Friday 28th and Sunday 30th - The River Glen

Friday 28th January

I read with great interest the results of the Bourne winter league match on the River Glen as there had been a number of double figure weights from the section near the Ship Inn. I decided to book Friday off work as I wanted to get in on some of the action I had read about. After the half hour drive from my home I arrived at the venue and it looked in real good trim with both colour and flow.



The River Glen at Pinchbeck



I decided to sit 2 pegs from the road bridge as it was a feature peg with a tree growing out into the water from the far bank. As the match winner had caught over 17lb of Roach on the punch that was going to be my opening gambit and with 7ft of water at 7 and 9 metres I cupped in a ball of liquidised bread with some hemp and a few Casters in it. After half an hour I was concerned at not getting any bites and after an hour and 20 minutes I gave up.On the way home I thought I would have a quick look at the tiny French Drove drain at Thorney, there was an angler sitting below the old pump and he had just had a small Roach so I decided to have a go for an hour to try and save the day. I sat just above the old pump house as it was sheltered from the biting North wind and as is normal in the winter the level of the drain is dropped some 18 inches, after plumbing up I had 2ft of water. I set up a 4x10 Drennan Pinkie float and cupped in a small loosely squeezed ball of bread and within a couple of minute I was into my first micro Roach. I was getting a bite most put ins and even managed a bonus Roach of about an ounce but after 1 hour called it a day as there were Pike crashing through the shoals of small fish every couple of minutes. Anyway I was glad to have had some bites and caught a few fish even though they were so small.

Home made tackle items

Well I don't know about you but I just love making items of tackle and I get a great deal of satisfaction catching fish on something I made myself. I started out making simple peacock wagglers and still have some in my tackle box that I made over 20 years ago. I also still have some open ended swim feeders that I made 15 years ago made out of sections cut out of Lemonade bottles and I even caught some fish on one of them recently.
This week I have made some pole feeders and elastic connectors, the connector is so that the fish do not feel resistance from the the heavy elastic in the pole when they take the bait.

An Example of the style of pole feeder and connectors I have made this week

Old Course of the River Nene 16-01-11

With the main river carrying a little too much extra water I decided to have a look at the old course of the river Nene at Stanground, Peterborough. This section averages about 10 - 11 metres wide, about 4ft deep in the main channel and never usually suffers when the main river is up and running. In these conditions it normally colours up nicely but only ever maintains a gentle pull from left to right and because of today's high winds we dropped in on the section adjacent to Turnstone Way as it is well sheltered from the SW winds. The bank along this section is generally nice and flat and provides a comfortable sit down, I elected to sit about 20 metres below my fishing partner Graham with another angler 40 metres below me.

River Nene Fails To Produce

I never thought that today would be so poor and although the water is still quite cold it did have extra colour and flow. We gave it 3 hours for 1 solitary 1 oz Dace and this was the only bite I had with my angling friend Graham biteless. The bailiff said that other anglers he had seen this morning had caught nothing so I suppose I should be thankful for the 1 fish.

Going down the drain - Sunday 2 January

  

Well with all of the ice melted around Peterborough I thought I would have a quick look along the Glassmore Bank section of Bevills Leam. This is a venue I used to fish a lot a few years back but as with many of my local venues have neglected for far too long. This is due mainly to me spending most of my summers on the Middle Level main drain and 10 Mile Bank and my winters split between the river Nene above Peterborough and the Grand Union Canal.