Hi everyone its Luke here!
To say the least, it’s been a while! For anyone who didn't know I had a job over the Christmas period so I haven’t had much free time to go fishing. But, putting that aside, Bath Angling is back in full operation with a new website currently being built! So, make sure you keep an eye out on our Facebook and Twitter for sneaky peaks!
Last weekend (10th January – 11th) myself and a few of our team members were out on the bank! The first session of 2015 was underway at Newton Park. On the session I was joined by Jacob & Jak (double trouble) and we were ready for our first session of 2015!
We arrived at the lake fairly early and set up in the bowl as it’s the deepest part of the lake. We have had a lot of cold weather lately and the wind was pushing up towards the dam. We thought that the fish would most likely be in this deeper water.
After having the rods out for a couple of hours and no bites, Jak had a bite! Jak was fishing both of his rods on the chod set up with just single hook bait’s that he was casting around to try and find the fish. The bait choice being the CC Moore Northern Specials 12mm in red! He managed to land this fish around the 12lb mark.
The fishing was proving to be quite tricky and many anglers were struggling for a bite on the lake. The majority of anglers were fishing the bowl and Jacob and I decided to move to swims that were in shallower water just to relieve some of the line pressure. This paid off for us and an hour into our move Jacob had one on the bank. He was fishing to the far margin and baited up with a few boilies around his hookbait. He had his fish on a Northern Special yellow wafter.
After all this time it was surely my turn for bite? The bites were coming very slow and a few hours later I managed to get my first bite. I had it from my mid-water rod that I was fishing as a single hookbait, which was a Live System boilie and Northern Special combination. It put up a good scrap on the rod, my first fish off 2015!
Just as light was begining to fade and it was coming close to the end of the session Jacob was blessed with another fish. He caught this fish from mid-water using a small amount of free offerings of corn around his hookbait. The day really came down to trying different approaches and tactics to get the bites as it was very cold and the fish didn’t want to feed.
So, that was Saturday’s session at Newton Park. Bites were tricky to come by but luckily it wasn’t a blank for our team!
Hunstrete:
On Sunday we headed down to Hunstrete Fishery. Joining me on this session was Jacob & James! I arrived at the complex for 8am and managed to get one of my favourite swims on Hunstrete Main Lake which is peg 7. On route I bumped into a couple of locals and spent a fair amount of time chatting and catching up! It’s been a while since I have been to Hunstrete and last year I spent most of my time fishing the main lake. So I became quite the local! Hahaha! The plan was to fish the lake up until lunch time and then move onto Withy Pool to try and get a fish or two!
Throughout the morning on the Main Lake it was pretty much the same old story that everyone tells! Not even a nibble! But, its one of those lakes that bites are hard to come by pretty much all year round!
We moved around to the back of Withy at lunchtime. We were all fishing one rod each tight to the refuge, as that is one of the prime areas to catch from. After twenty minutes I was hooked into my first fish! I love fishing to the refuge as when you get a bite they automatically try to take you inside and you have to apply the correct amount of pressure to stop them. Some may use the expression “Hit and hold!”. I managed to get the fish in the net, meaning it wasn’t a blank and it was this nice little mirror!
After returning the fish I cast back to my spot and waited! It wasn't long until I had my second bite and fish of the session. I had managed to get a couple of fish feeding and this little stunner graced the net!
After returning this mirror, Jacob’s rod went! He was also hooked into a fish. He was fishing the left margin going towards the refuge. We baited up the area with Live System boilies. The fish were coming on the feed! Shortly after we netted Jacob’s fish, James had a bite! With two fish in the net, it was only appropriate that the duo had a brace shot!
After these fish it hardened up and we didn’t have another bite! We decided to move around into the main bowl section of the lake, but it didn’t result in anything…
Hope you enjoyed this week’s blog! It was a bit of a productive weekend for us last weekend!
See you on the bank sometime,
Luke Nix
