02/02/2016 - A Horrid Session On The River

One of my chub caught on crust

Dave Whyte, Sgt Major Tam Miller and myself were greeted by a very cold westerly wind around 25 mph when we arrived for a few hours fishing on a different stretch of the Ribble from the previous day, checking the water temperature I got a reading of 40 degrees F down 4 degrees overnight, I reckon it was going to be crust or flake on a short link fishing the quiet water in the hope of catching a chub. We spread ourselves out over a hundred yard stretch, David and Tam fished a well-known chub swim while I roved about for the first hour, not a bite for my effort. After another two hours of trying Dave had a good trout on luncheon meat, Tam missed two bites I had a chub about 3lbs also a trout around two pounds, We then went off to the cabin for a well-deserved brew, Tam and David tucked in to some venison sandwiches I'd prepared, meanwhile I chucked a boil in the bag meal of Beef Bolognese & Pasta Shells in boiling water for eight minutes. I must say these meals have improved greatly from the early days when I would be in the wilds of Ireland and having to survive on these type of meals, often eaten cold. After a warming break we went back to our swims.

Three Chub and a Trout

After feeding in a small ball of liquidised bread I baited the size 4 hook with a thumb nail size piece of crust, then made an underhand cast dropping the bait on the inside of the crease, within a minute I had a tiny tap then nothing, five minutes later I retrieved my tackle the crust was gone, this was repeated on the next cast. Rebaiting I cast to the same spot then added a dough bobbin the size of a BB shot then held the rod, five minutes later the tiny bobbin moved slowly to the butt ring, I tightened into a nice fish eventually getting a chub, in a twenty minute spell I had two more chub and a trout all tiny movements of the bobbin. In the next hour I had nothing with the air temperature dropping the wind increasing and sleet falling we called it a day. It just shows how things can change with a temperature drop.

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