Author Archives: The tuesday swim

June 17th 2012. Canal carp & contact made!

17 Sunday Jun 2012

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Looking out from my balcony this morning I saw the return of two familiar shapes, in my hand coincidently was some left over mixers from yesterdays fishing trip. I was clearing up the tackle and about to throw the pre-soaked mixers in the canal when the lurker’s halted my actions.

Below me the dark shapes looked hungary so I catapulted a few mixers into the air, raining down over sixty feet from the heavens onto the two carps heads. They were not bothered by the rain feast and after two minutes they were on the feed, so immediately I picked up the Aspindale and Slater Latch from yesterdays fishing trip and made my way down to the canal side.

Keeping low and throwing in a few more offerings (now with only the largest of the two carp starting to slowly move around) she started slurping down the mixers with startling confidence, I was hopeful she had no idea of my presence. I was now caught between the electric shock of excitement and  trying to keep calm enough to cast out a bait without spooking the lone carp at my feet. The landing net was slowly set up, a mixer placed on the hook and then I crouched low beside a tree only five feet from the carp in preparation to cast. With nothing on my line apart from a hook and a bait, the cast  landed two feet in front of her, she immediately came up and engulfed the bait, “one, two, three” I counted, hoping the bait was not ejected. I then struck, the carp turned and set off towards the canal boats just fifteen feet away on the far side, I thought “how easy is this?” Looking down on the carp as it propelled away, my rod hooped over and gave me a sense of her power for two seconds,  with a final shake of her tail she was gone, the 10 lb line had snapped like cotton!

Knowing the commotion would have disturbed the carp’s  confidence, I returned home to rest the swim and set up a new stepped up rod  and centre pin with 12 lb line, the palomar knot was double checked and then laid to rest in the corner of my balcony ready for round two.

These carp can be caught and I shall catch one soon, I have no interest in day ticket stockies, this is the type of angling that truly excites me, the only problem is, it ain’t easy!

June 16th 2012. Wild carp & high winds.

16 Saturday Jun 2012

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Although I do dabble throughout the closed season, the 16th June is still a special date for any traditional angler, and there is no other species that epitomises  traditional angling than a good wildie.

Today I was travelling ‘heavy’ as I was taking two rods, a Mark IV Avon with a Ambidex Mark 6 loaded with 8lb line and a James Aspindale Carp Delux with an old Slater latch from around a hundred years ago, loaded with 10lb line.

It was not an early start but it was my way of showing some respect to the closed season, so from about half past Saturday Live I arrived at a rather small and I am afraid to say secretive pond in the south east of England. From the start I saw signs of wild carp (as this water seems to only contains them) high in the water searching for food. How wild these creatures are, I do not know but they certainly take on the classic torpedo shape, large heads, small bodies and big tails. The size in this lake does not exceed 10lb and to be honest I’ve not seen one over 7lb but this is not the point, they are so beautiful, an antidote to ‘Heather the Leather’ and ‘Fat Lady’, wild carp are exquisite…

The final few hours were spent with the old Aspindale rod and Slater Latch, bread cast out into the lilies, a slurp, a splash and then a clitter clatter of an old centre pin reel as line streamed out…

The Inaccessible Angler.

11 Monday Jun 2012

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I wrote this piece a few years back about the Lower Lea just after a new season had begun, so in anticipation of the 2012/13 season here is the piece …

 Last year I made a decision to simplify my angling techniques and reduce the amount of tackle I took with me. Going through my tackle I found I had too many floats, weights, reels, bank stick, swim feeders…the list goes on!

Now armed with only one rod and a small bag of essentials my fishing has become liberated and each week I manage to whittle down the kit further. Not once, last season did I sit at the waters edge and discover that I was short of a particular item of tackle.

After my liberation last year I decided this year I would take my new lightweight approach one step further and start to fish spots that to most anglers are inaccessible.

Steep and overgrown banks are the main culprits. My first new piece of angling kit came from a pet shop, a ground anchor, designed to tether your dog to the ground!

Screwed into the ground like a large corkscrew at the top of a steep bank, with some Para cord attached I am able to lower myself down to the bottom of a riverbank and more importantly I can get myself back up. To make it all easier I have put some loops in the cord for easier grip. A couple of year s ago I was barbel fishing on the Wye in November and I could have done with the ground anchor then, not so much for getting down the bank but more for safety as the flow was immense, and the bottom of a very steep bank was only about 18 inches wide, I digress.

To put theory into practice I set off for the river Lea on the first week of the new season. There has been a spot that I have had my eye on for three years now, looking down I have seen large bream and very large carp cruising about and feeding off the bottom, but access was impossible. Now armed with my ground anchor I could lower myself through some waist high undergrowth, down about twelve feet to a tiny ledge at the bottom, and if I did get lucky I could wade into the Lea as it is only about a foot deep at the edge.

From the start I threw handful of red maggots in and straight away a congregation of four large carp and one bream of about 8lbs froze me! I kept the maggots coming and after 10 minutes my meeting had expanded to about eight large carp all with their heads down and totally oblivious to my statue, just four feet away.

