travel

October 2026 – China still.

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Sunday 4th sees 31C and a trip to Zhuhai to fish the tilapia lake. I drew peg 7 in their automated peg allocation which seemed a good peg with Gareth on the opposite bank next to the bridge.

Things started well as Gareth had a 7-8 pounder second put in. Now just to clarify the rules are max 4.5m whip, two hooks, no braid and paste as bait but you feed pellet. It costs 330 yuan (approx £35) to fish for 4 hours but you get back 25 yuan (approx £3) for each fish in your net at the end. There are also some tagged fish, one which is yet to be caught is worth 1000 yuan to the captor. Now I was set up with a 3m whip that some locals prefer as it gives more control over the tilapia, line is Tornado 0.20mm and the hooks are about a size 6! Four hours later I was thinking of taking up golf! Not one bite despite following the feeding pattern of the locals next to me who caught 21 and 15 fish respectively. The only difference I could see was that they were on 4.5m whips and fishing further out. After Gareth’s start he lost a tilapia to a pull, had both hooks bitten off on another and missed two bites.

That evening we went to the main Shiqi river but only managed 30 minutes on feeders before a thunderstorm with spectacular lightning descended. In that time I had 5 casts, 3 bites and a silver bream on pieces of worm. While Gareth had 3 silver bream.

Monday 5th We returned to the Shiqi in the morning while it was under 30C. This time I managed 2 silver bream, 2 tilapia and a red belly tilapia in the short session. Gareth had double plus a small asp as you can see above. The afternoon sees us head into the hills to meet up with some of their friends at a mountain stream. What an eye opener with picnic tables set up in the middle of the water with families eating, barbecuing all the while others around them were trying to catch mini species with slightly larger nets than you see kids with at the seaside. Gareth had put in a 3m light whip and we found a slightly deeper area a little way downstream (you could still walk across the stream!) and I managed to get4 small tilapia by an outlet pipe, before moving well up stream and sneaking out 3 larger tilapia and losing a possible white trout that was too big to swing up the wall.

Tuesday 6th sees me visit a tackle shop and replenish my paste stocks! Temperature now down to 26C and we headed off in the afternoon to Zhuhai in an attempt for me to get a big tilapia. The owners to be fair must have taken pity on me as they put me on a favored peg and provided the tackle, set it up, provided the bait and pellets and showed me the area to fish, even setting up a purple floodlight when it got dark for me. I did far better this time and had one tilapia of about 8lb but lost 2 and missed 9 bites!

Final day and 6 hours at the Grass carp lake with 2 missed bites. Plenty of fish cruising but very wary and spook at the slightest thing. Next day sees a 24 hour journey home! May not have caught a tremendous amount but did I enjoy the experience – you bet I did!

September 2 and October 1 2026 – A visiting I will go!

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Returning from Torquay I managed to get out once before leaving for China, armed with a spare no 6 section(I have several old poles of the same make so I have spares!)I revisited Crookwood descending on peg 21. Once more I took just pellets and paste – a red and yellow mix with the jellyfish powder. The idea was to fish until the paste ran out- about 3hours. It was hard but I managed to sneak out 5 skimmers, best 2-10, 2 carp a tench and a solitary roach for around 10lb. Tackle was as previous visits.

Monday 28th morning sees me catch a bus to Chippenham, hop on a coach to Heathrow, take a flight to Beijing, have a couple of hours before taking plane to Shenzhen to be met by Gareth and then a taxi ride to Zhongshan arriving at approx 10pm Tuesday!

Wednesday sees Gareth in work so Wendy looked after me and dropped me off with some tackle to go fishing on the river near the apartment while she went to a yoga class for an hour. I was directed by Gareth to fish the high wall in the trees at the back of the sports court that we had fished before.

Now fishing from a 10 foot drop with a 3m whip is not ideal but the overhanging trees ,made anything else difficult but the shade was welcome in the 35C heat. Worm on the hook, depth approx one foot I missed the first bite but then had a small tilapia.

