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Fishery Reports

February 2024

The sport has continued to be excellent through February with the fish being very active indeed due to lower water temperatures and high oxygen content of the lakes. Plenty of fish could be seen in the surface layers, which enabled those that wanted to, to stalk fish, but the lower light levels and the angle of the Sun did make stalking tricky at times. Stalking and spotting fish was also hampered by the continual heavy rain showers we had through the month, which did mean the lakes were holding some colour. Everything seems to be springing into life and plants can be seen shooting up all around the fishery, even the bluebells in the woodland, and the birds are definitely more vocal in the mornings. In general it’s been a very mild month due to the low pressure systems that keep rolling in off the Atlantic.

The majority of the fish caught fell to flies fished in the upper layers of the water as most fish seemed to be holding in the top 4ft or so. Due to the colour in the water, bigger and brighter flies took more fish than smaller natural imitations. As is usual at this time of year the fish are very active so a faster or twitchy retrieve often brought follows or takes.

John Pike had the biggest Brown of the month with a lovely fish of 8lb, Andy also had a good Brown of 5lb which he caught along with a 10lb 8oz Rainbow and Neil Mundy managed to target a fine 9lb Rainbow in difficult conditions. Season rod Don Penrose topped his bag one day with a 7lb Rainbow and day angler Ed Blanchard did the same to top off his 4 fish limit. Aaron House bagged a fin perfect 9lb 7oz Rainbow on a 2 fish ticket, Jon caught a fine 9lb Rainbow on his first visit to the fishery and season rods Andy and Jolene both bagged 8lb Rainbows. Jason Greenwood had a fin perfect 9lb Rainbow, Peter Gifford and Adrian Rees both had 8lb+ Rainbows and season rod Lenny had his personal best Rainbow of 8lb 6oz. The session of the month must have been season rod Martin Hill when he banked Rainbows of 8lb, 8lb 8oz, 9lb 8oz and 10lb 8oz all caught on a new pattern that Martin had tied up the day before and fished deep to shapes sitting 4 to 5ft down.

The catch and release option on Oak, Pine and Spring Lakes has proved very popular with lots of anglers catching over 10 fish in a session. Indicator fishing proved the most productive method in the second half of the month. This has now finished and hopefully we’ll bring it back again next winter.

As with January lures and larger nymphs have been the order of the day fished on a fairly fast retrieve; blue flash damsels, montanas, cats whiskers, dancers, goldhead fritz or epoxy minnows are better in the morning with smaller more discreet patterns in the afternoons and on clearer water days.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery

January 2024

On the whole January was very mild, especially the very start of the month when we had more Atlantic low pressure systems roll in bringing yellow and amber warnings of rain. Our chalk stream was about the highest I’d ever seen it and the Hampshire Avon, into which it flows, recorded its highest ever level. We then had a very cold period of a week or so with temperatures down to -8 Degrees Celsius, which caused some of our lakes to ice over for a couple of days. But the temperatures soon returned to above average, over a 24 hour period the temperature went from -7 to +12, a difference of 19 Degrees Celsius! Despite this the fishing remained excellent with most anglers catching their bag limit easily on all manner of flies and tactics. Anglers on the new catch and release ticket have enjoyed some excellent sport with most catching between 10 and 20 fish. Fishing flies static under an indicator proved very successful two anglers who had 18 each on an afternoon session.

Plenty of bigger specimens have been caught with season rod Andy Toomer taking Rainbows of 8lb, 9lb and 9lb 7oz, youngster George had a lovely conditioned 8lb 8oz Rainbow and Phil caught a torpedo shaped Rainbow that fought incredibly hard of 7lb 8oz. Steve Vine had two 8lb+ Rainbows, Peter Chapman caught one of 8lb also and Richard Timson had a cracker of a Rainbow at just under 10lb! Day angler Bob Nunn had a good brace with Rainbows of 8lb 12oz and 9lb, Tony caught a stunning Sparctic Trout of 7lb and Malcolm Proctor landed a fin perfect 9lb Rainbow. Ian had a very good brace of a 8lb 8oz Rainbow and a 8lb Sparctic, Bob Tennuci had a lovely silvery Rainbow of 9lb 8oz from Oak and season rod Neil Perry had a fin perfect specimen of 8lb. Terry Shergold had a beautiful Brown on 4lb 2oz, season rod John Otter kicked off his new ticket with a fine 9lb 8oz Rainbow, Jolene braced a 5lb 4oz Sparctic and a 9lb Rainbow and Rob Perry braced Rainbows of 9lb and 11lb 4oz.

Brighter lures such as cats whiskers, appetisers, fritz and blobs are doing particularly well but lots of fish are still getting caught on blue flash damsels and black and green montanas. When the fish have been trickier to tempt and are shying away from lures, smaller bugs and buzzers have done well, especially ‘when all else fails’. Also fishing static under an indicator can be a deadly method.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

November and December 2023

November and December was generally very mild with plenty of rain as low pressure systems kept rolling in off the Atlantic from the South West. Hopefully all the rain we’ve had will have topped up all the chalk aquifers and provide a good flow of water in our chalk stream over the coming Spring and Summer. But we would have liked to have seen more sustained cooler periods as the continued mild weather certainly made the fishing slower than it usually would be at this time of year. As I write this in early January we’ve had more storms the past week with widespread flooding across the country and the Hampshire Avon, which is only a couple of miles away has recorded its highest level ever. A dry and cold period is now forecast and hopefully the ground will start to dry out. The mild weather has meant the snowdrops are already out around the fishery and the daffodils are shooting up higher each day, even some of the marginal vegetation is starting to show signs of life! The fish have generally been high in the water and you could often see trout rolling or moving just under the surface. But with the low light levels we have this time of year, spotting individual fish is always a challenge unless they are close to the margins.

The cooler water temperatures meant the fish fought very hard through December with long fast runs often to the backing experienced by many anglers. It is also a great time of year to fish fry patterns with a fast erratic retrieve as the fish will be chasing down and devouring this year’s juvenile roach.

