Blogger Import

I trust everyone had an enjoyable Christmas time.  I certainly did but it’s only involved one fishing session, which I’ll mention in my next blog post. Meanwhile, here’s something I found in my drafts folder which I thought I’d posted this a couple of weeks ago. Better late than never, as they say… A quick message to inform you of two recent additions to www.fishingmagic.com; firstly part 2 of my “Alternative Ebro” article is online to read at:  https://www.fishingmagic.com/features/coarse_fishing/specimen_fishing/15601-alternative-ebro-part-two.html Part 2 covers all of the catfish fishing we did with our guide, Carl of Rio Ebro Angling, during the week we spent boat & bank fishing with him at Riba Roja.  I’m told by Carl that since we were there, some of his guests have landed catfish to 164lb, including lure-caught catfish up to 148lb!!! Also, if anyone has a bit of Christmas money to spend on a little bankside/backside comfort for 2012, I recently reviewed the “Stalk-Lite Mk II” reclining chair by Cyprinus for FishingMagic, and rather liked it!  You can read my full review here:  https://www.fishingmagic.com/features/reviews/15584-cyprinus-stalk-lite-chair.html If you’re impressed, you can purchase this chair for less than £30 from Tackle Discounts Online Fishing Tackle Shop online fishing tackle store. That’s all for now …

Read More »

Just a quick update folks, to let any of you who are interested know that this months issue of Angling Star has hit the shelves and part 1 of my account of our Ebro trip in September has a double-page spread inside. Not only that, but Shane’s pose with his big roach has made it onto the front cover too!

Read More »

I’m writing this post as a showing of gratitude to Fox customer services.  It’s easy to criticise companies when they get it wrong, so I think when good service is received it’s worth praising. I had a major issue with a set of Fox Stalker digital scales (until the faults, I’d been very impressed with their quality and operation) which I’d bought back in January 2009.  They were technically out of their warranty period but these were not cheap scales and they had suffered what appeared to be a complete mechanical failure which rendered them useless.  Due to the nature of the fault I was requested to post the scales back to Fox for further investigation, last week.  Yesterday morning, I received a parcel in the post which contained a brand-new set of Stalker scales!  There were no quibbles whatsoever and I am very pleased with this outcome and the quality of customer service I received.  I think this offers peace of mind when looking for other big-ticket items in the future. UPDATE Although I couldn’t fault Fox’s customer service, unfortunately I can fault the Stalker scales. The replacement set lasted me a couple of seasons and then failed with the very same fault! …

Read More »

So, you knew I was going, but how did I get on, over on the Ebro?  Well, I’m going to keep a little bit back for articles (which I’ll post the links to as soon as they’re online), but we had a brilliant week with Carl of Rio Ebro Angling and we did catch plenty of fish!  Although the catfish took a lot of convincing to feed and the “Charlie Boorman” tactics were almost resorted to!  But, as with all the best stories, it all came good in the end… Between us we caught 11 catfish, several zander and – in just one afternoon – over 50 quality roach to specimen proportions.  We fished for 6 days using baits & lures from boat & bank, so all in all there’s a lot for me to write about! The related articles will be in two parts, the first covering the zander, roach and carp fishing (Alternative River Ebro part 1 – zander, roach & carp) and the second covering all things catfish-related (Alternative River Ebro part 2 – catfish cannonade).  The articles should be appearing in the December 2011 & January 2012 issues of Angling Star, with “director’s cut” extended versions appearing on FishingMagic …

Read More »

It’s now just two days until I head off with Shane and Dave for a week-long fishing trip to Spain’s River Ebro. We’ll be fishing with Carl & Angie of Rio Ebro Angling. I know, lucky barstools the lot of us! We booked the trip way back in February so there’s been plenty of time for the excitement to build on this (way overdue) installment of my specimen hunting roadshow! Between us we’ll be fishing for wels catfish, zander, carp and roach, but my personal goals are mainly the catfish and zeds. I’d like to join the Ebro “Ton Club” or better, preferably caught on a lure, although if it gets to the last day and I’m struggling I may have to resort to plan B, or as I like to refer to it, the “Charlie Boorman Plan”, (to catch one “by any means”!).  Hopefully that won’t mean going quite this far, but if my neck gets sunburnt and red and I pick up a bit of a Southern drawl, who knows!… Having never fished the Ebro before, I’d be happy to catch any zander from there. So far, this is my UK PB fish and if I could manage a double from Spain on a …

Read More »

