PB Perch

With the chance of some perch, I managed to persuade my lad out for a session. He's not yet got the fishing bug so I don't push him, I just occasionally ask him and if he doesn't fancy it I leave it at that. But he's been wanting to catch a perch, can you believe he's never caught one? A fish many of you lot would have learnt your trade on. How times have changed. So after I had a decent session the other day, he figured the odds of catching one might be in his favour and I might just be able to keep his attention for a little while, at least long enough to have some fun.

I talked him through the basics, explained how my little Greys rod would help him catch a fish and what to feel for and which areas he might catch a fish. I left him to do it and told him to just cast where he wanted and see if he could find some fish. I expected a perch to be somewhere here, at least a small one anyway. The Kopyto kept bouncing along the bottom and he was getting a bit excited striking at nearly every knock, but I explained he's better getting used to hitting everything than ignoring the knocks as that just breeds the wrong mentality and then when a fish comes you miss it. We'd been there ten minutes or so and he was finally in to the swing of it and then he finally got a proper knock. The rod tip was banging away and he had his first perch on. He was chuffed to bits with it!

I didn't really think many perch were in this bit of water so I made the call to move. Perch are the type of fish to at least show themselves with follows and often they chase the lure at least but we hadn't seen anything except that one perch. I knew that to keep him interested he needed to keep catching. This new spot had him straight in to the action and a slightly better stamp of perch was banked and he quickly followed that up with half a dozen more fish. He was well happy with that and so he even gave the rod to me for a go. We took it in turns to catch a perch and then pass the rod and the fish kept coming. We'd had plenty of perch now and he took a time out, leaving me to fish and since the small perch were all we had been catching I took to searching the area. I stuck on my rather old, but weighty spinner so that I could launch a huge cast and see If I could locate anything larger. I plucked out a few perch pushing the ten ounce size and then finally I got a better knock and was in to a perch of a pound or more. I was glad I'd caught something a bit bigger so that he could get a good look at a perch of size rather than just the tiddlers. He was still happy for me to fish as he was now messing with the camera taking photos of random stuff, so I kept searching for the big fish.

The sun was starting to go down a little and the light was starting to fade and I explained that this is often the time that bigger perch will feed. That they move in to areas where the smaller fish are in search of easy pickings and that one pound fish might just be the start of a few bigger fish coming in. I had a tiny tap on the rod followed by a whack and I was in. I knew it was another decent perch and when he saw it come up he thought it was massive. I didn't weight it but it was probably a pound and a half so a long way off a record but he was as impressed with a big perch as we all are. He took a few photos and then we slipped it back. I reckon Woody will love this photo.

"There's a new pb out there for you mate" I explained. If those big fish are in the area he had a right good chance of a getting one and so I gave him the rod and the spinner. He cast out and I told him to let the spinner sink a little and then retrieve. Immediately he struck in to something but it turned out to be the bottom. Luckily a few flicks of the rod tip and it was out and I told him to carry on winding in and within seconds the rod tip shot round and he was battling something which we already knew was better than any of the others he'd caught. No monster, but it's a decent perch and a new pb for him, not quite a pound but a proper perch and he was over the moon.

Going fishing - a matter of life and death?

Beautiful perch

Well what an eventful day. Sometimes you have the urge, a need to go fishing and it feels like a life and death thing, the pull is so strong. At least that's how it feels to us fisherman anyway but today we were about to prove that sometimes it really is about life and death.

I've been out on the boat again with Woody for more ultra light fun in the hope of some perch. On that front it was a success with around seventy fish to the boat between us, though that figure is an estimate as we had far too much happening to keep track of fish numbers. It's nice to have an idea of fish numbers as it gives you an idea how the day went but to me and Woody it's not something we're chasing, there's no figure we're after before we start we just want a few fish and some laughs. Today we got plenty more than we'd planned.

