Post-lockdown fishing adventures

What a strange year 2020 has been! Who would have thought on the last day of the river season (March 14th) that a week later, we would be put in to a nationwide lockdown until the middle of May. As well as countless household chores, the lockdown gave me plenty of time I previously hadn’t had to clean and organise my fishing gear, as well as research new venues to try once the restrictions were lifted. I’m lucky that I live within walking distance of several rivers, and our exercise walks along them became the highlight of the day. Watching fish in their natural environment is almost as exciting as fishing for them, and towards the end of the lockdown, we witnessed a fantastic mayfly hatch, which the Trout and Chub absolutely loved!

During the time we were in lockdown, what my Dad and I both noticed was that my local rivers, which normally suffer from abstraction, had a much better flow than normal, despite a dry spring. I’m sure that was probably because water abstraction was less than normal due to businesses being shut. I think nature appreciated the break we gave it when we were in full lockdown, and even before the government loosened restrictions in England on May 13th, I realised how lucky we are to have a sport where we can social distance, whilst enjoying the great outdoors.

When we were allowed to fish again, Dad and I had a few walks around local lakes (as it was still the river closed season), and many were the busiest I’ve ever seen them. Although it was great to see so many people out fishing, we didn’t really fancy joining the crowds, so our first trip was about 10 days after the relaxing of rules. We visited a venue we hadn’t fished before - a large, deep gravel pit, that we’d joined for the 2020/21 season. It’s a fantastic lake with a lot of potential, and it was nice to not only have a change of scenery to fish in, but a change of scenery full stop after two months of no travel! Those first few casts actually felt weird, almost surreal. Fish would be a bonus on this recce trip, but we ended up landing four pike between us - our first fish from the new venue, and our first fish post lockdown.

As I’m still furloughed, I’ve had a bit more time on my hands to fish, and explore new venues. Dad and I have varied our fishing quite a bit since the restrictions were loosened, so what I’ve decided to do is instead of trying to fit everything in to one blog post, focus on freshwater fishing in this post.

I was absolutely buzzing to be afloat on the midlands reservoirs again. The Anglian reservoirs remained shut until early June, so we missed the first few weeks of the flyfishing for predators season, a time where I really enjoy fishing around weedbeds for Pike and Zander. Interestingly though, there was actually very little weed growth on Grafham, which is probably because the water levels had been so low from the summer of 2019 onwards, that the areas where you normally find weed had been dry land for months on end. On that first trip, we managed to find fish in between 11ft and 20ft of water, and in the last few hours of the day, boated 15 zander, each landing a fish over 80cm.

 

 

We returned four days later, and also found fish in similar depths. We had a steady stream of bites throughout the day, with one of those being from a fish of 10lb 8oz, that took Dad’s fly. 

 

 

 

The action came thick and fast, and hadn’t gone unnoticed from the shore. It's not often Dad and I get really wound up when we're out fishing, but we were happily casting away when we heard the high pitched humming sound of a drone hovering above us. It kept circling our boat, at times just two or three rod lengths above our heads. It was very off-putting, causing me to miss a bite and then lose a fish from not getting a good hookset, from being distracted. I managed to spot the user with the remote control, who was around a quarter of a mile away, and after half an hour or so we couldn't stand it any longer. As we started to motor towards him, he started to retrieve his drone and we ended up chasing it back to the bank, and asking him to stop watching us. Thankfully, he left, and it worked out well in the end, as we stopped off at a different spot on the way back from where we'd been fishing, and on my first cast I caught this double figure zander!

It had been an action packed day, and as you can imagine, Dad and I were keen to get back as soon as possible, and I managed to book a boat for four days later, which was on a Friday - the last one left! However, the weather forecast changed during the week, and it turned out to be too windy, so I called up and postponed our boat to the following Friday. It was a good idea I changed the day, not just because of the wind…

Whilst we’d been fishing on the previous trip, I started developing a pain in the left side of my jaw. It progressively got worse during the week, and I also began to get a sore throat and had difficulty swallowing.  On the Thursday night, I started to get aches and pains all over my body, felt a little bit sick and was struggling to open my jaw, so I Googled jawlock and sore throat, and found the symptoms can be linked to the early stages of Tetanus, which is caused by bacteria entering your bloodstream through cuts or punctures. It takes anything between 4-21 days to develop, and I remembered I'd been spined by a zander quite badly on our first trip flyfishing the reservoirs, four days before my very first symptoms. I checked my innoculation sheet and realised I had been due a Tetanus jab back in February this year, 10 years after my last.

