It's A Sign

Back to the gravel pit for want of anywhere better. Where to fish was answered by the splash of panicking roach in one corner of the pool. As I was setting up another shoal broke surface in a panic just to my left. Clearly a sign. A headless sardine was dropped over to the right where the first shoal scattered and a roach to the left where the second shoal scattered. There they sat for quite some time save the occasional twitch from me. Another angler had turned up to fish a bit of bread punch for roach and was doing quite well. His catch included a couple of roach/bream hybrids, something rarely seen in this pit.

Around twelve the float above the sardine bobbed and shot away about two yards. I struck into nothing. I retrieved a slightly chewed bait which I tossed back to the same spot. Five minutes later the float above the roach did the same thing and again I struck into nothing. Back it went to the same spot. Ten minutes later the sardine rig performed the same trick. Cursing to myself  I popped the somewhat chewed sardine back to the same spot having injected a little oil in it. A little while later the roach angler popped over to say he'd had a pike lunge at a couple of fish as he retrieved them and his swim had died. I thought maybe that would be feeding time over and that I would have to wait to dusk for another bite.

I could see the other angler catching again when, around one thirty, the float above the roach bobbed. I struck straight away and contacted with something solid that came in like a wet blanket, until presented with the net. At this point it made several short runs as it tried to avoid the net before seemingly giving up. A healthy looking fish which kindly spat the hooks out in the net. At 85cm it weighed in at 10lb 1oz. Apart from a well healed scar on one side a very tidy looking fish.

I stayed on until nearly dark, but that was it. The chap fishing bread had quite a nice haul of pristine looking roach and hybrids all around the 3-4oz mark.

Music while typing provided by The Eternal Now with Andy Ortmann