Muddy Boots

Wrapping up 2007, was actually easier than expected. The Christmass pressure is something I try to avoid as years go by. Avoiding the chaos is easier said than done, much easier in Spain, but on my return to England 21st of December, I found myself thrown back into the grand scale UK shopping mayhem. My chance of escaping the madness was to go fishing, here follows an account of what we did!

Extreme Teggy Nosy.

Dave Edgerton my UK fishing mate and I decided to get into some fishing on the newly named (by us), Teggs Nose reservoir or as we now call it ‘Extreme Teggy Nosy’. Our remixed name comes from us adding in the mix ‘extreme’, and ‘dura;, from the Spanish Extremadura. Fishing in Extremadura (as I normally do), can be just that Extreme and hard, but Teggs Nose was nothing like, our new name is an ironic one! Actually fishing this time was quite a breeze, all be it, a wet and muddy one. Upon arrival at the reservoir it was raining as forecast, no problem. We popped up our brolleys and got the equipment set-up and under shelter as quickly as we could..

It wasn’t cold, the north of England has actually been very mild over Christmass with night temperatures as warm as 12’Deg. C. This is much warmer than Madrid currently where you can expect to be fishing at night with temperatures as low as –1. As you can imagine I was more than pleased with these temperatures.

Bait

Dave and I took completely different paths with bait choice. On Rod (1), I opted for a ‘greedy pig’, visual presentation with two red juicy fresh Mistral Crab and Crawfish boilies topped off with an Enterprise Baits Artificial corn. In the Winter in England a large presentation like this I expect is a big no no, but my thinking behind the presentation was I wanted something of size to pick up the bait, I like to contradict the norm, and I was confident this rig works. My other rod was my changeable roving rod, which had a single bait boilie, either a Mistral Isotonic Roship or Crab and Crawfish, or a Korda Maggot Clip, fished Medusa style, in my mind I knew nothing could me more attractive than a small cluster of Maggots in Winter, could it?

Dave went the other way with Rod (1) having the very tasty looking Solar 10mm Dayglow Ester and Pinapple pop-up with Cream and Candy Sweetner, and a single Mistral Bait with no name Boilie or ‘clints’, as we now call them. All of which were presented with a nice small walnut or 20mm boilie sized PVA stocking with some Dynamite Baits Swim Stim, hemp, ground boilie and Brazil Nut shavings. This mix made by Dave was actually made up with no water, just natural hemp oil. The effect was like nothing I have seen before, a very active explosive bag, full very fine attraction but little food.

Breamer

Within 2hr. of us arriving, my left hand rod signaled a drop back, I was slow to the rod, and not sure if I should hit it (I am accustom to Spanish ripper runs), the fact that the alarm indicating the pick-up was also the left rod which was my ‘greedy pig’ rod was a surprise. I spent some time next to the rod/alarm watching the line. Dave told me to tighten the swinger back up, which I did, at that point I knew a fish was on. When I struck I was even more sure, yet reeling in for some time I was doubting if indeed I had a fish on or not. Finally what came to the net was a surprise. I caught a bream of about 3½ lb. Dave and I disagree about Bream, I am happy to catch them and do not consider them a nuisance fish. Dave on the other hand does not care much for them. The photos were taken then the fish returned. For sometime after the capture I was thinking, I couldn’t believe a fish of this size could have picked up my ‘greedy pig’, rig, it took me sometime to get over that fact, but it was a reality and this fish did give us hope. The fished also helped us to believe that out in the 20ft plus water we were fishing, there was indeed more feeding fish. Our reaction to this capture was to apply more bait, a kilo of Mistral baits. Sadly not a great deal more happened, Dave managed to catch a bream on his 10mm Solar Pineapple Pop-up, the fish was about the same size again.

Christmass gifts

Teggs Nose is a small water, but it was impressive to see so many people out testing what looked like new fishing gear given by Santa.
On the bank we witnessed new Solar pods, and Diawa Basias reels which the owners were hoping to christen. Sadly between all 14 rods that must have been fishing that day we saw no other Angler catch. The carp were perhaps holding up in another area what-ever they were doing we couldn’t temp them into a bite and our session ended with the two bream only. As I say for me this was slow but a fine winter session.

Time past and time to come (Turners Pool).

