We get away finally, for three days on the farm, it had been a hard year now any fishing would do. En route to our acommodation we stopped off at the Warks Avon and I decided to fish the wides by the car park. Feeling a bit achy and under the weather it was once again simple fishing, mostly just wetting a line, having a picnic for a few hours before booking in, that sort of thing.
Expecting it to be windy I set up a waggler and fished on the drop hoping not to be plagued by bleak and whilst a few showed it wasn't too bad, Instead it was mostly perch from the off with the odd netter plus some half decent roach. The wind didn't turn up either as we were sheltered by the hill and a cloudy but dry day was welcome compared to the heatwave here the previous year. Bubbles appeared every now and then and I finally spotted the culprit when donning the polaroids during a sunny spell as a nice tench dashed through the weeds. My glasses also revealed the amount of weed on the bottom and it was no wonder I couldn't get to a clear spot to entice any tincas, it was nice to see them though. I had three hours fishing for 25 fish (mostly perch), having coffee and a nice packed lunch with the wife before we headed off to our abode for the evening.
Day 2
A short journey to the Severn on the first full day saw more windy weather therefore it had to be the right bank so I chose Coomby's Farm at Highley, here I set up in the shallows for a few dace and one small chub around a pound. Despite feeling a bit wobbly on my feet the need to explore made me move down to just below the Borle Brook to a spot where I have had several 2 pound roach and many barbel in the past. Today saw yet more dace, in fact I couldn't even get a roach or perch which meant that sole chub was the only fish that wasn't a dace or bleak.
I didn't mind too much, the scenery was stunning as ever but there were no steam trains* and no cheeky sheep but it was pretty damn good to be here. besides I'm till waiting for this huge tree to end up in the river
It was nice to get down the Severn again following a great trip last winter although I feel I didn't fish it that well and could have chose more oxygenated water, also I should have fished eves or mornings like everyone says but I just wanted to fish, and that was it, fish I did and the dace obliged, it was a joy to run a float through so fast getting around 40 silver darts, some nice ones too. The weed was absent once again and there was algae on the gravels, this however was not a good sign.
Day 3
This was one of those days, I was low on maggots but was kindly given some left over freebies by our b&b host who is also an angler and generous to boot, trouble was these maggots had seen better days and were a congealed sweaty mess by the time I loaded the car. Not to worry I thought as I'll pop into a local tackle shop on the way to get fresh bait. I get there after taking a wrong turn only to find it only opens on Saturdays. Ok plan C was to go to the Morrisons we passed earlier, get some maize flour and do a recovery job on those sweaty reds. You have got to love the countryside as this Morrisons was tiny and it's world food isle solely consisted of pasta and rice, I decided to finally go to the river and make do with what I have got.
We finally get to Eckington Bridge on the Avon after what seemed an age, this was much lower down than I had previously fished on the river so I hoped there could be a zander, good chub or perch but knew anything but bleak would be a good session. I loaded my bib with my old but relatively clean maggots and put the gloopy freebies on my unhooking mat, the big dollop of maggots stuck together but the gentle slope meant they would trickle down into the spare bait tub and meet a bit of turmeric powder, this at least would make them useable. My missus joked that she will never cook with mince again and I commented about how funny it would be if an out of control dog came bounding in and tried to scoff the lot, they stunk the place out for sure and nothing came near us.
The fish even stayed away apart from those pesky bleak, they had to turn up didn't they? I then finally had a small bream, the excitement short lived as it soon turned into a much larger pike much to my disdain but to the amusement of the missus, cue action shot of a bending rod.
The pike let go, then grabbed again before letting go once more, the result was a dead bream and a dead swim, everything was going wrong today.
The next spot upstream saw yet more bleak before I settled on a final spot, I didn't have enough bait to fish through bleak having only salvaged a few of the sticky ones so I was relieved to be trotting somewhere where I wasn't getting any bites at all if that makes sense. It was mighty deep mind, a good twelve feet close in under the rod tip, trotting any further out would have needed a slider. A couple of small perch here seemed like a minor victory.
A few better perch turned up along with some nice roach, for a while it was going great but the bleak soon showed, fishing right in the margins against the rushes negated this a little, dropping my stick float in vertically so the bait fell to the bottom quickly, I also figured the fish would be close in due to all the paddleboarders going by, even a wild swimmer came up the river despite the no swimming signs by the car park, she looked at me then turned around, a heavy shower or two then quietened things down on the recreational boating front.
Holding the float back just as the bait hit bottom below the rod tip worked a treat in the deep water, I ended up with 37 fish (not counting bleak of course) mostly an even split of roach and perch with a couple of dace and a pretty good perch towards the end.
* So my missus got chatting to a lady who said the Severn Valley Railway were having trouble getting coal from somewhere that ends in 'Stan' the end result being the steam trains weren't running except at weekends, a shame I say, hearing that beast roar won't kill the planet nor will it do any harm long term.
