With my club lake closed for maintenance (and spawning if the weather ever warms up enough), it was bank holiday Friday, so time to head back down to my local day-ticket water, Willow Park Fishery, to see if my luck was still holding. The session started very slow, but by late evening I'd managed a couple of small stockies followed by a nice common of around 17 to 18lbs. I'd seen pictures earlier on Thursday of a target fish that came out to James Anderson in a tutorial, at a current weight of 29lb 4oz – it looked mint. It’s not been out for a while, so it was good to see it doing so well.
Night time came with nothing much happening, rain followed by clear skies, and a savage temperature drop meant lots of ice, and not much else. Apart from a couple of single bleeps the night passed with little excitement, well, apart from a little mouse stealing boilies and hiding them in the back of my D-Ploy.
Early morning came and bite time passed with just another stockie to show for my efforts, so I took the time to help a couple of guys on the lake, and enjoyed a breakfast at the on-site cafe. I was back to my swim just after lunch with a full belly and the sun high in the sky, it was time to get the rods out and see if I could tempt one of the big commons again. A little underarm flick to the snag feeling the lead down and bang, the rod was being pulled out of my hand. What seemed like ten seconds of panic and trying to stop it going into the snag ended in a hook pull, gutted.
Time passed with several cups of coffee but there was still no movement in the bay at all. Fish seemed to have moved to open water, and noticeably, to a fly hatch right out in the middle. All the swims with access to that area had been taken, so it was ‘sit on my hands’ and work with what water I had.
Well, it paid off, as a slow take had me locked in a solid battle with a fish that would not let me get its head up, trying to find any twig or snag to deprive me of my capture. Some 15 minutes later a mint 21lb 5oz common was in the net. It had the most enormous set of pectoral fins and a tail suitable for a fish twice its size – no wonder the battle was so good. Once on the mat I checked for marks or hook holds and the fish was scale perfect, possibly the best common I'd had from the venue in 5 years of fishing there.
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With another quiet night passing and no fish, I went back to helping others on the lake and my second Willow Park breakfast. I left a couple of guys who asked for help with four good baited areas and the chance of their first fish from the big lake. I headed home in the hope of a message they had had something, and my nice warm bed of course. At 8am in the morning the message came through, not only had they had their first fish, but they had banked a stunning 21lb fully-scaled mirror. After two years of fishing the Big Lake on and off they had finally got what they were after – helping others can be so rewarding, and this weekend it really was.
