New PB Perch

My focus had switched to perch now that the rivers were out of bounds. A catch up with a couple of friends saw us head to a stillwater that I had been introduced to a couple of years back. It's fair to say the water had been kind to me . My first visit saw me break my perch PB twice in around 30 minutes. A subsequent visit saw me increase it to a respectable 3lb 2oz.

So it I set off at lunch with high hopes. After a frustrating month or so on the river the new challenge saw my enthusiasm renewed. A second wave of the 'Beast from the East' had returned to our shores and the east wind was certainly biting . Air temperatures were just above freezing but that wind was sending it the wrong side of zero and it played a big part in swim selection upon arrival. We managed to find a relatively sheltered bay that the three of us could occupy and fish reasonably comfortably whilst remaining social. My tactics were a simple running ledger rig baited with a prawn and then a bobber float baited with a large lobworm. Maggots would be fed regularly in the hope of attracting smaller fish which would in turn see them followed by some specimen sized stripeys.

My new personal best perch

Sport was predictably slow and that wind was ever so cold. The weather however was anything but predictable. At times we were blessed with sunny spells that almost felt pleasant. Then foreboding clouds formed that were soon followed by snow blizzards. We fished on in what turned out to be an uneventful first couple of hours. It was approaching 3pm by now and with nothing happening I decided to chop up a couple of worms in the hope it might trigger something. Literally moments later the bobber float slid purposefully from view seeing my strike met with solid resistance. I was confident it was a perch and this was soon confirmed when a sizable fish wallowed to the surface. It was safely netted and indeed I had a worthy specimen in the net. It looked like it could threaten the magical 3lb mark and could even topple my PB. The scales proved this to be the case when they registered at 3lb 3oz beating my own record by 1oz. This was more than a satisfying result to my first perch session of the spring campaign. Ben soon had a fish of his own, a nicely coloured common carp was the culprit however. Although he enjoys catching carp of all sizes I know he'd have preferred a perch on this occasion. It was soon my turn to do battle with a torpedoed shaped carp that fought powerfully and Tom also saved a blank with a carp of his own. Unfortunately, no more perch were to put in an appearance and Ben and I both managed another carp as the day closed in. By now it was freezing. My hands hurt, the landing net had contorted itself into a weird looking shape and a journey home to a hot shower seemed the best option.