Merry Christmas!

I haven't been fishing much lately, as a combination of bad weather, limited time and a cold kept me away from the canal. Hopefully the conditions will improve and I will manage to go out more often, but until then I wish all a Merry Christmas and tight lines!

Following are some pics of my recent catches 

A little jack at dusk. 

Nice perch from the lower part of the canal. 

Again at the 'magic' hour.

My new gloves are proving good..

Nothing spectacular with fish few and far between but at least avoided the dreaded blank!

All the best!

Hearing the drag after a while!

I 've been fishing on an almost daily basis the last couple weeks, trying to suss out the fish mood and locations but the results have been harder to come by than I expected. Nevertheless some patterns are starting to shape.
 I have been mainly focusing on perch with the UL gear and on the dropshot rig, incorporating a Knot2Kinky trace (6lbs) and although the fish don't seem to mind it, they are not there in numbers to give me more solid feedback. I have thus turned to normal jigging techniques with small jigheads and paddle/curly tails or swim/jerk baits, in order to cover more water faster and hopefully find more fish. Moreover I have been venturing further down the canal from my usual places, Google Earth has been very useful in letting me find new fishy-looking areas and Ive managed to get some fish from them.
On Friday I visited one such area that was only a half hour's drive from home, It was a nice basin with a small marina and seemed deep enough to hold some fish. Not knowing the bottom consistency (snags, structure etc) I rigged a 7.5cm Dragon Phantom shad on an offset hook clipped to a leadhead and started casting near the moored barges. I got a couple bites, missed a perch and then a nice pike under my feet! Following that session I decided to go at the same place today and try again. I started fishing around 14:00 and used the same lure albeit on a normal jighead as I didn't want to take any chances. I fished for hours until near dusk with only a couple subtle bites and no fish to show.. I had walked for more than a mile and I decided to make my way back for a last crack at the basin. I changed lure to a 9.5cm savagear soft 4play on a 4g jighead and as I was walking back I was making some casts only on the very likely looking spots for a fish.. As I approached a bridge with overhanging vegetation on its side (classic spot) I let a cast and worked the lure slowly back with twitches of the rod tip. I felt a take and struck on a fish. It fought well and made some good runs even though I had set the drag rather tight.. The rod was bent in a beautiful arc and after a while I managed to slip the net under a pretty pike.

Very welcome!

After that fish I reached the basin as the sunlight was fading fast. A few casts among the barges and I soon had another pike on, this one was  bigger but as it was caught close in it came up faster (and greener!). A couple photos and the fish was back.
I persisted a while longer but only got some tentative perch-bites without hooking the culprit and as it was really dark by now, I decided to call it a day..

Bad photo but beautiful pike.

Menacing look!

This was my first successful session for a while and even though the fish weren't huge, they did make my rod bend and the reel sing.. A sound I had almost forgotten!
As I mentioned above the perch have been tricky to locate and very finicky. They haven't shoaled up properly yet and I can only get individual fish here and there. Dropshot still remains the most effective method but small paddletails on a slow retrieve with plenty of pauses and twitches do well too. Barges and boats are the best 'features' to work around and most of the quality fish come at dusk and even after the light is gone especially in areas with artificial lighting. I had good results on the dropshot with white Storm Wildeye Finesse minnows and on jigging with Dragon Reno killers.

Among the barges..

Battle-scarred!

Well hopefully I will have some better sessions soon as I'm looking on trying some other areas and different presentations. The pike seem obliging though so I might target them more seriously on my next outings..

Tight lines!

Gear used.
Rod: Major Craft KG Evolution KGS-832ST 2.53m, 3-15g and Awa Shima Qlite spin, 1-5g, 2.40m
Reel: Shimano Stradic Ci4 2500f and Mitchell Mag pro 1000
Mainline: Spiderwire Ultracast Fluorobraid 10lbs, YGK nitlon DFC fluoro leader 10lb and 35cm Knot2Kinky 6lb trace, Toray Bottom Attacker fluorocarbon 3lbs
Lures: Savagear soft 4play, Dragon Phantom, Dragon Reno Killer, Storm Wildeye Finesse minnow.

Finally some fishing!

Its been a few weeks that I have returned back to the UK now and I have been aching to go fishing, but couldn't do so as I was kept busy by other things that needed my attention.. Yesterday though, I got my rod licence in my hands and having already signed up for the Lancaster canal fishery membership, I was off back to my old jaunts.. I chose my UL dropshoting gear as I was gonna be targeting perch. The weather was fair with no wind and temperature around 6 C.
I started with a Sworming Hornet Dropshot fish head and a slim 3" soft bait and after only a couple casts I had a fish on! It was only a small jack but very welcome nonetheless..

Full of dead leaves..