The last couple of months has seen plenty of good fish caught with Rainbows, Blues, Browns and Sparctics all featuring. Season rod Andy Toomer had Rainbows of 8lb, 10lb 12oz and 13lb 7oz over three visits along with a 6lb Brown and 9lb 2oz Blue, Jolene braced Rainbows of 9lb and 11lb 5oz, Mike Jones had a 10lb 10oz Rainbow and Rob Smith had a cracking 8lb 10oz Brown. Rob Batty had an 11lb Rainbow, Derek Major had a superb 8lb Blue, season rod Steve Bayliss fin perfect 8lb and 10lb Rainbows and Graham Brown caught a fine 7lb Sparctic. Richard Callendar visited twice in two weeks and caught an 11lb+ Rainbow on each visit. Dave visited us for the first time and was awarded with a 10lb Rainbow, Adam Docherty had a great visit when he caught a 6lb Sparctic and 12lb 6oz Rainbow and David King had one of the best Blues we’ve seen with a superb fish of 10lb 8oz, which he braced with a 6lb Sparctic. Neil Evans also had a superb Blue of 9lb 12oz, Paul had a 10lb Rainbow, Mark Hope-Urwin had a 9lb Rainbow and Ruslan and Jack both had fish of 11lb. Season rod Neil Perry had a superb bag with Rainbows of 9lb, 11lb 8oz and 12lb, young Zachary caught a personal best 8lb Rainbow and Sam had a cracking Blue of 9lb 12oz after having an hours tuition. Rob Perry braced Rainbows of 9lb and 11lb 4oz, Keith Roger and Doug Shuard both had 10lb+ Rainbows and Nick Tuke had a big Rainbow of 13lb 6oz. Dave Prevett had a beautiful 8lb 4oz Brown and season rod Martin Hill had a tremendous looking Brown of 12lb 4oz!

The successful flies have remained the same with brighter lures such as cats whiskers, appetisers, fritz and blobs doing particularly well but lots of fish are still getting caught on blue flash damsels. Some days when the fish have been trickier to tempt and are shying away from lures, smaller bugs and buzzers have done well and stalking is still productive due to the fish still sitting high in the water.
That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our Facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery

 

September/October 2023

On the whole September was very mild with little rain and October was also unseasonably mild month with only a couple of frosts to speak of, we had a good helping of rain at the end of the month, which brought the level up in the chalk stream that feeds our stock ponds, which was a welcome relief for our trout! Alder, Bridge and Longacre have fished fairly well but the water temperatures were still above average, which did make the fishing tricky at time. As I write this, just over a week into November, the fishing has picked up as the water temperatures have dropped to about 11 Degrees Celsius. Oak, Pine and Spring have had to be closed due to low dissolved oxygen, which is very frustrating! The fish have been sitting high in the water and when they couldn’t be tempted on dry fly, emerger patterns fished in the top few inches often fooled them.

There have been hundreds of fish caught this month with numerous 3-5lb fish landed and a lot of big fish. The light levels were still good enough for anglers to stalk fish and this method accounted for the lion’s share of the larger fish that were caught! Big flies also proved very successful with fritz and humungous type patterns often singling out the larger specimens. As usually damsels and montanas took plenty of fish, as they usually do!

Big or notable fish from September and October

Kelvin Hinton 9lb 14oz Blue and 5lb 4 oz Sparctic
Jolene Trotter 6lb Sparctic
Andy Toomer 10lb 11oz and 10lb 8oz Rainbows
Malcolm 11lb Rainbow
Tony Roll 11lb 4oz Rainbow
Pauline Pendle 11lb 7oz Blue
Greg Sinclair13lb 6oz Rainbow
Mr Forward 12lb Rainbow
Mike Maloney 9lb 12oz Rainbow
Anthony Futer 11lb 8oz Rainbow
Neil Mundy 6lb 14oz and 9lb 8oz Blues and a 13lb Rainbow
Chris Bowling 11lb 2oz Rainbow
Graham Brown 11lb 13oz Rainbow
Peter 11lb 14oz Rainbow
Neil Perry 11lb 8oz  and 12lb Rainbows and 6lb Sparctic
Jamie 10lb 8oz Rainbow
Paul Rees 11lb 2oz Rainbow
Sasha 9lb 8oz Blue
Baz 8lb 8oz Blue
Matt Pope 10lb 12oz Rainbow
Nick Spring 8lb 12oz Rainbow
Martin Hill 10lb 8oz Rainbow
Bob Tennuci 9lb 8oz Rainbow
Ken Bithrey 11lb
John Otter 11lb 8oz and 12lb Rainbow
Steve Cox 11lb 2oz Rainbow
Mike 11lb 4oz Rainbow
Aaron House12lb 10oz Rainbow
Paul Russel 9lb 8oz Rainbow Dave Prevett 8lb 4oz Rainbow
Giordan Ricco 10lb 7oz Rainbow
George 10lb 2oz Rainbow
Chris 12lb Rainbow
Andy Banks 9lb 8oz Rainbow

Some fantastic fish have been caught I’m sure you would all agree? The fish are really starting to favour bigger and/or brighter lures with cats whiskers, appetisers, fritz, blobs and humungous all doing particularly well but lots of fish are still getting caught daddy’s (sunk and dry), sedge and blue flash damsels. When the fish have been trickier to tempt ad shying away from lures, smaller bugs and buzzers have done well, especially ‘when all else fails’.

 That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery

July/August 2023 

As is the norm with fishing in July and August, first thing in the morning or early evening is usually the most productive time, with the fish a little trickier to tempt from late morning to mid-afternoon. But there is always a way to tempt them! I see dozens of anglers come through the doors each week and although many are good anglers and very experienced, most all fish in a set way and do not adapt. Below are some ideas/tips to try and bring more success during in the tougher months.