The hour passed quickly with 13 tilapia coming to hand but a larger tilapia was hooked but couldn’t be lifted by the whip, so hand lining up the wall it flipped and came off the barbless hook. While there a guy came along with a reel strapped to his wrist and went past a couple of meters and cast out a heavy spinner, only to hook a white trout of about 8oz that he gave to me but I returned it. Looking at the area close to the bridge there was a large shoal of I am assuming trout cruising around about 20m out. Oh for waggler I thought!

Thursday 1st October, start of the national holiday, Gareth takes me down to the river at 6:30am before it got too hot, to a new area upstream from the apartment. Again fishing 3m whips the depth was about 3 feet so more water to search!I had a climbing perch and 2 bleak with Gareth getting a climbing perch and a bleak, he spent time fishing the margins where bubbles were appearing but no joy!

Yes the bleak are big!!

That afternoon we went to the grass carp lake for about 3.5 hours. I was fishing a 7m whip, Gareth an 8.2m I had plenty of bobs but no definite bites. Gareth however had two grass carp by the end which were weighed in as 4 jin (1jin=500g), this was important as the fisheries here allow you to take the fish away but will buy back any fish caught by weight. Most anglers seem to take this route and get money back on the day ticket. It should be said that we used some interesting electronic floats that changed colour to red when a fish was touching the bait – we could not work out how they worked but they did!Also interesting was the use of old tyres as a rest for the whip, simply put the butt of the whip inside the tyre and rest the whip on the top.

Friday 2nd sees thunderstorms hit Zhongshan so Gareth takes me to an indoor fishery that had shrimp fishing in one area and tilapia fishing in another concrete pound. Given a 1.5m very light whip with the standard two hook rig but with a string of polyfloats as indicator. Very weird but interesting, sounds like hook a duck but trust me it was anything but. In the time allotted I managed 3 tilapia including a rainbow variety and lost 5 to hook pulls as they were not docile fish by any stretch of the imagination. Weight was approx 4lb in total.

That evening we returned to the grass carp lake fishing 7:30 to 11:30pm which produced 13 “red” indications and one missed bite! Was very humid 30c but felt like 36C according to the weather app.

Saturday 3rd Severe thunderstorms again with most lakes closed and very hot and humid. We headed off to Nanlan where I had never caught a fish despite numerous bites, however this time we were going to fish a freshwater lake at the end of the complex- lake 3 in the picture.

Now it has to be said that there were 30 anglers on the lake but only 3 proper fish caught, we did scratch to avoid a blank and by fishing in the margin with worm and slowly lifting the bait I broke my duck with a tilapia and Gareth snared two.

Four days left for fishing before returning will I catch a decent fish?

September 2026 Part 1 – Rumble in the jungle!

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Wednesday 2nd sees me at Crookwood peg 9 fishing 10:15 to 1:35(although really only to 1:15 spoiler alert!). I have made the decision to just fish the Chinese paste for the foreseeable future and try different combinations. Today I mixed 50-50 the blue packet and the red ( Old Ghost) with the obligatory jellyfish powder. Tackle was the 0.16mm rig with a Chianti style homemade float with the bulk set 6 inches from a 16 hook, elastic was a green 2.2mm Chinese hollow.

It was raining, that light “wet” rain that seems to get everywhere but fortunately it stopped after about an hour. I didn’t introduce any groundbait, instead just relied upon a half pot of micros and 6mm pellets with a few pellets every put in with the paste. The going was slow, in fact it took me 40mins to get my first bite, a skimmer. From then on it continued to fish hard with bobs on the float but no real bites apart from a further 2 skimmers and a stockie plus a couple of missed bites that may have been liners.

