Salford Quays

Fishing Cures The Blues

26th October 2020 by Mike Duddy

I’ve been feeling a bit fed up recently, drowning under a mountain of paperwork and red tape in the office, unable to get out much doing the things I enjoy.

What better way of beating the blues than going out with your friends and catching a few fish.

They don’t have to be monsters to be worthy, and fishing certainly cures the blues.

Have a watch of the latest vid, and have a read below.

Last Tuesday evening, the football match I was planning to attend was called off at short notice (non-league), and rather than sit indoors watching rubbish on Netflix, we decided to head over to Wallasey Docks to see if we could tempt anything other than pin Whiting after dark…. sadly we couldn’t. I’ve heard reports of a wide variety of fish species coming from this venue, but for me its only whiting, whiting and more whiting.

Then as Greater Manchester Tier 3 lockdown has come into force we have decided to stay local, and hit two locations on our local canals the Bridgewater and the Rochdale. Both venues hold some good fish, but its a numbers game,as there is plenty of small stuff that will try to get to your baits first.

We caught a crazy little jack pike on the Rochdale, and had a whole bunch of small perch on the Bridgewater, all fished on drop shotted dendrobena worms.

My biggest perch is only about a pound and a half, caught many many years back on the Rochdale Canal at Slattocks, and maybe now lockdown has been imposed – its time I spent a little time trying to beat this rather paltry pb.

A typical Bridgewater Canal Perch – there are much bigger ones lurking I’ve yet to find them

Slums of the future?? I feel sorry for people living in these little city centre rabbit hutches ,, bright and shiny when new, but already showing signs of ageing and neglect by their management companies — but if I lived there, I’d have a spot permanently pre-baited.

I parked on Hulme Hall Lane (free) and then just fished the 300 yards in the direction of Castlefield Basins,,, it was a busy session

I parked on a road called “The Causeway” and then fished up the canal towards the lock gates behind Lees Brewery. This is a great section of canal that can throw up good fish of all species (as well as micro pike)

Over the next few weeks, I have a number of local venues that I intend to try out to see if they hold big perch — once I’ve gone through my little list – I will take on the advice that I’ve been given by a few friends and hit the tried and tested perch spots in Manchester…I could just cut out the trying and go straight to them, but its more fun finding your own fish !

Fishing Salford Quays – Smash And Grab

10th October 2020 by Mike Duddy

Words and moving pictures !!

After Saturday morning dance classes for little girls, Saturday morning football for little boys, and with an early evening dinner birthday meal with my eldest (who can tolerate us between 5 and 7pm) to come, I only had a short afternoon window of opportunity to slot in a bit of fishing.

And then when that short window for a few hours fun presented itself … bloody hell … where do I go? There are so many venues within 20 minutes of home I’m spoilt for choice. Anyway, after last weekends great session at Salford Quays drop shotting with garden worms, I decided to go back and fish the same few swims with small soft plastic lures to see if how they performed when compared to worms. (and the fact that I’d been sent some lures to try by a manufacturer I know meant that I could give him a bit of feedback too).

The Pink and the White Long Paddle Tails worked really well on drop shot rig – we didn’t really have time to give the jig heads a chance

So, back to exactly the same swims as last weekend. But with lures not worms. Here’s a photo of the lures I was going to use, but I only ended up using the pink and white long tail lures and the yellow paddle tail. I didn’t get time to tie on the small sickle tail lures, but I’m 100% sure they would work really well.

We caught plenty on the hot pink long paddle tails

Not as many fish in the linking canals now the temperatures have dropped

Sad to say that once the redevelopment of Cotton Quay takes place, this part of the quays is never going to be the same again,, for how much longer will be allowed to fish here 🙁

After a week of cold weather and nearly constant rain, the fish which were in the shallower 7ft water of the canals, had moved into the deeper 23ft water of the main docks. And we found the fish in the bottom 3ft, and that they wanted a near static rather than moving presentation.

As soon as we sussed out how the fish wanted the baits to be presented we again had near constant sport for the hour and a half we had to fish.

The fish loved the white paddle tails too

I only had 3g drop shot leads (i need to replenish my tackle box) so had to pinch on a couple of SSG to get to around the 7g thats needed to get the bait down quickly and keep in touch with the bait – the hook is a size 6 Drennan super specialist

These white long tails worked really well.

We didn’t catch anything big (the perch run to 4lb in the quays) but it’s impossible to tire of that electric feeling in the rod tip once a perch grabs the lure and shakes its head.

Happy times.

Salford Quays Perch Fishing – most are small but perfectly formed

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Drop Shotting Wallasey Docks and Salford Quays

29th September 2020 by Mike Duddy

Have a look at the video, have a read below. Please subscribe to the Fishing Fiend video channel and give me a thumbs up!