I decided to call 111, as the pain was getting worse, and the GP told me to go straight to A&E to get it checked out. Although there isn't a test to confirm diagnosis of Tetanus, I had other tests to rule out other things, and the hospital said it all pointed to the early stages of Tetanus. So, I was given a Tetanus jab, and put on antibiotics and painkillers for the next week. If you, like me, enjoy fishing for toothy or spiny fish, or get a cut somehow and have these symptoms, it might be worth checking to see if you're up to date with your Tetanus innoculations. If you're not immunised and let the symptoms develop, I was told it can sometimes get quite serious, even life threatening without treatment.

Five days later, it was June 16th. I still wasn’t feeling 100%, but was very keen to get out for a few hours on the first day of the season on my local rivers. We managed to get fishing by 6.30am, however, by about 10am I started feeling a bit rough, so decided to return home for a few hours rest, before heading out again later that afternoon. We caught a few chub, nothing massive, but I did manage to stalk a barbel on a creature bait!

Although it was nice to get the season off to a start with a Barbel, during those first few trips to areas that had been successful in the past, we spotted far fewer fish. At first we thought it could be something to do with Otter and Mink predation, but we soon heard rumours that a couple of stretches of our local rivers had been netted, which was terrible news. As I mentioned earlier, during the lockdown I spent a lot of time researching venues to try with the potential of producing some great fishing, and now was the time to venture further afield and try them.

So far this season, I’ve really enjoyed exploring new venues. We’ve actually fished 10 different rivers now since June 16th, and six of those we hadn’t fished before. It’s been a case of trial and error, with some places fishing better or having more potential than others, but I’ve certainly been learning a lot. We’ve caught some nice chub on a variety of different hardbaits, with lures such as the Salmo Lil’ Bug, Hornet and Minnow, that have worked well over previous seasons, being very successful. 

 

 

Earlier this year, Salmo introduced the Rattlin' Hornet Shallow to their range. As soon as I first saw them back in February, I knew they were going to be a favourite of ours for summer chub. They're perfect for when the chub are a bit wary about taking a surface lure, as they dive to a maximum depth of around 2ft, although if you keep the rod tip up and slow down your retrieve, you can fish them just under the surface. Not only have they proved a winner for chub, but perch seem to like them too!

 

 

This year though, I’ve been using more and more sinking crank baits. Where I’ve found them particularly useful is when I can’t drift a floating crankbait downstream under overhanging trees and bushes, because foliage is hanging in the water. Selecting a sinking model will allow the lure to drift down with the current, underneath the foliage, reeds or undercut banks, reaching fish hiding away.

 

 

 

 

As we’ve had a very warm summer, our main target species has been chub, but whilst exploring these new venues we’ve come across a few surprises too. One of those was on a tiny, little known chalk stream, famed in the past for its roach fishing, but we thought it had potential to hold some nice chub. We only spotted a couple of chublets, but it had an incredible head of Trout, catching quite a few between us and spotting many more.

Talking of roach, whilst fishing another river, we spotted a nice fish of around 1lb 12oz, and Dad decided to try for it with the tiny sinking crankbait he had clipped on. He let the lure drift downstream, and as he was retrieving, he gave it a twitch, and one of the smaller roach in amongst the bigger fish nailed it!

Another river we’ve fished also seems to hold some nice perch, and I managed to catch my biggest of the season so far, that beat the chub it was with to a Micro Grub!

Whilst we've been concentrating on the chub, you can't help catching pike, and we've caught a good number this season so far. It's been a constant reminder why it's best to use a light trace, even when targeting chub.

As the water temperatures cool down, I’ll probably be spending less time on the rivers and concentrating on reservoir predators, as many of them open up for lure fishing soon. I’m also hoping to continue fishing for bass, which I’ve really enjoyed this year - but I’ll talk about that in my next blog post!

Changing lures in challenging river conditions

The 1st January 2020 was the first time I’d fished on New Years Day for a few years - the last time was in Sri Lanka fishing for Clown Knifefish! We weren’t even going to fish on our planned walk along a section of river we hadn’t fished for a few years, but right at the last minute we decided to take the rods for a walk too! The river looked in good condition, with a tinge of colour but not the horrible chocolatey brown we were to become used to up to the end of the season (more on that later). I decided to start with an 8cm Pro Grub, rigged on an offset jighead, as I wasn’t sure if the river had become snaggier since I last fished it, and within 20 minutes, taking the rods for a walk had paid off, as something slammed my Pro Grub. Heavy headshakes gave me a good feeling I’d hooked a big Perch, and it was - 3lb 12oz and 45cm! What a first fish of the year!