  • Look for the fish instead of blindly casting
  • Wear polarised glasses, you’ll often see so much more
  • Don’t be in a hurry to cast out, observe the fish and maybe identify fish that look more active
  • Target individual fish or small groups and try fishing on the drop or with a slow retrieve and try to watch fish taking your fly
  • Identify patrol routes so you can intercept fish
  • Try placing you fly on the lake bed and twitching it up from the bottom as a patrolling fish comes through
  • Check al likely spots – reed and weed beds, overhanging trees, areas of movement and flow
  • Wear drab coloured clothing and move slowly around the lakes
  • Small and more imitative flies will often score well in the dog days of summer and early autumn

 

Some really good fish have been caught through July and August. Over a few trips season rod Nick Spring has taken Rainbows of 7lb, 10lb 2oz and 10lb 8oz along a with a beautiful Brown of 6lb 8oz. Another season rod that has down well in Steve Bayliss taking Rainbows of 8lb, 10lb 14oz and 12lb and Martin Hill who caught Rainbows of 8lb 12oz and 9lb 12oz along a with a superb 7lb Sparctic. Gary braced Rainbows of 8lb 4oz and 9lb and his mate John had a 8lb 8oz Rainbow and 6lb Blue, Ben visited from Wales and caught a stunning 8lb Brown. Andy Banks had a good brace with a 9lb 8oz Rainbow and 4lb 8oz Brown. Alan caught a 8lb Rainbow, Chris had a very good fish of 12lb, Giordan had a 10lb 7oz Rainbow as part of a 8 fish bag and the biggest of the month was to Max with a superb 13lb Rainbow. Conor had a half days guiding and targeted a superb 10lb 8oz Rainbow, which smashed his previous personal best of 2lb 8oz and George had an hours lesson to get him casting (he was already an experience coarse angler) and the first ever trout he caught was a superb 10lb 2oz Rainbow!

Some fantastic fish have been caught I’m sure you would all agree?  The most successful fly for August was the blue flash damsel with the other usual suspects such as small stalking bugs, PTN’s GRHE’s, montanas and sunk daddy’s also scoring highly.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery

June 2023

June has seen Summer well and truly take hold of the Fishery with temperatures regularly getting above 20 Degrees Celsius and nudging 30, especially in the second half of the month. The high temperatures, as usual, have made for fairly tricky fishing conditions and lethargic trout in the late afternoons. The most consistent sport came in the morning and then late afternoon and into the evening. Fish were still caught through the middle part of the day but the trout were generally unwilling to chase down flies or lures. This called for accurate casts in front of fish where the fly would fall within inches of the fish or blind casting followed by a very slow retrieve. Top flies for this method were various guises of buzzer and stalking bugs or small PTN’s or GRHE’s. Through the morning period or in to the evening damsels and small green nymphs were very consistent in taking fish along with montanas. When the fish are in a more lethargic mood they seem to be less easily spooked so one can afford to keep casting to a fish until the presentation is just right. Most lakes also saw the fish rising sporadically through the day and larger patterns such as daddy’s, sedge or grey wolfs would tempt a fish to rise.

Despite the sometimes difficult conditions there have still been some excellent fish caught by our anglers with the average size around the 4lb mark. There hasn’t been a shortage of big fish caught either! Andy Watts had a 10lb 8oz Rainbow, young Toby caught his first ever fish while having a lesson with a fine 5lb 4oz Rainbow, season rod Matt had abeautiful 5lb 8oz Brown and Andy caught an 8lb 8oz Rainbow. Season ticket holder Martin Hill topped off a 9 fish haul with a superb Rainbow of 9lb 12oz, Gerry Hooper had two great fish with a 9lb Rainbow and personal best Rainbow of 11lb and day angler Grant had a 8lb 14oz Rainbow. Season ticket holder Hugh Shepherd turned up and had one cast and caught an 8lb Rainbow, Bob Nunn had a superb 7lb 12oz Sparctic, Ian braced two fine Blues of 5lb 4oz each and Neil Perry had a cracking 6lb 14oz Brown. Peter had a fine 5lb+ Sparctic, season rod Roger Brown caught an 8lb Rainbow and Andy Banting had a cracking 11lb Rainbow. Matt Pope had a great brace with a beautiful Brown along with a 12lb 10oz Rainbow, Paul Rees had a superb bag of fish with two Rainbows of 9lb and one of 12lb and Dean caught a 10lb Rainbow from Oak Lake that had evaded capture since the early Spring. Simon Verhost had a good Rainbow of 10lb 14oz, season rod Steve Bayliss caught a 12lb Rainbow as the first fish on his ticket and Richard had the biggest fish of the month with a 13lb Rainbow.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

March 2023

The fishery really comes to life through March, the snow drops are still out and the daffodils also bloom around the lakes adding a splash of colour. Its noticeable daily how quickly the marginal vegetation is growing and the water lilies in Alder and Bridge will soon have their leaves on the surface. This March was also slightly wetter than average, which is good news and hopefully this trend will continue through April to keep the springs that feed the lakes running through the summer months. It is always a great month for fishing as the fish are generally very active and most anglers caught their limit. All methods seemed to take fish and I saw people catch on dries, drifting buzzers, fishing deep/slow and stripping lures. It was just a case of working out which they preferred on any given day.

Hundreds of fish have been caught through the month with quite a few doubles as well. The biggest of the month was caught by Pauline Pendle on a John Lewis corporate day with a brute of 14lb 14oz. All 24 anglers that fished that day caught their 4 fish limit, for a total of 96 fish caught! Other notable captures from the day were a lovely Brown of 5lb 4oz to Neil Mundy, David King with a 7lb Sparctic, Bob Griffin with a 8lb 12oz Rainbow, Richard Timson with a 9lb Rainbow and Bill Turner and Chris Bowling both with 11lb Rainbows. New season ticket Erh-Hsuin’s first fish was a 7lb 8oz Rainbow, season ticket holder David Turvey had a personal best 9lb Rainbow and day angler Gareth caught a 10lb 2oz Rainbow. Day anglers Keith and Guy had a good visit with Keith taking a 8lb 6oz Rainbow and Guy a Blue of 7lb 4oz, season rod David Blease also had a cracking Blue of 6lb 10oz and regular Nick Spring caught 3 Blues with the biggest 9lb 4oz. Andy Vincent caught a 9lb 5oz Rainbow and Steve Perry had a great brace of Rainbows at 10lb and 10lb 8oz, season ticket Kelvin caught a 10lb Rainbow and season ticket Paul braced Rainbows of 9lb 8oz and 11lb. Day angler Harry Lee stalked a 10lb Rainbow, Season rod John Vincent braced a 6lb Blue and 9lb 10oz Rainbow and Bob Tennuci caught a personal best 11lb Rainbow. We also held a fishing competition and BBQ and Andy Heslop won the competition with a superb 12lb 3oz Rainbow, which won him a 6 month season ticket. Phil Tancock fished with us for the first time during the competition and led it twice, first with a 6lb Rainbow and then one of 10lb 1oz before Andy caught the eventual winning fish.

