3 weeks on from my last fishing session and I was itching to get on the bank again. After my last, somewhat low-key (and cold) trip to the Angel, I wanted to try the Oaks again and was looking forward to trying my new pole for only the second time.
Leading up to today there were some fantastic weights coming out of the match lakes but also some reports of spawning carp, so I didnt know where to head for - other than I fancied fishing a snake type lake which still left 3 options - Cedar, Maple or Poplars. Cedar would have to be vacated by 4pm for an evening match so I didnt fancy that. After asking Rob in the on-site tackle shop he recommended the high peg no.s on Poplars, so off I went.
Poplars is a long thin lake with a central island about 12-15m away accessible from nearly all swims. The lake has an access road all the way around so getting to your peg doesnt mean any long walks, yet you would hardly know the road is there or that you are on a complex with the line of trees shielding the lake from the road, but importantly for pole fishing with access "cut through" for unshippping etc. In fact Maple lake must be about 30 feet away at one end but such is the matured vegatation here that you would never know.
At the end of the lake Rob had suggested, there was already an angler on the "point" of the island and a few round from him on the far side that I could hear but not see. Peg 54 would have put me in a lovely looking corner peg, but would have seriously encroached on the other guy. I settled on one to the right, peg 53. On this peg there is a concrete platform that protrudes about 4 feet past the bank side. The island was slightly cut back about 14.5m away and I had the platform of 54 to use as a margin line 6m away on the left (I love these angling mags where someone states "I fished to the spare peg 16m away" !) and an overhanging bush just past the vacant platform on my right about 7m along.
Fish were certainly visible and audible crashing in the margin reeds near the island, but as I plumbed up I was a little taken a back at the depth (or lack of it) on my swim. The Oaks website had stated an average depth down the track of 5 feet (similar to Cedar) but I had a maximum of 2.5 feet in the centre shallowing to 12/14" at the margin/island with no distinct shelves or features to speak of. Rob had suggested finding 2 feet of water across and fishing pellet, but this was really anywhere from 3-13m !
I decided to have the pellet line at 13m with the option of going tight over if the fish did move into shallower water later. I'd originally planned to fish 4mm feed pellets with an expander on the hook, but followed Rob`s advice and fed micros instead.
My bait tray was full as usual with corn, 4mm cubes of meat, 2 pints of maggots, some groundbait and a variety of hook pellets as well as the wetted micros.
My bait tray was full as usual with corn, 4mm cubes of meat, 2 pints of maggots, some groundbait and a variety of hook pellets as well as the wetted micros.
I`d also wanted to feed a meat/corn line at the base of the near shelf. As I didnt have one as such I settled for a swim at 45° about 6m out. Here I would feed 4mm meat cubes and some corn every 5 mins. But quite sparingly. I`d hoped this would be my main line and as I was starting to fish late morning just as bites had tailed off here in the past, I really wanted to nurse this swim carefully.
I fed the left hand margin with 2 pots of loose groundbait and a few pieces of corn and intended to leave it for a few hours, whilst I would not feed the RH tree margin for a few hours but with a lot more groundbait. Although the water is heavily coloured I was concerned about the margins as they were so shallow. More of that later.
Today I was going all out with a variety of Nick Gilbert floats. I set up a couple of .3 rigs for the deeper water a Gimp for pellet and a Decker for meat/corn and 0.2 Mini Gimp for shallow, all on .14 line to 0.125 hooklengths as I really didnt know what to expect. My margin lines were on .2G mini diamonds with stronger 0.165 to .14.
I started with a cad pot and some micros and a plug of groundbait at 13m. It didnt take long to get bites but they were generally finicky despite dotting the float down. The weather was now around 23/24° and overcast but with hardly a breath of wind on the water. A bit of a change from my last time on the bank !
The expander was getting ragged and it was no surprise that when I did hook fish it was roach in the 1-2 oz bracket. I plugged away on this line and tried varying hookbaits. I didnt have any bigger expanders so used some banded hard pellets but through trial and error found 6mm soft hook pellets seemed the best balance between bites and durability. Eventually I picked up some nice ide and F1s to 1lb but it was starting to slow down.
I rested the pellet line and tried the 6m meat/corn line. Again bites were slow and from small roach generally. I tried changing the feeding pattern but it just wasn`t happening. I looked in on the LH margin with corn but save another mini roach and a crazed mirror around 2lbs it was again quiet. I`d now fished for 2hrs and had about 6lbs of fish which I found very disappointing.
Still on my previous trips to the Oaks i`d had quiet spells around this time of day. So after trying the margin line under the bush without a touch, I tried a new swim about 8m out with maggot but quickly abandoned it as I was back to mini roach and rudd. Lovely fish, just not my intended quarry. I decided to convert this line back to pellets but to try and get the fish shallow. I hadn't had many swirls on top when feeding but felt by increasing the frequency with a cattie that this might kick the fish on to feed with a bit of luck.
Gradually this started to work, by catapulting micros every 45 seconds or so then feeding from the pot above the float to tighten the fish up, I was starting to get bites again. Sometimes they would hook themselves against the pole tip but by varying the depth between 6" and 2 ' I was starting to get some fish at last, although I still had a lot of missed bites and little dinks.
I'd planned to go back onto the margins late in the day but 3 families of geese were using platform 54 for a diving competion so I left them to it. Graceful on the water, not exactly Tom Daley diving in !
The fish still came and went in bursts. At the end I'd had about 25 F1s, 5-6 carp to 2lbs, a few nice ide and plenty of roach and rudd for about 35lbs (keepnets are banned at the moment - so its a guesstimate). One of the small mirrors was either the fattest fish I've ever seen or full of spawn - a possible reason to why the carp weren't really showing today.
All in all a difficult day in some respects when you consider that I blew out on the margins and meat swims. Luckily over-complicating things and forcing myself to try different things probably worked in my favour for once today with fishing shallow and trying to make the fish switch on.
The Maver Enigma 1 pole was a total joy to use and being able to fish long is now a genuine option for me - if not always a neccesity.
The Maver Enigma 1 pole was a total joy to use and being able to fish long is now a genuine option for me - if not always a neccesity.
One thing I must say is how much I love this fishery. I'm a great believer in letting people enjoy their type of fishing, even if its not for me personally - but I'd read a lot of negative comments about commercial fisheries in the last few weeks on some forums, normally of the won't fish commercials as they are 'holes in the ground' variety.
Now perhaps these people can just turn up and catch a ton on demand. I know i can't and had to really work hard today for what I caught. Maybe that's just me, I've never claimed to be any more than an average angler at best. But when people look down their noses at ALL commercial fisheries I'll just say this... I don't think I've ever fished anywhere that's felt as 'natural' as it did here.
Being on Poplars today was a fantastic experience. Apart from a signal crayfish (which I didnt want to see !) There was a huge variety of animal life to see and hear (the birds were singing so loudly my wife could hardly hear me on the phone !) From squirrels to chiff-chaffs and 30 geese it really was idyllic. With well-conditioned, hard fighting fish but above and beyond that It was a pleasure just being alive and outside on a day like today. Its not often I think like that. And surely you cant get much better than that.
Thanks for reading
Tight lines
Robin.
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