Lee Swords Fishing

July 2013 may well go down as one of England’s rare summers!

I can remember 1977 and I can vividly remember the day it all ended and we got some rain…This one however may rival it…it is hotter than Taylor Swift on “Taylor Swift IS Hot Day!!”…And that is hot!

But it is still nowhere near as hot as my ‘nads got on Saturday night, my scrotal area ended up so hot and humid that I was beginning to worry that some botanical types would come and place a requisition order on my keks as a germination center for tropical orchids! Seriously I could have boiled lobsters on me little man!

But lets not talk about my overheated mini-beast and the potential for the propagation of rare flora in my ringing wet but un-skidded skiddies, lets talk fishing!!

I did try to fish the river last weekend but it was a circus…anglers, canoeists, bikers, walkers dogs, campers and a bloke on a uni-cycle playing the bongo’s!

Fooooook that!

I cannot handle company, I like solitude and peace so I decided that my next few trips would be nocturnal jobs so that I could minimise the amount of “others” that I would have to interact with.

Arriving on the banks of the mighty river Trent with a seriously cut back set of kit at 11pm meant that I was able to make the walk and be fishing for midnight…lucky for me I had cut back because I am not getting any younger and what with these hot nights I was sweating like a 1980′s childrens TV star by the time I got to where I needed to be…and where did I need to be?

I needed to be anywhere where the water looked to have a bit of life to it, think about it…what have we all done in the last few weeks? That’s right…We have opened the windows and let a bit of breeze into the house and that is just what the fish will be wanting when the weather is like this and the river feels like a bath tub…oxygen!

There is no point fishing deep still stretches with little or no flow, get on the shallower stretches where the surface of the water is moving and interacting with the air above, weirs are great this time of year but I generally don’t go there because weirs attracts fishing and none fishing idiots alike just as wasps are drawn to  honeypots and flies are drawn to shit or even mosquitoes to the thighs of drunken fat lasses on holiday in Egypt.

No, when I arrive on the river in the dark I go for lesser options, I go to the unfashionable stretches where I am confident my only company will be the other creatures of the wild places!

Anyway let me crack on because this is supposed to be a short piece about me fishing at night with nothing and nobody for company excepting a few Daubenton’s bats, the odd rat and mouse and hopefully at some point a barbel, a chub or even the occasional bream or two just to keep the rod tops moving!

I made up my batch of “attractivator” with extra Hook Bait Company boosters because this session is a sprint and not a marathon and I want maximum firepower from my loose feed so getting this done asap was first job because it allows the stuff  to settle and improve whilst I am getting the rods ready and the alarms set…all in all I was up and fishing in 10 minutes.

PLUG TIME!!

Korum two rod hold-all…awesome bit of kit!! Rods in and made up safe and sound…Rods out and put together job done!!

It does what it says on the box…I recommend it highly, I also have the 3-rod job…

Anyway less of the plugging and back to the fishing…Dropping a dollop of attractivator in the edge I was amazed at how fast the small stuff was on it…it looks to have been a good spawning year, lets hope we get good recruitment through because in five years time these will be my target fish!

I was also surprised when a bloody big crayfish turned up and began helping itself to some free food, I have seen Zebra Mussels and Mitten Crabs on the tidal but this cheeky bait snaffling crustacean was the first American Signal I have seen on the Trent, let’s hope the chub can keep their numbers down!

Two pale blue isotopes were slotted into the end of the rods and I was away…fishing!!

And ten minutes after that I was catching…ok…It was only a bream but it was a decent bream of about 7-8lb, I only weigh them now if they look over ten pounds :O)

Well there really isn’t much point is there?

Just As I do not weigh barbel that look under 8lb or chub under 4lb without good reason…I don’t weigh bream under 10lb!

That may sound a bit snobbish but I don’t need the slime aggro, it just isn’t worth it anymore I have had my Trent “double”  and one spare, so anything less is now not really worth the effort of logging down.

Anyway whatever my reason for doing things, they are my reasons and seeing as I can make my own mind up om things, I shouldn’t have to explain myself  so lets crack on and move away from the bream.

A quiet half hour passed where very little occurred before the bottom rod stuttered round in a typical chub take, this fish had taken a pellet cluster “gloopy” , it didn’t feel all that to be honest and I wasn’t surprised when it didn’t quite make four pounds in weight…oh well it can get recorder for posterity next year if I catch it again, this year it did not quite make the grade!

Oh well such is life…

 

Another twenty minutes passed before a decent “schoolie” barbel turned up and gave a bloody good account of itself but I must admit that it went back a bit sluggishly and felt hellish warm to the touch when I was handling it, I will be happier when a couple of degrees drops out of the water if I am honest because it feels like bath water at the minute.

Eventually the full dark began to fade and the second phase of bats arrived in numbers for their pre-dawn breakfast of moths and midges… I also notices a huge amount of daddies skittering about the grass and undergrowth maybe these are what the bats are after, the undergrowth was also covered in snails as well, mostly the white and brown rimmed snails Cepaea nemoralis and Cepaea hortensis but also some Succinea putris, a small nondiscript snail that does on occasion shed its dowdy image when it gets infested with a parasitic flatwom that causes its tentacles to become engorged and pulsate rhythmically…This generally ends up with the snail getting eaten by a bird and then the bird getting a dose of worms…and the wheel of life turns ever onward.

 * message to self. This is a fishing article so lets cut the crap out with the snail watching, everyone will think you’re a proper sad bastard.

Very soon the sun was thinking about coming up but as always whatever the time of year the old adage that the last hour of the night is the coldest came true once again and I sat shivering as the fog billowed down river and promised the potential of a spectacular dawn…but promise is all it did, nothing came of it, it was very grey indeed! I was very disappointed, I do like a spectacular dawn, one thing however that did not disappoint was the “Dawn Chorus” it was stunning…I never tire of hearing it.

 

The rod tip on the top rod slammed over and I was brought back to earth with a jolt…This one felt a bit bigger, a bit more power and a bit less speed, and so it was, it even managed to get itself a trip on the Reuben Heatons, this time the scales did not say “no” they said not quite 9lb 12oz

I checked the mobile phone and it said just before 7am…Time to text Tina…Time to go!

One more cast was made…

And one more barbel was landed and then it was time to go…Mission Accomplished in my books but not a mission for the faint of heart, a full shift at work serving almost 50 three course dinners, a midnight kick off and away before the loonies arrive to grill themselves to a crisp in 80 degrees of sun!

But then again..If you don’t push yourself you will never catch!

 

If you want to get your hands on any of the bait I have used in the article give The Hook Bait Company a ring!

 

 

The Hook Bait Company – 15 Dixon Close, Greetland, Halifax, West Yorkshire. HX4 8JX.

Tel: 07917 007827

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