I know the weather’s about to turn chillier for a few months, so surface fishing for carp won’t be high on many anglers’ agendas, but I’m going to share a rig with you which enables great flexibility when using Korda Kruiser surface controller floats. The great thing about blogs is that they’re on here indefinitely, so come next spring anglers will be searching for surface rigs and ideas and this may just help them out. The Kruiser, which is a very robust, solid plastic controller, creates a semi-fixed “bolt-effect” due to having a rubber insert which the hooklength swivel lodges into. I have a few issues with this controller design – it’s off-centre shape can be tangle prone on casting (despite what the packaging states) and it also makes much more of a splash than I’d like upon landing – however, it offers brilliant presentation, casts easily when coupled with a light, through-action rod and is very unobtrusive once the float has settled. The Kruiser is available in 3 sizes and if you’re travelling light around a venue, trying to locate different pockets of feeding carp, you can never say 100% which size you’ll need, as you may find fish further out than you anticipated …

Read More »

This is another quick post from an internet café.  I’m on holiday, you see, until tomorrow, so burglars you’ve got one last chance! The house is actually the reason for both my blog-slackness and my wider angling-slackness for almost the entirity of the river closed season and beyond.  I finally took the plunge and bought my first place with my girlfriend, Jen. Needless to say, there was a lot more to the whole process than I’d anticipated… Still, I’ve finally started to get a few sessions in, which I’m pleased to say have yielded very few blanks. So far I’ve had barbel to around 9lb off the rivers and a good few carp off the surface on some local lakes too. I also took my 13 year-old cousin Fraser for his first-ever river session a week or so ago where, under my guidance, he managed to land a clonking new PB chub of 4lb 5oz on simple groundbait feeder techniques. Not a bad first river fish at all; I reckon I was 19 before I’d caught a chub of that size. The only thing was the pesky chub was very lively on the bank and every time I pressed the …

Read More »

“Do you remember that fishing blog we used to read?  It was alright, you know; nowt special but he could waffle…” “Yeah, I know the one, but he’s been a bit quiet of late…” Admittedly, this blog has started to gather cobwebs in recent months, but I’m back with a bit of news and plenty of waffle as usual. I’m in an internet café at the moment (yes they still exist!), so time is short, but I have plenty to write about as soon as I’m back at my own PC. However, I thought this news was too good to hold back, so I’m sharing it now. I’ve agreed to become a regular contributor of articles to Europe’s largest angling website, https://www.fishingmagic.com/! So far I’ve only written an introductory piece, which went live this week.  You can read it (and, if you’re an FM forum member, post your comments) at Andrew Kennedy’s Intro on www.fishingmagic.com Big thanks go out to Will Barnard and Ian Welch for having a bit of faith in me; I won’t let you down fellas! More from me soon, but for now, please head over to Fishing Magic and take a look at my intro, which details my life …

Read More »

This post has been an awful long time coming, but finally – on a train on my way to a stag weekend in Liverpool – I’ve found time to patch together my account of a terrific day I had, doing something I do too little of these days; fly fishing. I received an email from Secretary of Errwood Fly Fishing Club, Ian Gould, offering the chance of “smashing your trout PB on fly gear”, if I joined him in the Spring for a day on the club’s venue, Errwood Reservoir. After taking a quick look on their website – www.effc.co.uk – at the quality of the scenery and the fishing on offer in the hills above Buxton in Derbyshire’s Peak District, I could not resist a visit! Ian emailed me again towards the end of March, informing me that the season had kicked off well, with some very large fish coming out, so I got down there as soon as I could. The week previous, Ian – who I believe still holds the venue record with a trout of over 14lb – had caught 3 double-figure trout the week prior to my visit. It turned out that I managed to pick the hottest, sunniest April day I …

Read More »

Firstly big apologies, I have a post about a brilliant fishing trip in April which I’ve been struggling time-wise to finish, but it’ll be on here ASAP. For now though, I think it’s important to bring to your attention the fact that the “Fish Fight Early Day Motion” (yes, that of Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s TV programme fame) is going to be debated in the House of Commons THIS THURSDAY AFTERNOON!  So, to ensure the issue gets the amount of attention and thought it deserves, we all need to make sure our MPs know that their constituents consider it to be a very important issue.  Click on the link below, which will take you to the Fish Fight website.  Follow the instructions and within 2 minutes you will have emailed your MP with a basic message, urging them to give the issue their support: http://fishfightnews.net/interface/external_view_email.php?P898860083645777142114542318&utm_campaign=Fish%2BFight%2BNewsletter%2B-%2BMay%2B2011&utm_source=emailCampaign&utm_medium=email Personally, I think that overfishing in general has/is raping our sea fish stocks, so over-quota discard is only a small part of the overall problem, but this motion getting seen in the Commons is a start.  If it grabs the nation’s attention and can start to change attitudes of both politicians and the fish-buying public then our seas might just …

Read More »