The little jack

Lure mounted on dropshot fish head.

Unfortunately this was not the positive sign I thought, as after the little jack I couldn't get any more bites. I changed lure to an LFT Live baby shad and after moving along the canal, managed to get a few tentative bites which I missed as I reacted too fast. A couple casts later and I got a little perch..

This was proving a tough session with the fish being extremely finicky and scattered throughout the area I was fishing. More over I saw no signs of hunting activity or fry.
The sun was going down and after another change of lure to a Jackall super pin tail, I got a proper bite and after a short tussle I brought a better perch up.

Seems to have been on a diet..

I had to wrap the session up as I had some obligations but I didn't mind as I didn't blank and I will be coming back very soon..
I was very surprised with the lack of more and bigger fish but I think that they haven't yet settled to the 'winter mode', meaning shoaling up and frequenting only a few areas with usually deeper water.
The finicky bites may mean that I will have to experiment with other lures and presentations but that's what I love about lure fishing!

Thanks for reading and all the best for the winter season!


Gear used:
Rod: Awa Shima Qlite spin, 1-5g, 2.40m
Reel: Mitchell Mag Pro 1000
Mainline: Toray Bottom Attacker Fluorocarbon, 3lbs
Rig: dropshot
lure: various

Catch up.

I have been very busy lately making several trips to both sea and freshwater for my fishing. The results haven't been anything out of the ordinary but it was good to revisit my old marks and see how they fish.
I went back to the Thisavros dam for perch fishing and this time I was hoping for some better numbers of bigger fish.. Reaching my spot I saw zero surface activity but was confident that the fish would be there. I decided to start with 5cm paddletails on a 4g weedguard jighead in order to cover ground and find the fish. After several casts and without even a nibble I was getting concerned but the presence of baitfish gave me confidence that there was something there. A couple more casts and I felt a single tap but didn't strike, retrieving a bit I felt a solid take and I struck into a good fish. After a good fight I managed to land a beautiful perch estimated around 700g. I kept fishing after the first fish hoping there would be more of a similar size, but even though I changed various lures and techniques including dropshot, cranckbaits, cicadas/blade baits and spin-tails, I  could only get smaller perch. As it got darker I packed up and headed home.

The largest perch.

cicadas seem to work well on the smaller ones..

Spintails are very useful in deep waters.

After the perch I concentrated  on my usually short light rock fishing  sessions. I have really been obsessed with lrf and seeing that I'm not gonna have many opportunities for saltwater fishing in the winter I have been making the most of it.. I concentrated on already familiar grounds and as usual got plenty of beautiful little predators. Cannot fault tiny 1" curly tails on #10 jigheads and straight lures on mini carolina, mounted on #12-10 slim offset hooks.

A nice-size painted comber.

Tiny creatures are very good for large-mouth species.

A hungry rock goby.

Stunning Scorpionfish..

Tiny baby groupers are common in rocky areas under the boulders.

Greater weevers are sure to come from the sand!

Beautiful and predatory rainbow wrasse.

Very sharp teeth!

A nice goby.

Ornate wrasse.

Five-spotted wrasse are hard fighters  despite their small size..

Two banded bream.

One of a few blennies I caught, they like very tiny lures,,

Annular sea bream..

The last days before my return to the UK were spent targeting the pike on my local canal. The fish were small (jacks) but I caught and lost a few, really enjoying myself in the process. Unfortunately the canal is regularly fished by netting hence the lack of larger fish, but I was happy to see that at least the pike were still there... I caught mostly on spinnerbaits and spinners as the pike were very aggressively feeding in order to fatten up for winter.

Very promising if only it wasn't netted...

A typical stretch.

C&R always..

Well that was the last of my fishing in Greece and I'm going back to the UK now. I had a superb time on my holidays and even though I didn't target the 'monsters of the deep' or devoted as much time to fishing as I imagined, still I fill like I recharged my batteries and I'm full of good memories.
Now I hope to meet again with the pike and perch of the Lancaster canal and maybe some other targets as well...

Thanks for reading and tight lines!

Gear used.
Rods:Major Craft KG Evolution KGS-832ST 2.53m, Major craft Solpara SPS-S792M (7'9", 0.5g-5g), Tica Seha Graphite, 2.70m, 1/4oz-1/2oz.
Reel:Shimano Stradic Ci4 2500f , Tica Libra 2500fd, Shimano Stradic X GTM 4000.
Mainline: Spiderwire Ultracast Fluorobraid 10lbs-YGK nitlon DFC fluoro leader 12lb, Toray Bawo Upgrade Fluorocarbon, 3.9lbs, Daiwa Tournament 8 braid 12lbs-Dragon 20lbs Titanium trace.
rigs:various
Lures: various