I love a good coincidence story. When i started my Salmon quest back in September the water levels on the Ribble were high. I lost more than a few flying C’s on my first couple of trips but always had a hunch that i might be able to recover them. I’m happy to tell you […]
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One of the many things in life I take great pleasure form is reading a good book. Having been blessed with a rather skittish mind, I find deep analytical thought something best left to others. The study of Philosophy is an area that I could never make any significant contribution, however I am more than […]
Today i competed in my first fishing match for 23 years!As a regular reader of the maggotdrowners forum, i decided to go along to their Xmas fur and feather match to enjoy the banter and to put faces to names of people i have been swapping messages with over the last 12 months.The match was […]
After a week of hard frosts, i wasn’t overly optimistic about my chances on the Irwell this afternoon. I chose to fish a city centre swim thinking that the roach might have shoaled up in the deeper water. The city centre has produced 60lb bags of roach during the past few winters for those brave […]
Retiarius recently recommended i take a look at a website which allows you to read pdf’s of old books. Using the sites search facility I found an old tome called an Anglers’ Evening compiled by the Manchester Angling Association, printed in 1879 which had a chapter about my favourite river the Irwell. Using the dark […]
As the seasonal clock slowly turns bringing about colder shorter days, catching fish becomes much harder. On the other hand the cold weather can bring about climatic conditions which can make the fishing of secondary importance to the unique changes to the scenery. Except maybe a dewy morning in early June when can a spiders […]
A sharp overnight frost wasn’t going to make fishing easy today. I decided to have a few hours on the Ship Canal in the hope that the fish might be more active in the deeper water. I was wrong.I fished chopped worm and caster using an open end feeder in about 20 feet of water. […]
This year, i have learnt how effective gold ribbed hares ear flies are on my local river, so now that i am learning to make my own flies, its only natural that i am going attempt to make this pattern. I bought most of the materials necessary to make this fly when i bought my […]
Now that the nights have drawn in, and the weather not conducive to pleasurable fishing, i think thats its a natural progression for me to learn to tie my own flies. This past season Tony has been incredibly kind with the donation of his time, effort and materials, donating many tiny works of art to […]
I sometimes wish i owned a set of scales – this one measured 27inches and came from a small river in inner city Manchester. Full report to follow One of my local rivers has been so polluted for so long that even by Mancunian standards its considered a lifeless sewer. However a few weeks ago […]