Small River Pike Fishing

After talking about sorting a river pike fishing session with my friend Oscar Bates for some time, I suggested that a roving trip on a particular tributary would be the best call for a catchup and the chance of a nice fish or two. On arrival at the small waterway, we could see the river bed in many areas suggesting that the water was very low and gin clear. We certainly knew that our work would be cut out to get a few takes. After acquiring a few baits to lip-hook, we started slowly roving our way through. On the second swim Oscar had a take and had hooked into a good perch, which was soon landed. My bait was left in the water and I then saw my float sail off. We must have found a pack of decent perch! Oscar's plumper fish weighed a little under 2lbs at 1lb 11oz and mine went 1lb 8oz.

A pair of beautiful River Perch!

Later on in, the session took a different turn when there was an accident involving my favourite feeder rod when we headed back to the car for lunch. Henceforth, we decided to leave all the excess feeder gear in the car and headed back out with a lot more roving flexibility. In the process of Oscar catching a few more small baits on his lure rod, we suddenly saw a pike come and flash at a particular perch Oscar hooked. Hoping we hadn't spooked it, I casted my float out and waited. Sure enough as the bait steadily settled into a steadier area within the swim, it slowly sailed under. I waited as I was only using a single hook on the trace before winding down. I had connected with the first pike of the day. It was only a 'Jack' pike but it certainly gave a great account of itself and displayed some fine colours.

A lovely streamlined River Pike!

Oscar and I were both overjoyed that we had managed to break the deadlock and roved on with a spring in our step. After covering a fair bit of water, we had now roved the entire stretch. Just as we were thinking of retracing our steps, Oscar sighted a decent pike sitting in a slack really tucked away. With the swim being an awkward one to get to, Oscar scrambled down with his rod and managed to beautifully cast the bait towards the fish. Just as the pike was looking at it, Oscar's bait mysteriously disappeared. We were both quite confused until I got a better view of what was going on and saw another pike was moving the bait in its jaws. Oscar struck and hooked into the pike, but as he was doing so the larger fish came into view and was either eying up the smaller pike or investigating the commotion. I couldn't resist to have a cast, considering the fish had moved into a perfect position to cast to. As soon as my bait settled into the water I saw the pike absolutely devour the bait with its whole jaw structure committed to engulfing the whole thing. Without any further hesitation I struck and we were in this bizarre scenario of having two feisty pike on at the same time! Oscar quickly landed his which was a nice Jack of a similar stamp to the one we had just caught, before kindly giving me a hand with the turbo-charged culprit I had hooked into, confidently chinning it after what had been a series of serious sprints!

A cracking small stream pike!

We quickly took this quick shot and released the stunner back to swim back to sulk at her snaggy home. All in all, it was an enjoyable session on the river with thanks going to Oscar for being great company throughout the day.

Tight Lines,

Tom

More Perch on the Lures

The tell-tale sergeant stripes!

From my recent blog, I'm sure many of you have gathered that I have slightly got the lure bug! Having picked up a few new lures and jigheads on the internet, I was dying to give them a try in some of the nice swims I had found. I decided on the first trip to go and try a couple of spots that in the past I have sighted some absolute monster perch. On the first stretch, I had a good follow from a good-sized perch, but unfortunately this was the only action that was to be had on the particular section. Having brought worms with me too, I decided on one of the more familiar stretches to try and twitch one in the path of a perch. I imagined with the conditions in front of me this was certainly going to be pretty deadly. Having arrived at a particular swim, I spotted three perch. I attached a split shot on the hooklink, and casted just above them and twitched the worm into their sight. The biggest one which looked a good pound or so started to move for it, but in a millisecond I saw one of the smaller perch push ahead and grab it themselves. It was nice to have managed another pretty perch in these difficult conditions and decided it was time to go home as I had a job induction the following day.

This one took a liking to a juicy worm!

