A four pounder from the local

I had little in the way of a smile from the fishing gods yesterday, today was to prove very different, although I had to work for the end result...

4lb 6 oz

Yesterday's problem with the car exhaust proved not to be serious, meaning I was on the banks of the weaver by 2.30pm. Sticking with the 'new' stretch I started off well as within 15 minutes I'd nailed  a near 3lb'er on bread flake. I gave it a few more casts missed a few bites but then decided on a move downstream with a view to re-visiting later on.


The next swim really looked the part, the swim itself is on a small spit that cut out into the main river and right below there are lots of near bank rushes with a tree 30 metres downstream.

I decided to fish the swim in stages by mentally dividing it into separate sections. I dribbled in mashed bread and initially started fishing fairly close in and down to my right, just off the rushes where the river bed drops off. Following this I planned to fish progressively further down the swim.


Sadly at this point I realised I'd done some serious schoolboy defending and not brought enough bread flake, so on with the cheese paste! First cast, the tip wallops round, missed. How? The next cast gives a repeat performance albeit after a 10 minute wait and a few taps and plucks before hand, sadly the end result is the same. This pattern carried on for the best part of an hour  and despite changing the size of the paste, striking late, striking early and fishing the other parts of the swim as planned, I could not nail a second chub!


Back to the first swim, the light is now fading, a cast to a downstream willow gives another series of plucks and taps, all missed! I change the hooking arrangement of the bait in that I fold a tiny piece of paste over the hook and a cast to mid river finally gets me a result in the shape of a 12oz splasher.


The light is now going properly, I have pasta and meatballs waiting at home, one more cast to mid river, bang, a good fish is hooked that dives right down the inside to my left, proper chub style. I take what line I can and the Technium tells me it isn't a bog standard fish. I see the width of it's back and it's a decent fish, into the net it goes, then out of the net it goes! Oh deep joy, I give it some stick and the next time it's in the net proper, 4lb 6oz and only my third '4' from the river, and from a relatively new stretch too, made up!