Risk

To be successful at this pike fishing lark you've basically got to fish where the fish are. That's easy enough to do, after all I do know where I can catch pike, but it's not really enough for me. From time to time I prefer to go pioneering, fishing new places in an attempt to discover pike that no-one else is targeting. This can pay off big-time on occasions. Neglected pike are both easy to catch and potentially big and I've had some good fish in the past by getting off the beaten track. It's a risky strategy however, most of the time an area can be devoid of pike anglers for a very good reason - the fishing's no good!

All of the piking I've been doing has been on rivers. We're having an unusually dry autumn and it's meant that the rivers have remained low and clear - just the kind of conditions I like. I've caught plenty of fish but so far the risk I've taken hasn't paid off - they've all been small.
Big fish aren't the be-all and end-all of pike fishing of course. I've really enjoyed finding these new places and some of them have been breathtakingly beautiful. What's more I've been catching on a wide range of methods with lures, livebaits and deadbaits all taking fish.

The baits have been mostly fished under a planerfloat and there is always a real sense of satisfaction in catching a pike on that method. Indeed I've had several fish on deadbaits fished that way - as opposed to the livebaits I usually use and this will give me the confidence to do that more in the future. Overall though I've caught more fish on lures than baits - and that's been on all four of the rivers I've fished.

Fishing lures on rivers is a risk in itself. Rivers are always full of snags - mostly branches brought down on a flood and losing lures in such places is an occupational hazard. I could, of course choose light lures which don't get down so deep or fish them on a quick retrieve to try and keep them out of the snags but that defeats the object really. Snags hold fish and if you want to catch consistently it's better to fish close to the snags - or right in them!

In order to keep my lures but still fish in amongst the snags I've been using a new trick that's proved very successful. I've replaced all the split rings on the hooks of my jerkbaits with Pro Rigger 50lb bs split rings. This means that every time I get snagged, a steady pull with 100lb Power Pro will break the split ring and leave the hook in the snag. It's working a treat, I've been snagged up lots of times but haven't lost a lure on a snag all season so far.

In Full Swing

The season's really under way now that we've reached October and guess what - it's raining! I squeezed a few days in before the rains came, two more in the big glacial water and two on the river and I'm pleased with the results so far. The pike on the big lake are playing hard to get just now, I had four on the first day to around eight pounds and two on the second, both double-figure fish with the best going 14.02

Interestingly they aren't very keen on livebaits, with only one fish, the smallest of the lot, coming to a bait. The rest took a variety of lures with replicants being the most successful (not surprising since I used them the most). I was pleased to get two fish on jerkbaits, one on a manta and the other on a slider. The slider was hit really hard by another fish which I mysteriously failed to hook though.

The river fishing has been truly fascinating so far. I discovered that I can catch livebaits easily at the stretch I want to fish for pike so bait isn't a problem and unlike the lake fish, the pike really do want a livebait. The first day produced a bumper catch (for the river) of five pike with two going over ten pounds with the biggest being a twelve pounder.

Day two was much more difficult. The weather was on the turn with a strong wind bringing frequent showers over all day long. It was noticeably colder too and these conditions meant that I had to spend much longer than I want to catching livebaits. I then returned to the swim where I had taked the five fish but they didn't want to know this time and after a few hours I gave it best and moved on. I chose a swim with a slow current and set up the planer float to fish a live roach.

Nothing happened for quite a while and as the day was wearing on and the light fading, I started to pack away my gear. Then I realised that the float was no longer there, wound down and pulled into a very hard fighting pike. It tailwalked back and forth across the river several times and on one occasion when I had it in the net, it actually jumped out again and carried on fighting.

It was quite dark when I landed the fish and the rain was started to fall heavily so it was a case of a quick weigh-in followed by two quick photos before the camera got too wet.

15lb 15oz - and you won't see a better looking pike anywhere!