The following session was a morning session, the day after my induction, and I felt confident having had a few natural-coloured lures arrive, that it was definitely worth another shot on the lures. The beginning of the session proved challenging, but eventually a single perch gave itself away, was there any of those better fish lurking which I had been sighting on sessions prior? On one particular cast I went a bit tighter to the streamer weed and let the lure sink down a bit more. I slowly retrieved the it, covering the past kill zones and out of nowhere a good perch appeared and absolutely devoured my natural-coloured lure. After an initial crazy burst of energy and plenty of sprints, a good perch graced the surface. I nervously reached for my net and managed to safely net it. Although it didn't look much longer than the 1lb 7oz perch I had prior, it's build was on a slightly better level and I knew it was at least creeping towards 2lbs. After quickly putting it on the scales, my face lit up when I saw the dial hovering between 2lbs and 2lb 1oz. It was great to have had a perch of this stamp as it has been years since I've had anything from this waterway of that similar stamp.

A stunning 2 pounder!

I continued the day, managing another smaller perch and disappointingly losing a good pike, which absolutely tore line off my little reel and had my light lure rod buckled over. The day was an overall success though, as I had achieved my little target of a fish around the 2lb stamp. It was certainly encouraging though, as this fish was certainly not the biggest I had seen on my trips so far, so will be nice to get out and target a few more fish of this stamp sometime soon!

Tight Lines,

Tom Aldous

Perch Fishing on Lures

Perfect haunt for Predators

After my new lure rod arrived, I was itching to head back out on the river to have another go for some of the stunning perch. After a day or so of bright and humid weather, a more overcast day motivated me to get out, as it was likely the perch would be on the prowl. The areas I had in mind consisted of a couple of darker and deeper patches of water, where I had sighted a fair few perch on a couple of occasions this summer, whilst walking the rivers. I started off in a few familiar swims and tried to get a feel for the new lure rod. I felt that extra precision and finesse in my retrieve and was hopeful that if I spotted a perch, I could agitate it into taking my jig. I opted to try the same micro pattern as my previous session, as they have an immense action through the water. After trying a few likely looking areas, I found myself in the zone which was a lot quieter and shadier, a perfect haunt for predators. After retrieving a few times in the deep hole with one less than decisive grab, I decided to try the near margin. With the aid of a simple flick cast and a nice short rod, I managed to get the lure nice and deep into the cover. As the lure hit the bottom, I slowly started to retrieve, and as I started to put a bit of a twitch from the rod tip into the retrieve, the lure got absolutely devoured. I tightened into the fish and saw that I had a lovely looking perch on. In typical river perch style it gave a great account of itself on the light lure rod.

A vividly coloured chalkstream perch!

It was great to see the perch go back strongly into the crystal clear water, and I knew that it would definitely be worth trying the deeper hole upstream. After working the pool, a nice perch came into view. I flicked my jig into its path and slowly tweaked it into its view. Without hesitation the perch snatched the lure and I was into a slightly better stamped fish. Following a great scrap, another vividly looking perch was in the net. This fish weighed it at 1lb 7oz which was actually bigger than I thought. After watching yet another fine-looking perch swim resiliently back into its watery home, it was time to go home for a spot of lunch.

A vividly coloured River Perch!

I decided a few days later to head out for another attempt at these quite elusive perch. The conditions were, again, nice and overcast and looking good for a perch or two. Several hours were spent this session struggling to tempt them on the lure of choice and finding the right opportunity to present the lure in their path. After a fair bit of pioneering and thinking, I decided to cut my lure down to a smaller size to accommodate for their finicky mood. It did take a while though to get the perfect scenario to present the lure, but once it came, it was quite a bizarre sight to witness. A pack of five perch were lined up and attacking a little eel that was burying its way into the silt. After casting the lure into their path and jigging it to agitate them, with the paddle tail convulsing in an appetising fashion, one eventually decided they had had enough and struck! After another very spirited battle another stunning river perch graced the net.

Stunning colours!

As I decided to work my way back, I decided to squeeze my way into a very dark and shaded swim. I casted the lure down stream and started to work it steadily with the odd twitch. Just as I saw the lure coming into view, I saw another pretty perch following. I slowed the retrieve and had yet another hit! Another spirited scrap followed and a very boldly coloured and proud perch I quickly admired in the water before unhooking her in the water. This one was in great condition and the colours again failed to disappoint.

It was really enjoyable to have gotten into some lure fishing with thanks going to some good mates for their helpful advice on this discipline within the sport.