As I was getting towards the end of my paste the float slowly submerged and a lift produced a solid weight that began moving slowly at first before heading towards the far bank. To be honest I thought it was probably a better carp around the 6-7lb mark and after a few minutes got it within netting range, when it finally showed itself I realised I was in trouble as it was more like a 12-15lb common, that when I tried to net it I managed to get it’s head in the net but nothing else, before I could readjust the net it flipped and swam out again. It then headed into the left hand margin (see photo)

The fish managed to get into the under growth and after steady pressure came out only to go straight back in and through the reeds for about three meters. Again I kept steady pressure and just as I thought it had finally snagged me it moved back towards me only to go under the bank at the side of the platform where it stayed, five more minutes of pressure resulted in nothing, so after approx 15 minutes of the contest with the fish I accepted I had lost the fish and it had finally snagged me. As it was so close to the peg I was able to get hold of the line and began to exert steady pressure thinking I was going to either pull free from the snag or snap, only for the carp to suddenly reappear with its head gasping a quick grab of the net and ping the float went slack and the carp slid out of view. Inspecting the rig, the line did not break, the hook did not pull out – the hook snapped at the bend! I thought “Oh dear” or some such equivalent phrase! At which point I packed up!

Following Monday I returned, this time to peg 26.

Tackle was similar although the float was now a homemade rugby ball style and the hook was a heavier gauge 14! Paste was the red and yellow 50-50 mix. Fishing along side the far end of the lilies over a bed of 4mm and micros I was soon getting lots of indications and had a busy session until the paste ran out on the three hour mark. I ended up with a tench of 2-02, crucian of 1-02, two brown goldfish (as opposed to crucians!)2-07 and 2-03,a skimmer of 1lb plus one other, a small roach and 3 carp ranging from 1lb to 1-05. Added to these I was snapped twice, pulled out 4 times and snagged once – the chances you take when fishing close to lilies.

Two days later sees me back, this time at peg 28 towards the end of the bank with open water and no lilies! Fishing 10-1 with same set up as previous visit and same paste mix. Started at 9m (7 section) and began getting skimmers after 15 minutes. However after an hour or so I lifted into a bite and crack my number 6 section snapped about six inches above the female join. I managed to get the pole back within reach and discovered it was a clean break- had it been a new pole as opposed to it being 20+ years old it would have looked like a “manufacture defect”! The remaining piece could not be telescoped so I ended the session fishing 5 sections. Again I had to build the swim but my final tally came to 5 skimmers over the pound (best 1-09) plus 2 under, a tench of 1-11 and a roach. Also had a crayfish drop off on the way in plus pulled out of a fish , probably a carp that took off towards the other bank.

Off to Torquay for a few days so no fishing, back home for a week then off to China!

Fishing the Chinese Paste UK style!

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I have been experimenting for some time with Chinese paste mixes but before I go further I have to explain that the way paste is fished in China is different from over in the UK. Big differences include using two hooks, having a firmer paste that allows casting, plumbing up using the paste as a plummet plus more. I am going to China later on this year and will do a write up of paste fishing there.

So firstly the paste, if you think we have a wide range of groundbaits then think the same for paste but more so. Paste for varying speeds of break down, for different species(tilapia, carp, black carp, sea fish, crucians, bream…), different flavours within each species, you get the idea! I have stuck to a limited range and experimented within that narrow selection. The paste I have available currently …

As you can see the packets are all in Mandarin so the diagram at the back is helpful as a starting point. Anyway let me show you it in practice. The venue is Crookwood Lake on the Devizes ticket peg 23.

Once I got my box set up I began on the paste preparation.

Left to right, top to bottom – main bulk paste; second paste; mixed in ratio 70/30%; two full pole pots of water added and stirred in then left while I sorted out the rest of my kit. Mix after 15 minutes: Jellyfish powder, this forms a stringy texture to the paste; Jellyfish powder added/sprinkled on; paste after quick mixing and kneading.

In China they use very long floats for paste fishing with rolled lead strip making a form of olivette, the lead strip is trimmed to get the weight correct so the float cocks just at the top of the body, the paste then acts as the weight for the long antenna.

