Fishing Fiend

Mad About Fishing

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I spent my first evening session of the season on one of my favourite lengths of the Irwell. As i knew Big Dave was coming i chose to fish the swim nearest to the car park. This proved to be a mistake as it only produced three minnows in an hours fishing.

Tony also came down to fish this evening, and he chose to fish one of the shallower swims behind the island. He only stayed for an hour as he wasnt feeling great but still managed to catch a couple of small chub.

After getting fed up of the first swim i moved 500yds up river to a swim i have enjoyed some success in before. I wasnt to be disapointed this time as during the next few hours i caught a succession of chub, roach, gudgeon and minnows. I love fishing at this time of the year as the twilight seems to last for ever, and this evening i was still fishing at 10.30!!!
Even though i didnt catch any of the bigger chub which inhabit this length of river, by feeding constantly i was getting bites and fish on a regular basis. I only had maggots as bait this evening so didnt have anything to bypass the smaller fish. I will be coming back to this swim in the next couple of weeks armed with hemp, caster and worm to see if i cant tempt some of the lunkers that were splashing about as night was falling.

An 8oz chub was my biggest fish of the session, but quantity compensated me for lack of quality.

manchester fishing Irwell Ribble Trout

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Back To Normal

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After a few dry weeks the weather returned to normal today with virtually constant heavy rain all day. I had intended to use up some of the maggots left over from Mondays trip to the Ribble this evening, but the local river rises like a flash at the first splashes of rain so fishing was a non starter this evening. Hopefully if the rain eases off i will be able to fish one of the slower deeper swims tomorrow evening. I havent spent any time on the banks of the local river coarse fishing during the last couple of months and i am more than looking forwards to catching a few of the lunking great chub that live there.

I have discovered the above photo on my mobile phone, it gives a great indication of the water clarity at Salford Quays as a shoal of bream can be clearly seen amongst the weed beds. One of my friends was fishing the quays this morning, and he told me that the water levels rose over a foot in 4 hours as huge amounts of extra water washed into Ship Canal from the Irwell. Neil reckoned he had over 30lbs of roach and perch in a 5 hour session, not a bad way to use up his left over maggots.
manchester fishing Irwell Ribble Trout

Good Times

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Yesterday was the first day of the official coarse fishing season, when the rivers open up to anglers after a three month break, during which time the fish spawn and recover.

After a couple of months fly fishing and coarse fishing on still waters yesterdays trip was a one which i had looked forwards to for quite sometime.

Tony took us to one of his favourite stretches of the River Ribble and armed with our trotting rods and three pints of maggots each we started off the season in style.

Have a look at the photos below as i dont think my words can really do justice to the great days sport we had, which involved new personal best Barbel for Phil, Neil and myself.

(above) 10 pounds 4 oz of smile! the fish wasnt bad either.
I didnt fish the “hot swim” for long, and had a great walk up river with Tony who showed me some great pools and runs. We even saw a stone loach, a weird looking fish that looks like a cross between a gudgeon and a tiny barbel. As always we turned a few stone over to take a look at the general bug life, there is an amazing variety of creatures that live on the river bed. My next purchase is going to be a fly tying vice so that i can learn to imitate these creatures in order to catch more fish. The quality of representation of the insect is so important and i have yet to find a shop which sells flies of the quality which can be tied by hand. Tying flies will also give me another way to be involved in fishing once the nights draw in, and fishing is impossible. I am sure that the fish which we caught yesterday could be caught using fly tackle – the main factor being able to find a fly rod powerfull enough to land them. My 15ft trotting rod was bent over like a hoop by the fish below which weighed just over 5lbs i wouldnt like to think what one of these fish could do to my fly rods!


I am 42 years old today, sometimes after taking under 13’s rugby training i feel 102, somedays after work i feel 102, but yesterday i felt as though i was sixteen again, out fishing with my mates, having a good time catching fish. Was a day out with the guys i shall remember for a long time.

manchester fishing Irwell Ribble Trout

Pilsworth Match Lake

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Matthew and i had a couple of hours up at Pilsworth last night in search of carp, but we couldnt carch any thing other than Bream. Matt hooked into another decent fish, which took him straight across the lake and into the weeds. He is determined to bank a carp so it looks like we will be having another session together soon.
Its taken time for him to get the fishing bug, as i often think he accompanies me just to keep me happy. If he decides that carp fishing is the thing for him (which its not for me) then i dont mind spending a bit of time sitting behind a pod and buzzer bars, as long as he catches fish and learns to enjoy his fishing.
I am looking forwards to a trip out with Phil and Tony tomorrow as its the first day of the coarse season.

