Last Thursday, I woke up with a pain in my right knee. By Thursday evening, this had grown progressively worst, so that I was unable to walk without some sort of support. On Friday I was reduced to hobbling about using a walking pole for support. Driving was just about impossible as, in the first instance, I am having great difficulty getting in and out of the car (10 minutes to get out of the car and into the house on one occasion) and in the second instance, I have trouble pressing the brake pedal!
Saturday and Sunday were spent with the leg immobilised and a bag of sweetcorn on the knee. Yet I had suffered no obvious trauma to cause the problem in the first place. Also the knee wasn't swollen at all, though very sore when I put pressure on it.
At one point I actually began to wonder if I had done some serious long-term damage to it, one implication being that my preferred style of fishing - roving on rivers - might no longer be possible. This is quite a shock at my age - 49.
Then a little brightness. One of my wife's clients is a former doctor (now a psychologist). I took advantage of her being round to ask her about the knee and she rather surprised me by concluding after a few questions that I probably had "viral arthritis". Some viruses can apparently cause imflamation of joints which produces the symptoms of arthritis. Its not real arthritis, just something that looks exactly like it.
Now I think about it, I have had a bit of a bug in the last week, the main symptom of which is a dry cough. In theory, as I fight the virus, the knee will get better with no lasting damage at all. In fact, there is a good chance that I will just wake up one morning and it will be better.
So from thinking that I might be facing weeks of physiotherapy and the possibility of not walking properly again, and so no more fishing, I may only have a few more days of trouble.
But I have no plans to fish this week - ironic as conditions are now the best they have been all season. Maybe I can go on Sunday or Monday next week. Then, later next week, Wife and I depart to France for our main holiday.
So really I might not fish again until the last week of August, four weeks away.
It has to be said, this season is really not going to plan at all!
Monday 30 July 2012
Thursday 26 July 2012
A short morning session
A couple of hours free before work starts and just time to see if conditions have improved much at the river.
Yes, the level is down a few inches, but would chub be on the feed? I fished two spots, both quite close to the car. Float fishing sweetcorn in the first swim produced no bites at all. Ledgering sweetcorn in the second produced half a dozen small fish - 4 chub and 2 roach - but nothing bigger than perhaps 8oz.
I have actually not caught many small fish over the last 12 months so in some ways it is good that there are some around (at least for the long term). But still no decent sized fish appearing.
The forecast is for more rain this weekend, and my new plan is to fish into the dark a couple of evenings next week.
Yes, the level is down a few inches, but would chub be on the feed? I fished two spots, both quite close to the car. Float fishing sweetcorn in the first swim produced no bites at all. Ledgering sweetcorn in the second produced half a dozen small fish - 4 chub and 2 roach - but nothing bigger than perhaps 8oz.
I have actually not caught many small fish over the last 12 months so in some ways it is good that there are some around (at least for the long term). But still no decent sized fish appearing.
The forecast is for more rain this weekend, and my new plan is to fish into the dark a couple of evenings next week.
Monday 23 July 2012
The season so far . . .
Well the current river fishing season is now just over five weeks old and I have had one of the poorest starts to a season that I have ever had. It had been even worse than five or six years ago when there were also really bad floods at the start of the season. But that year I was usually able to catch one or two chub each trip - now I am not even getting that.
All sorts of reasons have gone through my mind, from the idea that maybe the fish hadn't spawned and were all holed up on some gravel shallows somewhere, to the idea that maybe my filming of trips is somehow to blame - perhaps I disturb the fish setting up the tripod, perhaps I fish in a more anxious, less-patient way as I am being filmed . . . .
One possible issue is that I am mainly fishing for chub. Barbel would be a better principal target perhaps, but numbers are so low on the Upper Thames that deliberately fishing for them is almost bound to lead to long sequences of blanks anyway.
So what is my current plan? Well I went for a walk at the river on Saturday morning and remarkably, the river is higher again. It had possibly peaked a little bit higher still (though the evidence for this was rather patchy). But as I write this, we have had 3 days without rain and no rain is forecast for the next few days. So tomorrow I will pop to the river first thing and assess the level yet again. If it is down again (as I'm pretty sure it will be), I will have a trip on Tuesday afternoon / evening. This will be a multi-swim bait and fish in rotation plan, with sweetcorn or boilies as the bait. Then I might go early on Wednesday or Thursday morning for a couple of hours float fishing.
If the river is no lower, this plan will be moved back to Thursday evening.