I tend to try and adapt the paste to UK style venues so use two basic rigs- the float used can change but the shotting is the same. First a bulk with one dropper, the second just the bulk.

You will notice the relatively small hook by UK standards for the paste – a 16. Partly because Crookwood is a true mixed fishery so I wanted to see what I could catch on a 16 rather than a 10 or 12 which is usual for paste when it is used mainly for carp. Bait size was roughly a small walnut of paste, feeding a few 4mm pellets in the toss-pot with the paste in the area marked by the lillies.

I began at 10:15 and stopped at 1:25 when the ball of paste had run out. The float was constantly dipping and moving but I ended up with tench of 3lb and 5lb in the net together with a bream of 2.5lb, 5 skimmers and 3 roach. I also had 4 small carp (best 1-04) and two crucians of 12oz and 1-04, these where returned straight away as club rules do not allow carp to be retained in keepnets.

To be honest I probably put too little jellyfish powder on the mix as it was not as stringy as usual but it works. At some point I am going to have a go with a Chinese two hook set up if I find a venue that allows two hooks! Similarly I am tempted to try the paste on a river to see what would happen!

June 2026 part 2 – Weather!

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I am going to stop mentioning the weather as the weather gods are not happy with me! Following the thunder and lightning at Viaduct we then get a period of red hot temperatures plus more thunderstorms! Basically June the 16th came, that magical day with the opening of the river season, so what did I do… I didn’t go fishing! Experience has told me the first day on the river is never great but allied to that we have a river that is very low with hardly any flow and bright sunlight – a blank waiting to happen so I opted out and then the real hot period struck!. Yes I could have gone but these days I don’t deal with the hot weather in this country very well – China and Thailand seem to be no issue????

So my latter part of June has been curtailed to just one short visit to High Penn on the 28th. I had decided to set out to fish every peg during the season and as such set up on the west bank second peg in. I took my pole and fished 9:30 to 11:10 but the day did not start well with my 10m and 11.5m sections being jammed inside one another so it was 9m or not at all. No photos for this session and I had left my keepnet at home due to the hot weather so aimed to put any fish back asap. So plumbing up at 9m was just as it got deeper, I needed another section at least to be comfortably in the deeper area but that was not going to happen!

Fishing with a 1g Paster on 0.12mm to 0.10mm to an 18 with the bulk set 18 inches from the hook and a dropper 6 inches away from the hook I began with two balls of groundbait mixed fairly firm to try and get down past the rudd laced with chopped worm. Hook bait was double maggot and predictably the first fish was a rudd, after a couple more some perch appeared, switching to worm I had a roach and a micro perch at which point I thought to myself -“lets try something different”. I had in the past bought a series of jars of what are essentially flavoured and coloured translucent jelly pellets.

I have been using the bright yellow honey flavoured ones off and on during different sessions and have caught on them so I decided to give them an hour to see how they went. Immediately first cast there were constant dips as small fish investigated. Now I have to explain that these jelly pellets are about the size of a 4mm pellet and are perfectly round but after being in water for some time expand top a 6mm size. Eventually the float buried and a rudd came to hand. Basically I ended up with 6 rudd, 6 perch and 3 roach for about 1-04. Half of the fish were caught on the jelly pellets- including the perch!

In the meantime Gareth had made one of his flying visits to Vietnam as he had some time off for the Dragon Boat Festival in China. He visited the same place as previously and between having a nap and fishing for part of the second day racked up 21 hours of fishing time and caught 21 fish.

The first session, another 6 were taken in the second shorter session.

Bait for the non-predators were either stale cake from a bakery molded around the hook or if fishing up in the water the cake was used on the float feeder and rice paper on the hook, predators were taken with fish chunks.

Must make more of my time in July!

May 2026 Part 3 – will I catch?

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So Monday sees us back at the grass carp lake and this time we went on the far side bank of the first “lake” as the pegs we fished before were occupied, in fact the whole place was busy as it was the May Day holiday.