Brighter lures such as cats whiskers, appetisers, fritz and blobs are doing particularly well but lots of fish are still getting caught on blue flash damsels. When the fish have been trickier to tempt and are shying away from lures, smaller bugs and buzzers have done well, especially ‘when all else fails’.

 That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

February 2023

The lakes have fished excellently through February with most day anglers catching their full bag limit. The fish have been fighting incredibly hard with the low water temperature and high dissolved oxygen content of the lakes at this time of year. The trout have generally been sat high in the water, usually the top 2 – 3 ft. This meant most anglers were using floating lines, and on days where the light levels allowed for spotting fish, anglers could often watch the trout chase there fly and eat it. Some anglers even caught on dry flies, which was great to see. The days are noticeably drawing out now and the morning chorus has been much louder this month. Snowdrops have been out in full bloom all month, which is always lovely to see and the daffodils have just started to bloom as I write this report in early March.

The average size of fish caught has been in excess of 4lb over February with the best Rainbows caught being 10lb and over 9lb for a Brown with numerous 5lb – 7lb fish caught as well. The biggest rainbows were caught by Dan and Andy Banting, with Andy also bracing his with another Rainbow of 9lb 8oz and the best Brown of 9lb 8oz was caught by Mr Bettley. Adam had a beautifully marked Brown of 5lb 10oz, Ted Jarvis visited all the way from Cambridgeshire and caught a 7lb Rainbow as part of his 4 fish limit and Robin had a good fish of 8lb 4oz. Fishery regular Aaron House had a great brace of Rainbows at 9lb and 9lb 2oz, Luke Turner caught a personal best Sparctic of 6lb and Lee Cook had a 9lb 5oz Rainbow and his son Oliver caught one of 6lb 5oz.  Fly tier Martyn Williams fished with us and had a lovely Rainbow of 9lb 12oz, his friend Paul Rees braced Rainbows of 9lb 8oz and 9lb 12oz and season rod Neil Perry had a stunning example of a Tiger Trout with a new fishery record of 7lb 5oz.

As with January lures and larger nymphs have been the order of the day fished on a fairly fast retrieve; blue flash damsels, montanas, cats whiskers, dancers, goldhead fritz or epoxy minnows are better in the morning with smaller more discreet patterns in the afternoon.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our Facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

January 2023

January has been a great month for fishing with most anglers bagging their fish limits. The fish have been very active and willing to chase most offerings with some anglers even tempting fish on dries, which is fantastic to see. Most days fish could be found high up in the water and fish could be spotted or targeted when the light was right. With the fish being so high in the water, a floating line was all that was needed. We also saw plenty of rain, which caused our chalk stream to rise higher than I’ve seen it in the 12 years I’ve been here and made for some muddy and slippery conditions around the lakes. Hopefully this rain has topped up all the chalk aquifers and as long as we continue to get more rain through this coming Spring, will hopefully see the springs that feed the lakes continue running into the summer. There are plenty of snowdrops out around the fishery and the daffodils aren’t far away from flowering either.

Hundreds of fish have been caught through January by our anglers with some larger fish caught also. Steve Jones and his Grandson Tom shared an 8 fish catch with Tom also landing his personal best of 7lb 12oz, Nathan Williams had a fin perfect 8lb Rainbow and season rod Doug Shuard also had a very pretty fish of 8lb 8oz. Andy Banting had a superb Brace of Rainbows of 8lb 8oz and 8lb 9oz, season rod Bob Tennuci had a great fish of 9lb 4oz and Steve Perry had a brace of Rainbows at 8lb 8oz and 9lb , with one of those fish taken on a dry sedge. Jeremy fished with us as part of a John Lewis day and braced Rainbows of 8b and 9lb, Peter Chapman had a cracker of 9lb 8oz, Paul Savill had an 8lb’er and fly tier Martyn Williams caught a lovely 8lb Rainbow. Season rod Steve Forsyth has a stunning 8lb 8oz Sparctic, Paul Mason caught a 8lb 2oz Rainbow and Mr Tuckett had one of 9lb. Day rod John Sherry had his biggest Rockbourne fish so far with a 8lb  Rainbow, Aaron House caught a beautiful Brown along with an 8lb 10oz Rainbow and Lee Cook had a superb bag with Rainbows of 9lb 4oz, 9lb 8oz and 10lb 10oz. 

Brighter lures such as cats whiskers, appetisers, fritz and blobs are doing particularly well but lots of fish are still getting caught on blue flash damsels and black and green montanas. When the fish have been trickier to tempt and are shying away from lures, smaller bugs and buzzers have done well, especially ‘when all else fails’. As mentioned above dries have also taken a number of fish with smaller, black knat, daddy and sedge type patterns proving successful.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

December 2022

December saw the coldest weather we’ve experienced for quite a few years here at the fishery with a week or so of overnight temperatures below freezing, down to a very chilly minus 8 and daytime temps not climbing much above 1 or 2 degrees. It resulted in Oak, Pine and Spring freezing completely over for a few days, Alder and Bridge were only partly frozen as we had the aerators running to keep them as clear as possible and Longacre remained ice free due to the inflow from the chalk stream. Despite the cold weather anglers continued to catch plenty of fish and it was noticeable that larger and/or brighter patterns seemed to be taking more fish. We also had plenty of rain, which did colour up the lakes slightly, but it was greatly received. Our chalk stream is now wonderfully full, and it makes the job of growing fish that much easier in our stock ponds. Hopefully we will continue to get rain through the Winter and Spring to help us through next summer. All the leaves are now off the trees and it can look a bit barren but Winter has its own beauty and it wont be long until we see those first snow drops pushing up through the ground.

