Deja Vu

As expected the pike season petered out slowly. I caught a few more doubles, ending the season with around sixty but we've had such a cold spring that it was hard going right to the end. The cold spring has once again affected the tench fishing too - it's just like a repeat of 2012!

I've been determined to fish some new spots on my tench lake for a variety of reasons. It became noticeable last season that I'd had several repeat captures with one particular fish, the biggest I've had from there, showing up no less than four times. With 57 tench caught last season, mainly from one area, and several repeats I reasoned that the fish were being a bit territorial and that if I branched out a bit more I might pick up some different fish, maybe bigger ones.

The first two sessions in this new-ish area produced nothing. Denis joined me on day one and he did, at least, have a line bite while on day two I had a line bite of my own but no fish. I then spent a morning back at my old swim and picked up just one tench, a female of 7lb 8oz which was painfully thin - it obviously hadn't been feeding very much, presumably because of the poor water temperatures.

Next session, back at the new area, produced a result in the shape of two bream, a male of 8lb 15oz which was covered in spawning tubercles and a female of 8lb 5oz. It was the bream that drove me away from this area last year, constantly moving in and hoovering up my feed. There are some big bream in this lake but I'm really much more interested in the tench so I was a bit disappointed - was it going to be the same this time around?

My fifth morning's fishing was spent in a strong blustery wind which made the fishing difficult. It was cold too with occasional sharp, heavy showers some of which had lumps in. I've been experimenting with a new wonder-bait this season, fishing it alongside my standard maggot and caster rods and I have to say, the wonder-bait is winning hands down with all three fish caught so far falling to it. So it was again on this session when, shortly after first light I had a steady take and pulled into a fish that scrapped very hard indeed.

Several minutes were spent bringing this fish to the net, I was in no doubt throughout that it was a good tench and as I slipped the net under it I smiled to myself. 8lb 2oz, my first "eight" of the year. Still rather thin, this was a genuinely big fish which could weigh a lot more after feeding up and was in tip top condition. I slipped her back and watched as she powered away in the shallow water - but the day wasn't over yet!

Three times more the wonder-bait was taken, producing another female tench of 6lb 8oz, a male of 5lb 4oz and a small chub and all the while the caster rod lay untouched. Of course it might have been that the casters would have been taken eventually but for now the new bait is scoring well - I think I'll fish it on two rods tomorrow.