I do not get many chance to fish these days, contrary to me recent write-ups, due to a young family I mostly only manage short sessions on the local rivers, which whilst enjoyable, are not the same as a proper day out, of which their have been few this year (I think 6 so far in 2011). So I decided to use some of my vacation time to have a few day's out.
So by way of what is probably a final full session of the year I decided to head up the M40 to Boddingtons, a trip of some 75 miles. Not something I do on a whim, but as a special treat I thought why not?
I have a love-hate relationship with the place. I always catch, but I never bag up properly – in three previous visits I've seen what it can do, but only in fits and starts. On one occasion I had 80lb of fish in an hour, only for it to dry up. One day it'll click and I'll put a decent bag together.
So after a decent drive I arrived at Boddies about 0715, got the gear out the car, checked the match list (pegs 75-105 were booked) and carried the gear up the ramp. This worked out well for me, I fancied having a go on the damn (pegs 1-30), hopefully I could do some damage with the pole before moving onto other things. Then I saw the water level. Low wasn't the word for it. First 10 pegs unfishable, pegs 40-60 had 50 yards of mud in front of them. It was chronic.
Unperturbed I continued along the damn, there were but a few anglers there (thanks to my early start) so I wandered down until I saw a few fish near peg 16 – several splashes and a few heads were showing close in, so I settled on peg 15 – there was a clear gravel section at the base of the steps, and this looked perfect for my seatbox.
I set up, fed, plumbed and found a mere 2ft of water. Not what I expected, but enough to try. This was my classic large fish gear – 11m pole, 0.20mm line, size 8 hook, 11mm expander, 22 elastic. I could see movement over my feed as I shipped out at 0745. The float shot under, but no contact was made. Back out again the float shot under. Contact. A brief struggle later and 12lb on mirror was in the landing net. Nice.
Back out. Repeat. 10lb mirror. Back out. Repeat. 6lb common. Three foul hookers lost. Then a few more fish. I paused briefly to reorganize my kit – unhooking mat and coat repositioned behind me on the steps to protect my pole from the concrete and back to fishing.
An hour in and all was going well. 59lb in 60 minutes was excellent pace, visions of a superb session were filling my mind when I noticed in the distance a group of hairy arsed northerners at the top of the ramp. I thought little of it, often the match guys hang around for draws and stuff. I cupped in some more feed, tweaked the rig was about to get stuck in again when a voice appeared from behind me. “Sorry mate you've got to move there's a match on these pegs”. The bailiff no less.
I had a chat with him. Apologised and packed up, rather annoyed. As I neared the top of the ramp I thought I'd check the board again, as did some other anglers who's also been evicted. True enough, there was no match shown on the board for pegs 10-30. I spoke to the bailiff again, he was far from apologetic, but I was now facing a long walk, setting up again, having to fish the pellet wag/method (not my preferred approach) and the best pegs (or those with a little bit of water) had already gone (it was after 9am at this time). To say I was a little annoyed was an understatement. I've got up early, driven a decent distance, got a peg going and now I was back to square one with a choice of poo pegs on my day off and probably my last session of the year. I was not a happy bunny.
I grabbed my wellies from the car and headed off around the damn wall. I went past the next group of hairy arsed northerners setting up in the 80s and off into the distance. Through the gate, onto the mud flats and off to what was probably peg 110 ish. Well beyond where the next match group were due to be. I was not happy.
Having found a nice boggy patch to set up, I liberally coated me and myself with mud. I set up the pellet waggler and thrashed this about for a good half hour. One bite, one 7lb mirror, and great difficulties landing it. It was horrendously shallow. I had less than 6 inches of water at 3m where the landing net was. This was not fair on the fish. I changed to my wellies at this point and had a paddle. If I caught again, I would wade out a short way to improve conditions for landing fish.
At this point the next group of hairy arsed northerners arrived. They pegged well beyond their designated space, but thankfully stopped 50 metres short of me. I was not moving again, and I didn't want to have other people fishing on top of me. They were noisy, disruptive and lairy. Not something I like. But eventually they settled down.
However, there was a problem. Try as they might, they couldn't find enough depth for their keepnets. Not a single net was submerged at the end ring, let alone for any significant length. This didn't seem to bother them, I cant say I approved. Given the size of the fish in Boddies you shouldn't be retaining fish in keepnets in less than a foot of water. Period. And given the likelihood of someone catching 100 lb plus of fish (and then some), the mind boggles. Sorry BW, but you have to sort this out.
I ploughed on and tried the feeder for a while. Nothing. I went back to the pellet wag, nothing. However, there were signs of fish moving. So I tried working the wag a little closer, feeding heavily. Still no bites, but there were fish moving. So I thought nothing ventured... and dug the pole out.
I removed the based from my box, carried the box out a few metres (to improve the depth and use of the landing net). And set up for fishing at 11m. A big pot of pellets went in and I plumbed up. 12 inches ish. I was about to give up when I saw a tail and some swirls over the bait. What the heck. Out I went with an 11mm expander.
A few knocks later, experimentation with the presentation and a brief foul-hooked fish and clearly there were fish to be caught. Then the float buried, I struck, yellow elastic going off to the horizon. 9lb mirror in the net, with looks of astonishment from the hairy arsed northerners to my left. Hmm.
I was concerned that due to the shallow water that I'd struggle for regular bites – surely they'd spook as soon as I hooked one. But no, within a couple of minutes the swirls were back. Bites were still at a premium, occasionally the float would go, sometimes it'd connect and another fish would visit the net. (Landing the fish in the shallow water was a game in itself, but I soon found a method that worked).
This was the pattern for the next hour or so, not frantic, but steady. Smaller fish than on the damn wall, typically 7 or 8lb, but not bad when all things are considered. I was starting to build a tidy weight, maybe 30lb to the hour (at a push) which was considerable more than the match next door. (I could see envious looks in my direction whenever there was elastic pouring out.) I experimented with a 14 hook and a smaller pellet in case it improved bites. It did. From the roach. Back to the big pellet.
About 1pm it all slowed down. The swirls were gone, the tails were not there, and I went the best part of an hour without a bite. Hmm.
I grabbed something to eat, flicked the pellet wag over the line and had a few minutes to think. Nothing.
So back on the pole. Potted out some pellets and gave it a few minutes. After a little while the fish came back. Feed heavy, fish over the top, get a few bites, land a few fish and repeat. This seemed to be the pattern about 200ml of pellets every 3 fish seemed to work now, it appeared we'd gone through the midday famine and the fish were on again. Through the 100lb barrier in the new peg, then 120, 140 before it was time to think about packing up.
One last fish about 3:30 produced a big mirror of 15lb. And that was that.
Final weight from the new peg was 166lb to add to the 59lb from earlier. Not bad, but I cant help thinking of what might have been if I'd had peg 15 all day.
A long drag back to the car, a long drive home.
It'd been an ok day, but I have to say with the disruption, the lost time and the relocation I hadn't really enjoyed myself as I would have liked.
Till next time.
A few photos:
The setup, I wasn't going to win any tidiness awards today.
The rig, this was overdepth by about 6 inches
Typical stamp fish (8/9 lb)
This is how shallow it was at 3m from the bank - this was a recovering mirror having been released from the landing net.
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