Tag Archives: piking

I’m never going to fish that place! I decided a few weeks ago that after putting off the idea for a few years – for various reasons:  (“It’s not real pike fishing”… “It’s far too easy to catch a huge pike on there”… “Results will drop off before I get there, like at Llandegfedd, Blithfield”… “I don’t want to join the rat race in the fight for tickets and then rejoin it in the fight for best spots”, etc.)  – I would finally this year try for some winter tickets to pike fish at Chew Valley Lake. I love fishing rivers, drains and canals for pike.  The looks and fight of a double-figure river pike are hard to beat, but occasionally I get the urge to seek out larger fish.  Visits to reservoirs in the past haven’t been too productive for me, but I have the tackle and – thanks to these previous trips – a bit of experience of reservoir fishing.  So what if reservoirs are man-made?  The pike in these venues are as wild as any from a river.  They may have an easy, protein-rich food source of naive stocked trout, but this all adds to the challenge …

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Well, the end of the traditional close season is almost upon us. I had the rare chance to go fishing twice last week and for the first trip I decided to follow my own yearning for a return to the Lincs drains (they can be frustrating at times and I hear many reports of fish thefts and that they’re not what they once were, but I just love fishing them!) for a final try for a pike before the rivers & drains close on the 14th. I made the 70 mile trip East and checked a few of my favourite places out, before settling on a very shallow drain, carrying only 18 inches of water down the centre. The weather had turned and was much sunnier than we’ve experienced for months. This wasn’t ideal because bright weather can put fish off the feed. On the other hand, the water was in need of warming up, so surely the sun couldn’t do too much harm for my day fishing. Plus, there were clouds dotted around and I have noticed pike and perch launch attacks on sunny days, just seconds after the sun goes behind a cloud – as if they have been patiently poised, …

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