Season rod Neil Perry had a great visit, taking Rainbows of 9lb, 10 and 10lb 1oz along with a  7lb 4oz Blue, Phillip Cox had a lovely 9lb Rainbow and fishery regular Bob Tennuci caught a fine 10lb Rainbow. Lee Cook had a 6lb 13oz Rainbow and 7lb 8oz Rainbow as part of a 4 fish bag and season rod Nick Spring caught a 7lb 8oz Rainbow as part of his 6 fish bag. Hugh Shepherd had a lovely 7lb Blue, Ted Jarvis topped his four fish limit with a 8lb 8oz Rainbow and Season rod Martin hill had a brace of 7lb+ Rainbows and a superb 14lb Rainbow. That’s it for the bigger fish for the month but there were hundred of fish caught in the 3lb – 5lb range with most day anglers filling their bag limit.

Brighter lures such as cats whiskers, appetisers, fritz and blobs are doing particularly well but lots of fish are still getting caught on blue flash damsels. When the fish have been trickier to tempt and are shying away from lures, smaller bugs and buzzers have done well, especially ‘when all else fails’.

 That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

November 2022

November was much the same as October in that it was fairly mild but we had some welcome relief of some much need rain. We had a quite few low-pressure systems sweep the country which brought some very heavy downpours and many other fisheries just like us were very happy to see it. As much as our lakes needed the extra water, our fish farm was in desperate need of more water as the chalk stream that feeds it was as low as we’ve ever seen it. Water is everything when farming fish and without a sufficient flow, pushing fish on and getting them to grow is impossible. For the most part through the summer and Autumn months we were in survival mode on the fish farm. Thankfully now, we’ve got plenty of water and the fish are growing well. The high winds of the low pressure systems also brought down a few trees, including a big ash that came down across the stream at Longacre, on the plus side it’ll provide plenty of firewood for next winter. Sport has been getting increasingly better through the month as the colder weather set in and most anglers were filling their bag limits.

Some great fish have been caught amongst the hundreds of fish caught this month, with Season rods Eliot and David catching Rainbows of 10lb 6oz and 12lb, we managed to get David’s fish on film, so check out the footage on our facebook page towards the beginning of November to see that. Fishery regular Lee Cook brought his 7 year old son George fishing for the first time and he bagged a superb 7lb 4oz Blue, and on another couple of visits Lee caught a 7lb Blue and a 10lb 10oz Rainbow. Paul Tustain also had a stunning Blue of 6lb 8oz and, Mike Maloney had a cracking Rainbow of 9lb 2oz and season rod Martin French had a superb Rainbow of 9lb 8oz. Over a couple of trips season rod Kelvin Hinton Landed two Rainbows, both weighing in at 9lb 2oz and Neil Perry had a lovely Rainbow of 10lb 2oz.

The fish are really starting to favour brighter lures with cats whiskers, appetisers, fritz and blobs doing particularly well but lots of fish are still getting caught on blue flash damsels. When the fish have been trickier to tempt and are shying away from lures, smaller bugs and buzzers have done well, especially ‘when all else fails’.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery

October 2022

The unseasonably mild and dry weather has continued through October, which has made for some very pleasant fishing conditions but has made the sport somewhat tricky. The cooler nights have dropped the water temperatures, which resulted in the fish being more active and generally fighting very hard. The end of the month saw a good helping of rain, which I do hope will continue as we move into November as it has been a terribly dry year. As with September the fish could often be found sitting high in the water, which has helped those who like to stalk the fish but the Sun is lower in the sky now which can cause a lot of glare at times. The Fishery is looking wonderful in its Autumnal colours and if you sit quietly, you will see plenty of songbirds such as blue tit, great tit, blackcap, nut hatch and coal tits among many others.

Although the fishing has been tricky, plenty of fish have been caught along with some bigger specimens too. Father and son Lee and Oliver had a good day taking 6 fish, which included Browns of 4lb 8oz  and 6lb 2oz, a 3lb 8oz Sparctic and 9lb 4oz Rainbow, Lee also visited again a few days later and caught another good Rainbow of 8lb. Joe had a half day tuition with us as his first experience of fly fishing and went onto catch a superb first fly caught fish with a Rainbow of 8lb 8oz, season rod Mick Long caught a beautifully conditioned 9lb Rainbow and Malcolm Boyd had a stunning Tiger. John Lewis fly fishing club fished with us as usual in October and caught plenty of fish with several good Rainbow and Blues over 7lb up to just over 9lb, season rod Nick Spring had a good mornings fishing taking Rainbows of 8lb and 12lb and Neil Perry and a beautifully coloured Rainbow of 8lb. Season rod Martin Hill had a chunky 11lb 8oz Rainbow along with a beautiful Brown of 4lb, Robin O’Dell had Rainbows of 6lb 6oz and 9lb 14oz, Neil Mundy caught a 8lb Blue, and Steve Cupples had a 8lb Blue and 12lb 5oz Rainbow. Season rods Bob, Drew and Matt all had Rainbows of 10lb+ and Lee and Lauren visited us for the first time, with Lauren catching a great 9lb 8oz Rainbow and Lee a superb bag with rainbows of 7lb 2oz, 10lb 13oz and 12lb 4oz.                                          
The successful flies are all the usual suspects: blue flash damsels, stalking bugs, buzzers, sunk and dry daddy’s, PTN’s and GRHE’s all producing. As is gets cooler brighter lures, especially fritz based fly’s will take a lot of fish!

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our Facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

 

September 2022

This time of year is a transitional one between the Summer and Autumn and we had some exceptionally warm days with some very chilly mornings too. We were very happy to see some cooler night-time temperatures to help the lakes cool down. On the whole it has remained very dry for the time of year and the springs that feed Oak and Pine have slowed up significantly, causing the lakes levels to drop slightly. On a brighter note we did reopen Oak Lake for fishing towards the end of the month as the water temperature had decreased sufficiently for us to restock it. Pine and Spring Lake remained closed but are due to be reopened middle of October. The sport has got better as the month went on, with the onset of the cooler temperatures.

The most consistent sport was found by drifting flies through the current created by the aerators or fishing under the trees. On Bridge Lake especially, the majority of the lakes stock could be spotted under the over hanging branches and to get to these fish you either had to stalk them under the trees or cast a longer line from the opposite bank. Not the easiest of casts as it requires a nice narrow loop and a side cast. But those that got the hang of it would often get their fish. Some fish could also be found in open water, which also provided some sight fishing opportunities. By far, the best patten of the month was a montana or flies that were dark or black in colour.

