The fishing kit I use

I’f your like me you question some of these top anglers and the kit they claim to use. It’s funny watching the latest YouTube clip, said angler fishing away endorsing the kit they’ve supposedly been using for ages. Hmmm they’re either very good at keeping it clean or they only get it out for special occasions, looks brand new to me!!. Then there’s the anglers that seem to jump ship all the time still claiming what they’re using is the best, ‘but you said x was the best company last year’!. How can we believe what they say?.

Any way to that end I do get asked about my own kit.

What do I use?

I actually use nothing fancy it has to be fit for what I want it to do and with in my budget (yes unfortunately I do have to pay for my kit and not just grab what I need off the shelf)

I suppose in a nutshell what you find in the shop is in my kit bag or has been at some point, don’t worry I do clean it up before putting back on the shelf LOL.

If you were to take a peek in my rod holdall you’ll find a Middy XM10-2 pole 13mtr. As I fish a lot on rivers I have spare no’4’s and spare no’5’s plus match 16 top kit’s. Fitted with combinations of Middy solid and hollow elastics. There’s also mini butt’s that fit in either the no’5 or 6 section plus one that fits the no’10 or 11 sections. And of course the important cupping kit oh and a flick tip.

What else is in there? a Middy multi length Animal tamer rod which gives me a rod that I can use from 14-18 ft. There’s also an old school Silstar Royal class river feeder rod plus a Silstar Ian Heaps multimesh match rod.

Other than that there’s an umbrella and a few adjustable bank sticks.

In my Carryall you’ll find three reel cases which include two Middy CRX 30 reels. One is for Stick float fishing and one for Waggler fishing, line choice on both these reels is Colmic allround. The third reel is a Colmic Marzel 4000 which I use for feeder and bomb fishing, spooled up with Colmic feeder pro line.

I have a couple of small case’s with various things in them like swivels, scissors, shot pliers, a few spares like pole stonfos. The bigger case holds three different catapults from Middy and various pole pots.

Hook boxes, I like to use good old Stonfo boxes although I do have one Frenzee box. The hooks themselves are nearly all Colmic, these being Hayabusa’s, B2000’s and B900’s, All tied to Colmic Stream line.

For commercial types waters (frenzee box) you’ll find the hooks in there are all Middy patterns tied to Middy Lo Viz line.

Rig trays. In this area there’s a lot of variations of floats, but in a nut shell. My river rigs are tied (main line) using Colmic X5000, Canals Colmic stream, Commercials Middy Lov viz. Shot I really like the new shots and slot shots from Middy as they seem really soft. I also us some small sizes in Colmic to.

Seat Box is a Colmic One box (old model) Colmic attachments. Before this I had a old Danson match box which my son now has, All the attachments on this box are Middy Stargrip.

Landing nets I use a Colmic light tech for the river and canal, coupled to a Colmic Skar K3 Superlight handle. Commercials I use a Middy F1-50 coupled to a Middy White Knuckle handle. Keepnets for all venues are Middy.

Hopefully that gives you a little bit of an insight in to the kit I use in my match fishing.

If you have any questions about what I use then please do not hesitate to ask.

My roving kit is mostly made up using combinations of Kodex and Gardner.

River’s closed but the Sun’s out!

Finally the Sun is out, but where to go to satisfy that fishing itch while the rivers are still closed?

Well there’s plenty of places locally that you can fish on a day ticket, so where would I recommend?

Zouch canal is worth a visit, fishing from the tow path side the controlling club is Loughborough Soar AS. Tickets are £5 which need to be purchased either from our shop or you can get an E Ticket on your smart phone. LSAS E-ticket.

Zouch canal has a good head of fish, with the best areas starting from opposite the first house up to the old stone bridge. Baits are easy being maggots, casters and worms a fine dark ground bait like Match pro canal or Van Den Eyde special will help draw fish in to your swim. With a depth of around 3ft small and light floats are best. Pole float in sizes 4×12 should be fine or if your fishing rod and line a part loaded waggler of about 0.5g loading plus 3 no4 should be fine but I would change the no 4 shot for no 8’s and fish them strung out.