This was shortly followed by a jack Pike, and then after 15 minutes without another take, I decided to have a change of tactic. There are some lures that sit in my tackle boxes for quite a while before they get a swim, and sometimes, you just get the feeling that a lure you don’t use often (or have not used before) could be worth a try. Before New Years Day I’d only used the Salmo Slick Stick on a couple of occasions, but I felt it would be a good choice in this particular area if I fished it on a twitch and pause retrieve, given the water in front of me was about 7ft deep, and there was the odd baitfish topping. A few casts later that change paid off as I had another 3lb+ Perch in the net!

I've enjoyed fishing the Slick Stick since that trip, and on the following few outings it produced some more nice Perch and plenty of Pike, especially when fished in slack water where baitfish had been gathering.

River conditions deteriorated as January progressed in to February due to the heavy and persistent rainfall, with just the occasional window of opportunity where, if I was lucky on the day I had off, there would be a few inches of visibility - so, we had to rely on other lures and techniques to keep the bites coming instead. The Rattlin Hornet has a wide wobble and loud rattle, and in the UV Orange colour it zings out even in muddy water. Banged along the bottom, the 4.5cm model produced bites even in the worst of conditions.

One of my favourite types of lures to fish in coloured water are creature baits, especially in white. Chub are a species that I’ve found are often obliging to a white creature bait fished when the rivers are coloured, and we caught a couple of nice fish on the Rage Critters fished Texas style over the winter period.

When the rivers were raging through I mostly concentrated on fishing any slack areas I could find, where fish were likely to be holding. With a Texas rigged creature bait, I could cast right in to bankside roots, overhanging bushes and trees, or close to the bank, where most of the slack areas were. It gave me the confidence of not snagging up quite as frequently as when using a normal jighead. On one particular trip I’d been testing a new creature bait on a river that, the day before, had flooded in to the fields, and had only just receded back in to its banks. Wandering along the slippery banks where the floodwater had been, and concentrating on fishing any slack areas we could find, I caught one of the best looking Perch I’ve landed this winter. It took the lure just six inches from my feet, in about a foot of water, proving that in coloured water conditions when a river is raging through, fish will find whatever slack water they can, no matter what the depth, and tuck themselves in close to the bank!

Shads such as the Zander Pro Shad and 7.5cm Replicant have also worked well, fished on a straight retrieve.

Whilst I stuck to using bigger lures to target Perch, Dad spent a bit more time scaling down and fishing with tiny softbaits. He’s written a blog post about it for the Fox Rage website, which you can read by clicking on this link.

Although we’ve caught some nice Perch this winter, they’ve been particularly hard to come by. That’s not been helped by the less-than-ideal conditions, but it hasn’t stopped the Pike playing ball! They’re not really what we’ve been targeting, but they’re great fun on light lure outfits and provide welcome action through barren periods whilst hoping we can tempt a stripey to take one of our lures.

Last month I fished a canal for a video for Fox Rage, talking through some of the lures I use for targeting Pike on canals, which you can view here.

During the last week of the season, the rain eased up, which meant my local river conditions began to improve and look pretty good. It always seems that the conditions are at their very best as March 14th looms! We decided to spend most of our time targeting Chub, with the odd couple of hours just before dark after Perch.

The Salmo Hornet had been an amazing crankbait for us throughout the course of the season, especially for Chub, and Dad and I both caught some immaculate fish on the penultimate day, which hit our lures like trains!

In one particular weir pool, I cast out and ended up with a wind knot. It was quite a bad knot so I had to cut the braid, losing around 20ft or so of line, which was frustrating. I hand-lined the old braid in, with my trace and lure still attached, to find a good Perch following my Hornet back! I paused the lure but unfortunately, the fish spooked and bolted off - how frustrating! It turned out to be my last encounter of the season with a Perch!

Whilst targeting the Chub, we caught a couple of stunning looking Brownies that beat the Chub to the lures...

On the last day we were optimistic of some more Chub action, but until dark, all our action had come from jack Pike, with the exception of a very nice fish Dad caught on a straight retrieved Replicant.

We continued fishing in to the dark, as this can be a good time to target the Chub. At 7.45pm Dad approached me and told me that a Chub had followed him in and he'd seen its big white lips turn away just as he was lifting the lure out of the water! He moved a few yards upstream and made another, longer cast past the swim the fish had followed him in from, hoping a change of angle might entice the fish in to taking. Moments later I heard some loud splashing from where he was fishing, and it turned out he'd hooked and landed the fish. It was caught on the very same 4cm Hornet that had caught so many Chub, from the start of the season right up until dark on March 14th. It seemed like a good fish to round up the season, so we decided to call it a day - or night!

