still not a comfortable height, for me, to fish and reports of pike taking fish as they were been brought in, I headed to a, small, local pit.  I'd also been told it was rather full as the places you would normally plonk a chair now had up to 18" of water covering them. It also meant the margins were deeper than normal which would help my plan for the day.

This should be dry land

Arriving at my chosen swim, which has a couple of nice feature either side and a good command of the bar out front. In order to attract a few bait fish  I tossed in some roughly liquidised sweet corn around the feature and out to the line normally fished by the float anglers. The other advantage of this swim is it can be seen from all the other swims which would assist in my first course of action, which was to drop a sprat in around the features in the other swims. A small bob float and a single hook rig had been tied on the night before and I set off to the corner swim with the intention of fishing each feature for about 5-10 minutes. I'd used this tactic in the past and while it normally produced the odd jack here and there, it did occasionally throw up larger fish. One  problem soon manifest it's self though, the margins were full of debris especially silver birch branches. In fact twig fish seemed to be the order of the day as I made my way round.

Popped up Lamprey section

I eventually arrived back at my kit, fish less, and tossed the bait close to a fallen tree, but it failed to cock despite the depth. a slow pull with the rod showed it had snagged a sunken branch. A bit more pull and it came free but the bait also came free and slowly fluttered from view only to disappear amid a large swirl as a pike shot out and grabbed it. I quickly impaled another sprat on the hook and cast it back from whence it came. Despite fish at different depths and free-lining a bait, there was no sign of it wanting to eat further. In the meantime I'd cast a popped up lamprey onto the bar.

There must be something in here to entice a Pike

I moved the float fished bait between the three nearside swims and continued to toss in some of the sweetcorn with out any action. At various points through the day I twitched the lamprey, throw lures about and wobbled a roach with out any success. At one point I did latch onto the largest twig fish of the day with a deep diving plug, which at least put a bend in the rod.

Giant stick fish

With rain forecast for all day tomorrow it looks like the end of the river season could be a wash out.

Jack Saves The Day

A later start than normal saw me packing the car with the usual collection of pike gear and hoping the pike would  be obliging. A 23 had come out earlier in the week so hopes were high.

The plan of action for the day was to fish dead baits for a couple of hours then throw lures about before moving to another swim if there was no action. This what happened in the first swim. I moved to my next chosen swim, with the same plan.

After a couple of hours with no action I started to throw a lure about. The last cast with the lure rod produced a follow, as did the next couple of casts before a pretty jack grabbed hold of the lure. As I brought it close to the bank I realised it had a point throw both the bottom and top of it's mouth and hadn't crushed the barbs. Thankfully the hook came out easily.  Not sure if it was the same fish that had followed the lure three time I remained in the swim til darkness, but with out any further action.

I'm on holiday for the rest of the week, the last week of the coarse season and was hoping to get a bit of river fishing done. The recent rain though has seen the rivers rise very rapidly, as the water logged ground meant it ran straight into the rivers. Hopefully they should drop quickly to a reasonable level to get a bit of river fishing done.