Having recently achieved my goal of a 6lb plus Orfe I turned my attentions to the daunting task of cracking my relatively local canal system in search of big Bream and Carp, for canal standards these species can grow to 10lb and 35lb respectively, now to some anglers a 10lb Bream isn't exactly big but in a canal neglected and poached to within an inch of it's life they are big and boy are they hard to find, should the location be found then getting them to feed is even more of a task, one that i've only achieved on roughly 25% of my visits in four years and if that doesn't put my task into perspective then the fact that I have seen only one angler in all the time speaks volumes.
The Carp are even more difficult to locate as they seem to be extremely nomadic which makes my quest just that little bit trickier, but I love a challenge and this is one I've been looking forward to and I have only started now as only until the beginning of last week the canal system was like chocolate and zero visibility but with the drop of rain we have finally received it has cleared the water up and I can once again walk the many miles of towpath and stalk my quarry.
Remaining mobile is absolutely imperative as if a bait and wait approach is adopted one would certainly blank, I'd hazard a guess that no fish would be caught unless said angler was donning a set of golden spherical objects in his strides. Waiting for fish to come to me on a water I can stalk is not an option, this is my type of angling and today my ability was to be tested, as it always is here.
I left home around 6am this morning and arrived a little before 7am and was on the hunt straight away. As is often the case I walked for a couple of miles slowly scouring the water for any shapes, movement or feeding (bubbles). Probably a little after 830 I found a solitary Carp cruising the upper layer and it appeared to be looking for food on the surface, on certain areas of the canal near parks many people in the spring and summer feed the ducks, so bread is very much part of the staple diet to more than just the feathery kind, no doubt this Mirror that appeared to borderline 20lb was looking for any leftovers from yesterdays dinner.
For nearly fifteen minutes I followed the carp until it reached an inlet where it decided to rest up and sat on a bed of silk weed, I gently lowered my slow sinking flake a couple of foot from it's snout and didn't hesitate to inhale it, I didn't wait for my little quill to register the bite, I struck and somehow I missed it !! I cursed my luck and swore quite a few times before I realised I hadn't actually spooked it and she was still close to where I screwed up my chance, on went another piece of flake and put it straight back where it was taken first time around but she was not to be fooled again, no matter how much I tried there was no budging.
Having accepted my failing at a golden chance i ambled off with my tail between my legs.......would I get another chance??
On the Carp front that unfortunately that was my lot but as the morning wore on and the sun got higher I continued to seek any signs of life when after half an hours walking I finally found three Bream feeding and cruising around, having found Bream I set the depth to around 5ft and watched the flake flutter through the column and then once it reached the desired depth I would lift it two or three foot up and left it flutter back down and repeated this method for about ten minutes when one Bream broke off from the shoal and headed straight for the flake, no mistake this time!
My canal fishing was off to a positive start and on the scales she went 8lb 7oz which ranks that my 4th largest canal slab, I was chuffed with that as catching a fish is a huge achievement in itself. With that I continued to see if i could catch any of the others but there was no further interest.
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