Tight Lines,

Tom Aldous

July 2016 Update: Carp, Tench and Lure Fishing

A fine summer's evening

Last week, I decided to renew one of my Club Tickets to make the most of all the waters within walking distance from my home, and target stillwater species in conditions which are tougher from a river perspective. The species that have been on my mind of late are carp, tench and eels. I have also been contemplating getting into light lure fishing, which was also on the agenda for my local river. For the first outing, I decided to venture down for a short afternoon's session on my local club lakes after some carp and tench. As the light started to fade, and the workers on the peninsula of the lake had stopped strimming, I started to get some takes. The result of this was a few bream and tench, but sadly no carp were around to make an appearance in this duration. I think they key to catching these fish is to introduce some bait, so that the carp can potentially dominate the swim in their, at times, greedy fashion.

A powerful little tench!

On the next session, I set my stalls on another club lake to try and stalk a carp or two out. My choice of bait was a single piece of fluffy bread flake which I was hoping to trigger a couple of fish into slurping in. I arrived at the lake, brimming with enthusiasm as I saw plentiful carp, some of which were bathing and others were slowly cruising. There was also some slurping that was taking place with carp sucking naturals off the Canadian Pond weed. The first swim I chose, I saw a group of fish and a common which looked as if it was up for a helping of flake. After casting just over the fish and teasing the piece of ever-expanding bread towards the fish's path, a few agonising minutes were to follow. The fish carried on taking naturals off the weed and slowly made its way to my bait and paused. The mouth extended and sucked the piece of flake in. I let the fish take the bait and was baffled at the fact that I had managed to strike into thin air! This fish was well into double figures, which was a great shame as it would have been a lovely fish to start with. After missing another fish, cheaply getting away, I found myself right at the corner of the lake which was also thick with weed and a nice group of lilly pads. After drifting my bait to the edge of these pads, a small pair of lips came up and slurped in a medium-sized piece of flake. I struck more positively this time and connected. Despite this being the smallest fish that took my bait, the reward was a lovely dark little mirror.

An enjoyable tussle in the weed!

For the final session, I decided to head out and do some light lure fishing. Having chatted with a mate, Mark Lindsay, about fishing light jigs before, I decided to get myself a light lure rod and some braid for a 1000 sized reel. With the rod having not arrived yet, I decided to dig out a telescopic rod I had found in the garage from a previous holiday. After loading my reel with some light braid for some perch fishing and finding some abrasion-resistant fluorocarbon, I headed to a stretch close to home with some depth. This stretch is very weedy and boggy, but I knew that I was in for a chance of seeing some nice perch and pike in the gaps in the weed to cast to. After fishing a few swims and failing to tempt the perch, despite appetisingly pausing the lure in their field of vision, I headed to a stretch downstream of here. Within a very short amount of time, I had managed a few tiny perch which tend to congregate in this little pool which was certainly a start! Following the fact that I had seen a few little pike in the gaps in the weed and chasing minnows in the silty and stagnant areas, I decided to have a go for a few with my little jig. After getting a few chases, but failing to get a take, I casted the jig in a gap in the weeds which looked a likely area for a pike to be hiding. As the lure started to work, in light-speed a pike came out of nowhere and snatched the lure. The take was amazing through the braid, as you felt the fish crunch into the lure. With a quick strike, I managed to hook the pike comfortably in the scissors and it gave a wonderful little tail-walking scrap.

Maybe one day this will go from a minnow mincer to a duckling worrier!

It's wonderful with these small jigheads how easy it is to quickly unhook the fish and release them back into their watery home. I took a stroll onto a silty and stagnant section nearby and saw this tiny baby pike with a stunning green hue sitting boldly in the silt. With a little flick just over its head and the lure fluttering in its view the lure was absolutely devoured! With an energetic and lashing fight, it was lovely to see another one of these stunning juvenile pike in my hands. The immature markings on juvenile pike are wonderful to feast your eyes on, especially from my local chalkstream. By the time I had managed my third little pike, my lure had been bitten in half, so I felt with my family wanting to have some supper that it was a good idea to go home.

See what I mean about the immature markings?

Thanks for reading and tight lines,

Tom

Features Galore - A Small River Favourite!

