It's not all about big Pike!

Here is clip taken by Stu on a fun day on the Montgomery Canal. This little fish hit the livebait with such violence and the ensuing swirl fooled us .....we expected a lump; instead a perfect little jack was the reward.

Stu's Dee 20

Here is a small clip of Stu's Dee 20; a fish to be proud of................

Dee mpeg

Here's a short clip taken by Stu of me returning a nice big Dee Double

Region 31 Lure day on Pennington Flash

This saturday the 20th of September Jon Neafcy has organised a fun day of lure fishing on Pennington Flash for members of region 31 and anyone else who wishes to attend. There will be a BBQ and as always a good social gathering. Don't forget some small perch lures as well because there are some huge stripeys in here too. To whet your appetite above is a couple of Penny fish caught by Jon and Blunty caught in recent times.

Bridgewater Canal

Canal Pike fishing can be overlooked by many Pikers and they will be missing out on some fantastic sport. The Northwest has a myriad of waterways that once served British industry as their transport highways in the days before motorways and HGV vehicles. Canal pike are a hard fighting species and well worth the effort. The jewel in the Northwest crown for me is the Bridgewater canal that traverses through Cheshire, Manchester and Lancashire and all along the lengths of this magnificent old canal Pike lurk. Lots of hard-fighting doubles but 20's and even 30's can be caught if you get lucky. Gulper has fished the 'Bridgey' man and boy and lives only a stone's throw from the water and knows it better than anyone i know. Pre-baiting improves your chances as i have learned from Steve and fishing along the ledges near and far banks. Fish are usually caught within a few feet of the bank on or just off the shelf where the pike patrol searching for their prey. Fishing at first light and the last thing at night seems to produce the best results. Warrington Anglers control a huge amount of Bridgewater Canal fishing and it is worth the membership fee of £36 just for this superb canal fishing. Pictured above are some examples of the stamp of Predator you are likely to catch.

Gulper goes North of the Border

Steve ventured North of the Border last weekend taking with him his father and the father of one of his neighbours and friends. Their main target was to be the smaller stripey predator; namely the Perch. Steve has located a loch full of specimen 'Stripeys' as well as a resident population of Pike. In his report he detailed his plan of attack for both Pike and Perch. Pike; traditional deadbait and lure tactics which produced a nice fish for his friend's father (pictured above) but the Pike weren't really in the mood. As for the Perch he employed his tried and tested tactics of trolling the loch with small spinners and spoons to locate the shoals of 'Stripeys' and once they are located he throws a juicy bunch of worms at them. This tactic has repeatedly worked for Steve and on this occasion saw 30 Perch netted with 10 over the magical 2lb mark. Pictured above are examples of these beautiful little predators. Below is a clip on 'The Fury'; Steve's boat. The clip shows Steve tearing up and down a loch that produced the above Perch and Pike on a day the Loch was frozen and he was using his engine power and hull strength to break up the ice. That's me huddled behind the cuddy sheltering from the arctic conditions as usual. Brrrrrrrr!

Now that's a proper Kipper!

As i mentioned in my short article with the photos of Sturgeon i had hoped to contact 'The Gulp-Meister' Steve lewis for a copy of one of his Canadian beasts for the site and he duly obliged with a copy of this whopper pictured above. You know you have caught a decent kipper when it takes two big lads to hold it for the photo-shoot!

Steve has enjoyed a number of trips to Canada fishing for a range of species including our beloved Pike or Northerns as they are commonly referred to on that side of the Atlantic as well as carp and sturgeon. He recently attended a wedding over there and although i didn't expect him to be wetting a line on this trip you can't keep a bloke like him away from water for too long and he managed to tempt one of the notoriously shy cousins of Pike; The Muskie to a lure after alot of frustrating follows.

Anyone interested in fishing over there would be well advised to speak to the amiable Steve for advice and information. That goes for Spain and Ireland too; the fella gets about as you will see on this blog and catches fish everywhere and his better half Dawn, the blog's glamour girl has an infuriating habit of teaching the men how to fish.........Steve don't let her humiliate us anymore!

First Snapper of the Season

Womble made a head start for the new Pike Season with an early jack pictured above coming to Halibut pellet. He added another jack also to halibut pellet a short time later.......These halibut pellets will catch everything.

Summer Success

Although no other piscatorial species excites me like 'Esox Lucius' i do enjoy the traditional summer break and of course enjoy catching other species. This summer i have been consumed by catching carp off the top and again it is the influence of Stu maddocks aka 'The Womble' who is responsible for this obsession. I began the summer season with my bite alarms; a disciple of the 'Korda' video bible. I often had with me a float rod and mixed catching carp with plenty of Tench and Bream and other fish but the main target was carp. I have always fished for carp on the top but never with such an appetite, but observing Stu stalking around me as i sat statically often for long periods without a single bleep from my alarms made me more and more interested in fishing with bread and dog biscuits. Stu prefers dog biscuits where i prefer the old school bread. One particular session will forever remain in my memory; this time i watched Stu climb into the bankside foliage; a large willow over-hanging the lake and eventually after patience he hooked into a small hard fighting common. How he extricated this fish from such a tangled mess of branches i am still amazed by and in awe of. He came out of this tree with pride but also mixed with annoyance because his target fish was a much larger carp which had been beaten to the bait by this small common. So as the summer progressed i began to fish more and more with surface baits; mainly bread. Stu knew of my ambition to catch a 'Grass Carp' which i had never caught and had been an ambition for a long time. I had targeted the species a number of times over the years at expensive day-ticket waters without success and Stu had shown me spots locally where i could achieve it and eventually it happened; a fish of 20lb 1oz was my prize. Pictured above are a number of my summer carp and i must thank Stu again for all his advice and knowledge.