Today I had the chance to get out at first light for a couple of hours on the local canal. As expected the water was very clear and the cabbages were starting to show on the bottom. Staring into the water it can often look fish-less, but they seem to be able to hide under what little vegetation there is. I also had the advantage that the wind was getting up creating a nice ripple on the water.
I started with a small Savage Gear crucian crankbait as it's quite natural looking so shouldn't frighten anything in the clear water. This failed to stir any fish in to action so I went the opposite way selecting a fire tiger 4-play. A lure that's worked well in the past down here. This too failed to elicit a response. Opening the lure box for some inspiration a Cannibal Shad in white with a sparkly back fell out. I took this as a hint despite the fact it had a 5g jig head. This meant it would have to be moved pretty quickly to stop it snagging on the cabbages. Two casts later and a good solid hit produced a rather nice hard fighting 30cm perch.
A little while later a small jack shot out from the bankside vegetation and grabbed the lure. It came in like a wet rag until it got near the landing net where it proceeded to leap about all over the place before being bundled into the net. I was contemplating another change of lure when another pike struck grabbing the lure not long after it hit the water near the far bank. This one was clearly larger and put up a good struggle on the light gear. Having got it in the net I lifted it from the water to see a distinct lack of pike. At first I thought I'd missed it with the net, but the line was heading straight to the net and through a large hole. A bit of faffing about and I had it back in the net and by lifting the net vertically kept the fish away from the hole. Quite why this hole had appeared I've no idea. I'm pretty sure it wasn't there earlier as I'd given all my nets a damn good check after a mouse infestation.
Time had flown by and it was time to leave. Walking back I noticed three yearling swans heading towards me. I then heard the distinctive noise of a swan taking off. Looking behind me the cob of the resident pair was heading very quickly towards them just above water level. The camera app on the phone decided it wasn't going to work in video mode and kept crashing. The youngsters took off and headed away from the canal before swing back towards it. The cob had landed on the water but wasn't entirely convinced they'd left and was swimming downstream, against the wind at walking pace. It swam along parallel to me as walked back to the car. It kept this pace up for nearly half a mile. The territorial boundary is appears to be the bridge. As soon as the yearlings passed under it it stopped swimming after them. The problem for the youngsters now was that they'd swam into another pair's territory and would be chased away again.
Not a bad couple of hours fishing wise. I'd have loved to get a video of the cob doing it's under the radar flight as it's quite spectacular.
Nice few fish, well done!
ReplyDeleteThanks. I was quite surprised especially the perch as they're quite thin on the ground.
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