One other point - I do think that I ought to fish a bit longer than I have been each trip. I have been tending to go for just a couple of hours. This should go up to sessions of four or five hours I think.
And venues? For the moment I will stick to the local stretches of the River Thames - at least I dodn't have to travel far to get to these spots. But when conditions do improve I am thinking of having a few trips to the Thames at Northmoor weir. Or maybe the Pickfords stretch.
All sorts of reasons have gone through my mind, from the idea that maybe the fish hadn't spawned and were all holed up on some gravel shallows somewhere, to the idea that maybe my filming of trips is somehow to blame - perhaps I disturb the fish setting up the tripod, perhaps I fish in a more anxious, less-patient way as I am being filmed . . . .
One possible issue is that I am mainly fishing for chub. Barbel would be a better principal target perhaps, but numbers are so low on the Upper Thames that deliberately fishing for them is almost bound to lead to long sequences of blanks anyway.
So what is my current plan? Well I went for a walk at the river on Saturday morning and remarkably, the river is higher again. It had possibly peaked a little bit higher still (though the evidence for this was rather patchy). But as I write this, we have had 3 days without rain and no rain is forecast for the next few days. So tomorrow I will pop to the river first thing and assess the level yet again. If it is down again (as I'm pretty sure it will be), I will have a trip on Tuesday afternoon / evening. This will be a multi-swim bait and fish in rotation plan, with sweetcorn or boilies as the bait. Then I might go early on Wednesday or Thursday morning for a couple of hours float fishing.
If the river is no lower, this plan will be moved back to Thursday evening.
One other point - I do think that I ought to fish a bit longer than I have been each trip. I have been tending to go for just a couple of hours. This should go up to sessions of four or five hours I think.
And venues? For the moment I will stick to the local stretches of the River Thames - at least I dodn't have to travel far to get to these spots. But when conditions do improve I am thinking of having a few trips to the Thames at Northmoor weir. Or maybe the Pickfords stretch.
Thursday 19 July 2012
Two short evening sessions
Tuesday
Based on the rain we have had here, I was expecting the river to be down a bit on last week and prospects for chub to be better, so I was somewhat shocked to find it actually up a few inches. Moreover, the path by the river is now a very liquid mud and is really treacherous to walk along. Nonetheless, I was keen on going fishing and so settled in one of the swims nearest the car for an evening's float fishing after chub.
After about 30 minutes I landed a small roach of about 3oz, so at least I wasn't going to blank! But a further hour and a half produced no more bites and the mystery of the whereabouts of the chub remains. Only one decent fish all season in the current poor conditions.
Wednesday
A last minute change of domestic plans opened up the possibility of a short, two hour, evening session. As the river was higher yesterday, I thought the best chance might actually be to fish for barbel - never a great chance of success on the upper Thames, but given the conditions, possibly my only chance of a good fish. I had baited a swim last night with hemp, corn and boilies and so planned to fish "bait and wait" in this one swim tonight.
So I was at the swim by about 7:30. It was actually a much nicer evening than last night with a decent sunset over the far bank. It is possible that I had one bite during the evening, but there was also quite a lot of weed coming down and it might have been that.
Packed up just before dark as the walk back to the car is really difficult in the mud.
The weather forecast now suggests more rain till Friday and then a change in weather towards hot and sunny. So maybe next week will see improving conditions. My next planned trip is Tuesday and I will fish much longer sessions once conditions start to improve.
Youtube link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yZmslnlHtBI&feature=plcp
Based on the rain we have had here, I was expecting the river to be down a bit on last week and prospects for chub to be better, so I was somewhat shocked to find it actually up a few inches. Moreover, the path by the river is now a very liquid mud and is really treacherous to walk along. Nonetheless, I was keen on going fishing and so settled in one of the swims nearest the car for an evening's float fishing after chub.
After about 30 minutes I landed a small roach of about 3oz, so at least I wasn't going to blank! But a further hour and a half produced no more bites and the mystery of the whereabouts of the chub remains. Only one decent fish all season in the current poor conditions.
Wednesday
A last minute change of domestic plans opened up the possibility of a short, two hour, evening session. As the river was higher yesterday, I thought the best chance might actually be to fish for barbel - never a great chance of success on the upper Thames, but given the conditions, possibly my only chance of a good fish. I had baited a swim last night with hemp, corn and boilies and so planned to fish "bait and wait" in this one swim tonight.
