The Gargantuans

Although my own list of personal best captures makes for modest reading to say the least, for instance I'm yet to catch a sizable barbel, a bream over 7lb, a tench much over 6lb or a chub over 4 and a half and have only recently achieved the milestone of catching a 20lb carp.

That's not to say that I haven't encountered some leviathans along the way, because I have.....


Picture a bright sunny Summer afternoon at Napton Reservoir, sometime in the 1980's, it was blazing hot (as hot as a chip I like to say), so hot that few anglers were fishing, there wasn't a cloud in the sky and the only sound was the faint background hum only experienced in high summer at the waters edge.

Phil and I had gone along to the reservoir for a walk round taking a bag of bread with us in the hope of feeding some carp, glare on the surface prevented us from seeing very much at all as we walked along the causeway bank but as we approached the far end of the lake we could see fish moving on the surface in the furthest corner of, what was, the small reservoir.

We had soon walked the length of the canal bank and the culprits were revealed as we turned the corner onto the far bank, carp, six or seven fish to about mid teens in weight, big fish for the 80's were cruising on the surface along the avenues formed by the abundant weed in the area so we proceeded to bung out bread in their general direction.

Naturally the carp had seen it all before and continued to bask in the sun as before ignoring all our offerings with casual disdain.

I moved on and left Phil to it, I had probably walked about thirty yards before I saw it....

Just a couple of feet from the stones of the bank, in crystal clear water and in a small area free of weed was a colossal tench, the like of which I had never seen. Dark in colour, motionless and huge it literally took my breath away.

Eventually I managed to shout Phil but as he approached it slunk away into the weed never to be seen again. He wouldn't, and I couldn't blame him, accept my estimate of 14lb, but I swear it was, even if I was to concede a couple of pounds a twelve pound tench was front page stuff back then.

Breakages amongst tench anglers at Napton were common in those days and carp anglers were pretty thin on the ground, who knows what monsters could have been lost !



When working on a trout farm in Hampshire the water source was the fly anglers Mecca the River Test, a beautiful crystal clear chalk stream. The fish farm offices were located in an old water mill and upstream of the mill was situated a relatively large pool incorporating hatches to allow control of water levels and control of water being allowed to pass through the mill.

Each and every winter for the entire seventeen years I worked there, at some point in October or early November a shoal of about forty roach would appear in the pool and there they would stay until early spring when they would migrate upstream, the following Winter they would be back without fail.

Fish in this shoal were from about 8oz up to, I kid you not, an estimated 3lb+, one fish in particular could well have made three and a half pounds. Incredible I know !

Did we fish for them? You bet !

In clear conditions, you wouldn't get a touch. If you were lucky you would catch one of the big grayling or dace but the roach, which were as wild as can be, were way too canny.
However, in coloured conditions when the river was fining down after a flood we did catch a few, my mate Tony and I both caught fish to two and a quarter pounds on bread but never the bigger ones unfortunately.

Coarse fishing on the Test is tricky but the fish are huge, dace average about three quarters of a pound, grayling to well over 3lb, big pike and potential for truly enormous roach and perch. If the chance ever comes your way give it a go !



When conditions were right we ran the big eel trap which was an integral part of the mill and we would sometimes accumulate huge hauls to sell on to dealers, these fish would usually be from 6oz to 1lb but when eels became trapped inside the maze of the fish farm where escape was impossible they grew big on an abundance of dead trout.

The basic layout of the fish farm consisted of a nursery unit where the fish were fed up to the fingerling stage before being transferred to the main farm consisting of 25 large circular tanks some 25 feet diameter by about 6 feet deep, these emptied into enormous ponds around the outside of the farm by means of a bung in the centre of the tank, the final stage of production took place in the big ponds where the trout were grown on to marketable size.

Catching the resident eels relied on one of the circular tanks sitting empty for a few days. With no water passing through the underground pipe leading to the big pond the eels would take refuge in the pipe in their hundreds. It was then simply a case of re-fitting the bung, filling the tank and flushing the eels, by removal of the bung, into a keepnet braced over the pipe's exit by two burly fish farmers.

On the occasion in question we flushed a tank which had been empty for several weeks, as one of the men bracing the net I could tell it was an exceptional haul.
Once on the bank the first thing that was obvious was that we had a lot of eels to deal with, mainly in the 3lb class which was about usual, then, almost as one, we clapped eyes on the closest thing I have ever seen to a genuine fresh water monster.

Dark grey, almost black in colour with wrinkled and leathery skin, broad snouted with eyes white with cataracts the eel was a gargantuan. Not as long as I might have expected but in putting your hands around the middle of the fish your fingers would barely touch.
At eight and a half pounds it was a rare sight indeed and too old and noble a fish to appear smoked on a dinner plate in Europe, it was granted it's freedom.

Cold on Jubilee

It seems I've reached that time in my life when you are inclined to put comfort and practicality ahead of brands and appearance when choosing clothing, as a result I have recently been mulling over the options available when it comes to fishing hats. A wide brimmed olive green jobby caught my eye, ideal for those long Summer evenings but after yesterday I might well go for a bloody great fur lined thing with ear flaps and a chin strap.

Due to very few pegs being available at the far end of the bottom lake at Jubilee, where we usually fish, we settled on a couple of pegs in the vicinity of the old (sheep?) shed. There was a reasonable amount of fish activity on the surface which lulled us into believing we would catch a few.