After an early start and flopping out of my original plan with public transport, I managed to persuade my mum to drive me to this stunning waterway to meet Mark again. After talking about it for a while,  Mark and I finally managed to arrange a Winter's roving session. We have had three enjoyable trips on this particular waterway in the past sharing the highs and lows it has brought both of us. The river contains a good recruit of fish, with good chub, perch, pike and roach. After a pleasant drive, I arrived at a charming little bridge to meet Mark. My choice of tactic for the day was the link leger rotating between breadflake and cheesepaste. It was also soon apparent that Mark wanted to try and cover bases for some good perch and chub on the lobworm. The river before us was very low, therefore we knew that it certainly would be interesting in regards to conditions and how the fish were going to react.

We parked ourselves in a nice spacious swim where I tackled up, whilst Mark had a little go trundling his lobworm offering. It was interesting that the lobworm didn't induce a take from this certain swim. With the raucous of a football match going on in the background, we soon moved on upstream. The next swim Mark pointed to is one that I haven't fished as much as I perhaps should have. I balled in some liquidised bread from my bucket and trundled the link leger under the bush on the opposite bank. As it settled, the tip suddenly rattled. I had my hands on the rod ready as the tip sprung into action. I was into a nice chub holding nice and deep and getting a very feisty scrap indeed. A lovely grey-lipped resident broke the surface and Mark was kindly on hand with the net to land the fish.

A nice looking chub, one of a few to trip up on the flake offering this season! (3-8)

It was nice to have my second largest chub from the waterway, in such quick succession. After releasing this fish, we soon wandered our way further upstream. The next spot has always been a spot I have liked the look of when fishing this stretch. It is quite shallow, but has a nice overhanging tree which is perfect refuge for chub, perch and pike. Mark flicked his lobworm offering and let it trundle under the structure. It was not long until his tip sprung into life and he was now into his first fish of the day. After a very energetic and testing scrap, another lovely chub was in the net.

Pristine chub for Mark

I also tried a couple of quick casts under the tree, but the only bite to come of this was a slow pull round, which was almost certainly a pike, as all my link leger had gone when I had struck. After wandering a couple more swims, with little response, we made our way to an area where I lost a very good fish on a past session with Mark. After trundling the breadflake into an enticing position, just as I was putting the rod on the rest, I felt a thud. I placed the rod on the rest and it was not long until it flew round. A nice looking chub, similar to the one Mark had was in the net. After a few more casts it was apparent that the breadflake was no longer triggering a response, therefore I decided to switch to my amino cheesepaste. After balling in a few pieces, I trundled the bait under the snag and waited. Sure enough the rod flew round and another lovely looking chevin of a similar stamp to the last was resting in my net. Mark kindly took a few pictures for me and we moved on looking to fish some more exciting swims along this section.

I was happier than I look - was certainly nice to have a few of these stunners!

Mark and I continued to leap frog the stretch, and on return to some of my favourite swims on this stretch, I did manage another chub of similar stamp to the ones I was having in the other swim. This swim has always been kind to me, throwing up a good bite or two every time. After wandering further and attempting to poke my rod into some of the more secluded swims, Mark gave me a ring to tell me he had a lovely perch in the net. It was a stunning fish over a pound and it was nice to see a stripy finally make a appearance.

Lovely, vibrant perch (1-2)

It had been a lovely trip discussing some of the lovely looking swims on this stretch and exchanging thoughts on some of the elusive larger specimens within this river, that Mark has been lucky enough to go and catch. A few more chublets were to follow for me as the light faded and another call from Mark was to follow. This time, he had a lovely looking chub in the net. Both the chub we had of the larger stamp this trip were rather hollow, with this particular fish going 3lb 4oz. It was a lovely looking chub and in very nice condition. It was no surprise when Mark relayed to me the excitement of the fight.

When the sun descends, it is always a good time for the resident chub (3-4)

Even though it wasn't the easiest of days, I felt that this was one of our more productive trips on this waterway, managing a few decent fish between us, as well as having a great social. Although I did try and couple of swims on my way back to the car, there were no forthcoming customers for the juicy lobworm Mark let me use for the last knockings. In fairness though, the time was rather limited by this point.