We had the boat in the water for not long after 6am but when Woody tried to start the engine it was a struggle. He'd just had a tinker with the engine adding a new pull cord in the week and it seems something wasn't quite right, it seemed too short even though he measured it against the old one. Something to keep him busy in between the next outing but at least now he managed to get it going after a  just a few pulls. It was a cool morning considering the weather we've been having and we were both looking forward to the sun breaking through. In the mean time we picked up a few fish in a steady start to the day. Actually, I had just one perch while Woody had around ten. It just shows that lure choice can be a big factor. Neither of us think it's anything much more than the depth the lure gets down to and we reckon Woody was getting his lures deeper than I was. I either needed to change lures or hope for some shallower water. I knew the lure I had on gets to 14ft and there's plenty of water to come at that depth for me to pick up some fish, plus plenty of fishing time so I was confident I'd catch a few eventually.

Finally it was my turn and I hit a purple patch where I bagged ten fish in quick succession along a short stretch of boats. The fishing seemed good here and we had a couple of runs over it and picked up more fish. While passing a couple of boats, a couple of old chaps decided they wanted to talk down to us. What is it with some people? These chaps had large boats, obviously a bit of money and had lived a while but it doesn't mean they are superior to us insignificants. Most old chaps are spot on but sometimes you get a pair who think they own the river and that you're a nobody, an idiot and have no right to be here. "Can you troll further away from the boats?" one clever sod asked as we passed. Sensing the tone the question was delivered in I bluntly said "No". He then gave us a lecture on how if we hooked a fish it would go under his boat and get tangled in his prop. I assured him it wouldn't but he still harped on. Woody gave him a few words and we carried on what we were doing, trolling along the boats. His mate then piped up "just leave it you're wasting your time, some people just haven't got a clue". My god, some people think they're so superior to everyone else.

Woody chasing snotties

The fish were mostly perch, probably 80% of them the rest were pike all except for one fish. Woody just loves a bream on the lures. I don't know how he does it but he's always snagging one in the back. Actually I do know why, Woody is good at getting the lure down right to the bottom of the river and I think this is why he bags a bream more than anyone else. We grabbed a few pike from "like a pike but smaller" size to about probably 7lb and when you add a few of these in every now and again it adds for some good fun. I also managed to capture these couple of shots below of Tike watching as Woody plays a pike.

So we weren't doing too bad by now. It's mid morning and we're confident it'll be a fish filled day. We round a corner to an area we sometimes pull up so Tike can get out and have a drink and a pee, on a sand bank which is also a spot for people having picnics, throwing sticks for their dog and also very popular when it's sunny for people swimming. Obviously the sand bank is what draws them here. As we come round we can see a bloke/lad sat on the right bank in just his shorts. He's talking to a girl/young lady swimming in the river. She's about 30 yards from him maybe a shade more and she's 15 yards or more from the left bank. We can make out that he's asking her if she's ok and it looks as though she's treading water. I start to real in my lure, hook it on to the rod and stick it in to the holder. Woody is sensing the same thing and he gets his rod in. By now we can see the young lady is treading water but she's not comfortable, her head is facing up, her chin is up, her arms are not relaxed. The lad sat on the bank says "I'm coming" but he would be way too late. As if we've done this before, I turn and make my way to the front of the boat as Woody cranks up the speed of the boat. The young lady has a look of "what the hell?" panic and relief as we pull up by her. I reach out my hand and lift her and she grabs hold of the boat and then Woody guides us all gently to the side. She explains she's not the best swimmer and is getting some practice. "This isn't the place to practice" I say and Woody adds that the river is "28feet deep here love". The boyfriend has made it across the river now and we leave them to recover. She was a little embarrassed and relieved at the same time but we didn't hang around as there were fish to be caught. Chatting about it afterwards me and Woody couldn't believe it to be honest. I say it so many times about catching fish, but this really was right place right time. Had we been a minute earlier or later that could have been very nasty and thinking back now, I actually caught a fish 50 metres back round the corner. Had that been a big fish or a bad hook up that slowed us down or had we not even caught that fish that would have changed everything. Only this past week two girls have tragically died while swimming in a river during this hot weather.