That was my last fishing trip, and I’m now staying at home, listening to the government’s advice and putting the health and safety of our families, friends and the general public first. It gives me a chance to catch up and clean and organise fishing equipment, so when the restrictions are lifted it'll be a fresh start, and I'll be about as prepared as I can be, and absolutely raring to get back out on the bank or boat! Stay safe and well - hopefully we’ll all be fishing again soon!

Huchen fishing on the Una River in Bosnia

One of my favourite books to read as a boy was actually a book my Dad bought when he was a boy, which was all about freshwater fish species of Europe. I used to enjoy looking at the drawings of the fish and reading about what species we have here in the UK, but there were also some really interesting species in other parts of Europe that fascinated me, and perhaps the one I found the most unusual was the Huchen. I found it hard to believe that a Trout (or salmonid, to be precise) could grow to a metre and a half in length, with a diet consisting of Grayling, Barbel and Frogs! It was one of a handful of species in that book that really caught my eye and I hoped to fish for one day.

Anyway, last year, Farlows had an evening showing a screening of ‘Una - The One’, a film highlighting the issue of building hydropower dams on the Balkan rivers, especially the Una. If you get the chance, watch it, because it’s a fantastic film - the footage is amazing and I was stunned by how beautiful this river looked, and upset that there was a risk it could be dammed. One of the fish that would be affected by these plans were the Huchen, a fish that attracted anglers from all across Europe to fish the Una for. It was the first time I’d seen Huchen on film, and underwater footage showed these mysterious fish in all their glory - and in good numbers too. I went away from work that evening captivated and with an ambition to one day fish for the species. Here is the trailer for the film:

One of the people featured in the film was Anes Halkic of Una Discovery Pro Guides, who guides on the river. I contacted Ani and after picking his brains about the fishing and good times to visit, we decided to book a week’s fishing there for the first week of December.

We were picked up by Ani from Zagreb airport in Croatia, before embarking on a two and a half hour drive to Bosanska Krupa, our base for the week. We arrived at around lunchtime and joined a group of 6 anglers from Germany, Italy, Holland and Switzerland (some of whom had already been fishing for a week) at a restaurant beside the river, who were taking a break after fishing that morning. This would be our stop for breakfast each morning and where all the anglers would regroup for lunch, before heading back out for the afternoon fishing.

Then it was on to the chalet, where our accommodation was based and where we would prepare for our first day’s fishing on the Una the following morning. It was also an opportunity for us to get to know the guys we would be fishing with, and pick their brains about Huchen, over a few beers beside the log fire!

There isn’t a lot of information about Huchen fishing in English (most of it is in German), but when researching Huchen fishing back at home, Dad and I were surprised at the size of the lures and flies anglers were using for them. They certainly like a big meal, in fact the smallest lure we fished all week was a Salmo Hornet 9, but most of the time the lures we fished were between 18cm and 25cm in length. The primary diet of the Huchen in the Una river are Whitefish, Chub and Grayling, and our lures were imitating these fish. As some of these lures needed to be rigged on heavy jigheads to get down in the strong current, we each brought along with us a Fox Rage Terminator Big Bait Spin - 8’10” 40-160g rods, as heavy as some of the outfits we use for Pike back at home! Our 4000 and 5000 sized reels were spooled with 60lb braid, and a 44lb fluorocarbon leader, although Ani suggested a leader wasn’t necessary, so one of us tied a heavy snap to the end of the braid, which the lure was clipped on to.

It rained for most of our first days fishing, which turned to snow in the late afternoon. The river had been rising and slowly colouring up as the day went on, but despite the conditions not being 100%, we were really enjoying fishing in such stunning surroundings and learning about these unusual relatives of the Taimen. However, because of the lack of visibility, we couldn’t see the big boulders and snags that we were trying to cast around, and we ended up losing quite a few lures on the first day.

As it was getting dark, and the snow was falling heavily, I’d made a cast upstream and was just about to lift my 18cm Pro Shad out of the water, when I was taken by surprise as a Huchen of around 85cm emerged and engulfed the whole shad, almost leaping out of the water in the process! It all happened in the blink of an eye and unfortunately, the hook didn’t set, but to give you an idea of how aggressive the take was, the splash was so loud, Dad, who was about 20 metres downstream, thought I’d fallen in! It was great we’d seen a fish so early on our trip, and we were now both desperate to see one on the bank!

