Lovely Chubbly

Thursday Morning at 8:30am

As I arrived at my local River Kennet at 8:30am, Sun shining (For a Change)  I immediately knew that the River will be very high and extremely coloured then normal all because of the recent snow melt and constant rain we have been having, as I starred upon the river I saw a lot of debris going down and just imagining how much natural food is passing by for the fish so I new that the fish will maybe a little more eager to feed.

 

I knew that it wasn’t going to be a long session only a few hours but I made the most of it by going into few various chub looking swims and tried to chop and change the way in which I would tackle that swim but the main swims I was looking at where over hanging trees, Slow Glides, Eddies and Slacks where hopefully a chub or 2 maybe be lying.

I knew the fishing was not going to be easy but I planned to stay in each swim for around 15/20 minutes, even longer if I knew that fish was there!
In the first swim I chose was quite open with a main current through the middle and wanted to put my baits in the slackers areas where hopefully my lead will take bottom nicely, My rigs consisted of 12lb mainline, 2oz Grippa Lead, Enterprise Tackle ET49 Snag Safe Running Lead Clip,
ET04 Adjuster Stop, Then my mainline tied to hook length using an Albright knot and finally a size 10 Korda Wide Gape hook.

Bait wise I am using CC Moore Halibut Stix Pellet cut in half and slid into an Enterprise Tackle Pellet skin the matching colour which will not only make the bait that slightly bit lighter but also the Signal Crayfish cant get at it!   Along side this I have also attached a PVA bag with matching CC Moore Mini Halibut pellets ,Oily Bag Mix and Halibut Stix Liquid which I dipped the hook bait in to give it even MORE pulling power and create a lovely small oily slick going downstream!

 

On my second rod I was going for more of a simple natural bait approach with was Corn, a nice visual bait which I chucked out as feed but on the hook I use Enterprise Tackle Sinking Corn, set-up Line aligner style so hopefully if the smaller fish come in on the feed my hook bait will always be available.

As nothing occurred in the first, faster paced swim I settled in the next swim down which was much slower and narrower and had a very small tree coming direction in front of me on the opposite side of the bank so I though I would put the Halibut rod downstream and the Corn rod right under the tree, minutes later I had a knock on the Corn rod but as I struck nothing come of it, I either struck to early or too late! So I sharpened my hook and moved to the next which had a slight uncut far bank and where I placed my Corn Line aligner by and placed a hand full over the but slightly up stream, it wasn’t Long before the bait runner on the reel was going mental and the tip looped round but at first I though it was a barbel but in actual fact I slid the net under a lovely chubbly chub!

Louis Slade