The canal can get a bit of flow on it when the lock gates are open and closed. If there is a fare bit of boat traffic you will find bigger float sizes will help. Its important not to lose feed while there is flow on the canal, wait for the flow to stop before lose feeding.

Target fish, Roach, Skimmers, Perch and Bleak. Best times are when there’s some colour to the water.

Noise on the bank!

You may know I’ve been fishing the Coventry canal league this winter in some not so great weather conditions.

After a week of snow and freezing temperatures the final round would be held on a frozen canal.

After a hard day I actually won the match over all with not a massive weight but not shy of 3lb.

Putting that to one side the conditions and how myself and other anglers actually caught from the seemingly impossible got me thinking and asking myself questions. How were we able to catch?

After all we hear people saying be quiet on the bank don’t splash feeders etc or you’ll spook fish off.

But hang on surely that has just been proved wrong. I’ve just fished a section with a dozen other anglers smashing the hell out of the frozen surface before fishing!.

Now the ice was a good 3 inch thick and it took most of us a good 45 minutes to break through enough to be able to fish.

The noise under the surface must of been deafening with repeated hammer blows all along the bank.

Swinging an icebreaker about means you can’t really go to far out roughly a top 5 or 6. Don’t forget this is a canal with not much more than 3ft of depth to it.

So hopefully I’m building a mental picture up for you.

So answer me this.

All in is called and after around 20 minutes I’m in to my first fish and I can see the angler to my right starting to catch to. But hadn’t we just spooked every fish off with in a mile of us?.

So are fish more inquisitive than we think, does the noise spook them off for only a short period of time only for them to return to find out what all the noise was?.

I like to think so, and by placing a small plate of food down there for them to find hopefully they’ll hang around.

Noise must play apart in fishing as in keeping it to a minimum. But I do think fish will come and investigate.

Maybe a new noise all day long will push fish away until it stops.

I seem to recall someone saying that they dropped a brick in to margins that spooked the fish but only for the them to return quite quickly to investigate.

Lots to think about and may a few experiments are needed.

Scott

2017 Winter League round one

It only seems like five minutes ago since we entered our first winter league back in 2016, I say we I actually mean team Colmic Soar.

2017 see’s us a lot more settled and with some new team members we’re hungry for results.

So having spent the last twelve months learning more about fishing the pole on rivers, canals and commercials. I’m a lot more confident in the whole aspect of pole fishing. After filling in for a team member on the Frazley canal teams of four in September and doing quite well in my section now is the real test on the river ‘Soar winter league against some of the best in the country’.

As with the rest of the team I’ve put in weeks of prep making and fine tuning rigs to cover a wide range of water conditions. As well as tying plenty of hooks in a range of sizes and patterns to suit a range of baits and possible fish sizes. All my kit was checked and double checked making sure rods reels my pole and nets etc were all in good working order.

The morning of October 1st soon came round and after a down pour of rain a few days before the river should be in good form all though the much wanted colour never came and the river was still gin clear. With all ten team members booked in we had a fairly good draw and it was off to our respective pegs and sections.

I had drawn p7 on Mountsorrels Waterside section. An end peg known as the boat swim, due to a large house boat moored there. As the draw was actually at the Waterside Id not far to go to get to my peg which was great, no loading of the barrow and humping kit across fields.

There was a boat moored up against the house boat which I could reach with 11 mtr. Great a long line across to the boat plus a line at round 10 mtr and one at 5 mtr line to hand. I couldn’t really see a bomb line and there wasn’t really any need to set up a waggler line as I could reach what I needed with the pole.

With a plan of fishing groundbait caster and hemp at 11mtr’s I would see what the boat traffic was like on the 10 mtr line as this line would be on the edge of the boat track. My 5 mtr line would be a mixture of maggot caster and worm as there was a clump of streamer weed just down the peg, fingers crossed it would hold a few bonus perch. There was only 1/2 hour left to set up when the people that owned the boat across from me suddenly up’d sticks and headed off for the day. Hmmm ok that’s changed things a little, with all the disturbance I’d leave this line alone for at least an hour for it to settle before adding any bait.

