My 2015 Overview.

 It has been quite a year, as ever I simply enjoy getting on the bank but catching specimen fish of various species enhances my enjoyment, can't think of any other sport that I could enjoy more.

 January: The first month of the year was fairly quiet, plenty of Grayling were caught on the Test over a few trips along with some healthy sized Roach, although nothing large came out it was enjoyable.

 February was spent doing pretty much the same, Grayling were high on the agenda and managed to crack the two-pound barrier twice with the best nudging 2.02, larger were seen but never tempted. Also wangled out a stunning wild river Linear Carp using the technique of stret-pegging. Plenty of other fish also fell during the colder days of the month but that monster Grayling did evade me. The Roach were also on form and I had a couple of very decent bags, one of these was edging towards 30lb.

Beautiful fish aren't they.

 March is always a strange month but things weren't too bad, again a few good Roach came to the net and I had a real red letter day on the Barbel front with a 7 fish haul topped by a 11.13 specimen. Plus I started my canal campaign which fast-forwarded it turned out to be very successful.

 April for me is always a month of transition, the river season is over and the other waters don't usually start producing until it begin's to warm up, but the month's stand out trip was a very short, quick fire spinning session in search of Perch and banked a new personal best weighing in at 3lb 6oz. The rest of the month was a combination between Gudgeon, Trout and Tench with some Crucian's chucked in for good measure.

Stunning creature.

 I do like May, one of my favourite month's as the temp' starts to improve and a lot of species come out of their winter slumps to feed with gusto, my canal fishing took an upward curve as I banished the disappointments of numerous difficult blanks by overcoming a stunning 25.03 Mirror Carp, accompanied by a 7.02 ancient looking canal Bream. A few other species were caught but the canal fish were the highlight of the month.

 On to June, I continued on the canals with more success, I was catching at a rate of a fish every two sessions, fish were hard to locate and even more difficult to catch, the opening couple of days I managed a bumper haul of Roach and Barbel on consecutive days, it was great fun but nothing massive again. My Bream campaign started but it didn't go off like I hoped and missed out on a double-figure fish by a fraction too. Also I had banked some lovely pristine Tench along with a new species to the list in the form of a 4.07 Golden Orfe.

 Usually in July my Mrs and I tend to go away on holiday so I don't get as much fishing in but still made a concerted effort to get on the bank, the Loddon proved to be a little tough but had Chub to 5.09 but the larger specimen's remained elusive, I smashed my PB Brown Trout with a 7.2 animal and I started to locate some great shoals of Dace by taking some to a shade over 14oz.

 August was fairly quiet as I didn't do much fishing but the stand-out trip was travelling to Somerset to track down canal Rudd with Russell Hilton, we were both successful and on the second day I topped my haul with a 2.01 specimen through much hard work and plenty of selective angling.

 September is another of my favourite month's as the days are still longish but the slight chill in the air gets certain species feeding better, namely the big Roach, only the one came in this month but it was a good omen. Double-figure Barbel and large Dace. I travelled around abit but whilst visiting the Stour and Avon fishing was tough.

Beautiful fish. Magical fish.

 October was always going to be interesting and it didn't fail me, the capture of a PB Roach/Bream Hybrid from the canal, some more very large Dace slowly approaching the pound mark, along with my second Roach over 2lb of the season.

 Now November, by this time I'm starting to realise winter should be settling in yet it wasn't even cold, at times I was still out in a t-shirt!, again I wasn't particularly successful on a few trips but when I did catch they were fantastic fish like this stunning Autumn Common of 23.09 from one of my local canals, plus another "fish of a lifetime", this clonking fish pulled the dial around to 2lb 10oz which is the largest Roach for quite a few years.

 Then December, where do I start. It has been quite a month, having been off work for a couple of weeks leading up to Christmas I stepped up my efforts on a couple of fronts by putting in some serious legwork and I certainly reaped the rewards, Chub to just under 6lb, beating my PB Zander four times to finish on 7lb flat with Brian Roberts, a lovely days trotting with Tom Aldous on the Itchen for Grayling and Roach, some big Dace on the Avon, catching my fourth 2lb Roach at 2.06, double-figure Barbel and last but not least, I realised one of my angling dreams as I successfully targeted a twenty-pound Pike and from a River too, at 21.07 I was and still am so made up, a truly wonderful experience and what a creature she was, I'd love another one just to prove it wasn't a fluke!

That's it from me, I hope you enjoyed your angling journey's in 2015 like I did.

Tight lines for the new year and be lucky, make those dreams, reality.