"Dad, I want to catch a chub....."

....were the words uttered from my nine year olds mouth this morning. We'd been talking about going fishing, and I told him in these conditions, his best bet was chub, pike or grayling. So after giving him a little fishing encyclopaedia, he decided on chub. 

Getting out after lunch, we set up, him with a trust john Wilson Avon and me with the drennan IM8 super feeder. I told him where to cast a big lump of meat, and just I was side hooking my bait he shouts over that something was dragging his rod in...."strike son". To his credit he played it well, and we soon slid the net under this chub of 3lb 10oz. He was over the moon!

After moving peg twice and me losing a big one in a snag, I had a consolation prize of 3lb 8oz (he's spent the rest of the day reminding me of the importance of catching the biggest of the day!).

Like I said before, bit of a new chapter in my fishing now as he's going to be getting a lot more involved. So far, so good! 

Waggler tactics for chub...

Armed with 2 pints of maggots, I intended to hit the river to try bag up on chub today with a mag and wag approach. Set up was a drennan float master, Preston pxr, 5lb drennan supplex and a 4lb supplex hook length, to a size 18 Kamasan animal. 

I got there to find the wind blowing a lot more than I'd expected, not ideal and I wished I had the feeder gear. Finding a sheltered peg (sort of), it was still a struggle on the float, I decided to opt for a me cope with the flow and wind. The first dozen casts resulted in 4 fish, two of them grayling and two trout. One of the grayling was a clonker, well over a pound, and just as I tried to take a photo it flipped straight into the river....never mind. 

I had a robin keep me company most of the morning, happy to gorge on the maggots.

After that the swim went very quiet for an hour. I paused the casting, leaving the bait out the water for 45 minutes or so whilst I trickled maggots in. I then scaled down to 3lb bottom and a size 20, as the water was freezing and bites were hard to come by. First cast in, I had a chub of 3lb 10oz, next cast I lost a 4+ at the net. Great fun on light float gear. 

I had to pack up after this, pretty bleak weather but happy to get a couple.

A cold biting wind and low temps - grayling time

Woke up this morning, with my alarm going off at 6.00, with a killer headache, blocked nose and sore throat - man flu....."potentially life threatening" I thought, so went back to sleep. After a good sleep in, I earned some brownie points by making a bunk bed for the kids and, at 1pm, left for the river. After getting there, I realised that my bait was tucked nicely away in the bottom of the fridge - crap. Drove back home, then back to the river, now 2pm.

Set up and wading for half past 2, I was using a drennan floatmaster, cheap centrepin, 3.2lb drennan floatfish, to a size 18 kamasan animal. Tactic was to wade a couple of feet downstream after every trot, with a pint of maggots in a bait pouch. For the short space of time I was there I was getting a bite every other cast or so, nothing special but a bend in the rod at least. I had about 15 grayling in the end (by the time it was too dark to see my float), with not one dropped. I'll be back after pike or chub next week (or even carp if the temps are decent), just fancied a quick change with a few bites after getting one fish in the last two sessions. Wind by the way - was awful. My hands were hurting by the end of it