Ancient Lakes, finicky takes & a few mistakes.
Early on in the year I travelled to the Midlands to try for a variety of species with the help of good friend Nick Rose, one of the species I caught on that weekend was not a target and although I got it I really didn't want to count it. The fish was a small Zander caught in a canal and the reason for my reluctance to include it within the challenge was that I had already been offered a trip to try for a personal best Zander for my charity challenge later in the year. So although I had put the little Zander on the gallery I had always hoped to replace it with a proper Zander and even better a personal best. Before I knew it the day of the Zander trip had arrived, and good friend Steve McDonald had kindly offered me an all expenses paid trip to Old Bury Hill Fisheries in Dorking in support of my challenge. I have really wanted to fish this 200 year old estate lake ever since I first witnessed it on one of angling legend, John Wilsons programs, all these ancient lakes have an air of mystery and legend. The other issue that really excited me was to try Zander fishing on a Stillwater, I have had them from canals and rivers but never a Stillwater so there was lots to look forward too. Steve Mac had, had his first and only Zander at this very lake 16 years previously so the trip would add a touch of nostalgia for him and give him a chance to reacquaint himself with the lakes Zs. The trip was only a day after I returned from the Midlands, and that great trip courtesy of Carl and Wendy, this meant I dropped one lot of tackle in the house and grabbed another set. Steve Mac had planned to pick me up at 7.30am to get to the lake for midday and be fishing by 13.00, he had negotiated with the owner for us to stay on the fishery until 21.00. With the Zander being largely a nocturnal feeder we would be fishing a prime time, we were staying over in a hotel and if it didn't go well on the first session we had scope to stay until lunchtime Tuesday for another attempt. The morning dawned with a thick mist and light drizzle, Steve picked me up on schedule and we started the long trip to Dorking, the mist followed us for the duration of the trip. We reached the venue and entered the drive, the long estate road was shrouded in thick woods and this combined with the low light, mist and drizzle it felt very like a Hammer Horror. This feeling was increased further as we past the huge old estate house and entered the fishery carpark, a cabin sat on the edge of the road housed a tackle shop and a chap called Dave. We parked up and sidled over for a chat with Dave, he gave us a wealth of information on the lake, and what to use and where to use it, he even made us a cuppa while we sat and explained my challenge. Like so many times on this adventure I have been fortunate to meet so many wonderful people, and although some may be strangers they have gone out of their way to help me get the target, Dave was indeed such a character. With more information than we would ever need, rigs and baits sorted it was time to head off and get started. My first look at the old lake was just how I imagined, a truly ancient sheet of water that has given 200 years of angling history to several generations of anglers, I felt privileged to enjoy the same experience. The lake was typical of an old estate lake, huge island, thick lush woods adorning the shorelines and the boathouse, although this was in the process of being converted to a dwelling for the owner.
The birdlife was abundant and just walking to the swim, Ducks, Heron, Coots, Moorhen and Egyptian Geese all made their presence known, its amazing just how much a new bird call stands out from those you hear more regularly. We reached the double swim suggested by Dorking Dave, who was actually from Kent and set up the tackle, I opted for the left hand side after spotting the snaggy margins that would surely contain some big predators.
The rods and stands were assembled and it was now I realised I hadn't picked up my rod pod or more importantly my rollover indicators, the indicators are perfect for these resistance shy fish. This vexed me considerably and I paced around scratching my head for a while until one of the remaining cells fired up and delivered a cunning plan, I used a couple of red foam balls that I use for popping up deadbaits with a hook to hang on the line. This made a super sensitive bobbin and although when these were combined with the wonky storm poles looked naff but I knew it would work, a carp angler would have been pulling their hair out. Steve's set up was just as awkward and strangely sported the same type of bobbin, if only the fairy liquid bottle top was still available.
