First Fish of Spring

First of March and it's the first day of the meteorological spring, one of two first days of spring. In a change from the recent summer weather it was back to spring with a overcast slightly chilly day.

 








It was back to the Derwent again, which in this sort of weather looks a somewhat miserable place. Fishing over the same swims as last week, but this time I'd decided to fish one rod to a feature and trot dead bait in the faster water. This didn't prove very successful as it was five hours before I got my my first run to a float legered lamprey placed next to a snag. After a rare old battle a rather scared pike of 11lb 9oz and 92cm was in the net. One wound near it's tail was actually bleeding as I brought it to the net. I'm not really sure how it had come by these wounds as they didn't look like the sought of marks otters leave. After a long recovery it swam away strongly.

 











 








The next sign of action was three hours and several swims later, again to float legered lamprey fished under an overhanging tree. The float bobbed a few times then drifted down stream. I tightened down to nothing so tried twitching the bait back towards me to no effect. Same thing occurred when I returned the bait back under the tree. That was to be it for the day.