Still shell shocked we'd only travelled fifteen metres before we had another moment to remember. The time is only 10:10am as I've checked the photo data just now. Some people spend their Saturdays morning fishing on a boat while others, well....

We reckon that this couple had been here a while, probably all night by the looks of the bottles in the sand. There is also a good chance the lass we rescued and her boyfriend were part of the group, as I did suggest to Woody before seeing this, that she might have been a bit tipsy.

Back to fishing and we continued to catch. Many of the perch were up to around the one pound mark with the odd fish a bit better. Some of the perch were stunning creatures and we couldn't help but admire them. They are a handsome fish and the bigger they get the more impressive they get. I hooked a fish which I first called a small pike but as it came close it turned in to a decent perch. I reckon it was pushing two pound though Woody wasn't being generous and only gave me a pound and three quarters. However we will never know since Woody quickly knocked it off the hooks before we could get a look, which suggests to me it was blatant sabotage on his part and indicates it was definitely a two for me! We had a couple of double hook ups including one not far from where I'd just caught that sabotaged fish. This area turned out to be a good spot and we went over it and back over it a few times adding to our perch tally. Strangely today we didn't do too well jigging for perch. We had a go on this spot, armed with the knowledge that perch were here and feeding. We just couldn't buy a bite though which was strange. We were just about to pack up the jigs and get back trolling when I got a good knock. If this was a perch it was a right lump and Woody braced himself and got ready to knock it off the hooks. It turned out to be a pike in the end but it had him worried I''ll tell ya.

We had one last scare of the day when the boat cut out and then wouldn't start. It seems that pull cord certainly does need sorting and for a while we were left slowly drifting down the river as Woody tried time and time to get it to kick in. We eventually were offered a tow by a passing boat, there are still plenty of good people about who are there to offer help. I'd just caught the rope and we had just started to be towed when Woody finally got the engine to fire up again. Saying our thank yous, we were back off under our own steam and fishing again. A few more fish were had before we were finally back at the launch and another good day afloat had finished. Today was one of those days where I was so glad to have been fishing. The fishing was good, the company and banter was too but the best thing was knowing that we had been in the right place at the right time and there wasn't another tragic news story.

New perch pb

I recently met up with for the first time, another forum regular and blogger Matt Holmes from Fooling Fish. He loves to lure fish and has a far greater variety of skills to his name than I do catching anything from small silvers to pike and even often on his own home made flies or lures. He took me to a canal which is one of his new little gems and while he couldn't promise me a massive perch, there were some in there to be had if we could find them. On my first trip out I managed around eight small perch on a small Kopyto lure that Matt had lent me. Matt faired a little better managing a few more with a nice perch of over 2lb easy, possibly 2.5lbs (photos here). I was happy with my little trip and it was good to meet up with another lure angler to see how other people are doing things. We later had another brief get together, this time with me tagging along late with Matt and Neil who had met up a little earlier. The going was a little tough but Matt had yet again pulled out another perch over two pound, something Neil has noted from his outings with Matt. He always seems to bag a decent stripey! I only had the one fish that evening but it was a little bigger than the usual six ounce perch and I was just happy to get out. A further session together saw me and Neil meet up first with Matt joining us an hour or so later. Neil had three perch and Matt got one in a quiet, head scratching, where have the fish gone, session while I didn't get a sniff.

So today while sitting restless I decided to get out just after lunch time. I decided against jumping straight in to Matts' stretch but still fancied the canal he'd taken me to. So I set about exploring a little further along, having a look at some of the small bridges that criss-cross the canal. My plan was to check out all these features, see if we can get parked up anywhere and then if ever two or three of us meet up here again we've a bit more water to explore in case things are quiet. We'd previously walked a stretch of the canal, leap frogging each other up to the next bridge and then back again. So this time I decided to start at that bridge and continue along and see what is in store.