So I was at the swim by about 7:30. It was actually a much nicer evening than last night with a decent sunset over the far bank. It is possible that I had one bite during the evening, but there was also quite a lot of weed coming down and it might have been that.
Packed up just before dark as the walk back to the car is really difficult in the mud.
The weather forecast now suggests more rain till Friday and then a change in weather towards hot and sunny. So maybe next week will see improving conditions. My next planned trip is Tuesday and I will fish much longer sessions once conditions start to improve.
Youtube link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yZmslnlHtBI&feature=plcp
Wednesday 11 July 2012
Newest video - "Rain"
It was only when I was watching the video footage from last night that I realised how odd it looks in many respects. For much of the time I am touch ledgering, but also watching the quivertip. And so I was not always fully aware of the extent to which I was being rained on. Actually some of the rain is extremely hard!
I wonder if my youtube videos will still exist in cyberspace in, say, 200 years time. By then, climate change, pollution or something might have wiped out fish stocks and angling might be a sport of the distant past. A cyber-historian might come across a dusty old server in a back room somewhere and when fired up, might discover my fishing videos. And so he will discover what our wonderful sport had to offer - sitting in nettles for hours at a time as the rain pelts down, watching a stationary rod tip and not catching any fish.
In these postmodern times, my latest fishing video is, perhaps, the perfect embodiment of the sport. Or perhaps not. Or, as Gilles Deleuze** put it, in a passage I selected at random from Cinema 2,
The sheets of past exist, they are strata from where we draw our recollection images. But either they are in any case unusable, because death is a permanent present, the most contracted region; or they can no longer be recalled because they are breaking up or becoming twisted, scattered in a non-stratified substance (p.111)
** French Professor of Philosophy and a key figure in poststructualism. Cinema 2 draws on the work of Henri Bergson to offer an analysis of the representation of time in film and the cinematic treatment of memory, thought and speech. Most of it is bollocks of course.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Css8XBwIj4&feature=plcp
I wonder if my youtube videos will still exist in cyberspace in, say, 200 years time. By then, climate change, pollution or something might have wiped out fish stocks and angling might be a sport of the distant past. A cyber-historian might come across a dusty old server in a back room somewhere and when fired up, might discover my fishing videos. And so he will discover what our wonderful sport had to offer - sitting in nettles for hours at a time as the rain pelts down, watching a stationary rod tip and not catching any fish.
In these postmodern times, my latest fishing video is, perhaps, the perfect embodiment of the sport. Or perhaps not. Or, as Gilles Deleuze** put it, in a passage I selected at random from Cinema 2,
The sheets of past exist, they are strata from where we draw our recollection images. But either they are in any case unusable, because death is a permanent present, the most contracted region; or they can no longer be recalled because they are breaking up or becoming twisted, scattered in a non-stratified substance (p.111)
** French Professor of Philosophy and a key figure in poststructualism. Cinema 2 draws on the work of Henri Bergson to offer an analysis of the representation of time in film and the cinematic treatment of memory, thought and speech. Most of it is bollocks of course.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Css8XBwIj4&feature=plcp
No success with the newest "cunning plan"
My latest "cunning plan" to catch some chub consisted of me baiting up four swims at about 5:00pm and then fishing each in turn through the evening and into the dark. Bait for each would be two pints of hemp, a tin of sweetcorn and two dozen of the smelliest boilies I still have. Then I would not rebait later, simply hope to land on some feeding fish who would recognise the bait straight away, even if they had already eaten everything I had put in earlier.
There had been no rain since Saturday when the British Grand Prix just up the road had been so badly affected, and there had even been some sunshine early this afternoon. So loaded down with the usual stuff I made the 3/4 mile walk down to Shifford lock. I had been there less than 10 minutes when it started to pour down, which it then kept up for the next two hours. I switched my planned four swims to include a couple that were a little sheltered by trees, but I was pretty wet even before I had made my first cast.
And the only possible action I had in the next five hours was in swim two, where I did get a series of very fast taps on the tip when using sweetcorn. I expect these were small fish, but I failed to connect with anything each time I struck. Not a touch on the boilie and no decent pulls on the corn.
But at least it did stop raining about 7:00 and it was actually quite a pleasant evening. Some bats were hunting mayflies along the river. The odd fox was barking. Several kingfishers flew by, or the same one three times. It certainly is a lovely spot in which to not catch fish and a change from last week when my main problem was dehydration. I wrapped up about 10:30 and endured the long walk back to the car through the thick mud that now covers most of the path. But I have to say, I did rather enjoy being out in the dark again. Come late August / September, I shall fish quite a few evenings into the dark.
