November 1st to 3rd Linch Hill Willow Lake

Well this is going to be one of my winter pursuits, after the large roach and rudd that swim in the 7 acre lake. I’m fishing it with Dan Williams who I’ve known from my time fishing for tench with him on an Oxford lake a couple of years ago.

We arrived at 10am and looked around the lake. There were a couple of carpers already there and I must say they have been very helpful with advice on the features. I gave Dan the first choice of swims and I settled into my choice. I leaded around for quite a time but could only find weed or silt. There is so much weed still around, well it’s been mild. I found a spot in 15ft of water with a gravel bar in front which came up to 12ft. The only problem being that it was covered in weed. I fed with a little hemp and red maggots. For the next 18hrs I sat behind static bobbins and no sign of the roach or rudd. Dan had a couple of pulls and a drop back but nothing else. It had been a wild and windy night and many leaves had come down.

I decided to move swims to one end of the lake where there is 15ft straight off the ledge 5ft in front of me. There was much weed down the slope so I raked this out with Dan’s Dad’s rake. I also lost this rake on a snag so I owe Mr. Williams a new rake. I could bait by hand here, and did so with hemp and maggots (dead and live ones). During the afternoon from 4.30 onwards I had a few short pulls. The maggots though were not touched. All the time roach and rudd rolled over the bait and along the ledge. Then at 9.30 pm I had a twitchy take which resulted in me having a right old tussle with a 3” perch. So I baited up with a few more maggots. The night was very windy but warm at 12c. A few carp crashed out in the lake during the night but my maggots were not touched. A full swim feeder went out again just as the sky started to glow in the east. More roach were rolling then I saw a few tench roll. There are supposed to be a few in there.

I had a take at 6.45am which resulted in the hooklink breaking when it got in the weed. So I decided to change hooklink strength to something heavier. As I was changing this on the first rod the second one was off and again resulting in a repeat performance.

Having changed all the hooklinks and the roach still rolling I was rewarded with a good take and a handsome 4-5lb tench came my way. That was that for the remainder of the morning.

I need to reflect on hooklink strength while the weed is still apparent. My rigs are some new ones that I had been working on when fishing Horseshoe for tench last year. I’ll show these off later.