A New Season of Coarse Fishing

For many of you the coarse fishing season never ended, as you moved from the rivers to the still waters and canals. Some of us still recognize the old close season of March 15th until June 15th both days inclusive. On June 16th I had a traditional dawn start for tench, on one of the Wasing Estate fishery syndicate lakes in Berkshire. My companions on the trip were John Bodsworth of Sussex and Graeme Cook of Lancaster.
It was a beautiful dawn, a ribbon of mist drifted over the lake, carp swirled in the weeds. A Great crested grebe were hunting small fish to feed its hungry youngsters, while a pair of swans with five cygnets were feeding on the soft weed around the margins of the lake. A Cuckoo called from the trees on the eastern bank and coots were being quarrelsome as usual. In the wood behind me I picked up the scent of a fox, some minutes later it joined the dawn chorus with its barking. As the sun climbed slowly over the trees on the far bank the sky was forever changing from various shades of pinks gold's and silver.
Legering or float fishing with lobworms, sweetcorn, pellets, breadflake and crust over the three day session didn’t produce one tench, but we all caught suicidal perch. On my last day, I had the perfect bite. The dough bobbin moved slowly to the butt ring, the answering strike connected with a good fish but only for a few seconds then the hook pulled free. I watched a bow wave moving fast across the lake which turned out to be a carp. Graeme spent a couple of days on the river Kennet catching dace, barbel and chub.
The Kennet wasn’t flowing gin clear as it did in previous years. Today we have highly coloured water flowing in the summer when no rain has fallen, this stops the water crowfoot (Ranunculus) growing. The problem is caused by the boat traffic on the Kennet and Avon canal. The British Waterways Board operate the canal and I feel its beholding on the BWB to install filters so the rivers aquatic environment isn’t destroyed. Lets not forget the BWB is funded by the Government. I.E. you and I the tax payers.
I have a busy few months coming up with trips to Swedish Lapland, where I will be the MC for the European fly fishing championships and the Lapland World Cup, where I have been the MC of the latter event for several years. They have always been very enjoyable events with some excellent fishing. Then its St. Lawrence County in upstate New York for a big carp fishing tournament and some muskie, pike and smallmouth bass fishing on the Grass river. After a break of three years I will be back Oregon and Washington State for a couple of speaking engagements also some steelhead and trout fishing. I then visit Denver Colorado for the Fly fishing tackle dealers show where I will be on the Thomas and Thomas stand. Its home for a couple of days, then its back across the pond to Boston where I will fish for striped bass, false albacore and bluefish.