Diary of a Thames Fisherman

I went barons ponds for a float fishing session this week. I have neglected fishing this way the past few years due to my pursuit of Thames barbel, however my intention is to keep myself sane by having a few sessions with the feeder and float rods to catch a few in between my barbel fishing. I took a drive down to the lakes on the wedsnesday to have a look around as I hadnt been to the lakes in around a year. There were 3 people fishing so a quick chat to them revealed a few nice roach were being caught but not many carp. I walked around both lakes and saw plenty of fish moving about, and plenty of areas with fish bubbling up from routing around on the bottom. I sat in one swim for about 20mins and saw enough for me to give it a look the next day, plenty of fish bubbling up the bottom in several areas of the swim. On my arrival the following morning, Im glad to say the fish were still all over the swim, with more being up cruising around the surface than bubbling up the b

Due to some new restrictions put on the app I use to update my blog I have had to create a new whole new one with a new email address. You can read all my old blog posts at http://www.tonusstonus.blogspot.com  although this page will not be updated from now on. I have also created a facebook page - https://www.facebook.com/DiaryofaThamesFisherman Please feel free to join the page and add comments or your own blog entries and fishing pictures. tight lines....

Today was my first session out in a few months. I decided last minute to chuck the gear in the car for an afterwork session as the temperatures had been around 1º for the past 3 days and then there was a sudden temp increase up to 10º for a couple of days so I thought this could trigger a brief feeding spell. I fished the same area as where I lost the fish at the beginning of the season. I decided on just one rod, fishing in a semi slack area off the main flow. Its around 10ft deep here normally, however the river was carrying an extra foot or so of water causing it to come up over the bank. I had seen some posts online that the water temps earlier in the week had been 3.8º so upon arrival I took the temp which showed around 4.7º so the increase in air temp had definately made a slight difference to the water temps after only 12hours. Upon arrival there were 2 guys just packing up. A brief chat revealed they had just one fish, a sea trout. This area of the Thames is extremely popular,

I have not been out fishing for a while, but was recently looking through some photos and having a play around with them in photoshop and an app on my phone.

After my determined start to the season, renewing tackle, plans etc I seem to have fallen into a severe lack of motivation when it comes to actually getting out and putting the time in. Work and my family play a big part in the amount of fishing I do, so its not always easy to get out when the conditions suit, more a case of going when I have the chance whatever the conditions and deciding what to fish for based on when im going. Losing the only fish I had hooked in a long time then losing it to tackle failure didnt help my cause either!! I have had a couple of sessions out since my last blog entry, both after barbel, both were when the river was carrying extra water from the rain, and both resulted in the same result.......BLANK. I like to keep in touch with whats going on at the river, whats being caught, conditions etc, but as I now live further away its not always easy for me to get there to check, as I used to drive and walk the river a couple of times a week checking on areas / s

I was going to take my barbel rods for this weeks after work session, but decided instead to grab my lure bag and take wander along a stretch I hadnt fished before. Lure fishing the stretch offers me a few benefits, one of which is I can obviously target pike and perch with lures. However is also offers me the chance to map out the water fairly quickly, by regular casting from each swim with lures you will very quickly establish snags, weed and depth of water. Once I have found areas I think I would fish for carp or barbel, I will clip on a lead and map the area out in my head then later on a note pad or a google earth print out. So I chose a favourite Thames lure of mine, the spinnerbait. These spinnerbaits are brilliant on the thames for working close in around the cabbage weeds. The design of them means they rarely snag, and the blades really throb on the retrieve, creating alot of vibration through the water, and the pike that sit in and around the cabbage weed, attack these lure

Summer holidays are here and with came the promise to take my nephews and son fishing again. I chose somewhere different from the last trip out. The spot needed 2 things, 1, be flat and comfortable to minimse the kids falling! 2, have a decent depth close in to target smaller fish on the whip. I arrived at my chosen area shortly after 11am to find most of the area taken. The guys to the left had rods out on buzzers, and the guy to the right was float fishing. I dropped in between them having more than enough water out in from of me. Plumbing the depth I had about 7ft at my feet, and about 8ft further out. I set up a 3 and 4mtr whip, the 4mtr fished with a 4no4 stick float set just off the bottom in 8ft of water, with the bulk shot a foot from the hook to get the bait down quickly. The 3mtr whip was fished with the same float but this rig was set about 4foot deep and the shotting spread equally down the line to create a slower fall and to target fish up in the water. A tin of hemp and 2