manchester fishing Irwell Ribble Trout

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This weekend i was lucky enough to be able to fit three fishing trips in. My first venture was a return to the swim on the Manchester Ship Canal where i had bagged up on roach last week. This week however i turned up but the roach didnt. I struggled to get bites but stuck it out for a couple of hours to catch 4 small roach and a chublet.
Sunday morning saw me fishing at dawn again with Neil at Salford Quays for Pike. Over the last couple of weeks it has been noticeable that the Pike feed as night turns into day, and that once the sun is up the pike stop feeding. Today was no different, and i took this nice little fish at about 4.15am. About half an hour later Neil hooked into what he thought was a small fish, so passed the rod to his girlfriend Tez who was accompanying him. She made a good job of playing the fish which stayed deep for 5 minutes or so to the net. It was only when the fish rose up in the water the we could see that it wasnt a small fish at all but a broad shouldered pike of at least 15lbs. As is often the case once a fish sees the landing net in the water, it spooks and finds an extra reserve of energy – in this case, as the fish turned its head away from the net the hooks pulled and a lovely pike zoomed back down into the depths. By 5am the sun was shining on the water and the pike stopped feeding. We fished on until 9am but didnt have any more runs.

To keep myself occupied i set up a slider rig on my waggler rod and had a go at catching some small roach and perch. The water on this particular quay turned out to be 24ft deep only one rod length out! I caught quite a few little fish but nothing of any size to report.
In the evening i had arranged to meet Tony on the river for a short session. Tony had tied up a few Oliver Edwards caddis patterns which he had used with great success midweek so i was looking forwards to trying them out.
On arrival we decided to walk up to the furthest away runs and then make our way downstream back to the car.

However for some reason once we started fishing we moved upstream through some delightfull pools and fished water we had never visited before. I found this great fun, and it more than compensated for the large amount of trees i was catching and the few fish i was hooking.

I did manage a few takes and to land a small brownie, but to be honest i was knackered and should have gone home to bed.

As we reached the pool which was at the head of our allowable beat, Lucia decided to come and visit us which was great as she could save us a long walk in our waders and drive us back to our starting point.

What poor old Lucia didnt realise was that two big guys in wet waders in a citroen saxo would create a vile stink of the type she had never smelt before. Therefore she drove like a nutter with all the windows down to make her experience as short as possible. As she left us at 9pm i promised her that i would only fish for another half hour but at this time of the year the twighlight seems to last for ever and we fished on until 10.15pm! Tony took a nice brownie from the car park swim, but the fish which were rising, seemed preoccupied with some form of fly and werent really interested in our offerings.

I have a busy work schedule over the next couple of weeks so my fishing activities are going to be curtailed to some extent. I have however booked myself a day off to fish with Phil on the Ribble on the opening day of the coarse season – i cant wait.
manchester fishing Irwell Ribble Trout

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Klinkhammer Magic On The Ship Canal

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I spent a very enjoyable evening in the company of Nick, author of Angling For Something. We had arranged to have a plugging / spinning session after work for the large trout that allegedly inhabit the Ship Canal. I originally planned to take a second rod which i would use to suspend a team of buzzers beneath a bubble float, but as i finished work later than expected i didnt have time to organise my tackle properly so only took my lure fishing gear with me. A decision i would later regret.
When we met up Nick had brought two rods, his spinning gear plus a fly rod, with which he hoped to catch some of the many freely rising fish which can be seen along this stretch of water.
It wasnt long into our session before Nick put down his plugging gear and started to fish a dry fly.
The photos below illustrate his virtually immediate success.

However this proved to be the only fish of the evening. We fished fronm 6 -10pm but didnt have any more luck. I stuck to lure fishing whereas Nick alternated between his lure rod and his fly gear. We explored a mile or so of the canal bank all the way to Potato Wharf and beyond into the city centre. We saw a nice carp topping in one of the side basins, and lots of small roach rolling and topping in the main canal, unfortunately we saw now evidence of the large pike and trout which were our intended quarry.
To be truthfull, I am getting pretty brassed off now with lure fishing as i am having no luck at all using this method. The last time i caught a fish on a lure was a jack pike back in Febuary on a spinner when the river was in flood.
I have a box full of about 30 different lures and i have used them all on trips during the last few weeks with Matthew, Lucia, my father and now Nick. Whilst i really enjoy time on the bank, and the company of the people i go fishing with it is important to me that i catch some fish.
With this in mind i am going to put my lures away for a few weeks and dust off my old rod pod and alarm set, in order to attempt to catch a couple of larger fish. I am sure that there are some really large specimens in the Ship Canal and it will be fun trying to see if i can catch them – watch this space!
manchester fishing Irwell Ribble Trout

