Inspiration

Nick Carter, Tom Donnai, Matt Eastham.

Back in 2007 I started reading the blogs of Nick Carter, Tony Peet and Matt Eastham Angling For Something Time By The River and North Country Angler These guys writings were revelations to me at the time, my kind of angler, fishing waters I knew and they inspired me to start writing this blog. (my wife says she cant wait to get her hands on them lol).

Over the last few years its been my great pleasure to meet and fish with them, each of them great anglers with their own unique styles, and I can’t begin to tell you how much my fishing has improved as a result of my hanging on to their coat tails.
Matt has been in charge of the construction of a new building at my sons secondary school, and we’ve been trying to arrange an evening on the river for some time now, but the dry weather this spring has resulted in some pretty poor fishing conditions – so our planned evening on the river together has been on hold for quite some time.
Last Friday evening was do or die, as Matts project in Manchester is soon coming to an end. Unfortunately there was some sharp overnight showers and the area of river I have for so long wanted Matt to experience had sadly turned into an open sewer as the up stream sewage overflows were kicking out their filth. The stench of petrol made it feel as though i was trout fishing on a petrol station forecourt – very very sad – and hopefully something that The Salford Friendly Anglers Society can get sorted out. Check out the colour of the water below. It was such a dissapointment that i couldnt show Matt our river at its best.

And the colour of the water above the offending sewage overflow.

However it seemed as though no matter where we fished – the trout werent interested. Later in the evening we found ourselves further upstream in Nick and Toms favourite stretch of river where the trout are often obliging – but werent for us.

No matter how poor the fishing was, the company was excellent. Its always a pleasure to spend some time in the company of these guys, especially when Tom starts off his wisecracks. Nick & Tom – anglings version of Cannon & Ball.

Just a pity Tony couldnt make it – though on hearing how bad the fishing was, I’m sure he was glad to have stayed at home.
manchester fishing Irwell Ribble Trout

0 thoughts on “Inspiration

  1. Regular Rod says:

    Mike I always call the EA hot line 0800 80 70 60 and report these discharges. That way there is a record of how frequently this occurs. It is also worth getting Fish Legal involved if you can or your club can. Combined Sewer Outfalls (CSO) shouldn't exist today. BUT until we make some noise about it the water companies will carry on polluting our rivers and killing the creatures that live there because it is cheap. It's not easy. One infuriating CSO on a stream I fish is still commissioned but the number of times the water company was called out by the EA (after reports on the hot line) to clean up the sanitary towels and other waste, drew it to the attention of more senior management and now, by some change in management, this particular CSO discharges much less frequently and the waste is screened more effectively too. Our MPs need informing of these outrages too, because until the law changes the water companies will continue to simply discharge their raw sewage and the other contents of their sewers into the rivers, streams and brooks of "Great Britain"…

    Regular Rod