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.