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Had an afternoon/evening session on the Ribble with Tony and Phil, i was looking forwards to trying some more upstream nyphing.
Despite the rain that was falling, the river levels were low, a good two or three feet lower than on our last visit.
Tony and i started fishing the shallow pools below the bridge but all i could catch was weed. Tony however connected with a couple of fish but didnt land any of them until a nice brownie graced his net, caught from the last pool in the series beneath the bridge.
We then wandered down to Phil who was fishing a much deeper pool further down the beat, he too hadnt had any takes but as ever was enjoying his fishing.

Tony and i fished another couple of pools, trying to make sure we fished the streamier, faster moving, more oygenated inflows at the head of the pools. Again Tony had a couple of takes and i had none.
We have developed the habit of turning stones on the river bed to see what sort of invertebrate life we can find, as we are sure that these bugs must form 90% of any fishes diet. A good hatch of flies must be a trouts form of dessert after having a good meal of bugs.

Tony is quite an expert fly tyer, and the photo below shows a real hydropsyche larvae, and an imitation fly that Tony has made. I am hoping that Lucia gets me a tying vice for my birthday as Tony has promised to show me how its done. His flies are impressive and seem to catch far more fish than shop bought ones.

The last pool we tried was one where another river joined the Ribble, Phil had joined us by now and was pleased to report success further up the beat in the shape of a brownie and a grayling.

There were three fast streamy run intos into this pool, and we each fished one of these tongues of water. I had a take from a really good fish on only my second cast, but it shed the hook after about 10 seconds. As i hadnt had a take all afternoon i was gutted, and thought that my chance for the day had dissapeared with that fish. However a couple of casts later i hit into a nice fish which i landed. About 15 minutes later i took a second, both of which Lucia and I have had for breakfast this morning. These fish appeared to be ones that had been stocked and didnt have fully formed tail fins, also their markings and colouration didnt match those i have seen on truly wild Ribble trout, so it was a guilt free breakfast. I have never intentionally killed a wild trout and would never do so.

Both Phil and Tony caught trout and grayling from this pool, so it was three happy anglers who made their way back home. Topic of discussion was do we take a day off on the opening day of the coarse season (june15th) and go fishing- of course we do!
manchester fishing Irwell Ribble Trout

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Early Start

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I had arranged to meet Miggy at 6am at Dock 9 Salford Quays, so despite all my best intentions i didnt get to bed until midnight the night before. Imagine how i felt to get a text message at 3am to inform me that he couldnt sleep and was going to set off at 4am!. I cursed and rolled over, beds are so soft and warm zzzzzzz, 4am another text – he had set off and was setting up and where was i ? 15 minutes later i parked up next to 9 dock and could see Miggy busy trying to catch livebaits. A small perch was greedy enough to seal its fate and was set up on the trace. Before the lead hit the bottom 30ft down the Pike in the photo below had made the perch its breakfast. It caught us unawares as i had to quickly unpack and assemble Miggys landing net in order to get it up the quayside. I hung around for 2 hours chatting with Miggy without setting up a rod, then decided to head over to the ship canal and test out my killer method for the shoals of roach that i have previously had trouble catching.

The last visit to the Ship Canal with Phil was hard work as it was blowing a gale, making bite detection all but impossible, we knew the fish were there, as our baits were regularly chewed up by the fish, but the wind made bite detection virtually impossible. This morning it was the exact opposite with a glassy calm making bait presentation and bite detection far simpler.

My killer method was to lay a bed of groundbait using an open end feeder at two rodlengths out in 14 ft of water. I then trotted through a 4 gram Cralusso Bolo float in the gentle flow.
Bites and fish came thick and fast, and i gave up counting after reaching 50 fish. The roach were in pristine condition ranging in size from 4 – 12oz. The chub were a smaller stamp from 2 – 8oz.
I caught steadily til about 10.30am when the bites slowed and then stopped. By this time the early morning mist had dissappeared and the bright sunshine must have put the fish off the feed.
I fished on until 12.30 but in the last hour the size of the fish got smaller until the bites dried up completely. Miggy came along at about 11am to tell me he had caught another Pike of about15lb ana a nice tench of about 5lbs.
I have no idea of the total bag weight i caught but guessing that the average weight of fish was 6oz then i must have had a net of at least 20lbs of roach and small chub. The best days silver fishing i have had in ages. It would have been interesting to see and photograph such a bag of fish but unfortunately its still the close season until the 16th June so keep nets are not allowed.

