Pike in the Sun

Friday's session, although slightly curtailed, was a pleasant day out in the sun. I'd popped down to the local gravel pit, which is slowly filling back up after the summer drought. The first swim was next to a fallen tree. I dropped a sprat in nest to it and a sardine over to the left in the deeper water. After a short time the float shot under the tree and I was into a small, but very spirited little jack.  just as I got the hook out it 'swam' through my hand back into the pit and shot off in the surface of the water, like a torpedo back under the tree. Normally this wouldn't have bothered me at all, but it was such a striking and vividly coloured fish I'd of liked a photo of it.

After another hour I moved swims. This swim had a bit more room to it and commanded a great area of the pit. Again a sprat was dropped in to the right, nest to a over hanging tree. The sardine had a length of balsa poked down it's throat and a shot a couple of inches from it's tail to pop it up just off the bottom. Injected with sardine oil it was cast out onto the central bar. Again I didn't have to wait long before a run on the sprat. A jack of 66cm that came in like a wet blanket till I bent down to chin it, at which point it went berserk. Leaping about all over before landing on the bank and calming down. I don't know if it had concussed itself but it was in the landing net recovering for over ten minutes before showed any desire to leave. In the mean time I'd dropped a sprat next to the over hanging tree to the left.

 








The next run was on the rod out in the middle and was one of those is moving or am I imagining it runs. Steadily it sped up and I was met with something heavy that started to feel like a big lump of weed or something. It seemed to get lighter the closer it got. There was nothing apart from the sardine when I got it to the bank. The only damage was where the hooks had slipped a bit. I do use a few turns of light elastic thread on sardines to stop them coming adrift when they hit the water. This bait was returned back from whence it came. The float under the tree then started bobbing about before setting off further under the tree, I struck into nothing. A little while later it was off again and I was into another jack which put up a bit more of a struggle  in the water than the last one. A fish of 68cm. I dropped anther sprat in front of me on the 'pole line', but after half an hour it was time to go.











At one point in the afternoon a buzzard flew over and circled about, it's reflection on the water looking more impressive than trying to stare up through the trees at it.