Slowly I moved my rod into position and dropped a bunch of red maggots into the mass of grazing carp, the water was clear so I could see the maggots on the riverbed occasionally obscured by a drifting carp. After a minute one of the smaller carp got its lips over my bait, I was poised to strike but the carp drifted away leaving the bait behind. A minute late the same carp returned and this time committed to my bait, my rod took on a bend as the other gang members scattered in all directions. Being perched at the bottom of the bank, landing this fish was proving tricky, so I slid into the water, after all I was determined to land this golden nugget. After a short hit and hold style battle the landing net engulfed a small but slender river carp of around 8lb.

Update: Four years on I shall not be returning to this spot as it is now in the Olympic Park area and climbing down steep banks attached to ropes could be taken as an act of terrorism! The spot still exists untouched by the landscaping so when the party finishes I shall slip back into position…

Searching for canal carp…

06 Wednesday Jun 2012

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With four days off this Jubilee weekend I had to get out and fish, I am now pre-occupied with catching a London canal carp. The trick is stay mobile, travel light and keeping looking.

This weekend I was out twice, on one occasion I didn’t wet a line and on the other occasion I did after spotting three ‘doubles’. So far the results are in the favour of carpus maximus! But this is a cathartic practice, the process is to be embraced, the results will come soon…I’m sure of it! I am starting to sense the carp and their where abouts.

Lurkers in Zone One…

02 Saturday Jun 2012

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With summer coming and going at present, the carp are up on top and here in central London I have come across a small quiet spot where access is limited, private infact.

Urban carp are always exciting as they exist in a very secretive world where most people would be surprised to see a small bream let alone a twenty pound carp swimming around in so called ‘dirty water’. The simple truth is our canals hold some of the best and un-known specimens in England. Its just a case of finding them…

Old school meets new school…if only my Flemish was a little better!

18 Friday May 2012

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Sometimes something comes along just like Waterlog did over fifteen years ago with a bright fresh approach…admittedly I can’t read it so I can’t comment on the editorial content,  but being made aware of it by Pink Heron (who has a great balanced approach to carp fishing) I feel this is many swims away from the UK carping dross! In English please.

More Monkey Climber

Old friends…

01 Tuesday May 2012

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With all this rain at the moment it is good to have a good waterproof jacket, as an angler it is essential along with a wide-brimmed hat (the only way you can keep the rain off, still be able the hear your surroundings and keep you hands free to cast a rod and line).

The Barbour jacket has been the standard outdoor jacket for generations, it’s a true waterproof, breathable and  thorn-proof garment but it has one other added feature. Year after year a Barbour changes its personality normally reflecting on the previous seasons severity of weather, its a barometer of outdoor life.

My ‘regular’ Barbour is an International (that’s not me by the way) which I have owned for at least fifteen years, I have been flung off my motorbike in it, had the wettest Scottish days out in it and spent the hottest summer days lying on it. You can apply a revitalising dressing, Barbour supply a tin which reinstate the smell of a newly bought jacket but just like any beauty product, they never promise your youthful looks again, at best they may hold off the rigours of life…temporarilly. These dressings tend to trap any detritus in the preservation process and as these jackets can never be washed properly, years on year they get better as each page of weather is preserved literally into its fabric (this could be my imagination but I am sure they also get heavier?).

So as the years pass and your jacket gets patched and waxed there comes a time when the rain just can’t be held off anymore and a replacement is inevitable, so a new jacket comes on board but what of the old? Ebay, charity shop, no! My Barbour’s of past (also including a Hardy’s wading waxed jacket) remain hung up in the hallway like books all with stories to tell and all with tattered covers.

One such story was a shabby old Eskdale that I obtained after a  close friend had died almost ten years ago now. Les worked for an architectural salvage company at St Leonard’s Church, Shoreditch in the East end, when requested, reluctantly (like any good architectural salvage type) Les would put on the trusty old Barbour to protect his more dapper wear underneath (the jacket was ripped and three sizes too big) and go in search of old dirty cast iron radiators or sift through Victorian railings out in the rain. I sometimes wear it as an homage, its way to big for me too but it has memories and in the top left pocket is his business card.

Now one thing that I have noticed living in between the fashion hotspots of Dalston, Shoreditch, London Fields and dare I now say Lower Clapton, every skinny jean wearing wot-sit is kitted out in a Barbour International! Why? It seems a recent campaign has made everyone want to be Steve McQueen, well it could be worse but now I have the dilemma of looking like an East London fashionista, the other issue is the price and availability a  good second-hand one is bloody expensive and as scarce as hens teeth…damm you McQueen!

So, for one more year, the needle and thread has come out, some more wax dressing applied and my International shall be embalmed in one more season and take on the new season, hopefully with a new chapter…and hopefully on the Lea.

Tackle boxes part eight, the carpers Oxo Tin!

11 Wednesday Apr 2012

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The carp fisherman of the 1950’s had different requirements to the usual float angler, the Oxo tin was the perfect size to take a selection of hooks, numerous weights and spools of line. Just like the carp scene now, fashions prevail, so once the Oxo tin was seen in a few Redmire photographs the tin and specimen hunter became common place on the water’s edge for another decade in search of Leney’s.

This season (2012/13) I’m trying the Oxo tin myself, aside from floats, it can take all my terminal items plus a torch and two bite alarms. My angling this year will be very much grab it while I can approach, one small bag, a net and a rod (maybe two).

Gerry Berth-Jones is sited here with what I believe to be an ‘Oxo’ set up and a ‘Pup’ tent also an essential part of my 1980’s carp outfit. Pre sun-lounger stuff, I believe.