With the lake temperatures still fairly high and very low flow through our stock ponds, we had to make the decision to not net and stock the bigger fish. The stress of netting them in low flow conditions, coupled with the shock of then stocking them into much warmer lake water would have ended up in multiple fatalities. It was a difficult decision but the right call. As I write this, in mid October, we’ve started to trickle out a few bigger fish as the temperature difference between the stock ponds and lakes is much smaller, so therefore less stressful for the fish.

Sebi fished with us twice, having a lesson each time and caught his fish on both occasions, fishery regular Mr Feltham caught his first Tiger Trout, Mr dalley had a personal best 5lb 12oz Spacrtic and Justin had a lesson and went on to catch a fine Brown of 4lb. There were plenty of fish caught by the anglers that fished with us with most fish in the 3 to 5lb Range.

 
That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery

August 2022

August continued the run of hot and very dry weather and we are in desperate need of some rain and cooler temperatures just like many other lakes and rivers up and down the country but it will take many months to replenish the chalk aquifers that feed chalk streams and lakes. We are still continuing with the closures of Oak, Pine and Spring Lakes until we are certain that conditions are optimum for stocking trout and we predict this to be in October; by then we should have had some meaningful rain coupled with cooler Autumn temperatures. It’s not all doom and gloom though as Alder, Bridge and Longacre are open, with fish caught every day. Mornings are proving more fruitful for most anglers with the flow created by the aerators of Alder and Bridge particular hot spots. It’s worth paying particular attention to detecting bites at this time of year as often, they can be very subtle indeed, with only the slightest movement or halt in the end of the fly line as it is retrieved to signal that a trout has taken your fly. If you can watch your fly then you’ll often see fish mouth it or take it very quickly before rejecting it, so be quick on the strike.

Chris Sharp had a lovely 4lb Tiger and season rod Chris Pilbeam caught a long and lean 6lb 5oz Brown that would have been stocked back in the winter. Steve Long had a half days fly fishing lesson and ended up catching three fish, topped with a cracking 4ln Blue Trout and season rod Tony Roll caught a 9lb Rainbow. Season ticket holder Dave Robjohns caught a 7lb 4oz Brown that would have probably been stocked at the same time as the one Chris caught, and David Holt brought his Grandson fishing and they had a superb 7lb 4oz Rainbow. Season rod Eliot targeted a fine 4lb Tiger, 12 yeal old Joey had a 4lb Rainbow while having a lesson and Tony, Mike, John, David and Barry shared a 14 fish catch.

The most successful flies for August were blue flash damsels, small stalking bugs, PTN’s, GRHE’s, montanas and sunk daddy’s.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery

July 2022

July has continued to very dry and I believe that we’ve had less than 20% of the average rainfall we’d expect for this time of year and this followed a drier than average Winter and Spring too. This has affected ground water levels, which feed the springs into the lakes, especially Oak, Pine and Spring. We have made the decision to cease stocking those three lakes until we get cooler weather and some much needed rain due to the high water temperatures, which makes it unsuitable for stocking trout.

As is the norm at this time of the year fishing first thing in the morning or the latter part of the day is usually the most productive with fish always a little trickier to tempt from late morning to mid-afternoon. But tempted they can be! Our six lakes are intimate places and the fish always find some nice shady cover to tuck them selves away under to hide from the bright conditions (and a lot of our anglers!). The more keen eyed angler will often find fish in such places and with plenty of stealth and a bit of luck a fish or two can often be tempted. Top flies for ‘stalking’ are usually weighted bugs that sink quickly and a range of colours, usually olives, blacks or browns will take fish and the old faithful PTN’s and GRHE’s in smaller size 16s or 18s can prove deadly. A much over looked method when creeping around under the trees is to place your chosen fly on the bottom and then twitch it up in front of an approaching fish, if you can see your fly watch this or if not, watch the fish to see when it ‘mouths’ your fly and STRIKE!!

Despite the tough conditions our anglers have still enjoyed some great sport with most catching their limits, with plenty of fish in the 3-5lb that has also included a good number of Sparctics and Tiger Trout. Some big fish have been caught also but we have reduced the number of bigger fish we’ve stocked due to higher water temperatures. Big fish do not cope well with stress and the process of netting and stocking them is a large stressor, especially so in the summer with the large difference in water temperature between the stock ponds and lakes. Season rod Nick Spring had a productive couple of trips taking Browns of 7lb and 8lb 8oz along with a 10lb Blue Trout, Alan Drewitt had  6lb 4oz Sparctic and Bob Lawson caught a 5lb Tiger Trout and Joan Russel caught a superd 10lb Rainbow. The other big fish that have been stocked have been hard to tempt and often only seen for short periods under the trees.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery

June 2022

The summer is well and truly here now and we saw a couple of weeks of high temperatures exceeding 20 degrees Celsius. These hot and bright conditions coupled with low ground water levels (due to a relatively dry winter and spring) have combined to make some tricky fishing conditions.

The most consistent sport came in the first couple of hours in the morning and then late afternoon and into the evening. Fish were still caught through the middle part of the day but the trout were generally unwilling to chase down flies or lures. This called for accurate casts in front of fish where the fly would fall within inches of the fish or blind casting followed by a very slow retrieve. Top flies for this method were various guises of buzzer and stalking bugs or small PTN’s or GRHE’s. Through the morning period or into the evening damsels and small green nymphs were very consistent in taking fish along with montanas. When the fish are in a more lethargic mood they seem to be less easily spooked so one can afford to keep casting to a fish until the presentation is just right. Most lakes also saw the fish rising sporadically through the day and larger patterns such as daddy’s, sedge or grey wolfs would tempt a fish to rise so it’s certainly worth persevering with a dry.

The fish were often found under the cover of the trees in the shade or sitting in the deeper holes but on Alder and Bridge Lakes plenty of fish could be found in the current created by the aerators. Drifting or swinging flies in these areas of flow accounted for many fish.