It took a Herculean effort just to get a bankstick into the gravelly lake bed, I was having trouble getting comfortable and arranging tackle to hand and I was beginning to have doubts about a sunken tree to my right which would undoubtedly cause me serious problems should I hook a big fish, suffice to say I wasn't completely happy !
Having looked at some other pegs with a view to moving I finally decided on staying put and grin and bear it.

We had, as it turned out, made a considerable error in only taking sweetcorn as bait as we couldn't buy a bite between us. To add to our problems the cold, facing wind was growing stronger by the minute making things ever more uncomfortable, the top of my head has far less hair on it than it had a few years ago and I was getting cold. In the depths of my seat box I found an old Skretting cap that has been festering in there for years and even in my current predicament I wasn't about to put it on my head !

Eventually a bite materialised and it was dad who got it, fate of course dictated that we were to catch nothing on this outing and having felt the weight of a good fish briefly it was bumped off.
Cold and somewhat disheartened we left soon afterwards not really knowing where we went wrong. As I think I have mentioned before not catching much, or anything at all, is part and parcel of an anglers lot but catching nothing while learning nothing is hard to take, and so it was on this occasion, I learned absolutely nothing....except that I really need to buy a hat !

Hooks, Lines & Sinkers (part 3)

In the old days I used to carry a wide variety of ledger weights and feeders, everyone did. Drilled bullets, coffin leads, watch leads, strips of lead, lead wire, those enormous clear plastic block end feeders that were the norm on the Trent and Severn in those days, I had them all.

Nowadays things are different, more refined I'd like to think, lead has long gone, I only carry arlesley bombs and swim feeders are generally smaller and better designed.

My bombs range from an eighth of an ounce to two ounces which covers pretty much every eventuality I also carry a couple of flat camoflaged bombs for clear water river fishing, a variety of open end feeders in various colours and sizes and a couple of cage feeders, my block end or maggot feeders are mostly quite small, I still use drennan feeder links sometimes ( the green ones that used to come with 2 swan shot as weights ), others include the very tidy Kamasan black caps (with power gum to keep the lid tight) and the smoky coloured ones by Drennan with a flattened profile.
I also have a small selection of method feeders should I ever get round to using them.

Other associated items include swivels of various makes and sizes, ledger stops, ledger beads, hard plastic beads and rubber beads.

Two Bomb Strategy

Finally commitments and weather allowed us to have another bash at Jubilee yesterday.

As seems to be the way in recent weeks a beautiful morning gave way to a somewhat breezier and overcast afternoon and as we unloaded our tackle as the lakes it was obvious from the waves on the top lake that we would have to seek shelter on the bottom lake.
With very few anglers on the lake we had plenty of choice so we headed for the far end where dad chose to fish the corner peg (furthest peg from the car park) which was probably the most sheltered peg on the lake and I opted for the same peg I fished on our last visit.

I don't really like to return to the same swim time after time particularly on a fishery I'm trying to learn more about but this particular peg fitted the bill for the type of approach I had in mind.
Sitting on the platform there is about 2ft of water at your feet, to your right is a bed of dwarf lillies and to your left is open water, in front the bottom shelves off steeply to a good 15ft.

I tackled up with a Shimano Solstace tip rod and Baitrunner reel, 8lb Maxima and a 6lb bottom, a size 14 hook tied with a knotless knot completed the outfit.
The plan was simple enough, by changing between two different sizes of bomb I would fish at two distances. One swim was at about thirty yards in the deep water and was fed quite heavily with sweetcorn in the hope of attracting some bream, the other swim was close in off the end of the lily bed in shallower water and was fed quite sparingly.

Starting at 30 yards proved a little slow so I gave it another couple of pouches of corn and left it to settle, meanwhile I clipped on the small lead and dropped in on the margin swim.
Shortly the tip went round in a take no prisoners kind of a way and a carp was on, typically the fish initially bolted away from the pressure towards the centre of the lake and was soon under control but then the hook pulled out, great!

Next cast resulted in a tench of about 2lb who failed to bolt for the centre of the lake instead choosing to do his fighting in the centre of the lily bed, great again!
With the tench landed and the near swim disturbed I fed next to the lillies, clipped on the larger bomb and went back out at 30 yards.

After a couple of line bites I had a real one and a decent bream was soon in the net, a pale looking fish of about 4lb, this fish was quickly followed by a three pounder.
Next I was back to the inside swim and I didn't have to wait long before another carp was making his bid for freedom forty yards out, this time the fight went my way without too many concerns and a fish of 10lb+ was on the mat, one of the commons.

Try as I might, after the carp I struggled for bites on both lines and went on to catch just one more tench, dads story was almost the exact opposite.

Dad's swim in the corner of the lake was very calm and sheltered, he had trees extending out into the lake to his right and open water to his left, his set up was very similar to mine and he started by fishing quite close in towards the trees with the option of fishing the open water later on.

While I was catching my fish in the first half of the afternoon dad was sitting biteless, just as the action drew to a close for me dads swim came to life.
Glancing over my shoulder at my fishing position further round the lake I saw dad applying side strain to a good fish so I took a jog round to help with the netting, when I arrived the fish, a double, was close in but fighting well. During a short powerful run from the fish the clutch on the reel seemed to jam resulting in the hooklength breaking near the hook, real bad luck as the fish was very nearly beaten.
Undeterred dad, by now fishing the open water, went on to catch a 3lb bream soon after and then just before we left a common of about 5lb which went some way to making up for the big one he lost.