Monday 15 September 2014

Koi Pool....The Return

I fancied something a bit different, something I don’t fish for very often, and after a visit to the Koi Pool a couple of weeks back to show dad around, my mind was made up. I booked the Friday off work in the hope it might be quieter, when I pulled up and found I was the only one there I was bouncing.

The Bottom Bay
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The owner told me of someone who had recently caught some good perch, showed me the spot and left me to it. Float fishing prawns I caught 2 eels first, horrible things when you’re using fine lines, and how they swallowed those big prawns I’ll never know. Anyhow, the next cast after releasing a slimy resulted in the float dipping practically as soon as it hit the water, but this was no eel.



As it rolled on top for the first time, I shook a bit, spluttered something I shouldn’t repeat and reached for the net with a trembling arm. It went in first try and sat still in the edge whilst I readied the scales and camera. A little early to kick of this season’s perch campaign, but welcome nonetheless, and a little cracker at 2lb 2oz.

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I fished on in the same spot a little while longer, but after two more eels I decided to up sticks and stalk something bright and flashy. The koi in the pool are crazy, all sorts of colours and quite impressive looking, they go to over twenty pounds too. The water coloured which made spotting them tricky, but not impossible. I found some under some surface scum in a corner that had gathered with the wind, tail patterns and a swirl or two gave them away.

I fed a small amount of pellets into the corner and set my float to 18 inches depth, attached a chunk of meat to the hook and swung it gently into place. After a few minutes the float dipped and sailed away, I found myself connected to my first koi of the day.

They don’t fight like regular carp, no fast long charges, but more akin to very large carp, ploughing around deep and ponderously but keeping it up for eternity. Finally the big goldfish surfaced and I managed to slip the net under without too much fuss. These fish aren’t so well behaved on the bank either, but I still got a self take away.

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The other thing I’ve noticed with koi is that they are very spooky, a heavy foot and bow waves leave your bank, and when you hook one the spot is rendered useless for the foreseeable. With this in mind I left the corner and moved on. Further round is the spot I caught my first fish from there, which was a koi with a red tint of around 7lbs. As I approached and cautiously looked into the margin I spotted two fish and retreated to get things ready.

With everything set I crept up to the edge of the water on my hands and knees and sprinkled some pellets into the pool from an inch above the surface so to avoid any commotion. Once the bait was in place I fetched the rod and lowered the baited hook onto the spot. I watched as the fish moved in, clouds of silt appeared and tails began waving as they fed. The float was being knocked all over the place, but I waited until it buried properly, and then all hell broke loose.

I said before that these fish don’t run, but this one thought it was a wildie, stripping yards of 4lb line from the centrepin. Luckily there is a minimum of snags in the pool, I let it get the lunges out of its system and finally saw my quarry. It was quite large, I estimated it to be upper doubles, and I sighed with relief when she eventually slid into the net.

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After that fish was returned I got back to the perch spot and was visited by my friends Dave and Tony briefly. I went on to catch more eels but no perch, when my buddies left I got back to the stalking. Each of the further 6 koi I caught were caught in an identical way to the first, so I won’t go over it all again. It was a blinding day, all alone at the pool just the way I like it. I can’t wait to get back there.

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