We woke up on the second morning to a thick blanket of snow, which made for a very scenic backdrop. However, the river had risen and coloured up even more overnight because of the rain before the snow. On the plus side though, if it stayed cold enough, the snow wouldn’t melt and the river would drop faster, and so would the colour. In the morning the conditions were at their worst, but by the end of the day the river was starting to clear. After a biteless morning for all the anglers, we regrouped for lunch at the restaurant before Ani took me and Dad to an area that has produced some very big Huchen over the years.

It was now just about dark, and at the time I was fishing with a Salmo Hornet 9 over a sandy bottom, when I felt some resistance. It felt a bit unusual, a bit like weed so I half-heartedly struck, when I began to feel some very wide, heavy headshakes. I’d hooked a big Huchen.

The fish tore off downstream, then after two more heavy headshakes, it threw the hooks. Huchen have very bony mouths and I hadn’t set the hooks properly. Ani and I were both gutted, probably Ani more than me because he knew I’d just lost a fish that could have been over a metre long. Then, just a matter of seconds after I lost the fish, the prayer calls from the Mosques echoed all across the valley. Obviously the timing was just a coincidence, but the fact it happened just after I’d lost, potentially, the fish of a lifetime, made for a very surreal experience, like I’d been beaten by the fish Gods!

As the river level dropped and the clarity improved as the week went on, the fish holding structures in the river became more visible, making it easier for us to see where we needed to fish our lures.

Despite the river conditions continually improving though, I went the next two days with no action at all. Dad, however, had a take on the third day in the dark (which messed up the Pro Shad he was using), but it was on the fourth day where he came the closest we’d come to a fish so far.

We’d just been looking at some trees that had been gnawed at by some Beavers, when our guide for the afternoon, Firduz (who is Ani’s brother), spotted a fish on a sandbar from quite a long distance. I didn’t actually see the next part happen as I was fishing further upstream, but Dad cast to the fish and it took his Pro Shad head first. He’d played it for a little while but I heard the voice of Markus (one of the anglers we were with) yell a word I can’t repeat on here! Firduz and I ran round and found Dad and Markus both staring at the ground in disbelief. Dad had just lost a dream Huchen, possibly over 110cm. Dad and I have targeted some difficult fish species over the years, but this one was really testing us both.

On the last morning, the river was really coming in to its own and looked the best it had all week. We would be fishing from a boat, mixing it up between flyfishing with a 9’ 10wt, and lure fishing.

For the duration of the week, there was a handmade jointed crankbait sitting on the dashboard of Ani and Firduz’s van, and Firduz suggested I should start off using it that morning.

As an Italian angler had told me earlier in the week after losing my big Huchen, if I felt something unusual, strike, and strike again! After half an hour or so of drifting downstream and swinging Firduz’s crankbait across pools, I had what felt like a proper take, and struck hard, and struck again!

The heavy headshakes began. I was praying that this one wouldn’t come off, and I managed to steer it through an area of strong current flowing through the middle of the river, to where the boat was positioned in the slack on the opposite bank from where I’d hooked the fish. I brought the fish up to the boat and Firduz grabbed the tail - I’d done it!!!

I was shaking with excitement. It was by no means a monster, but I was finally able to appreciate this mysterious predator in the flesh. The markings were stunning, almost like it had been sprinkled with grated pepper-sized black specks.

After a few quick pics, we lowered it back in to the water, and it soon gave a strong kick of its tail and zoomed down in to the depths. And, just like that, the hunt for a Huchen was over!

We met the other anglers from the group back at the restaurant for lunch and it turned out that my Huchen was one of three caught that morning, the most prolific fishing session in two weeks. We had high hopes for more Huchen that afternoon, and I was really hoping Dad would be able to land one.

For the last couple of hours we visited the canyon where the Una becomes quite narrow compared to the rest of the river. The pace of the river here was still very strong though, so we returned to the areas we'd been fishing earlier in the week.

The conditions in the afternoon were the best we'd had all week, but such is the unpredictability of Huchen fishing, no one in the entire group had a single bite all afternoon, which was strange as all of the bites and fish caught throughout the week (apart from on the last day) had come in the afternoon. But that’s Huchen fishing! I felt gutted for Dad, but the week had been a huge learning curve for us both and anybody who’s fished for Huchen will appreciate that targeting them is not as straightforward as it seems!

That evening, we were all invited to a big party that only takes place twice a year at the restaurant. There was free food for all so I’m not surprised that there were 2-300 people at the party - it was packed! Everybody had a great time - and drunk too much!

What an amazing experience it had been fishing for Huchen on the Una River. Bosnia is a beautiful country and Ani, Firduz and the guides at Una Discovery Pro Guides gave us a trip to remember, so a massive thank you to them! We’re already in the middle of planning another trip - Dad has unfinished business!