The all in was called at 11am, my first line would be on my 5 mtr line. Cupping a mix of bronze maggot and hemp I fished over this using a 0.75 Colmic Dudda float with strung out no’10 slot shot. Inching the rig through it wasn’t long before the first fish was in the net, a huge bleak!. This line started to come a live with some good fish coming to the net. Swoping between red and bronze maggot I put together a good run of perch the one bonus fish I was after, a try on the caster brought a good sized skimmer and things slowed off a little. With the big perch about may be the fish had backed off a little time to rest this line but not before a cup of bronze maggots was carefully cupped in the swim.

Reaching for the long pole line I cupped in 12 balls of groundbait which was a mix of Van Den Eynde River ace and Super crack Roach, plus a few casters.

A 1 gr Colmic Liri was my rig of choice running the float though with a caster on the hook I pick off a few roach but nothing really worth the effort.

A quick check back on at 5 mtr and I was back in to perch straight away, there must be some big un’s in here somewhere. So a change of bait and hook was in order, off came a size 18 and on went a Hayabusa 157 size 14 wide gape hook prefect for a lobby tail. Using the same float I added on an extra float length of depth and out the rig went. ‘Bang fish on’ first monster perch!

I managed to but a few of this big perch in the net before loosing one in the weed! With time getting on and about 1 hour to go I knew Id put a good weight of fish together so thought a quick experiment was an idea. With about 1/2 a kilo of groundbait in the bucket I balled my 10mtr line, this being a tactic that can bring instant results or completely kill your swim so use with caution. First run through resulted in a small roach, a few more followed but as with the 11mtr line nothing to really shout about. Back to the 5 mtr line and a small perch with only a few minutes to go a frantic re-bait of the hook and back out but nothing before time was called.

Knowing Id got a few good anglers in my section with Rob Perkins in p5 and Nathan Hughes a bit further up river, it could be a tight one. I will have to wait for the scales to come. Being p7 I was the first to be weighed in with 5kilo 150g wow nice! then to my surprise the next few pegs where all around 2kilo. ‘Might of got this one in the bag’ only to be pipped to a section win by 5kilo 350g, dam it ill beat you next time Ross!

As a team we did really well with a section win for team member John Lock at Kegworth, an impressive 6 kilo bag. The rest of the team did their bit and backed up our weights with some amazing results. With a total of 41 points we finished 4th over all, roll on round two!.

Littlemans first match

A few of you will know that my 5 year old son Leon aka littleman has been on the bank with me for a few years now. And that it wasn’t that long ago that he pinched my new pole and set about bagging up on a local water.

A few trips up to Springwood fishery and he’s starting to get the hang of pole fishing, catching carp Ide Rudd and Roach. One afternoon a rough tally up would of seen him putting 20 odd pound in the net (no keepnets unless in a match) which ain’t bad for a 5 year old.

One Sunday I was booked in on a match up at Springwood with a few of my team mates from Colmic. After a chat with the lads we thought if he wanted to Leon could fish the match instead of me.

Thankfully we managed to get him off to bed early with an early start and long day ahead.

Up early we loaded up and headed off to Springwood for breakfast, paid our pools, peg fees and Leon drew his first peg.

While I set his kit up he pottered round to give the competition a few words that he was going to beat them especially Charlie. I have to say it’s great to see others talking to him, helping him on.

Time was called and it wasn’t long before Leon was in to his first fish of the day with a nice Carp gracing the rim of the landing net. A few Ide followed which he correctly placed in the silvers net. The day went on with Carp Ide and Roach before it went quite for a while.

A try in the margin with meat saw a nice Carp which but up a great scrap, a few missed bites followed and Leon was starting to get tired after all the excitement.

“Dad and going to have a sit down with a cup of Tea, you can have ago now”.

At the final whistle Leon weighed in a fantastic 17lb even after a few lost fish.

I have to say a massive thank you to Iain and Jen up at Springwood fisheries for making us so welcome on Leon’s first ever match.

Want to know more about getting your kids in to fishing, please just ask, i’m in the shop most days of the week for a chat. Or have a look at www.getfishing.org.uk 

Enjoy your fishing

Scott & Leon

 

The art of the river angler

We may never see the glory day’s of anglers lining the banks of the river’s up and the country in 100 + peg matches week in week out. World championships held on the Trent embankment in Nottingham, drawing huge crowds to watch top anglers at their best. I even recall matches covering both banks on the Trent and river Soar on more than a few weekends.