We collected a couple of boxes ourselves and set up in the same way with one notable exception – Gareth had now acquired a 7m whip that had been delivered to the apartment within 24hrs of ordering! We struggled to get a bite and there were no signs of bubbles like the last visit, the guy fishing where we had been last time had a few fish and when he packed up we decided to move into the area. I fished the same peg as last time and Gareth went to my left, away from the corner. Still no bites and then the son of the owner came around making his rounds on his electric cart and asked if we had any luck. On hearing we had nothing he got Gareth to show him the rig and he then proceeded to take the hook length off and put one of his own on which had significantly larger hooks. He said the pellets were right but use them for feed – he then got a bag of paste from his cart and made up a big ball of paste for us to use. He then attacked the rigs by shallowing up and reducing the weight until the float settled with two paste hook baits in place. He then put the depth back so the bottom ball of paste was just touching bottom. After this he did the same for my rig and used our pellets to put a couple of big handfuls out. Casting- we had been swinging out underarm but he said to cast overarm. The paste was soft but firm and stayed on the hook remarkably well, with the float rising when the paste came off. Now that is real customer service! As a consequence in the hour or so we had left I managed to miss a glorious bite, Gareth missed two but finally connected with a good fish that turned out not to be a grass carp but a black carp weighing 5-03 or 2.345kg which saw Gareth get 20 yuan back.

So Tuesday, my last day for fishing, arrives and I am on a two day blank streak! Back to Nanlan we went and although I missed two bites early on and Gareth four it was clear that the heavy rain had cooled the water as there were no cruising fish in sight. Gareth then managed to hook something that doubled his rod over (his was longer and more powerful than the one I was using) and ripped line from the clutch before pulling out. Apparently there are grouper over 100lb present! Heavy rain then started and it got busy as new fish were stocked and that usually meant a load of anglers rushing to the places where the fish went in.

Some grouper in the 4-5lb range were getting caught by sticking the rod under the walkways, releasing the line and withdrawing the rod then feeling the line for the shrimp being taken. Most were using light drop-shot style rods with multipliers so when they hooked a grouper the rods were bent double! The heavy rain continued and we were not getting any action so we decided to return back home.

After having lunch delivered to the door! Gareth took me back to the river where the visit started but this time you could see the bottom clearly. Fishing the same whip but this time without the isotope I had 90 minutes of fishing, 75 of them in the rain! It was interesting to see large circular craters in the river bed which Gareth informed me were tilapia nests. Indeed you could see larger tilapia in one or two, I managed to hook one of the bigger ones but it dropped back as Gareth was trying to hand line it up the wall! In the end I managed 27 small tilapia but saw several larger fish including carp just out of range. With the rain not easing we waited for a slight break in the weather and packed up.

Next morning (Wednesday) I was picked up by the taxi at 5am (10pm Tuesday UK time) to start the journey back home, 25 hours later after a transfer in Beijing I stepped through the front door-knackered! The traveling to and from China accounted for 12 806 miles while travel within to the venues took the total to a minimum of 13 000miles. Was it worth it – you bet! Putting the obvious family visit aside the opportunity to fish in a different environment using different tackle and tactics for new species will always be worth it. The blanks, well it is called fishing not catching and even blanking you gain a lot of experience and memories.

Now need to get back to catching some fish over here but I have brought back some paste I will try!

May 2026 Part 2 -Something different again

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Saturday sees a five minute car ride to a grass carp lake. Again we pay by time in this case the standard is 6 hours and rather than a refund per per there is an option to keep the fish or sell it back to the fishery at a rate per pound depending on the species. The lake was split into two by a causeway with a bridge over the connecting channel, the far part of the lake looks busy while the nearest half only has one fishing on it so we opted for the quiet lake and settled into a corner area. We had folding stool to sit on but the owner brought around seat boxes with whip rests for us to use. They really look after their customers as you will see later.

