22 January 2016

19 Jan 16 Hampshire Avon

I had a day off from work today and I had decided that I would be back off to the Avon to try and catch a Chub, the main goal though was to try different hooks out on the float as I have been suffering hook pulls of late.  I stayed up late tying hooks in various patterns and sizes to various lines and could feel the cold leaking into my fishing room, so when my alarm went off and the wife told me that there had been a hard frost, I ignored it and had a lay in.  I got to the river at about 10 O’clock and the thermometer had barely read above freezing the whole way, I had a quick recce on another stretch before finding myself parking up where I had been on Saturday.
This time I had packed my seatbox so I was able to keep my feet dry on my platform and I started on the float, due to the depth and flow I set up a 6 no.4 lignum stick and I was soon happily trotting down the far bank crease but, my hook pulling spell continued and in the first 40 minutes or so I lost 5 decent fish but still managed to land a chub of about 2lb and a trout of a pound. 
So the pattern continued for another couple of hours until I was unable to get a bite anywhere in the swim, at this point I decided to set up the feeder, I had managed a few small trout and a grayling on top of the earlier fish by this point and the feeder was brilliant for about 20 minutes with a bite a chuck resulting in a lot of missed bites but a few decent dace and grayling.
After about an hour I was varying feeder size and packing the feeder with hemp to reduce the amount of maggot going in the swim when I hooked a good fish, it tried to run under the trees downstream but I turned it from them and then it ran upstream, just as it got opposite me the fluorocarbon hooklength hit an unseen snag and parted about halfway down.  I was not impressed.
I started to alternate now between the float along the inside  which gave me a number of small trout and grayling and the feeder won which the bites had reduced and were just as hard to hit, just as the sun was starting to set though the tip bounced and dropped back and I lifted into another decent fish.  This time the hooklength broke on my double figure of 8 knot at the top of the hooklength as I was trying to turn the fish from the trees.  I will get it sorted soon.
After that bites dried up and the temperature plummeted so I decided to call it a day, I bumped into Simon and Dave from whom I managed to glean a little information and I will have to see where I decide to go tomorrow.
A quick video of the session can be found here: 

What would I do different?
Sounds like Corn is the bait of choice for the Chub along the stretch so it may have to be start on big baits next time.

Tackle used:
Float:
Rod: Drennan Acolyte 14ft
Reel: Daiwa TDM 2508
Line: 0.16 Shimano invisitec (Off the front of Angling Times I think)
Hook: Various, best at moment 16 Carbon feeder
Float: Dave Harrell Pointed Lignum stick six No.4

Feeder:
Rod: Drennan Medium feeder at 12ft 6 inch, 3oz tip.
Reel: Daiwa TDM 4012
Line: 8lb sensor various hooklengths
Hook: Various, best 14 Carbon Feeder
Feeder: Various, mainly small 30g black cap and small 30g vari weight feeder.




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