Having dropped my daughter off at the railway station for her early morning train, I headed for Staffordshire. Grayling were the target again and my venue the small Dove tributary that I'd had so much success on in the past. .Got to the venue shortly after 0800 hrs and was fishing half an hour later. Tackle was simple - my 11' Drennan Ultralite float rod, Speedia centrepin loaded with 3lb line, a wire-stemmed stickfloat and a size 16 Drennan widegape at the business end, baited with two maggots.
Second trot down the first shallow run the float buried and I felt the mad thumping, twisting and gyrating of a grayling on the end of the line, not a biggie, but always good to get that first fish of the day. After that it was non-stop. There seemed to be fish in every riffle, run, glide, pool, nook and cranny! Most were clean, young fish in the 25-30 cm bracket, with just a handful displaying signs of attention from predatory birds - one with a stab wound and few more with classic "grab" marks on the flanks.
Made my way slowly downstream, working the float, holding back then running through, and constantly changing depth to search each new spot. By the time I stopped for lunch I had landed over 60 fish, but had only got a fraction of the way down the section. Was just finishing off my coffee when I got a text from my lad with the results of his driving test. Not one to waste any words, it just read "I passed"! Couldn't help having a chuckle to myself before carrying on downstream.
Skipped a few swims in order to give myself time to fish a pool where I'd had some nice dace and a few chub in the past. However, got there to find a large tree trunk wedged at the head of the run. The majority of the pool was still fishable, but the the tree had deflected the flow and changed the swim's characteristics. The first few trots down resulted in more grayling, including what would probably would have been my biggest - one of only a few that had come off during the course of the day. It was only as the light was beginning to fade and as I was trotting down the crease next to a a bit of a slack next to the bank that I eventually had something different in the shape of a couple of small chub and the same number of perch. Had one last grayling before snapping my hook off in the landing net taking my total to 83, by far the best session I've had at the venue. The light wasn't far off going completely at this stage, so I made my way back to the car, a bit tired but looking forward to celebrating with the lad (#mumanddadsnewtaxi!).
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