Tag Archives: fishing close season

It’s been a while since I posted but the good news is that I did manage to notch up a session in February and I’ve already been fishing once in March but the river close season (which I back 100%) is looming ominously.  I am now faced with the dilemma of which river/stretch/swim/species to target for my final session of the 2010/11 season.  Not an easy one when I’ve got memberships of 5 clubs, all with their own merits, but I prefer to have plenty of options available (usually, but not when it’s down to choosing one last session!).  Anyway, that’s to come later this week, but for now I’ll tell you about my last two sessions, during which I have been reminded just why and how much I love catching pike from a natural river.The week or so preceeding the first session had started off with a lot of rain falling and relatively mild weather, but as my session grew nearer, the rain subsided, river levels dropped and clarity started to return to the water.  These developments had me changing my mind at the last minute; I’d originally decided to fish for barbel, but with the water dropping I had an urge …

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As day was breaking I arrived at the Reading & District AA car park and was sorting through my worms as Will pulled up. Will Barnard not only has a string of massive perch to his name, he is also the angling development officer for Reading, a bailiff and coach for RDAA and is a founding member of a small specimen group based around Reading called SAS Angling! Over the past year, you may have also seen him feature in one or two of Ian Welch’s articles in Anglers Mail too…  Right from the off I got on really well with Will, who’s a genuine, amiable chap, not to mention knowledgeable! My first glimpses of the Kennet gave me instant optimism and I couldn’t wait to get set-up.  It was slightly couloured and with plenty of perchy features.   We set up in a shady area of overhanging near-bank trees, which provided the margins with some shade as the sun rose behind us. The roots were quite terrifying to offer a bait towards, but they were blatant perch (and chub!) holding features.  Before long, Will was getting bites which he was suspicious of.  Eventually after an aggressive tap on the rod tip, …

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