My left hand rod was a free running rig with a wire trace and size 6 barbless hook baited with a Lamprey section, the Lamprey is an eel like fish that sucks blood from a host fish and is basically like a swimming black pudding, although more grey. It does contain large amounts of blood and that attracts any predatory fish so the Zander should home in on it, the second rod was baited with Roach section. The Lamprey was cast left towards the tree line and the Roach straight out towards the middle of the bay, Steve done the same but with Smelt section and a small chunk of Sprat. It was now a case of sitting back and hoping we could nick a bonus fish before the evening witching hour arrived, the overcast skies did still give us half a chance. My left hand rod alarm screamed as the bobbin flew to the top and jammed against the rod, I struck but connected with thin air, the bait was re-cast and I sat back down. It was only 20 minutes later and the same rod was beeping again as a steady climb of the bobbin indicated something had grabbed the bait. I struck to the right, away from the treeline and the rod immediately bent over and line started to pour from the spool as the fish powered towards the centre of the lake. The fish seemed too strong for a Zander and now changed direction back towards the snaggy sunken trees, I put as much pressure as I could but not only did it not stop it , the fish took even more line. Eventually the fish won the day and made it to the trees, now I could feel the grating line and the branches furthest out were shaking indicating the fish was stuck. Steve headed off into the overgrowth brandishing the net, after 5 minutes of jungle warfare he got to the waters edge, the fish however was still a long way out. Steve shouted through the darkness of the undergrowth " its a good Zander", darn it, I sort of hoped it wasn't what I was after as the fish was surely lost. The fish sensing Steve had crawled within scooping range, splashed frantically on the surface sending waves from the trees to the bank where I stood, I was now thinking I am going take a swim for it. Then the fish popped the hook free and disappeared just as Steve reached the branch holding it in place, he shouted those sickening words " its gone mate"! I immediately pulled for a break knowing the fish was gone, and stood staring into the now calm waters surface rueing the fact I had swapped from my 3lb TC rods with 8010 baitrunners to my 2lb TC rods with smaller baitrunners. I just know a more powerful rod could have stopped that fish. I had felt they would have been to OTT for the type of Zandering I was doing, anyway chalk that up to experience. I set up again but instead of wire went with 45lb quicksilver trace, mainly because I had no Dorking Dave traces left and I've always done fine with quicksilver, I did however cast further away from the tree line to give myself a better chance. During the course of the afternoon I had several takes on Roach deadbaits all on the quicksilver traces, I only managed to connect with one fish that managed to spit the hook fairly quickly, Steve's rods on the wire trace remained still. It had got to about 5pm when one of Steve's rods signalled a steady take and he was hooked into a Zander, his first one for 16 years.
With the photos done I was bemused as to why I had got so many aborted or dropped takes, the bobbin was really light and I was on it before it reached the rod butt, I then thought about my Eel angling. When I first started eeling I used light leads, less than an ounce and as the fish moved off with the bait the lighter leads used to move slightly changing the lines resistance, this was then very often dropped. Here I was in the same situation, fishing light leads for a resistance savvy fish, I changed my leads over to 2oz on run rings to allow easy passage of the line. The twighlight had arrived and it was now feeling like the witching hour, this would be the period the Zander should start to prowl.
The next take I had was to a freshly cast bait and I had reduced the bait size to just a small Roach head, this was hooked through the mouth and up out of the nose. I cast, set the bobbin, then sat in the chair as instantly the bobbin began to rise steadily having no time to relax I was instantly ready with the strike, which resulted in a strong fish pulling back. The fish also tried for the tree line but I wasn't falling for that again and applied maximum pressure, this changed the fish's mind and direction. Now it headed over towards Steve's lines as if to teach me another lesson, fortunately it was by now up on the surface and no harm was done, Steve done a great job of netting the fish. With the fish unhooked I could have a decent look at this wonderfully adapted night predator, its eyes glowed bright red in headlight and the multiple fangs glistened as a warning to anyone getting to close. This lovely Zander was now my fourth personal best fish species, in the last 3 trips, highlighting what had been a wonderful couple of weeks fishing.
Its a shame that night time photos are never as good as the daylight ones and where Zander are concerned they really don't do this beautiful species justice, it does highlight their super reflective eye shine. We kept the fish upright in the net close to the margins, to let it recover fully, like a lot of predators they may seem tough but the truth is they are fairly fragile and need to be handled carefully. Within minutes Steve's rod was away as another Zander struck out in the darkness, this was another good fish but the barbless hook came free and the fish was gone. It was now 19.30 and there was a lot of activity out on the lake with Carp crashing in the back bay, Zander striking fry on the surface and the deep screech of a departing Heron, I love night fishing, its when the intrusion of man recedes in favour of the creatures of the night. Suddenly my right hand rod was lit up as the bite alarm burst into life, the indicator climbed as the Zander took the bait, I stuck hard, only for the spool to whirl violently, I hadn't disconnected the baitrunner before striking, text book bad angling! That cost me a Zander for sure and I reeled in the baitless hook, as Steve shook his head in disapproval, and rightly so I may add, I should have known better. I re-cast a new bait and as I set the bobbin the left hand rod beeped causing me to jump, however as I was stood by the rod I wasn't going to miss this time and sure enough I had another fish on. This one was only a small one and we quickly netted it, I thought I would grab a quick picture but as Steve took the first picture my other rod went again, I instantly released the first fish but in the few seconds that took, I missed the second fish.