My next trip will probably be Thursday evening again - I may try the same tactic as tonight. Or I may abandon the river and go trout fishing at Bushyleaze instead! The weather forecast is already really bad for the end of this week, but is suggesting slightly better weather for next week.
I am thinking of publishing a video from today's footage that just consists of me sitting in the rain watching a stationary rod tip.
There had been no rain since Saturday when the British Grand Prix just up the road had been so badly affected, and there had even been some sunshine early this afternoon. So loaded down with the usual stuff I made the 3/4 mile walk down to Shifford lock. I had been there less than 10 minutes when it started to pour down, which it then kept up for the next two hours. I switched my planned four swims to include a couple that were a little sheltered by trees, but I was pretty wet even before I had made my first cast.
And the only possible action I had in the next five hours was in swim two, where I did get a series of very fast taps on the tip when using sweetcorn. I expect these were small fish, but I failed to connect with anything each time I struck. Not a touch on the boilie and no decent pulls on the corn.
But at least it did stop raining about 7:00 and it was actually quite a pleasant evening. Some bats were hunting mayflies along the river. The odd fox was barking. Several kingfishers flew by, or the same one three times. It certainly is a lovely spot in which to not catch fish and a change from last week when my main problem was dehydration. I wrapped up about 10:30 and endured the long walk back to the car through the thick mud that now covers most of the path. But I have to say, I did rather enjoy being out in the dark again. Come late August / September, I shall fish quite a few evenings into the dark.
My next trip will probably be Thursday evening again - I may try the same tactic as tonight. Or I may abandon the river and go trout fishing at Bushyleaze instead! The weather forecast is already really bad for the end of this week, but is suggesting slightly better weather for next week.
I am thinking of publishing a video from today's footage that just consists of me sitting in the rain watching a stationary rod tip.
Monday 9 July 2012
Video from last week's trip posted
I was away over the weekend and have only just had time to cobble something together out of the video footage from last Thursday. There are the three boats that pass through my swim in the space of a minute. There is a heron that takes off from close to where I was fishing and which I hadn't spotted before then. There are the two bombers that flew over, presumably from Brize Norton over to the west. But sadly no fish. Three others were fishing that evening. Mark apparently blanked but is seeking barbel so that is a good excuse. And two others were fishing in the first main glide and had caught a few roach and perch up to about 8oz. Where are the chub?
I have been sorting out bait for this week and am planning, should the rain hold off a little, to go for an evening on Tuesday. I have a new "cunning plan" to find some chub!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HytjhBkTv0U&feature=plcp
I have been sorting out bait for this week and am planning, should the rain hold off a little, to go for an evening on Tuesday. I have a new "cunning plan" to find some chub!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HytjhBkTv0U&feature=plcp
Friday 6 July 2012
The excellent "Fishing for memories" blog / videos
There are dozens of fishing blogs out there of course, and some, like mine, are linked to companion video channels on Youtube. The one of these I like best is Mark Erdwin's Fishing for Memories (http://fishing-for-memories.blogspot.co.uk/) I have been studying this blog-video channel in some detail, looking at what he does differently to me, looking for ideas I can use, and so on.
One of the first big differences is frequency of posting. Mark's blog goes back to 2007 and has 103 postings so far, 17 a year on average. I have posted 75 entries in 2012 alone. He has posted 37 videos in that time, while I have posted 8 in just the last few months. This could be that this is the frequency that he fishes, but I actually suspect it is because he is happy to post only when he has a good catch or some interesting film. That's fair enough, and there is no doubt that it leads to an exceptionally high quality blog and video channel - he is an excellent angler with some amazing catches - I am of course mostly interested in his amazing chub catches.
My philosophy is slightly different but shares the view that my blog and video channel are there to preserve memories. So I have taken the view that I should post regardless of success and try, over the entire sequence of entries and videos, to show what "my fishing life" actually consists of day-to-day, week-to-week, and so on. So my current poor start to the season is shown, "warts and all".
So when I'm 90, I will be able to watch myself in my late 40s blanking in a variety of venues while pursuing huge chub and barbel!
I have downloaded all of Mark's videos and am slowly working my way through them - really excellent stuff I have to say.