I went into this weeks session quite confident, the river was still carrying extra from all the rain we have been getting in the south (3 months of rain and still a hose pipe ban, whats that all about!?!?) I decided to concentrate my efforts on an area just downstream of a weir. The main flow was pushing through nicely, and I finally settled on an area of slack water and fished 2 rods in the crease. I was fishing just my side of the white water in the above photo. Fishing this way you are fishing right on the edge of the main flow, so you dont need as much lead to hold bottom, 3oz leads were being bounced along in the main flow and coming to rest just on the edge, this is the area that any food will gather that is being washed downstream. I fished both rods in this spot, one with 2 x 11mm pellets, the other with a glugged boilie. Around an hour late the boilie rod (fished slight downstream) absolutely ripped off, as is always the case, I had my back to rod at the time answering the ca

My first session of the new season wasnt how I expected it to be. I had planned on it being an evening with barbel rods, but for the first week or so the river thames was really pushing through with all the rain we have had. Opening weekend I booked the 16th off work, having promised my nephew a day out fishing, but the weather had the river pushing through way too quick to be able to set up most of the way down the lower. I made excuses not to get out before now, the football was on (england v ukraine, euro2012) The next session I had been suffering from a head ache for about 3 days, so decided to sleep instead!!! So anyway, back to today. The sun was out and the river had lost quite a bit of its pace and colour, so a quick call had my nephew all excited about fishing for the first time this year. A quick trip to the tackle shop, and nearly a fiver later for a pint and half of staines' finest maggots, we arrived at the river and were greeted by a much slower moving river tha

I have several targets this year, the first one being to catch a known carp from a local club water. The water in question is a group of 3 lakes set within national trust woodland. All 3 lakes are connected, but its the bottom lake that contains the fish im after. This fish is known as a Leney carp, an extract taken from carp wiki - The Leney Strain of carp is named after early Carp stocking pioneer Donald Leney who originally stocked the correctly titled 'Galician' strain into many waters. These waters such as Redmire and Savay went on to contain some of the most sought after and sizeable fish to swim in British Waters.Famous Leney record carp include the mighty Clarissa, Dick Walker's early record, and later on the Bishop, Chris Yate's famous record smashing UK fifty. The fish im after is pictured above. It is a fish thats caught in the high 20s to low 30s. The lake does not look at all easy, the fish are regularly seen up in the water and right in the edge. Th

Barons ponds are 2 small lakes set in Liss, Hampshire. They are run by MBK fisheries both lakes are well stocked with carp to over 20lb, crucians and some big roach and rudd, aswell as some large perch. My first session here was a late afternoon session from 1530 until 2100. I decided that as it had been so long since I had used a float rod I would stick with the pellet waggler for today. I chose to fish one of the swims against the island because when I had arrived there were a few fish topping in the area, and I could see a few carp cruising slowing about the island. Setting up my proton 12ft float rod (this is a rod made by sundridge) its about 15+yrs old and perfect for this style of fishing. The rod was couple with my ever reliable shimano stradic 3000 and 4lb line. The rig was simple, a 6gr pellet float locked in place by 4ssg and a couple of bb's either side. Hooklength is a daiwa tdr rig line in 4lb tied with a knotless knot to a barbless drennan size 14.

My preparations this year have seen me conpletely sort out all my coarse fishing gear. Having not fished with a float or feeder rod for about 2 years I decided this year I would do more of it. First up was putting all my gear into my new korum all rounder holdall. This really is a brilliant bag for the general coarse fisherman, it has a massive main compartment, big enough to hold reels, bait, large fox box, feeder bag plus more. 2 end pockets for catapults, rod rest heads etc, a long zipped pocket big enough to take my boss bait table, and finally a net pocket which hold my keepnet and 2 landing nets. For £30 you really are getting alot of bag for the money and the quality of it is brilliant. Once I had sorted all my gear into a pile I decided to go through it before putting it in its new home and sort out the stuff that needed replacing or stuff I didnt need anymore. I managed to sort out my feeders and I had a surplus of about 30!! So these were sold off. Next up was new li