Thursday started off a bit drizzly with moderate westerly winds but was forecast to dry up by the afternoon. So after the previous day’s F1fest I decided to go for something less commercially orientated and rolled up at Hendre. Fairly quiet now at the back end of the Summer although the carpark swims seem to be on permanent sub-let to some fairly dodgy looking ‘anglers’. I hope the syndicate are keeping a close watch on their precious C**p stocks.
I opted to stay well clear of their dubious antics and trollied around to old peg 2, i.e. to the right of the sluice. Standard Hendre approach, 28g hybrid feeder, bed of micros covered by a skin of groundbait, and with various bandums and wafters on a size 16QM1. 8″ hooklength. Cast out, tighten up, wait for the pull.
At around the half hour mark I noticed a slight indication, and sure enough 2 minutes later a proper pull and Bream #1. Another followed and in the space of 90 minutes I took 6 in all, including a couple of the largest slabs I’ve taken there, easily knocking 4 Lbs, proper turkey plates.
It always amazes me how such a decent sized fish can manage to look so small in a photograph!!
After this run of fish I had a bit of a technical melt-down where a twist-up in my reel line formed a knot and rather than try to unpick it I opted to scrap out about 7m of line. Of course this meant I had to reclip and although I worked hard to regain the right line I may have been no more than a half-turn out. But either because of this, or perhaps because the Bream can get a bit ratty after a few have been taken, the next hour only produced 2 Bream, and then the following hour was practically biteless and I resolved to pack up at 4 pm as it wasn’t as totally dry as the forecast had predicted. Of course, after over an hour of nothingness the tip went round with about 10 minutes to go and then again on my last cast after I was mostly packed up. So 10 Bream, easily 30 Lbs+, simply lovely. Bit of light preparation now over the next couple of days to strip the gear back for Tidefest.
26 Year ITCH 