One of the first big differences is frequency of posting. Mark's blog goes back to 2007 and has 103 postings so far, 17 a year on average. I have posted 75 entries in 2012 alone. He has posted 37 videos in that time, while I have posted 8 in just the last few months. This could be that this is the frequency that he fishes, but I actually suspect it is because he is happy to post only when he has a good catch or some interesting film. That's fair enough, and there is no doubt that it leads to an exceptionally high quality blog and video channel - he is an excellent angler with some amazing catches - I am of course mostly interested in his amazing chub catches.
My philosophy is slightly different but shares the view that my blog and video channel are there to preserve memories. So I have taken the view that I should post regardless of success and try, over the entire sequence of entries and videos, to show what "my fishing life" actually consists of day-to-day, week-to-week, and so on. So my current poor start to the season is shown, "warts and all".
So when I'm 90, I will be able to watch myself in my late 40s blanking in a variety of venues while pursuing huge chub and barbel!
I have downloaded all of Mark's videos and am slowly working my way through them - really excellent stuff I have to say.
A frustrating afternoon-evening
More rain and the local rivers are actual up again - still, the urge to go fishing is overwhelming. I did actual plan to go trout fishing for an evening at Bushyleaze but the local forecast was that it was going to rain hard again around 6:00pm which would wipe out about half my fishing time - not a good idea when the evening ticket costs nearly £20.
So it is back to the River Thames, this time the main river below Shifford Lock. I figured I would have an afternoon float fishing for chub in a couple of my favourite swims down there, not with a high chance of catching anything, but more for the enjoyment of being out.
What I hadn't reckon on was that the afternoon would be so hot. I was expecting some rain and was dressed accordingly, but it was actually quite a nice afternoon with only a few scattered clouds. By the time I reached Shifford Lock I was really overheated and made the mistake of drinking most of the liquid I had brought with me.
What I had also forgotten about was the possibility of extensive boat traffic on this stretch, something that didn't occur back in February-March when I was fishing this area a lot. I had just baited up two swims when two barges came through. I am sure the fish are used to boat traffic overall but that it does spook them for a while and especially early season. So I left the two swims and settled in a swim at the downstream end of Duxford Loop. No boats here and also no fish in the hour of sweltering sunshine that I fished here.
Back to below Shifford Lock and less than five minutes in the first swim when one barge and four pleasure cruisers came through the swims more or less one after the other. So much so that they had to queue at Shifford Lock to get through. One or two boats might be ok, five might be too much.
So a change of plan. I would switch to ledgering and a "bait and wait" approach in one of my favourite chub swims on Duxford Loop. The sun kept shining and no rain appeared. I became more and more thirsty and was reduced to pouring water from the river over my head. Around 7:30 I was surprised to see Mark from Witney, who I had seen lots at the end of last season. I didn't recognise him at the start as he didn't have his thermal hat on and I've never seen him with hair! I complained about the poor start to the season I'd had and he complained about the excessive vegetation growth by the river compared to March - some of the swims we fished last season are too overgrown to get to now. He was kind enough to let me have a few mouthfuls of his rather-nice lime drink. I would have happily drunk it all.
I stayed until just after 9:00. It was actually a really nice evening and clearly I should have gone to Bushyleaze. I will start fishing into the dark soon I expect.
So no chub again and no fishing till the middle of next week as I am off to the Lake District for a few days with Daughter - the weather forecast is for up to 10cms of rain to fall this weekend!
Still I did take a rather nice photo of a spider
So it is back to the River Thames, this time the main river below Shifford Lock. I figured I would have an afternoon float fishing for chub in a couple of my favourite swims down there, not with a high chance of catching anything, but more for the enjoyment of being out.
What I hadn't reckon on was that the afternoon would be so hot. I was expecting some rain and was dressed accordingly, but it was actually quite a nice afternoon with only a few scattered clouds. By the time I reached Shifford Lock I was really overheated and made the mistake of drinking most of the liquid I had brought with me.
What I had also forgotten about was the possibility of extensive boat traffic on this stretch, something that didn't occur back in February-March when I was fishing this area a lot. I had just baited up two swims when two barges came through. I am sure the fish are used to boat traffic overall but that it does spook them for a while and especially early season. So I left the two swims and settled in a swim at the downstream end of Duxford Loop. No boats here and also no fish in the hour of sweltering sunshine that I fished here.
Back to below Shifford Lock and less than five minutes in the first swim when one barge and four pleasure cruisers came through the swims more or less one after the other. So much so that they had to queue at Shifford Lock to get through. One or two boats might be ok, five might be too much.