Although the conditions were tricky at times, plenty of fish were caught through the month along with a few bigger or notable fish. Season rod Matt Pope had a beautifully conditioned Rainbow of 12lb 7oz at the beginning of the month, Neil Perry had a superb bag; two Rainbows of 8lb 10oz and 10lb 14oz along with a 7lb 14oz Blue and Zac caught his first Tiger with a great fish of 4lb. Lee Cook and his son Oliver shared a good bag of fish with taking a 6lb Tiger and 7lb 2oz Brown and Oliver a personal best 5lb Sparctic, Dan Berry caught a 7lb+ Rainbow and over two trips Nick Spring had Rainbows of 9lb and 12lb 8oz. Tod Beverley had a 10lb Rainbow, Mr Cooper caught a lovely 5lb 12oz Sparctic, Mr Bourne had a lovely 8lb Brown and Mr Thompson a 10lb Rainbow. Season rod martin Hill had a 8lb Rainbow, Dave Prevett caught his personal best Sparctic at 6lb and Jeremy Halford caught a Blue Trout that was tagged, which netted him £100. Pauline Pendle and Neil Mundy both had cracking Blue of 10lb 2oz a piece but the catch of the month must go to David King for taking four fish that weighed between 9lb and 13lb for a total weight of 43lb!

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

May 2022

The fishery is looking wonderful now we are in May and it’s a beautiful place to spend a few hours. The sport has been very good with most anglers catching their limits. This has been helped by cooler temperatures compared to what you’d usually expect in May, we even had a few frosts right at the beginning of the month. The usual tactics of stripping lures and nymphs have taken the majority of fish, with most of the bigger fish caught by those that like to stalk and sight cast and we’ve seen a few anglers having great fun fishing dries too. The most consistent sport came in the first two or three hours in the morning and then late afternoon and into the evening.

A run down of some of the notable catches in May. Jerry Smith caught his first Rockbourne double, a fine rainbow of 12lb 12oz, season rod Martin Hill had a day to remember when he caught a 10lb 4oz Blue along with Rainbows of 11lb 8oz and 13lb 8oz and 90 year old Tony Bevan fished with us for the first time and had a brace of 4lb Rainbows. Season rod Christ Bowling visited us a couple of time and had Rainbows of 9lb 10oz and 9lb 8oz, Paula had a mornings tuition and had a brace of Rainbows, Mike Slater fished with us for the first time and opened his Rockbourne account with a superb 12lb Rainbow, Nick Spring a had a beautiful Brown of 10lb 12oz and season rod Mick Long caught a personal best 9lb 4oz Rainbow. Day angler Andy Wallis had an excellent session, which included a 5lb Sparctic, 8lb 8oz Blue and a 13lb 10oz Rainbow, season rod Rob Cooper caught his first Rockbourne double with a 10lb Rainbow and Ringwood Tackle owner, Richard Middleton, caught a fine 8lb 12oz Blue and 10lb 12oz Rainbow. Tony Targett smashed his personal best Brown with a stunning fish of 13lb 2oz from Longacre Lake on his own tied rainbow bead damsel, Ben had a personal best 6lb 4oz Sparctic, Chris Roots caught a 10lb 10oz Rainbow and Rob Sweep had a 10lb 4oz Blue. Fishery regular Lee Cook had a lovely 12lb Brown, Alan Waller caught a 9lb 8oz Rainbow and Simon Newnes had a 9lb 4oz Rainbow while fishing with us as part of the fish mongers fly fishing club. Season rod Martin Hill bagged another double in the shape of a 11lb 8oz Rainbow, Jayden caught his personal best 5lb Sparctic and John Pike, Andrew Cogle and Alan Drewitt all caught 8lb+ Rainbows.

The fish were often found under the cover of the trees in the shade or sitting in the deeper holes, so having a floating line for stalking and an intermediate or sink tip line for fishing deeper helped cover more options. Anglers fishing floating lines sometimes struggled to fish deep enough when the fish moved to the depths for cover.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

April 2022

April was a dry month, no sign of the traditional April showers that help top of the chalk aquifers for the summer ahead, which is slightly worrying as the winter has also been on the dry side too. The start of the month felt unseasonably cold before we started getting warmer day time temperatures towards the end of the month, albeit, often with a ground frost at night. Spring was in the air though with plenty of fresh growth around the fishery and the bluebells in full bloom in the woodland. The fishing has been excellent with most day anglers bagging their limit. The fish were often up in the water so could be seen and targeted if the angler wished and fishing a dry was a good tactic, especially grannom imitations as these hatched in their thousands along with a good number of alderflies.

Plenty of bigger fish have featured in the catches of our anglers over April including a superb 20lb 1oz Rainbow to Neil Perry and a fantastic fishery record Brown of 15lb 9oz to Lee Cook. The third biggest fish on the month was caught by Luke with a cracking 17lb Rainow, Baz had the biggest Blue at 11lb 10oz and Tristan caught his first double of 10lb 6oz. Alan Drewitt and Joe Quinlivan both had 8lb+ Browns, Andy Toomey had a very pretty Brown of 7lb 10oz and Martin Hill had a cracking Brown of just over 6lb that had lovely big red spots! Steve Perry had a great couple of visits with two low double Rainbows and a superb 14lb 4oz Brown, his Dad Tim caught a 10lb 3oz Rainbow and Rob his Brother also had a couple of double Rainbows too. Will Deakin travelled a fair distance to try and catch a Brown and achieved it with a cracker of 8lb and Nigel Kennard had a brilliant brace of Browns that weighed in at 7lb 10oz and 9lb 10oz. On a separate visit Neil Perry had a fin perfect 14lb 4oz Rainbow, Lee Cook had a Rainbow of 10lb and Mr Skinner caught a very spotty 9lb Brown. Peter Burdett, David Broome and Dave Haskins of the Saint Michael Fly Fishers all and a double Rainbow each at 11lb 1oz, 12lb 10oz and 13lb 4oz respectively and Jerry Smith caught his first Rockbourne double with a cracker of 12lb 12oz. 

