First Fish Of The Year

With the rivers on the rise again I made my way to the gravel pit. I was surprised to find ice still on it. In fact there were only four fishable swims, two of which were already taken. I did ponder whether it was worth fishing as there was only a couple of rod lengths before the ice. While having a natter one of the anglers landed a broad headed stubby pike of 15lb. This gave me some hope so I set up in the other corner swim.

 

A sardine was tossed out to the edge of the ice and a roach suspended just off the bottom was drifted into the little bay to my left until it hit the ledge.. The ice did slowly retreat on the side we were all fishing, but not on the far side. Just before twelve a pike drifted through the swim into the bay. Ten minutes later the float moved  very very slowly against the drift. Winding down I was in contact with a lively little fish that was soon in the net, which was a good job as the failure to strike resulted in the hooks dropping out the moment the line went slack. A rather empty fish of 77cm and 6lb 10oz with a rather distinctive scar on one side.

Another roach went back in and the sardine was injected with oil and cast into deeper water as the ice had now retreated some more. Mid-afternoon the temperature dropped and it felt like it could snow. A fret formed over one end of the pit, but disappeared as it started to drizzle. Those were the only fish of the day as far as I know. It was nice to get off the mark and nice to see a double in such good condition. I was also informed that pike a showing on the estate lake, not many but pike no the less.

Music while typing provided by : Idyllic Music Podcast

Second Session of 2021

With the local rivers a tad overfull, one even above it's previous record height, the second session of the year had to be at a stillwater. I headed to the local gravel pit half expecting it to be full of anglers. I was surprised to find only one there. I was also surprised to see some ice still left as well. The other angler, pike fishing, reported one dropped run. After a bit of a natter I set up in the opposite corner, after a bit of umming and ahhing. A trout was flung out to the end of the gravel bar and a roach dropped into the little bay to my left. The water level had final risen, but not as high as I'd expected. Still, it was nice to see it at a reasonable level again. Several other anglers eventually arrived, either pike fishing or maggot drowning. One informed me a couple of anglers had had nine pike out earlier in the week. Today there was nothing  coming out. Apart from the dropped run the only other sign of fish was the ones the kingfisher caught. Everybody seemed to agree last night's frost hadn't helped. It wasn't a bad day though. there was a bit of warmth in the sun for a while and when the chill breeze dropped the big coat wasn't needed.

I think the stillwaters are going to get a bit of a bashing over the next few weeks as we wait for the rivers to drop, provided they don't freeze over again. Which, given the projected temperatures could well happen. As usual when nothing much is happening I didn't take mnay photos, despite my New Year's resolution to do so.

First Session Of 2021

The last few days of 2020 had been cold, hovering around zero, but sunny. The first day of 2021 was to be warmer, up to four degrees, but wet and windy. As I loaded up the car in the drizzle and breeze it felt a lot colder than previous days. I decided to head to the river as it was now only one metre up and I thought the still waters may well be still iced over. The carpark had turned into an ice rink and had yet to thaw. It did mean however that the muddy path down to the river was nice and solid. The ings was covered in a couple of foot of water that was steadily draining away into the beck. Although it looked to have thawed the gulls wandering about on it told a different story. I decided to stat at the bottom swim by the confluence of the beck.

I'd got set up and the brolly up before the drizzle turned to rain. A trout went out just beyond the shelf but still in the large slack. A sardine was placed on the top of the shelf by an upstream sunken willow. My intention had been to fish several swims for an hour or so each. The rain put pay to this idea. In a short gap in the rain I had a quick wander with the lure rod. The rain on top over the frozen mud meant a lot of swims were just far to dangerous to fish. I did fin=d a couple of swims with large slacks in front of them that I could move to. The rain stated gain and continued to lunch time. Apart from a sunken branch dislodging the float there was no sign of activity.

After lunch I moved to another swim. The sun came out for a couple of hours and the breeze dropped which made things a bit more pleasant. No action was to be had after a couple of house I moved to another swim opposite Bishopthorpe Palace. A nice backdrop, but it didn't influence the pike in any way. I was blessed with a short view of the local otter though. Frighteningly it disappeared underwater rather close to one of the baits. I don't know if otters take dead fish, but thankfully this one didn't. I also witnessed a cormorant crash land on the ice which was rather amusing. Rather than fish to dark in the hope of avoiding a blank I decided to navigate the icy path back to the car in daylight. Back at the carpark I talked to a chap that had fished here several times in the past couple of weeks. He too hadn't had a run an any of his trips, but had seen a pike taken on the opposite bank yesterday.

 Not the start I would have liked to 2021, but the action cam worked properly. It clearly doesn't like sub-zero temperatures. Back to work tomorrow, so it'll be next week before I get out again.