So a change of plan. I would switch to ledgering and a "bait and wait" approach in one of my favourite chub swims on Duxford Loop. The sun kept shining and no rain appeared. I became more and more thirsty and was reduced to pouring water from the river over my head. Around 7:30 I was surprised to see Mark from Witney, who I had seen lots at the end of last season. I didn't recognise him at the start as he didn't have his thermal hat on and I've never seen him with hair! I complained about the poor start to the season I'd had and he complained about the excessive vegetation growth by the river compared to March - some of the swims we fished last season are too overgrown to get to now. He was kind enough to let me have a few mouthfuls of his rather-nice lime drink. I would have happily drunk it all.
I stayed until just after 9:00. It was actually a really nice evening and clearly I should have gone to Bushyleaze. I will start fishing into the dark soon I expect.
So no chub again and no fishing till the middle of next week as I am off to the Lake District for a few days with Daughter - the weather forecast is for up to 10cms of rain to fall this weekend!
Still I did take a rather nice photo of a spider
Monday 2 July 2012
Long range weather forecasts
In the hope that the rain might be coming to an end soon, I was looking at the local 10-day weather forecast and basically there is a 70% chance of rain every day for the next week and a half. It rained quite a lot here yesterday and it is doing so again today. This is all rather disheartening. It might be ok if barbel were a serious local target, but chub fishing is just constantly hit by the river rising and colouring up, just as you expect it to be getting better.
As I left on Saturday, I left a marker at the top of the stretch and popping back today, the river is up an inch or two. It reminds me so much of the start of the season in 2007 where the rivers remained in flood till August. Earlier in the year, when I was planning my season, I had been expecting good catches of chub from the local stretches, maybe some fun fishing on clear rivers for chub with floating crust or natural baits. Certainly not this.
If there is a break in the rain tomorrow afternoon, I might go and have a few hours in a single swim, rather than moving about lots. But that's only to be able to get out by the river, not due to a view I will catch much.
I have just been reading the new Angling Times and Angler's Mail for the start of the new river season and they have no chub captures of any note at all. Maybe my 5-05 was actually pretty good! If I had said I caught it on the Windrush, I might have got my picture in the fishing papers again!
Or maybe I sould have a trip after trout again - maybe Bushyleaze?
Addendum - Tuesday
No large chub reported in this week's Angler's Mail. Also, I have been catching up with my favourite fishing blog - Phil Smith's http://www.barbelblogger.blogspot.co.uk/
He has just turned his attention to barbel, fishing from early pm to around 11:00pm on three afternoons last week, managing one really nice barbel. This does suggest that the afternoon into evening might be the best focus for longer sessions. But that is one fish for 24 hours fishing with two rods.
I had a quick trip down to the river this lunchtime and it is up about 2 inches from the weekend. Rain showers are occuring every couple of hours, so the earliest I am planning an evening session is perhaps Thursday. I may go and bait some swims on Wednesday afternoon.
As I left on Saturday, I left a marker at the top of the stretch and popping back today, the river is up an inch or two. It reminds me so much of the start of the season in 2007 where the rivers remained in flood till August. Earlier in the year, when I was planning my season, I had been expecting good catches of chub from the local stretches, maybe some fun fishing on clear rivers for chub with floating crust or natural baits. Certainly not this.
If there is a break in the rain tomorrow afternoon, I might go and have a few hours in a single swim, rather than moving about lots. But that's only to be able to get out by the river, not due to a view I will catch much.
I have just been reading the new Angling Times and Angler's Mail for the start of the new river season and they have no chub captures of any note at all. Maybe my 5-05 was actually pretty good! If I had said I caught it on the Windrush, I might have got my picture in the fishing papers again!
Or maybe I sould have a trip after trout again - maybe Bushyleaze?
Addendum - Tuesday
No large chub reported in this week's Angler's Mail. Also, I have been catching up with my favourite fishing blog - Phil Smith's http://www.barbelblogger.blogspot.co.uk/
He has just turned his attention to barbel, fishing from early pm to around 11:00pm on three afternoons last week, managing one really nice barbel. This does suggest that the afternoon into evening might be the best focus for longer sessions. But that is one fish for 24 hours fishing with two rods.
I had a quick trip down to the river this lunchtime and it is up about 2 inches from the weekend. Rain showers are occuring every couple of hours, so the earliest I am planning an evening session is perhaps Thursday. I may go and bait some swims on Wednesday afternoon.
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