Freezing Cold

I can only just remember what the weather was like during the summer months going out with just a tee shirt covering my back instead of being trussed up like an oven ready turkey restricted from movement by the layers of clothing wrapped around my body and sheltering my frost bittern fingers from the ravages of the cold , don't you just hate it , winter I mean , it’s all right to go out in the freezing cold to do the shopping or to visit members of the family because you know that in a short while your punishment will be over or maybe not in the given scenarios but when you take yourself off to fish a match for four or five hours placing yourself at the mercy of the draw bag as to the chills of the wind etc there is no wonder that we are looked upon as being completely mad although they say that brilliance is close to madness , we must all be too brilliant for our own good.

As we get older and obviously wiser most of us show a distinct lack of enthusiasm to venture out into the depths of a winters morning unlike in my youth when I remember one instance in particular .
It was early November and bitterly cold but all I could think of as I toiled in my apprenticeship was fishing at the weekend deciding on a local iron stone pit as a few big roach had been showing to those whom were braving the cold evenings, I had tried in vein to secure the company of a fellow angler in my quest for these big roach being called a whole manner of things in the process for wanting to venture out on these bitterly cold nights especially as most of my mates were looking forwards to larding it up on the town but if it was a competition between fishing or boozing I new that there was to be no contest , so off to get some maggots I went, In those early days fishing was fishing non complicated barrels of fun and if a decent catch was attained it was with much luck , but if dedication were to be measured I would have hit the top of the scale and some, now I can’t exactly remember why I took it upon myself to fish through Friday night until Saturday morning I seem to recall the old seasoned angler of the lake telling me that the best chance I had to connect with a big roach was at night even though it was so cold he insisted that it was the best time to fish for them , he would still be laughing now if he were still alive I am sure as I never recall seeing him fishing much after midday even during the summer , so armed with my bait and my newly purchased thirteen foot carbon ultra light float rod , which of course was cutting edge technology or maybe not as Ian at our local Bennett's pet store was a good salesman and also owed me money from a previous outing having more than something to do with it being in my possession for the outing ahead, as I nestled in for what I new was going to be a cold night because unfortunately I had only a thin Italian ex army jacket , trainers and new short hair cut to keep me warm , Oh the things we do in our youth, as you can imagine I was well rigged for hypothermia or worse , I had decided to fish for the evening and into nightfall and to stay all night if I began catching or until I got too cold but alas when you are young you just don't know when you have had enough do you so into the night I went even though I had not even had a bite , now again I can’t really remember the finer details of the events after it got dark and too cold even to move but in short I fell asleep not a wise thing to do but getting up at 5am every morning and the freezing temperatures contributed greatly to the situation, the next thing I remember is waking up looking somewhere between a newborn blue baby and a fresh lobster in colour near paralyzed with cold as my reels drag system furiously screamed off , I would like to say that I leapt up and played the fish with vigour to the net but that would not exactly be the truth as I had to will myself to move from this state of cryonics first with a short battle ensuing thereafter , how I landed that fish in this state remains a mystery but it had my name on it that morning for it was staring up at me from my landing net in all of it’s glory and what glory it was a proper fish as my mate Mr. Crabtree would say , after a much needed hot coffee and a smoke I fumbled around with numb fingers setting up my camera to take a photo , my first two pound plus specimen what a thrill even though it had nearly cost me dearly but from that time onwards I have always been drawn to roach especially the big ones , although not to a degree of fishing for just these but it does pull my wire a bit when I catch fish of quality as some unfortunate anglers will go a whole lifetime without catching or seeing them.

There is no magical recipe to catching fish of specimen proportions just to fish the places that contain them from roach chub barbell to carp it is not any different from an ordinary days fishing you just have to catch the smaller fish along with the bigger fish but I can’t see that this is a problem as you have a far greater chance of attracting these better fish with a swim full of smaller fish.

As I have said before it is no accident that later on in a match or towards the end of a days fishing you will often connect with a larger fish , hence the match mans term “ fish the caster in the last hour for the better fish ” as these better fish have arrived over a longer period of time from the constant feeding of that particular place, to be perfectly honest they have probably been in the swim for a couple of hours but have only just gained a frenzied state of feeding in order for you to catch them.

It surely stands to reason that if you are catching more fish you must put more bait in and the more bait that goes in the better the fish you will catch if that water contains these fish of course , you must try to induce a state of frenzied feeding in order for the larger fish to move in and boss the smaller fish out of the way, It is my opinion that a fair amount of anglers even those whom are very good at certain types of angling do not do themselves justice in the bait department when fishing in general , you seldom see these anglers with more than a couple of pints of casters and maggots, even when fishing the mighty Trent do they seldom exceed these amounts why I just do not know perhaps it is just the way it is or the way in which they have learned over the years but think if you will of the comments you hear or the things that you see over time like “ I ended up blasting bait in and getting a fish a chuck I had a right net of fish until I ran out of bait ” and I can never forget whilst working in tackle shops the amount of anglers that were going abroad with massive amounts of bait , thinking nothing of putting two bags of crumb along with a gallon of casters and ten tins of corn into a venue from the off but returning home and going to the Trent with a kilo of ground bait and a couple of pints of casters , obviously the argument is that there are more fish in say Ireland or Holland per volume of water which is of course known to be true but the methods employed work just as well in this country applied in the right places at the right time.

This area is a great place to find fish of sizeable proportions one place in particular that holds a special place in my heart when big Roach are my quarry is a big pit in Barton upon Humber called yachting pit or pelican pond besides being a place of outstanding natural beauty with all sorts of wildlife it is also well kept and well run thanks to the efforts of one man , as is the case with a lot of waters , giving up his time to look after it’s banks and it’s anglers , “ thanks Terry ” for this pit is not heavily fished and one can often find that they are not bothered by anyone all day such is it’s size and location.
Me and one of my good friends Robin White fish it occasionally throughout the summer months taking catches often to 40 or 50 lbs each of prime quality Roach on hemp and white maggot some of these roach often weighing well in excess of the two pound mark and the angler being able to find several of these fish per session which isn’t bad considering that a main stream top flight angler from these parts looked at me as though I was mad when I mentioned that this was the case “ how little they know ” , this pit also holds some very large Rudd that always seem to avoid capture
But that’s big Rudd fishing isn’t it and I could tell some stories about that , perhaps another time , I have also been lucky enough to witness one of the large pike that live in the water when it nearly frightened me to death last summer again they are seldom caught but believe me they are in there , this thing was huge, so the next time you go out in summer if it ever gets here don't be shy in the bait department and above all don't be led by the norm “ this is how you fish it ” routine as you may just miss the boat.
Tight lines.

 Tomo.