I had some of my own Kopytos stuck in the post that hadn't yet arrived. My fault for putting the wrong address on my order but luckily I'd bumped in to Dominic Garnett (check out his blog here) at the PACs annual conference in Harrogate last weekend and he had a few Kopytos for sale so I grabbed some. Armed with my new perch catching lure I set about casting at the shadows of the bridge, along the walls and anywhere else you'd expect to find a perch hiding. My first ten minutes or so produced nothing except one strong "pluck" of the lure which I never managed to hook in to. I crossed the road and tried the other side and again no luck before finally settling back on the other side of the road but this time the other side of the canal. I was casting around, letting the lure sink to the bottom as Matt had taught me, and then slowly winding in. Sometimes bouncing it on the bottom, sometimes straight retrieve, sometimes letting it sit on the bottom for a few seconds. Nothing seemed to be getting any attention and since I'd not even seen a perch follow it didn't look promising.

Then bang! My little Greys G Spin rod was bent double as a rather large perch was bashing away on the other end. The water was pretty clear and I soon got a glimpse of the fish and then started to feel the bottom of my arse start to fall out. I squeezed my butt cheeks and quickly grabbed the net. The perch put up a fantastic scrap on the light rod before I got it over the net and scooped up. This was a big perch!

I unhooked the perch and then grabbed a carrier bag out of my rucksack to get a weight. It was a solid, chunky old warrior and I knew it was going to be a new pb, but when the scales dropped just short of 2lb I was gob smacked. I checked the scales, maybe they were a little rusty, so I gave them a good tug and had another go, still just short of 2lb, what the hell? I put the fish back in the net and gave it some water, and then as it gathered some air I gathered my senses. By golly you idiot, that was kilos! It was just short of two kilos and if my math was any good then that converted to a pb by a mile. I got the perch back in the carrier bag for another look. Holly smokes, 3lb 12oz. That looks much better and certainly fits the size of the fish. I've never seen a perch as big in my life up close and what a sight it was, what a creature these big perch are!

pb 3lb 12oz perch

Putting the old warrior back

I make no apologies for blanking out most of the photo. Matt put me on these fish and I'm not about to let out his new little secret so the dodgy photo editing will have to stay. I had another twenty minutes or so in the swim with no more joy so had a walk along the bank about a hundred metres or so. Nothing much happened until I dropped on a shoal of smaller perch around 10 ounces in size. The first one to hit the kopyto lure was chased by another six or seven of the same size. What a sight to see in this crystal clear water. I managed to catch another two from the same spot before it went all quiet again.

I walked back to the car and set about my original plan of exploring the other bridges and features. I didn't spend too long in each spot, thinking that they all certainly looked like perch areas but once I'd not had any action I moved off to the next. Occasionally I'd drop on some small perch which would struggle to get the 2.5inch lure in their mouth and I also dropped a small jack pike which I managed to tempt out, twice, from under a overhanging tree but then lost it off the hook after a very brief tussle. There was nothing to suggest that any of these other bridges held mammoth perch but there's no reason why they wouldn't either because it's the same bit of water just a few miles apart. I'll certainly give them another shot a few times to see what crops up. I set off home happy I'd got that massive perch, but couldn't' resist a cast in another more local canal. I had a few small perch chase, grab hold of and drop off the lure which added a bit of fun before finally a small jack pike of around 3lb smashed out from the weedy depths, took the lure and then set about stripping off around 20m of line. A great bit of fun on the light rod and a good way to finish off my day.

So a big thanks to Matt Holmes for showing me this bit of water. Pity the fish didn't come when you guys were around to see it but as we've already said before, there is lots of potential in this canal and there are some even bigger perch to be had!