For the final day of the year we wanted to bag up, and bang it! Teggs had been slow so we went to a water where we could bang plenty of fish, the Cheshire water that could do this would be the small farm pond called Turners Pool. It’s not the easiest place to find in the world, but after an early morning call to Brian the owner we obtained the postcode which was entered into the GPS and we were off…

We arrived at about 9.30am, temperature was good about 7 Deg. C mild and dry, no rain expected, perfect. We set-up in a wide swim which Dave already knew, the position was comfortable and allowed us to fish socially together, we also had plenty of water to go at. On our rods we both opted for the same presentations we had adopted on Teggs Nose.

Andy: – Rod (1): ‘greedy pig’, rig. – two red juicy looking Mistral Crab and Crawfish with an Enterprise Baits Artificial corn. Rod (2): Single bait (smaller presentation) Mistral Isotonic Roship or Crab and Crawfish, or a Korda Maggot Clip, fished the Medusa style.

Dave: – Rod (1): Solar 10mm Dayglow Ester and Pineapple pop-up with Cream and Candy Sweetener. Rod (2): single Mistral Bait with no name Boilie.

By 11am Dave had caught 5 fish on his 10mm Solar Day glow Ester pop-up. I had not managed one! My thinking was to hold out for the better bigger fish, in the end, it got me and I gave up, I wanted to catch, I wanted action, so I changed my ‘greedy pig’, rig and scaled down for the tiny single 10mm Solar Day glow Ester pop-up. As a general rule I don’t like pop-ups. I know they are devastating especially the fluro pop-ups. Several Anglers I have fished with use them when the going get’s tuff, and I have seen them get results time after time. I think pop-ups are totally unnatural, but in cold water winter conditions they can really make a big difference. I am positive that if we had not had these pop-ups with us, we would have caught less than 5 fish all day between us. As it ended we caught nearly 30 fish between us..

Instant reaction

The Solar floro pop-up created an instant impulsive reaction, when I made the first change I had 2 fish within 10 mins. of casting to the same swim I had been fishing for more than 2 hours previous, without a single pick up! Both the medusa rig / Korda maggot clip and single bottom bait had not triggered a bite!

I could never imagine a small pop-up fluro boilie would out-fish a maggot, but it did! Because the fluro success was so instant and obvious, we ended up changing all the baits for them. Actually my last memory and fish of 2007 I will never forget. It was an 11lb common carp and the best fish of the day (see photo). The fished picked up a snowman double floro orange pop-up combo. I remember saying to Dave ‘this is my special Christmass snowman pop-up’, totally festive, luminous Santa bait, the presentation looked like Santa himself. Needless to say the common carp picked the bait up and gave me a really good fight on the light 2lb TC rods I was using.

Difference in style of fishing

There were big differences between my style of fishing and Dave’s. I suppose this is because I spend most of my time on big open Spanish waters and Dave does not. The fish were attracted to the splash and sound the small PVA/mesh bags going in. My bag mix was not the better mix on the day. I say this because mine contained too many food and big items such as Frolic and corn. ).Dave’s on the other hand was just Dynamite Baits Swim Stim ground baits, lot’s of fine oil and shavings of nuts, hemp and boilies all very, very fine. I think this was crucial in drawing, attracting fish, but not feeding. My mix fed fish which was not the better idea or method to get a bite. The other point of interest was that when Dave was using a flat lead that would not penetrate the silt. Also when he was casting as the bait went in, Dave would pull back. This helped the bag/rig sit up above the silt rather than in it or below it. Fish can find a bait more easily if it’s on the silt rather than in it, a small difference but one that can increase the amount of takes considerably.

Memorable end to 2007

In all it was a very memorable day and an excellent way to end 2007, baggin up, and banging plenty of fish in the net. We totally banged it off, and even entertained some of the local math anglers of the water. One of which kept asking ‘what bait are you using?’. It was a day of fun, and not serious fishing, a day where weights of fish was not important but enjoying time out and away was. Plenty of action and laughs to round off 2007.

I cannot wait to get back to Spain and catch some Spanish fish using these killer mini Solar floro pop-ups. I know the perfect water to give them a try and hopefully bag up again..

Where-ever you are, and what-ever your doing, I hope your planning to take time and bag up and enjoying your fishing, all the best for 2008.

May the fish be with you.

Andy Macgregor