I look forward to perhaps visiting this waterway a few more times next season, and more collaborative trips with Mark, whether it is more exploration on this particular waterway, or some other waterways to discover or those ones that are close to our heart...

Big thanks goes to Mark for inviting me on this lovely piece of water yet again.

Tight Lines,

Tom Aldous

Testing my new Ultralight: Two Trotting Trips

After not fishing on the previous weekend due to workload for college, I thought the best call for getting out was to try for some of the larger roach on my local river, the Itchen. With various walks after college on the way home past the river, I found a few areas holding some good roach and even spotted a few skimmer bream amongst them!

With my birthday money, I picked up a Drennan 14ft Matchpro Ultralight float rod and was absolutely dying to test it out, along with the Clearwater floats I have been kindly given. I started on a deeper, slower stretch where I had spotted several roach to what I personally reckon are over 2lbs. Unfortunately though, there was still a lot of weed and presenting a bait was not particularly straight forward so I decided to move on downstream.

Lovely rod and my favourite Clearwater Float!

After a few minutes walking I arrived and spotted a good shoal of roach. I fed some mashed bread upstream, and watched as I saw some nice roach taking bits as they crumpled off. After missing one bite, it wasn't long until I was into a fish. The rod was absolutely beautiful with a nice action in it and was feeling in very good contact with the fish. With the right tackle I've come to realise that roach are actually decent fighting fish. This was a lovely fish to christen the rod at around a pound or so in weight I would expect, what I would see as a quality roach. After a few more runs through, as the roach had backed off from this spot, I long trotted the breadflake and picked up a nice grayling coming onto a pound and a half. I moved swim and connected with a very nice roach shortly after feeding another nice pocket of fish. It gave another lovely scrap, flashing its beautiful silver bar as I gently guided it towards my waiting net. After putting this pretty roach on the scales it went 1lb 6oz, which is my second biggest of the river season and a nice result. After this, it was time to go, so I packed up and headed for home.

Can never knock a River Roach!

A couple of days later after a kind invite from a good friend, Simon Daley, we headed to the Dorset Stour with a decent chub or two on our mind. After sorting out tickets etcetera, we headed to one of Simon's favourite chub swims with some cracking features for chub to dart and skulk around. After feeding for a good few minutes, catapulting maggots, Simon ran through and at the bottom of the run, he was into a chub straight away. After a few seconds the hook pulled out, but we were both not feeling disheartened as this was so early on in the day. After sorting out an appropriate float rig for the job for the shallow water on this particular swim, I ran through a few times before the float buried and was into a nice chub. The ultralight had a lovely forgiving action and despite the chub digging away on the end of the line, I managed to slow its run and slowly guide it to the waiting net. This was a nice solid fish of 4lbs or so which was a lovely result and was nice as the first chub on the new rod.

Nice way to put the new rod to some test!

Simon and I continued to feed, and as I was watching Simon's float moving beautifully through the swim, I knew it his float was going to bury at any second and sure enough it did. After what seemed like a very enjoyable battle as I catapulted another dozen or so maggots, another quality chub was in the net. This fish was at least an upper 4 pounder, so another great result.

Another for Simon's impressive album!

After one more hook pull and a few missed bites, the swim was suddenly dominated by minnows as the morning mist cleared. It was rather frustrating though as despite the chub were still coming in and out of the over-hanging tree, it was impossible to wade through the minnows. We decided therefore to venture downstream and try and find some 'virgin' fish.

It wasn't long until Simon spotted a lovely group of fish in the shallows downstream and in no time we had them going on our offerings of maggots. After patience of watching this nail-biting scenario of 5lb plus chub feeding on our maggots and eating a few snacks to try and make time go faster, I had my first run through. Continuing with the feeding pattern, on my third or so run through my float buried. I struck and felt another good chub digging on the end. "Get downstream of it mush" Simon urged, as I ran up the bank trying to keep in good contact. Unfortunately there must have been a weakness in my hook link and therefore it unfortunately parted. Much as I will beat myself up about it sitting on my desk now, it is easily done at the time. After giving the swim a few minutes to rest I fired some more maggots in and it was Simon's turn to run through. After a bit of steady feed and a few runs through, Simon's float buried followed by a firm strike. Not hesitating like me, Simon hurriedly ran down the bank and managed to guide the feisty chub out of the thick weed and after what seemed to be an enjoyable battle of the chub digging away on the end, another nice fish of 4lbs or so was in the net. What I enjoyed about this scenario was it was opportunist fishing and in difficult conditions like what we were met with, it is a very rewarding endeavour.