2012 pike tally
Doubles 30
Total 197

Largest 22.5lb
Twenties - 2
Bonus Perch 48
Largest 3lb 12oz
Bonus chub - 1

Ultralite trolling with Chief

After getting out with Woodchucker the other week I was invited again to go out on the boats. This time there was to be two boats, with me and Neil (Chief) in his boat and Woody and Grant in the other. The river was in decent condition, the weather was pretty hot and we had the intention of using ultralite set ups to catch plenty of fish and have some good fun. I'd only previously met Neil once, bumping in to him on the local river as I went for a roam and had ventured in to his territory but we'd chatted before on the forums plenty and he actually lives only a couple of miles from me. Grant was new to both me and Neil but everyone knew Woody and we all share the same cyberspace. Grant seemed a good chap, up for a laugh with the lads, a good fisherman and plenty of knowledge, not bad at all for a Lancastrian but unfortunately he'll have to live with that large fault.

Woody rubbing it in

The bit of mist that had been rolling across the fields had started to lift by the time we got to our launch ramp. As we unpacked the gear we hit on our first problem. Woody had no power but after a bit of a fiddle Grant tracked it down to a loose connection on the battery. Having no power, and no fish finder would have been a bad thing especially when the aim was to help Neil set up and test his boat and fish finder. We got in the river and set off, only to then fall on another problem. Neil seemed to be having trouble with his fish finder. After lots of faffing around and head scratching, he found a bit of loose wiring. This didn't look good and we were getting nothing on the screen. While all this was going on, Woody and Grant were patrolling and bagging a few jack pike and perch just to rub it in. Neil was getting a bit frustrated as I would have been had it been my kit.These things happen and not everything goes to plan. While Neil carried on wiggling wires I had a few casts and got a pike of about three and half pounds. Then our luck changed and there was life in the fish finder. Whatever Neil had done had sorted it and off we went in search of some fish. There was a chance the dodgy wire could fail again at any time but at least for now we had some real time information to help us.

Neil gets his first fish

We got going and not too long in to the ride Neil bagged his first fish. I think that was a moment of relief for him and made him feel much better about everything. Hopefully now we could just concentrate on fishing, if only that cable would hold up. We then picked up the odd small perch or small pike between us and things were looking up.

Woody and Grant were now ahead of us and we could see them picking up fish too and the sun was starting to get a hold and warming up nicely. Neil then had a take but this time it felt a bit better, especially on a very light set up. I could see a good bend in the rod and as it came closer we figured a net be of use this time and then as the pike came to the surface we could see the first double figure fish of the day. I scooped up the fish, Neil got the hooks out and we both noted how slim the pike was. Had this fish been in better condition it would have been a mid double at least instead of a low one of around eleven pound, but still it was a great fish to catch on the ultralites.

Small lure big mouth

Pity this fish wasn't in top condition

When using a boat you have a few advantages, you're more mobile and can cover lots of water and lots of places you can't reach from the bank. Another advantage is the use of the fish finder, keeping an eye out for features, depth and fish. Neil had spotted an interesting spot on the fish finder and then hooked the double, so he made a call to return to the same spot and go over it another time. This call paid off when Neil hooked another good fish. This one not as long, but certainly in much better condition. Great result and a good bit of skippering. Neil was on a good run now and seemed to have the fish finder troubles left behind.

Good conditioned 8lb pike

We'd notched up a few fish between us by now and it was good sport. I then got my first decent knock of the day and was playing a fish. It felt a bit bigger and was putting up a great scrap, but I knew it was nothing in the league of either of those last two fish from Neil. Then as the fish neared the boat, the flash of stripes greeted us. Neil quickly got a hold of the fish and scooped it in to the boat. What a lovely perch, I was made up. This one went in the bag to be weighed and Neil told me it was two pound seven ounces. Not a monster by perch standards, but a lovely fish and one which I am now claiming as my pb perch, since i've never really weighed them or photographed many. It's always great to notch up a new pb and I was chuffed. That would do me for the day even if I caught nothing else. I was also glad I'd purchased the new ultralite rod because I could much more appreciate the fight this fish had in it.

