A Bite a Cast !

A long time ago, in the days when Great Britain still had a car manufacturing industry, footballers wore black boots and if you wanted to see a Tattooed Lady you had to visit the Circus, the lake known simply as the Blue Lias was legendary amongst my school mates and I.

It was rumoured that one hundred pound catches of tench were common place from the syndicate water and this at a time when such catches were almost unheard of in England in fact many anglers would make the pilgrimage to the largely untapped waterways of Ireland in search of the elusive 'ton'.



Nowadays, in the hands of British Waterways, Stockton Reservoir is a successful commercial fishery or baggin' water I believe they are sometimes called (for the younger anglers wot go fishin') heavily stocked with a variety of species with an emphasis on carp.

The perfect venue for a couple of knock about anglers with some old bait to use up in fact....

It was the first time I had ever seen the lake and it looks good with reed fringed margins, islands and other features to be explored, a wooden walkway has been constructed along one bank and each peg boasts a well constructed wooden platform each of which feature metal clamps for banksticks and a central hole for your umbrella, a nice touch.

We opted to fish at the car park end of the lake in an area sheltered from the wind and which allowed us to fish in a channel between one of the islands and the bank. Conditions suited a floatfishing approach and for bait we had maggots and pinkies left over from our canal trip last week. Dad and I both targeted an area halfway to the island looking to catch silver fish on single and double maggot.

It wasn't long before we were catching roach to about six ounces and some small perch, these came in a steady stream keeping us busy throughout the afternoon. I hooked a good carp at one point but found myself seriously out gunned and Dad was broken twice by carp too. In the last hour I stepped up my tackle and increased my feed rate determined to catch a carp but could only muster a small common of three quarters of a pound.

I like to try different fisheries every now and again, I enjoy the learning process, and my first impressions of Stockton Reservoir are that it's certainly worth another visit, there are a variety of species to be caught including crucian carp, rudd and chub and the carp are plentiful although there are no monsters to be caught.