found myself with a clear weekend and decided that I would make the most of it with a 36 hour session on the trent. I had picked a swim during the week and had baited it with a bucket full of goodies ( a few kilos of corn, kilo or two of 10mm tutti frutti boilies, 10 and 22mm halibuts padded out with a kilo of so of vitalin) on the tuesday, wednesday and thursday evenings, trekking to the river after work each evening to try and establish the swim as a feeding zone for the patrolling carp.
A river carp was the key objective of this little mission, the area had good form at this stage of last season, the weather was good and I was feeling confident. So confident in fact that in my mind I was going to be doing a hat-trick towards my T&T A-Z, my baitbucket contained a couple of pints of maggots, intended to produce a bleak, carp would be the next on the list after being seduced by the old skool tutti boilie and a common bream was bound to show up abd snaffle the fishy pellets... of course the reality was somewhat different.
I hadn't long set up before the alarms bleeped for a drop back and I turned to see the bobbin jiggling about, this was on a rod baited with a 22mm "donkey choker" halibut pellet, hair rigged to a size 4 on a 10lb 12inch hooklength. A quick strike led to me reeling in a fairly manky bream, not my target but an encouraging start...
so 6:30pm and already a fish in the bag, I was still optimistic as I settled back into my seat, though by half past seven I was becoming a bit suprised that the floatfished maggots that the bleak were supposed to be scoffing were yet to yield a bite - this is one of the first summer Trent swims that wouldn't at least throw up a consolation perch from a regularly maggot fed swim. By eight o clock the onslaught of mozzies forced me back to the sanctuary of my shelter, one rod was now on tutti frutti boilie, the other went out with two 10mm halibut pellets, both rods were fished about a rod length out in a deep margin.
The trangia stove had produced countless cups of tea and steamed a defrosted ready meal for tea without a pip out of the rods, and a couple of bottles of beer finished off my evening. I had settled down for the night before i had to spring up for another halting bite, the jigging bobbin was answered with a strike and another bream. by the time i had rebaited it and recast it was heading towards 2am, still plenty of time for the carp to show up, and after all, i wasn't even a quarter of the way through the session.
The night was short, and before 5am I was back up with the float rod, feeding maggots and trying desperately to find the elusive bleak. Everying about this location looked "bleak'ey", almost no flow, overhanging trees for insects to drop out of but no small fish...until suddenly the waggler dipped and 4 inches of wriggling fish was swung to my hand - not a bleak though, this was a baby chub, the next cast produced another, but that was it, they were gone as soon as they appeared.
by 6:30 it was feeling like i was flogging a dead horse (or feeding an empty swim) so i went back into carp mode and after a cup of tea and a sausage sandwich crashed back in the shelter for another few hours kip.
Saturday was spent watching the wildlife, a pair of kingfishers spent their time shuttling to and fro feeding their brood of fledged babies, a tern provided entertainment with regular dive bombing of a fry shoal on the opposite bank that was also harried, presumably by a pack of voracious perch. A heron observed all from above and the damselflies danced between the bankside foliage, seeking a mate in the summer sunshine. On days like this is really doesnt matter that the fish wont join the party, just being on the bank with so much going on is enough. My main challenge of the day was attempting to photograph the kingfishers. Such small fast moving targets were impossibly hard to frame, let alone focus. the pics below are some of my better efforts of the day
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