It’s been on my mind now that after 7 consecutive blanks I need to catch a fish or two. The words “Mick the blanker” have been posted on my facebook page and even though I enjoy trying out new methods its always good to have a little confidence boosting session at an easy venue. Over the years, my go to easy venue has been Bradshaw Hall Fisheries in Bolton, and a few other local easy waters where i can catch for fun (Drinkwater Park on maggot fished shallow, Sainsburys Pond on punch bread for example) but today I fancied using up some worms I have in my shed so decided to go drop shotting at Salford Quays for some perch.

This would set me up nicely with a few fish on the bank, so that I could then head off down the motorway to the other end of the Ship Canal, and have a try for the unknown by fishing the drop shot at Liverpool Docks, a venue I’ve only ever driven past before, never stopping, never looking, and certainly never fishing.

I got to the quays early doors, and the sky was blue, and so was the water (the quays management dye the water to suppress weed growth – health and safety for the swimmers and other water users). I set up my 7ft 0.5-9.0gram drop shot rod, loaded with 6lb braid, 4lb flouro and a size 12 hook. Got my worms out and hooked up half a worm.

Salford Quays — Please don’t fish from the boardwalks when the swimmers are out

First drop in, I slowly retrieved and could see a shoal of small perch flitting about around the worm – first cast — the fish were there, it was going to be a good session!

A 6 inch Perch – the average size at the Quays — but the odd one grows MUCH larger.

And so it proved as I caught perch after perch for around two hours. I started off on the boardwalks near the Beefeater, but once the open water swimmers started their morning session I moved off Ontrario Quay onto one of the side canals. The angling club and the water sports centre have a very good relationship and for health and safety reasons the club ask anglers not to fish when people are open water swimming. The Quays is a shared space, plenty of room for all. The swimmers are over and done in 2 hours,,, so please just leave them to it.

So I started out fishing the canal between Ontario and St Peter Basin. It was stuffed with perch – all hungry for a bit of worm ,, and I caught plenty of greedy 6 inch perch. As we moved round into St Peters Basin, I was hoping for a few bigger fish from near the rafts of floating debris — as the big perch love a bit of cover.. however it wasn’t to be – I just kept on catching the small ones. Very welcome as well after a run of trips with no fish.

Once Phil arrived later in the morning, we stayed on St Peters Basin for another half hour or so, banging out small perch for fun.

We then decided to head off West down to the other end of the Manchester Ship Canal, and have a try in the salt water of Liverpool Docks. I’m slowly getting into my sea fishing, and especially my species hunting, but due to the geography and built environment here in the North West — LRF/drop shotting opportunities in the North West are in short supply on our local coastline. I’ve wondered for quite a while if Liverpool Docks would be a good venue, but there isn’t that much info online. So it was a bit of a step into the unknown. But on the premise of if you don’t give it a go, you’ll never find out – we drove out to Wallasey Docks, and once we found somewhere with parking and access (Tower Rd) we set up our drop shotting kit again, and loaded the hooks with garden worms.

Liverpool Docks – a very welcoming place

The water looked very inviting and clear, we could see huge growths of mussels and anemones on the dock walls, and the odd prawn flitting about but not fish.

First drop in we found the water to be 23-28ft approx deep, and after a while of jigging about down the side with no interest from any fish we started to flick our drop shot leads a bit further out into the dock.

Initially we were worried about debris/snags at the bottom of the docks, but these proved unfounded, as it turned out to be snag free.

The after a couple of plucks and stripped hooks, Phil hooked into the first of quite a few micro whiting.

The bites were no where near as frequent as Salford Quays, and all we caught in the hour or two we spent fishing were a few small whiting. However, Phil had a cracking bite/pull down on his rod tip leading us to believe that there are other, bigger fish in there, and that a return visit with a bigger variety of baits, and heavier drop shot leads might be worth while.

I say we needed bigger leads, as our 3.5g weights were really too light for the job in hand – when I come back it will be with 10g – 30g weights and with lug/squid/sand eel as bait.

Checking out a new venue is always good fun, but figuring out the fishing and catching a few is always better so we will be returning soon.

At the close of our day, we headed over to the Liverpool City side of the Mersey and had a look round the docks near Brunswick and Mariners Wharf. However parking was terrible, as was fishing access. And where there was access there were hoards of tourists/day trippers enjoying the nice sunny Sunday afternoon.

I apologise for the poor camera/shaky video. Next time out, I am going to be using an antishake camera holder, and will start trimming, and adding music and other fiddly bits to my videos.

In the mean time, please remember to give my new videos a thumbs up like, and please please please subscribe to the Fishing Fiend video channel.