The owner even set up brollies for us when the sun came up! Now Gareth was using a 5m whip and I had a 6m whip, the water was about 10ft and we were using 1g floats with the standard double hook rig with grass carp banded pellets.

There was plenty of action on the other lake, particularly near the bridge area, after 2 hours I had a bite, the float bobbing and slipping away, a strike felt like I had hit a brick wall as the whip arched under the water and then came pinging back. The fish had snapped the 15lb braid hooklength! Gareth then told me that there were grass carp up to 25lb in the lake! At this point I swapped to a 10lb mono two hook rig and about an hour later the float slides under and I connect with the fish and after ten seconds the hook pulls – a size 6 !! A further hour passes Gareth misses two bites and I get another bite only for the 10lb hooklength to snap!!! With little more than an hour left Gareth sets up a 3m whip to fish paste in the corner margin with a dibber UK style in order to save a blank! That worked as he had four F1 type carp, a bitterling and a roach(?), he got me to have a go and a F1 type duly obliged so blank saved! The frustrating thing was that the fish were there and were bubbling all day although I did miss7 bites that may have been small fish.

Sunday morning arrives and we are off to the main river in Zhongshan, the Shiqi. So far all our travel has been done by taxi with impressive short waiting times for them to arrive. So we set up open end feeders on telescopic rods fishing segments of worm with a pink coloured groundbait in the feeder. We were positioned about 7ft above the water on a promenade with a flower box the water side of the railing.

Gareth was straight into fish and had nine silver bream and a small asp while I managed top miss five bites and blank much to the amusement of my daughter-in-law! That afternoon plans were changed as a major thunderstorm hit and moved along the coast and many venues closed as a result. We did manage at about 5:30pm to drive in their car to Nanlan to fish a salt water lake stocked with a variety of fish including bass. We started off with it being fine but about 8 heavy rain set in and although we continued for a fair bit the action slowed right down. Initially we were getting bites on shrimp- attached with a band and shrimp hook set up, with an electronic lighted bung float set as a slider at about 5 feet (the length of the telescopic rod I was using. For some reason my missing bites is increasing with ELEVEN bites on shrimp all missed, Gareth missed 2 while bass of 3-4lb were constantly seen moving around. We could have stayed until midnight but gave it until about 10 as it was so wet.

So Sunday was a blank day for me with 15 missed bites – must do better. As you can imagine I took some flak for missing so many, LOL. Last two days to follow- will I catch?

May 2026 Part 1 – Something different

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Before I left for China I managed a couple of outings, the first sees me return to the same peg at Rowde fishing the 5m whip from 9:45 to 11:45. Plenty of action with 17 roach, 28 skimmers,2 rudd, 2 gudgeon and a perch making up a net of 5-02. Double maggot accounted for speedy bites but small pieces of worm provided better samples but longer between bites.

My second visit was to high Penn fishing 10-11:45 on the first peg on the East bank. Tackle was the 15 ft (4.5m) waggler with a 4AAA insert waggler with a no 6 and two no8 droppers in the 10feet+ of water. Hook-length was 0.10mm Shogun line to an 18 hook and double maggot. I fed two balls of groundbait to start and 1 further top up after an hour with loose fed maggots every 4-5 minutes. This approach resulted in 19 roach, 21 rudd and 15 perch for a 5-04 total the rudd were small being 2 or to the ounce.

Wednesday 29th (morning) sees me catch the bus to Chippenham to get a coach to Heathrow, from there a flight to Wuhan transferring to a further flight on to Shenzhen. Then a prearranged taxi ride to Zhongshan to be met at my son’s apartment at 10pm Thursday. A lift up to the 11th floor of the 34 storey block to drop my luggage off, a quick change of clothes and we are off for a quick hour session on the local river!

Fishing from a wall about 10 feet off the water with a 4m whip and a BGT float with an isotope set at about a foot deep baiting with worm I soon had 3 tilapia coming to hand plus a Nile tilapia. I also managed a new species both for me and Gareth – what the Chinese call a big mouth carp.As we packed up we shone a light into the base of the wall to see a large carp- unfortunately or perhaps fortunately it ignored the bait!

