Alive after five

Its Tuesday evening, and I am already thinking about the weekend. Its going to be a fishing weekend, if conditions allow, so lets look at the evidence:

on the other hand:

I think I will rely on the old faithful "coin toss". I will flip a coin, if it lands on either a head or a tail, I will in fact go fishing!

With that in mind, I planned to fish, and here is how I got on:

Date fished 22/01/22

8am until 5.30pm!!

I know I always say that this time of year I can fish dawn to dusk easily, I tend to go early though and leave early. As its a fair drive, it's easier to do that in the early hours when traffic is quiet. Today though I decided to stay into dark, I thought about it before I set off and was going to pack the head torch, sadly I forgot. If I hadn't, I would probably still be fishing now!! 

A barmy seven degrees when I set off. Zero when I arrived on the Swale. A frozen field welcomed me. 

I fished in an old favourite swim but nothing was doing so I headed upstream. I fished a few new areas that looked good for a fish, but again nothing doing.

I headed further upstream and came across another angler. He had caught one Grayling and was just moving too. We chatted for a while and he offered me his swim. He had been feeding maggots and trotting, I took up his offer and jumped in. No luck for me here so I moved on. I stood by a swim that looked good, suddenly I started moving. The banks were slippy even just stood still, crash! Down I went, right on my wrist and bum, and it bloody hurt. I still fished this swim for a while, but seemed its only good for a slide! 

I tried a few more swims and soon was happy to sit on my box and have some lunch. Lifting sandwiches and drinking soup was not too much for my sore wrist! 

The rod finally gave a jerking wiggle, I knew straight away why. It seems out of season fish don't know what their season is and do not know what they eat either. Another Trout to cheesepaste! Safely unhooked and released without leaving the water. 

I walked a bit further up and spoke with the other angler again. He had caught Trout too! I looked at some other pegs before trudging back to fish a different favourite. My pb Chub came out of this swim, so I liked it in here. I was going to stay here till just into dark. My phone pinged, Jason was on the Swale too. He was quite a distance downstream. He gave me some info about a peg close to me, the slide, aka "fall over" swim!! I headed there again. This time I manged to walk down to the water. I cast where I was told and waited. The light started to fade but not enough that I didn't see the rod tap. I struck and was soon scooping a 4lb Chub into my net! What a result! Thanks Jason!! 

It was amazing how much I could see even with the fading light. My eyes adapted, I could see my rod tip but holding the line was so much better. I could feel every little pluck. There was loads. I had more bites in the final 30 minutes than all day. I missed them all, mostly because I was chuckling to myself. It really came alive after five!