The answer to Thursday’s dilemma?OK it didn’t take me long to decide… The stillwater won!
Why? Well based on the fact that I want to “learn” this water through all its seasonal changes it was the right move to make.
The weather was settled and we’d had a rising barometer… was it going to be good?
I awoke to a second morning in a row with a frost… thermals on (was I going to regret this move?) A couple of rounds of toast and off to the lake for 9am… a bit later than anticipated but with having had a busy week and the drive… c’est la vie!
Having tackled up I used the Thursday night pattern and fished the bay I’d lost in last Friday… nothing doing at all and so I moved on. The next bay I changed pattern and cast around the structure available… along tree lines and the soon to be sprouting reeds I then put a few cast into open water and counted down and stripped back putting a pause in about 15ft away from the bank… a slab side emerged and turned away the full flank catching the sun… although not with the sun directly behind me I thought that the fish might have seen me! Was that the case or was something a foot. That first fish was about the 12-14lb mark. I than changed back to the Thursday fly and fished directly ahead of me stripping back at a quick and steady pace… second cast the same principle… and at the end slowing it right down… as I brought the fly within 2 foot of the bank a pike of 3-4lbs came into view from the depths… I stopped the retrieve dead and waited, I saw the pike think for all of 4 seconds… and it was literally on the tail of the fly and then it struck… I should have waited for it to run before striking and therefore suffered a loss. That was painful!
I remained in the bay trying to recreated the moment and fished my new fly along the snaggy edge of the lake… what was to happen next was so interesting that I lost myself in the event totally… I saw a small mirror carp come into the shallows and start to “nest” into the dead reed bed… was this fish close to spawning or sun bathing? One thing is for sure it took my mind off my fly and when I continued the retrieve I succeeded in hitting a right royal snag! Lost fly!
I did the round of the lake passing the day with two guys fishing quiver tips for silver fish… a pike had been patrolling the margin and sure enough whilst I was there it came buy… slowly but purposefully through the water…
Having done the round and stopped for lunch I moved back to the second bay… another angler was fishing for carp, but was happy for me to cast toward him for the pike… during the rest of the afternoon I spent the time teasing pike with flies… they were having none of it… slow, fast, medium or stationary they were having nothing of it… one pike had very distinctive markings and having looked at photos of those captured, I think I’ve handled this one before!
Either they really wanted the Thursday fly… which has great mobility or they had other things on their mind… with a water temperature of 11 degrees Celsius… I’m sure they are thinking of spawning…
Late afternoon action was seen out with a flurry of carp to the chap who kindly allowed me to fly fish toward his swim… His best a 13.5lb common carp (full to bursting with spawn!) and 10.5lb mirror carp.
I went home feeling that I’d had a great day out!
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