Friday morning comes and I don’t yet feel the effects of the journey which was just as well as we were heading off to Zhuhai to fish a tilapia commercial. Now when I say it was different from ours it really was- firstly you pay the equivalent of £30 for 4 hours but you get a refund for each fish you catch, needing I think 8 fish to break even. You “draw” via a random number generator two pegs and you choose which one you fish. Given that situation Gareth had spent some time creating two sets of tackle as we could be at opposite ends of the lake, as luck would have it we ending up drawing numbers that let us fish next to each other. The rules were strict in the sense of maximum whip size was 4.5m, no braid or elastic and two hook system with paste the only bait allowed, but you could feed pellet. I was fishing a new 3m medium heavy whip with a 8lb main line to a two hook 4lb hook-length that was attached via a rubber O ring to a swivel on the main line. Gareth had prepared two types of paste in preparation, the darker one was allegedly for tilapia, the other was made from ground down pellets, both had additives .

The pellet paste mix
The tilapia paste

You start straight away as you are timed from the point you pay. Now the fish were to be kept in a 1m square net anchored to the side of your platform which had it’s own umbrella. It was a real experience watching the Chinese anglers fish but one thing that was universal was that if someone lost a fish the banter would start – “why don’t you go home, you won’t catch”, “Oh what a shame” you get the idea! The guy on my right managed to land two but lost about four, the one on Gareth’s left landed one and lost six! But they are tilapia I here you say they are small- oh no … average size is 6lb they don’t stock anything less than 4lb!

So how did we do? Well Gareth landed two and lost two I had 1 and lost one when the swivel opened up after which I dispensed with the O ring. The one I did land only just managed to get it in the net- an 8lber on 3m whip- yes it was exciting! Photos are difficult to take as my fish only just fitted in the net and they have spines and sharp gill covers and teeth! I just wanted to get mine safely into the “keepnet”.

Gareth's 6lber
My 8lber

At the end of the session they come around and lift the net to see how many fish and record it on their app. Payment is all done via phone apps and by the time we got to the lane out Gareth had been refunded for the fish caught. It had fished poorly compared to normal as the weather was cold for the time of year although it was mid 20s! The results of sessions are posted on Wechat and the best on the day was 14 fish, a couple of days earlier the best was 64 for an estimated 650lb!!!! Apparently the same individuals are usually in the top 3 for the day- it is their way of making money as apart from being refund for the number of fish they also pay the top three in each session a prize! The following day our fish would have put us in the top 10!

Part 2 will follow a grass carp lake!

February 2026 Part 1 -How many magpies?

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Tuesday 3rd February I set off at 9:53 in the rain for the Three Magpie stretch of the Kennet and Avon Canal and got out of the car at 10:06. I am so lucky to have a number of decent venues within short distances of home! Anyway I gathered my tackle, haversack seat on my back, bait bucket, whip mag, landing net, handle unhooking mat and pike rod and set off up the canal towards the swing bridge but stopped about 40m past where the concrete moorings stop and half way between two moored boats, giving them a good 30-40m space each. Pike rod was set up with my usual float and two single hook wire trace with a sardine and was lobbed out towards 3/4s across. Set up the 5m whip with a 1g Chinese float with a 18 hook and double maggot. I chopped up some worm in a bait box and added a handful of groundbait then mixed it up with just a dash of water. Two squash ball sized helpings were introduced along with a half dozen maggots. Started to get bites immediately with a couple of roach coming to hand before the pike float bobs and disappears, a strike, an initial heavy weight then nothing – it had left go leaving me cursing!

Back out and within five minutes another run, this time it was connected with properly and soon a pike of 9-06 was on the unhooking mat.

The session carried on in a similar vein as by the time I was driving away at 12:18 I had added pike of 3-00, 8-12 and 8-04 with 6 roach, 4 perch and a skimmer for about 2lb.

