I hadn't been able to fish during the November lockdown, but a reasonable weather forecast saw me and a former boss, Mel Russ, meet at Fields End Fishery, Doddington, on the last day of the lockdown. We worked together during the late 1980s, when Mel edited Sea Angler and Boat Angler, and I was assistant editor, also editing Sea Angling Quarterly.
We took a few minutes looking at The Pit, which Mel fancied, as it holds a more varied head of fish than The Pool, which is a large irrigation reservoir about 90 yards across, with mainly carp. But the very cold wind, sun in our eyes if we got the wind behind us, and not a lot of shelter, forced us to amble down to The Pool. Here there were some very sheltered swims, and farther round, in the biting wind, a high bank also looked to give shelter.
So we ended on those back-wind swims, still with sun in front of us, but able to fish a little to the left to avoid the reflection. White rime still clung to grass as we walked to our pegs. We both decided to start on feeders.
The water here is deep - probably 15 feet at 25 yards - so I opted for a banjo rather than a Method, as there was a better chance of keeping groundbait in the feeder by the time it has hit bottom.
My bait was luncheon meat - a "Summer" bait if ever there was one. So many myths persist in fishing - almost all untrue - and I now just ignore them. I chose quarter-inch cubes of luncheon meat because it is quite light, so there was a chance it would waft about if a fish swam past; also, unlike pellet or sweetcorn, you can pare it down to whatever exact size you want. Sometimes, especially in Winter, size matters!
Information from regulars
After half an hour with just a small roach coming to hand, I walked up to see two anglers to our left. Both were regular, both feedering, and one had six fish and the other three, but both had started about 90 minutes before us. The first angler said that fishing has much improved since matches were stopped, because matchmen use so much bait.
I suspect that that's another myth, since the anglers who used to matchfish here were either club anglers or over 60s (there were about eight Over 60s matches a year) and with a maximum of £5 pools not many are going to spend a lot of money on bait. But I was too polite to say so. Perhaps stopping matches does improve the fishing, simply because of the loss of the pressure, even if only twice a week.
I also learned that matches on Head Fen, near Ely, have also been stopped, so the renters of the new chalets don't have to put up with being woken at 8 o'clock on a Sunday morning, and don't have to put up with bad language (that I can believe).
Back to my swim and eventually two carp about 2 lb came in. But I was waiting a long time and made a switch to soaked micros in the feeder, with the bait laying on top of the pellets (but held in) so it could be clearly seen. The slightly larger-than-normal cubes seemed to be best.
This brought another seven good fish, including a beautiful roach of about 1 lb, my biggest for years. Mel had just one small roach, on a banded pellet with a cage feeder, and I could not see why he wasn't catching. So I took my gear up to him, to see if it would make a difference, and went back to try the pole.
Before I could start I managed - not for the first time this year - to get a splinter of carbon in my finger from my aged cupping top. This necessitated clamping a size 14 hook in the end of my forceps and gradually digging it out. It took about 15 minutes, but experience has taught me that leaving splinters in my skin sees start to fester within a short time. Better to deal with it on the bank.
I plumbed up on the pole and at 13 metres it was about 12 feet deep, I think (the pole tip was under water!) The 1gm rig I had chosen was only about 11 feet long, so I came back to 11.5 metres where it was about 10 feet deep. This brought another eight or nine carp and ide to 3 lb, putting just a few cubes in as loosefeed, before we packed up at 2 pm, bringing my catch to 40 lb to 50 lb.
Best news was that Mel had now started to catch on my gear, and ended with seven carp to 4 lb. He had never used Korum Quickstops, and was, naturally, quite taken with the system, so said he would use them in future rather than the old-fashioned hair rig with something pushed into the loop.
Before we left we spoke to the regulars. The one who had had six fish earlier now had 14, and his companion about 20. So our catches, made in less time, compared favourably.
It looked to me as if perhaps the fish had not been in front of Mel to start with, although two anglers to his right had had occasional carp. Perhaps I had just hit on the right depth of water. I had clipped up and Mel kept the same clip. Anyway, eventually he had found the fish, and 'discovered' Quickstops. I also told him about the Preston ICS system, which saves so much time changing feeders, and will show him in detail next time we go.
So all-round a good day, the highlights being that 1 lb roach, a kestrel stooping into the ground five feet from my car, and a red kite somehow gliding around in the wind behind us as we packed up, without moving a feather. Not sure when my next outing is.
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