Stick float & Caster for river chub

I fancied a change from pike fishing (I find this keeps my fishing fresh!). There's a long stretch of river that I keep going back to year on year as it offers a brilliant variety of fishing, some fantastic chub shoals and one or two very nice pike.

A bit of research with the locals told me where the chub were likely hiding, and I turned up with the 14ft drennan acolyte plus, stick float and casters. Turning up on the first swim, I was struggling to get a bite other than off a kamikaze trout, despite steady feeding. I was then rudely interrupted when i looked behind me to find a big herd of cows wondering why an intruder had come between them and the water hole. Time to move....

Next swim looked inviting, though was not the easiest to trot the float through, and required an accurate cast and careful float control to trot through, avoiding the bushes and weed growth underwater. I soon hooked the first chub, which took me straight in the bushes and I pulled only to open out the hook. Increasing the hook gauge and line strength, the next trot through and a chub was hooked, the fight lasted long this time, only for the hook to pull at the last minute - damn. A couple of trots later, and i hooked into another solid lump. This time I had to react quickly to lower the rod angle and pull away from the tree roots, the acolyte worked nicely to carefully prize the fish away and into the net. A few casts later, and same result, this time a bigger 4lb+ chub. Despite trying more, I must have spooked the swim, and no more bites were forthcoming. A wander downstream and I could see the shoal had dropped downstream near the bridge, however unfortunately I had to leave. A nice morning

Prior to this, I had an evening session into dark in search of barbel, without success. I did, however, take a couple of pics of the night sky, one showing the movement of a satellite....why not!