After going downstream where the next section seemed somewhat even weedier, after getting electrocuted a few times by the electric fence, and sorting out our gear we found a good point to wade in and fish this beautiful run. The sun also came out glistening beautifully on the river, and it certainly was enjoyable to run the float through and we managed a few nice chub between us. After doing some roving around and not finding many more 'trottable' runs, we moved on upstream. It was not long until we saw some big chub, some of which we both reckoned were over 6lbs! After feeding these fish for over 40 minutes they unfortunately disappeared to our sheer disappointment and disapproval as someone waded in on the opposite side right near where they were. We were very disappointed as we refrained from fishing for these fish for a while and it was sabotaged within seconds.

Not feeling disheartened we moved upstream and fished a weirpool where Simon had had some good chub action in the past. We decided, to begin with, to try and catch some perch on minnow livebaits. After catching a few, we let the minnows whirl about on the weir pool and it wasn't long until we started getting takes catching plenty of lovely conditioned little perch.

Pretty Little Perch

Whilst I continued catching a few perch on the live baits, Simon decided to get to work with the maggot feeder. After baiting his swim up effectively, he was starting to get bites instantly from dace and managed many hooking themselves on his feeder rig. After doing lots of chopping and changing with bait variations using imitation and real maggots, his perseverance really showed when he hooked his first chub after battling through MANY dace. After a good fight, although it wasn't the biggest chub in the Stour, it was a very pretty chub, scale and fin perfect. After more dace, Simon's tip walloped round and he was into a much better fish. After getting upstream and guiding it out of the snags downstream, it unfortunately managed to find the concrete of the bridge upstream and cut Simon's hook link off which was certainly wounding for him in the circumstances. We fished into dark on the tip and after missing a couple of bites we decided to head for home as we were both getting tired from the roving about and the early start. Thanks for a great day Simon, look forward to sorting another trip soon!

Tight Lines,

Tom Aldous

Clearwater Chubber Floats and Opportunistic Piking!

My friend Ollie Johnson has just launched a new company called 'Clearwater' and has brought out some very good quality, robust floats. He has also kindly given me some to try out and have tested them on my local river with my favourite float so far has been the wire stemmed avon style float which is perfect in the larger sizes for controlling a bait in a turbulent swim.

Nice visible tip for fishing at some distance

On this particular session Ollie kindly invited me to one of his local bits of river and in the first swim he had located some nice chub up in the water skulking about, as well as some good specimen-sized roach gliding on the clean gravel run. We also noticed some nice dace about. The swim was a steady glide formed by a snag with a confluence coming in at the rear end. As Ollie was fishing at distance he chose one of the Clearwater Chubber Floats and opted to fish maggots on a size 18. After spraying maggots for a good 15-20 minutes Ollie casted out, but by this point we noticed some dark shapes emerging that were not there before which were some good-sized pike.

Trotting into the slack to begin with

The roach, chub and dace were now nowhere to be seen, therefore Ollie wandered downstream, just below the crease and fished at some distance on a quite shallow, gravelly run and instantly was catching some nice dace. The float was standing out beautifully and you could clearly see that Ollie had good control due to its buoyancy. After giving it a good forty five minutes, Ollie managed a few more dace and grayling but the larger fish that were located had clearly cruised off and noticing some nice pike in the swim, Ollie kindly offered me a shot in catching one. As we were sorting out the gear, Andy Little, who is a good friend of Ollie's, came over and had a chat with us before he headed upstream to target some perch, which was certainly a nice surprise!

Hooked a dace!

After catching a small dace livebait, I flicked it out into the crease on a paternoster, on Ollie's instruction, and waited. Within 10 minutes, if that, I saw a pike come and seize my bait. I didn't decide to give it too long and wound down to the fish, it was nice Jack pike but on one of the first head shakes he managed to slip the hook. Amazed by the instant action, and with a bait still on the hook, I made the same cast again. The second take came very quickly and this time I let the fish run a bit as it was only on a single treble trace.