As you can see from the pictures, I needed to make some repairs to the net!

Friday 6th, day before Gareth and family arrive, sees me back at the Three Magpies but this time a lot further up as the boats had moored in the previous spot. Fished 10:40 to 1pm when heavy rain descended. No runs on the pike rod and fishing the whip in the same way but with a different Chinese float (with a bulbous tip shotted down) accounted for 22 roach, 2 skimmers, 2ruffe, a gudgeon and10 perch, the best being 1-10,1-04 and 1-02.

Sunday afternoon Three Magpies near the swing bridge end as the boats were multiplying! Gareth and I fished but the weather was wet and cold, during our time we had three deer in the field opposite watching up from the relative shelter of a hedgerow! Gareth fished a 4.5 m whip and I stayed on the 5m but it was hard with Gareth ending up with about a pound and a half while I managed about 3lb, boosted by skimmers of 1-04 and 12oz to go with 3 roach, a micro-perch and6 smaller skimmers.

Gareth et al fly off to Finland on the Tuesday and will return the following Tuesday so Friday 13th (good job I’m not superstitious!) I am back at the Magpies fishing 5m from the bench started at 9:40 and packed up at 11:40.Fished the same way and ended up with 18 roach, a ruffe, 9 skimmers including 4 net ones and two micro perch for about4lb plus a pike of exactly 6lb. Should really have been two pike but just as I started to get the initial bobs as a precursor to a run I had to wind in as the Canal and River Trust barge came down just at the wrong time! At which point I packed up.

As you can see the net repairs were not great! Meanwhile in Finland Gareth and Zachary where ice fishing to no avail!

Chew valley coming up soon!

January 2026 Part 2 – a start!

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So Sunday 18th I finally kick myself in to gear and get on the bank! The weather was not great, rivers up and flooding, Bowood chocolate, possible match on canal so I opted to go to Blacklands for a change. I paid my money at Reception and said I would fish peg 13 – my first mistake as they had re-pegged it! So instead of being near the overflow I was now on the opposite side of the island- the furthest point from the car!! As it happened I was the only one on the lake but I stuck with my choice and primed two areas both at 11m, the left hand swim with worm and caster and the right hand with micros. Groundbait is not allowed so loose feed was the order of the day, fishing with a 0.10mm hooklength to an 18 barbless under a 1g Paster.

Bites came straight away with a piece of worm about an inch long and despite a couple of slow periods when I was playing around with different shotting patterns and baits it was a pleasant few hours with 18 roach averaging 3-4 oz, the one in the picture is one of the smallest, 8 skimmers (best 1-04) and 3 perch(10oz best) for a total between 7 and 8lb.

Wasn’t until the following Sunday I got out again this time for the rearranged pike match at Peatmoor. I had missed the first one when everyone blanked as we were in Yorkshire.The plan was to fish two deadbait rods on floats (Bowood style) one with smelt the other with sardine. I fancied two pegs- peg 1 which was right in the top corner that had form in previous years and peg 13 which was on the corner of the bay. I ended up going to peg 1, blanked and only one pike caught – that’s right from peg 13 in the first 10 minutes!

No further visits this month as life got in the way! However on the other side of the world Gareth made is trip to Thailand to fish at AmazonBKK, a predator lake. The rules were lure fishing until midday then bait fishing, but after a couple of biteless hours the guide had a word with the owner and he allowed Gareth to bait fish. The results were over 30 runs, that produced 2 Arapaima (110kg and 30kg) 2 Alligator Gar (12kg and 7kg) 1 Red Tail Catfish (25kg), one snap off and several hook pulls. The alligator gar are notoriously difficult to hook due to their hard tooth beak of a mouth and that was the cause of the missed bites and pulls.

Even as I have been typing this he has been fishing the bass commercial he went to earlier this month and has sent me this!

February is likely to prove interesting as he arrives next week!