Despite fishing next to each other and using the same baits and virtually the same rigs, I was getting a lot more takes, the only difference was I had quicksilver and Steve had wire. We fished on to around 20.30 and I had packed up my alarms having just a rod on the platform when I noticed the spool spinning wildly, another take that I managed to miss. That was the first session done and dusted and I could certainly have done without the school boy errors, but we achieved what we set out to achieve, so happy days. That evening it was a celebratory Chinese meal and a few beers, that's two celebratory Chinese meals in a week I could get used to this, I guess it will be vegetables and salads for a few weeks now!
With the Zander session yielding a result we decided to try another lake on the complex, Milton Lake, this smaller water had several nice Crucian Carp and even the possibility of a Ruffe. We left the Dorking Travel Lodge at 6.30am stopping for a quick bacon baguette on route then it was off to the lakes. Dorking Dave didn't work on Tuesdays but fortunately another helpful chap was in the cabin to offer advice on the new lake, it appeared that the fishing was tricky and we would need to scale down. We grabbed some maggots and headed off for the 15 minute walk over to Milton Lake, this more recent water looked like a perfect Crucian Carp water with thick lily beds dotted randomly across the whole lake. The early morning mist rose from the lakes surface similar to a recently run bath, a moorhen called out in its gurgling shriek, it was a lovely morning to be out by a lake.
I set up next to a large bed of lily's and my rig was a fine float coupled with a 2lb hook to nylon with a size 18 hook, baited with a tiny cube of luncheon meat, Steve went similar but tried the maggots. This lake also had some incumbent water birds and none were more spectacular than the spectacular Kingfisher, although the bird didn't come over to us I managed to use the zoom to get a few shots of this most handsome of anglers.
Another of this lakes inhabitants that I simply had to take a picture of ,was an Egyptian Goose much better looking than the monotone Canadian honking grass gobbling goose. There were many of these Geese at the complex and to me somewhat like the Coot there is a large degree of novelty, even more amazing was the flock of Green Parrots that flew over us, didn't manage to get a photo of them though.
I had been steadily feeding the swim micro pellet, chopped meat and corn and finally tiny pin bubbles started to rise close to the float, any bite now would need to be taken seriously. Then the float lifted flat and slid slowly away, I struck and felt the fish for an all to brief second, then it was gone, the only evidence a cloud of slowly rising silt and a shaking lily leaf. An hour then elapsed and I felt I had missed the opportunity, Steve however was getting a Perch a cast and I thought it was time to try a few maggots. As soon as the maggots reached the lake bed they were gobbled up by the feisty Perch, still good fun when things had been so quiet and there was always the chance of a Daddy Ruffe.
After catching several Perch I caught a couple of Roach but still none of the species I was after, the lake was strangely quiet and with the sun out it had become quite hot.
The great thing about being at the waters edge is there's always something to sit and watch and while sat there Dragonfly's would approach and hover perfectly still like a biological Apache Helicopter, I really wanted to capture that amazing sight but every reach for the camera sent them darting away. I did manage a few shots but these were blurry until I altered the shutter speed, still couldn't get the shot I wanted though. The time reached midday and that was our cut off to ensure we cleared the M25 in plenty of time, so it was a quick pack up and hit the road. It had been a thoroughly enjoyable couple of days and I cant thank Steve McDonald enough, for his generous support and excellent company, we achieved the main objective but the Crucian eluded me. So to answer my friend Simon Ward's question from the last blog, see I do blank mate! Next weekend I am off to Scotland for our friends wedding and unless there's Salmon on the menu I am not going to see any fish, time is running out now so I need to try and squeeze a few more trips in somewhere.