About to wind down into the pike!

After a few seconds as the fish moved to the back end of the crease to the shallow water, I wound down and was into a better fish. Although it wasn't fighting particularly hard it was a big dead weight and after pulling it through the weeds and seeing it emerge, it was certainly an upper double and at one final thrash by the net it managed to shake the hook out, I could not believe it. I was rather disappointed as this was certainly a much better fish and would have smashed my personal best river pike, but not feeling disheartened we got the float rod out to try and catch another livebait.

The one that got away!

The first chuck resulted in a minnow which was certainly a good size for a perch livebait and certainly one we couldn't waste. After chucking the bait and letting it settle under the in the near bank slacker area, the float was gone in seconds and Ollie struck into a lovely little vividly coloured perch. Although the fish was not going to break any records, it gave a great little scrap.

Hooked a perch!

After this Ollie had a phone call from Andy. He was telling us of a big pike (around mid-20) upstream which had been attacking the perch he'd been hooking. Without hesitating we headed straight up there! On arrival at the swim Ollie sticked on another small livebait, exactly where Andy had said the pike was attacking the perch he hooked. We were hoping the pike was going to make another appearance at some point but we were slightly unsure as it had certainly taken a fair few perch off Andy's line.

Whilst we waited for a take, Ollie got his float rod out again and attempted to catch some roach, but all that could tempted was large trout which not only caused a disturbance, but were much more obliging than the roach we were after, therefore probably driving them away. After watching Andy continuously bagging beautifully conditioned perch, Ollie and I opted to also give it a go and after catching a few livebaits we trotted them to likely looking areas and where we could see the perch and takes were instantaneous!

One of a number of quality perch for Andy

The chubber floats were fantastic for this, as they are not dragged by the minnow livebait on the end so the takes would be easy to detect. Another advantage is that you could literally let the float control the livebait by casting out and letting the current sweep the bait wherever it would and the it would perfectly settle in the slacks on this particular swim where a number of perch are lurking and patrolling, leading to savage takes!

Beautiful vividly coloured perch for Ollie

After a few more thoroughly enjoyable hours catching plenty of perch and having a nice social with both Andy and Ollie, we decided to head back to the swim where I had lost the pike. Unfortunately the bigger pike in this swim did not make an appearance but I'm sure that's one of a number of pike on this stretch which has either Ollie or Andy's name on it!

The light's starting to go, prime roach time!

Ollie brought down his trotting gear and fished below me and managed a few nice quality little roach, dace and grayling, but the question was where had the bigger ones disappeared off to. After catching another livebait, I flicked the paternoster to the same place. After 15 minutes or so, I had another take where this time the pike sat on the bait, but after giving it a bit of time, I wound down and struck into another nice fish which certainly gave me quite a battle - managing to successfully weed me a couple of times and shake its head like mad when it came towards the bank, we thankfully managed to get the this one in the back of the net. Although it wasn't massive, it was a nice result as I had managed to lose quite a few, and the markings were absolutely stunning on this fish.

After a quick photograph and release it wasn't long until another livebait was caught which I quickly hooked up as a last ditch effort, and flicked it back into the same spot - this one was on the money. The float absolutely sailed away instantly. I gave the fish a few moments to spin the bait in its mouth and run with it, then I wound down and set the hook. This fish stayed nice and deep and taking it steady I slowly guided it to the bank, by which time the fish had really woken up and starting thrashing in the shallows and charging off at speed tearing line off the reel. Hoping the hook would stay proud, I gave the fish some stick and Ollie kindly netted it for me. A quick unhooking was to follow and it weighed in at just a double at 10lbs on the nose - not massive for many's books, but my second river double which I was really made up about. It was also in good shape and again, had stunning colouration.

By the time I got the fish back, I realised it was time to pack up as my mum had arrived, but it was a fantastic session and a big thanks goes to Ollie for taking me to the stretch and showing me a spot with a few nice pike lurking about!

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Tight Lines,

Tom Aldous