2lb 7oz pb perch

We plugged on and again picked up a few more perch and pike between us with a couple more decent perch each well over a pound. Meeting up with Grant and Woody they were having similar results and Woody had bagged a nice perch over two pounds. I don't know what it was, but every time we went near that other boat, Neils fish finder would play up. The other two headed up stream while Neil tried to get some pictures back on his screen. I made a few casts to the bank and I had what felt like a hit but didn't hook. I cast back at it and felt something in the same spot again, but wasn't sure if it was a bit of a twig or something under the surface. I figured on another cast because I was certain that at least the first knock was a fish and there it was, fish on. It wasn't a big fish but as it came in to view it was a pleasant sight indeed, another pb for me. I've caught plenty of chub in my time, but this was my first lure caught chub, what a cracking result.

pb lure caught chub

We had a bit of a quiet spell with not much showing. The fish finder blinked on and off a couple of times but Neil kept managing to get some life back in to it. with Woody and Grant now visible in the distance we could see Woody was dealing with something, possibly a lump? As we got closer the boat chat told us he'd actually hooked a bream, foul hooked in the dorsal fin. We exchanged banter and threw lots of abuse at Woody, it seems that's what happens on these double boat trips. Woody is man enough to take it and dish a bit out, but I'm not so sure he's keen on those bream though.

Woody

Loves

Bream

We parted company again and me and Neil bagged a few more fish each. I had a couple of small pike totally engulf the lure and so too did Neil. The pike had seemed to have switched off and it had mainly been perch for a while but these couple of small jacks appeared and really did hit the lures.

These pike were hammering the lures

Again we caught up to the other two and could see in the distance Woody was dangling a carrier bag in the water, the carrier bag obviously full of water and a fish inside. They were saving something good we knew that and as we got there we were greeted with the sight of another clonking perch, this one falling to Grant and weighing in at two pound eight ounces.

Grants 2lb 8oz perch

We stopped off at a pikey looking spot and proceed to throw the larger lures around. Woody bagged a couple and there were quite a few follows, some decent fish too. I managed to hook one on the reel eel, felt a couple of head shakes and then it made a dive for under the boat. Unfortunately the hooks came out and I didn't get to see how big a pike it was. We headed up stream ad then Neil realised he was half way in to his fuel supply. This journey, accompanied by another boat, was to find the cracks and iron out the creases and Neil was getting those sorted. We'd covered plenty of water but I think this trip convinced Neil to bring his larger fuel can next time. We turned round and headed back downstream and to be honest much of the fishing was a bit quiet. We soaked up lots of sun, unhooked the odd snagged lure and passed a few pleasure boaters. Even though the fish didn't seem to be coming out now it was still a great way to spend the day. Finally we started to pick up a few more perch with the odd pike thrown in and at least this way we were finishing off with more fish instead of a bit of a lull. Neil then hooked into another half decent perch but somehow between trying to get a photo of the perch with lure still in it's mouth, instead we ended up with Neil and the perch attached to each other. I helped separate the two, leaving the new fishing badge to be seen in the trophy shot.

Neil with his Blue Peter fishing badge

Meeting back up again it was clear the run downstream hadn't been as fruitful but we'd all still picked up some fish each. We had one final fling nearer to the launch ramp, swapping between large lure, ultralites and even doing a spot of jigging. I'm not sure much more was caught here but I did pick up another small perch and pike jigging with some small soft 4plays to cap off a great day for me. I'm sure the other three enjoyed the day too. Plenty of fish caught, some nice perch, a double figure pike, a bream and a chub. I know my own tally was 8 pike, 13 perch and a chub. I even managed to bag more perch today than I have the whole year so far and I guess that's plenty to do with actually targeting the properly instead of half arsed like normal.  Neil had a similar result to me with a couple of extra pike to his tally than I did. This time out on the boat we achieved what we'd set out to do and that was have some fun on the ultralites and let Neil test his new (ish) boat set up.

Cheers for the invite lads what a cracking day!

2012 pike tally 

Doubles 29

Total 186

Largest 22.5lb
Twenties - 2
Bonus Perch 22
Largest 2lb 7oz
Bonus chub - 1