But the rivers are dead now or are they? or is it more we just don’t know how to fish them in these modern times.

Anglers are slowly drifting back on to the river banks, but why?. Is it because clubs are trying to make access better, I’ve come across some parts of the Trent that has better access than some commercials with pegs that you can now park behind. Or is it the weights that are coming out, the 2016 Soar Valley winter league you had to be well in to double figures to get anywhere. Not to mention the treble figure weights yes that’s right well over 100lb, but the rivers are dead aren’t they!

So where do I start, what tickets do I need?

If your relatively new to river fishing then i’d suggest starting on the river Soar rather than the Trent. Access is pretty good in a number of areas and there is a good variation of sections from slow deep runs to fast shallow runs that will test your skills.

Much of the Soar is club controlled, as a rough guide starting from the Trent area Ratcliffe on Soar through to Kegworth is controlled by Long Eaton Federation, Kegworth to Kegworth Deep locks is controlled by Long Eaton Victoria. Kegworth Deep locks to Sutton Bonington playing fields is controlled by Loughborough Soar AS. Zouch canal (tow path) to Barrow upon Soar Osier beds is mostly controlled by Loughborough Soar AS. Barrow through to Birstall on the outskirts of Leicester is mostly controlled by Leic’s & District Amalgamation. Find out more

Can I get away with using my commercial match gear? of course you can. Your pole floats and set ups will be different and you’ll more than likely need to size down your elastics to a solid 4-6. A lot of commercial rods tend to be between 9 and 10ft which are a little to short for river fishing but that doesn’t mean they are completely useless.

By far the quickest and easiest way in to river fishing from commercials is with the pole. As mentioned above scaling down your elastics and a few running water pole rigs, don’t forget the pole feeder and your sorted.

Want to know more? why not pop in to our Kegworth shop for a brew and a chat or you could throw your self in at the deep end and join us on some of our river Soar open matches.

5 years old and bagging

Was school holidays and little man had been pestering me for sometime to going fishing, after all he’d been out pegging match sections and seen me off entering verious competitions all winter.

The weather wasn’t great but a careful watch of the forecast showed a window of two days at the end of the week when it wouldn’t be to cold and windy for him.

He wanted to fish the river but it would of been so hard going just to try and catch tiny roach that I knew we had to go somewhere with at least half a chance. So off to the Moat at Weston we went with the view to let him fish the whip in the margins.

How wrong was I

I adjusted my seat box so the footplate was as high as I could get it moved everything in and set about priming two swims to fish. I’d got the near swim started with a few telling knocks on the float it was over to Leon. I want to use your pole dad

err…!

Well ok after some thrashing about helping him get settled we’d pushed the fish further out than we wanted, to about 9mtr but Leon was getting the hang of holding the pole across his legs.

Swinging on 9mtr of pole at 5 years old he had his first fish on which turned out to be a dam good sized Perch. Once broken down he handled the pole prefectly guiding the fish in to the net.

Back out and it wasn’t long before he was in to some good skimmers, getting a little to confident he was trying to hold the pole and reaching for the landing net!

The wind started to get up and really gust making it really difficult to control the pole so we had call it a day.

Can we come back tomorrow dad?

We’ll see what the weather is like in the morning.

Day two

Same peg and the weather was almost a spring day bright and sunny not good for fishing really. I’d packed a block of wood for him to place on the foot plate to raise his legs a bit more in line for the pole.

We basically fished the same way all though we tried a small amount of groundbait with the hope of forcing things on a little faster.

As with the first day Perch was the order of the day followed by skimmers. The light was all wrong causing the pole to cast a shadow across the water like a sun dial. There were fish in the area then a few missed bites saw us breaking for something to eat. A hour gone by and the sun had moved causing the near by trees to cast shadows over the same area we where fishing, the prefect time to get back out on the pole.

A few pots of micros and I past the pole over to Leon which saw the float bury in to a nice carp. After a good scrap Leon managed to guide it in for me to net, good few pounds that fish. Shipping back out we managed another two good carp before the strain of the fish and swing about on the pole beat him and it was time to pack up for home.