The Bolo float worked like dream holding its line two rod lengths out, there wasnt even a hint of it trying to return to the line behind the rod tip. Another bonus of using this type of float is that it doesnt ride up when being held back against the flow.
At 12.30 went home for a well deserved sleep.

In the evening i went fishing with my favourite fishing parter. He gets into lots of tangles and misshaps, but is the best company i could ask for.
Matt is slowly becoming a better angler and can now set up his rod, tie some of the knots, hook and land small fish but hasnt the experience to play and land larger specimens. We took a quick two hour trip to Maceys in Bury.

Matt caught this skimmer first cast, then had a few perch and a roach.

He then hooked into a fish that took off like a train across the lake – everything was going wrong for him, letting the rod tip fall and follow the line of the fish, letting the fish into the weeds, letting it swim under the fishing platform, despite all this just as i was about to slip the net under a lovely 5lb plus mirror carp the hooklength parted. Matthew i feel for you but you know its only a matter of time before you catch a cracker.

manchester fishing Irwell Ribble Trout

A Quick Fix

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As i had an hour or so free after work this evening so went for a quick fix of my new drug upstream nymphing.

After having a couple of practise casts in the swim i fished with Phil and Tony yesterday evening i moved a couple of hundred yards downstream and fished the gentle weir pool in the photo above.

I had about 5 good takes which resulted in the fish below and another nicer one which slipped out of my hands before i could photograph it.

The gear i used is not really fit for the job as the lightest line i own is a 6 weight. This line is great for still waters and the larger rivers i sometimes fish, but on a small stream such as this i winced every time the heavy line crashed into the water. Additionaly the rod i was using was long at 8ft 6″ and a 7ft rod would be far more suitable for small streams, i seemed to spend alot of time retrieving my fly from the undergrowth rather than fishing it through the swim.

I have a feeling that before i fish this stream again i will be raiding my fathers tackle collection – beware dad i am coming round for a cup of tea and a chat tomorrow!!

Lastly again thanks to Tony for his killer ptn pattern which gave me 4 out of the 5 takes i had this afternoon and both fish.

manchester fishing Irwell Ribble Trout

Upstream Nymphing

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I spent Monday afternoon with Phil having a wade and fish down a new section of one our local small rivers. Our tactics were not very succesfull as after completely fishing through the chosen length of stream, our only fish was a small Chub which Phil caught. I didnt even get a bite.

Later in the evening, Tony joined us, it is good to see him out on the bank again after his recent enforced lay-up. Phil took us to have a look at a new tributary of our local river which neither Tony or myself had fished before.

Upon arrival i had a small trout virtually immediately upon casting in.
Phil then proceeded to catch every fish in the vicinity, taking 10 fish in the next hour using float and worm.

I moved to a slightly deeper swim 25yds downstream and proceeded to catch another trout of about half a pound, which is about the average size of fish in this river.

Meanwhile Tony was trying out his new cut down 4 weight rod using dry fly and upstream nymphing techniques. After having 3 good takes and a nice fish, he very kindly invited me back upstream to show me how to fish using an upstream nymph style.

To say that the bites were electrifying and the whole experience addctive would be an understatement. I think i have become a pretty confident traditional wet fly down and across fisherman but the thrill of watching my line dart forwards when a fish takes is amazing. Being a beginner, i missed plenty of bites but did manage to hook into one fish, which i saw flash and turn in the current before shedding the hook.
I feel like a little boy in a sweet shop at the moment as i dont know which place, method or venue to fish next. Since October last year when i decided to escape the rut of continually fishing the same venues, i have discovered and been introduced to some first class fishing within 15 minutes drive of my front door. Now i know that these venues exist and the quality of fish that they contain, it makes it difficult to decide on where to try next.
I think i have figured out a plan of attack for the roach and chub on the Ship Canal, but Tony has now shown me a new fly fishing technique which i know i am going to enjoy learning to use.
For the time being, the trout win and i’m going to go upstream nymphing after work this evening. Roll on 5pm!

manchester fishing Irwell Ribble Trout