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

March 2022

Spring is well and truly here at the Fishery when March is upon us, the daffodils are in full bloom, the primroses are out, the bluebells will be flowering soon and the hedgerows are all bursting with small vibrant green leaves. The marginal vegetation around the lakes is growing taller by the day, the lillies in Alder and Bridge have started to make their way up to the surface and frogs and toads have been busy laying spawn . The fishing is also coming in to its own, with the fish very active indeed and stalking opportunities getting better by the day with the increasing light levels coupled with the fish often being found very close into the margins. 

The fishing was excellent through March with many fish caught. At the beginning of the month Lee Neale had a brace of 7lb Browns, Steve Perry had a great brace of Borwns at 9lb 3oz and 9lb 6oz and Stuart Quick had a 6lb 8oz Brown and 9lb 8oz Rainbow. Mariusz caught a 6lb Brown, season rod David Seddon had a 8lb 8oz Brown, Richard Power caught a superb 12lb 14oz Rainbow and Stephen Harding caught a stunning, personal best 11lb 8oz Brown. Season rod Martin Hill had a brace of Sparctics at 6lb 2oz and 7lb 2oz, Jon Patten had a superb 8lb Sparctic, which he caught along with another of 5lb and a superb 11lb Rainbow and Andy Banting had a great brace of Sparctics of 6lb 12oz and a new personal best of 9lb. Over another couple of visits Martin Hill caught Browns of 8lb 4oz and 12lb along with a 10lb 12oz Rainbow, season rod Arthur Perrett had a superb 10lb 10oz personal best Sparctic and Lee cook had a session he won’t forget in a hurry, landing Rainbows of 10lb 2oz and 10lb 4oz along with Browns of 8lb 12oz and 9lb 12oz! Paul had a good brace of Sparctics at 5lb 8oz and 6lb 2oz, season rod Russell Hayter caught a 9lb 8oz Rainbow, Anthony Brettel had a cracking 11lb 10oz Rainbow and Rob Cooper caught his first Sparctic of 5lb 8oz. Steve Perry had a good brace of Sparctics along with a lovely 13lb Rainbow, Paul and his son Julian caught a 6lb Sparctic and 8lb 6oz Brown, Steve Bailey persistence paid off when he was rewarded with a lovely 7lb 7oz Brown and Mal Evans landed a 11lb 2oz Rainbow. On another trip Lee Cook caught 4 Sparctics and a fine 10lb 12oz Brown, Chris Bowling had an immaculate 12lb 4oz Rainbow and Richard Francis had a 12lb Rainbow. Ian Randall caught a beautifully marked 7lb 7oz Brown, Nick Spring also had a Brown of 5lb 12oz, John Otter caught a 10lb 8oz Rainbow, Richard Timson had a lovely Rainbow of 12lb 2oz and Seb Hartley caught one of 13lb 4oz. Marek caught a great Brown of 12lb, season rod John Pike caught a lovely dark Brown of 14lb 2oz and congratulations must go to Pauline Pendle on catching a new fishery record Brown of 15lbs!

Brighter lures such as cats whiskers, appetisers, fritz and blobs are doing particularly well but more imitative flys such as damsels, PTN’s and GRHE’s are taking more and more fish. When the fish have been trickier to tempt and are shying away from lures, smaller bugs and buzzers have done well, especially ‘when all else fails’. Dry fly sport has also picked up now the natural fly life is starting to wake up and hatch!

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

February 2022

Once February is here we know that Spring isn’t far away, even though the weather can be foul. If you look closely, you can see signs that the plants are just starting to shoot and buds are appearing on some of the trees. We have snowdrops in full bloom around the fishery, daffodils started to flower in the middle of the month and we even had frog spawn in places.

As is usual for February the fish are fighting incredibly hard with long runs down to the backing not uncommon often accompanied by the trout leaping clear of the water several times. The light levels are slowly increasing, which is helping those who like to stalk fish, especially as there are lots of fish sitting high in the water.

We stocked quite a few Brown Trout during February as they seem to do really well at this time of year and plenty have been caught along with a few big rainbows and hundreds of smaller rainbows in the 3lb – 5lb range.

John Pike had a great 8lb 2oz Brown from Longacre, Dave Burgess had a lovely brace of Browns at 6lb 8oz and 8lb and season rod Andy had a personal best Brown of 9lb! Pete Willingham, Alan Brand, Chris Bowling and Eliot Hankins all had Browns between 4lb 8oz and 7lb. Ashley, Dave Robjohns and Steve Perry all had Sparctics between 5lb and 6lb. Over two visits Aaron House had a great hit of fish with a Brown of 6lb and Rainbows of 10lb 8oz, 11lb 11oz and 12lb 2oz, Stewart Easey had a lovely 10lb Rainbow and Kennie and Matthew both had Rainbows of 11lb 2oz. Season rod David Seddon had a 8lb 8oz Brown, Ron Huey had a cracker of a Brown at 9lb 12oz and Callum and Kennie both had Brown, 10lb 8oz and 9lb respectively. Steve Perry had a couple of 6lb+ Browns along with a 11lb Rainbow, Gary Barlett also had a 11lb Rainbow, Rich Power one of 12lb 14oz and Ross Huey had the biggest of the month at 14lb 8oz.

The successful flies have remained the same with brighter lures such as cats whiskers, appetisers, fritz and blobs doing particularly well but lots of fish are still getting caught on blue flash damsels. Some days when the fish have been trickier to tempt and are shying away from lures, smaller bugs and buzzers have done well and stalking is still productive due to the fish still sitting high in the water. One Angler, Eliot also took a brown on a dry sedge, after spotting it risisng.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our Facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery

January 2022

For the most part January was fairly mild with only a handful of frosts and it was also very dry for the time of year. In fact we are in desperate need of rain to top up the aquifers for the summer ahead. Our chalk stream is at its lowest I have seen it for the winter months in the 12 years I have been here! The fishing has remained excellent though, with plenty of fish caught. There is also a splash of colour around the fishery with plenty of snowdrops in bloom and it won’t be long until the daffodils are in flower too and the resident Kingfisher has been very active and you often seen the blue and orange flash as it whizz’s past in search of its next meal.

It's been a fairly quiet month for numbers of anglers visiting the fishery but those that have fished with us have nearly all caught their bag limits with lots of fish caught in the 3 – 5lb bracket. For the time of year the trout have generally been sitting very high in the water and a few anglers have used dries to tempt a fish or two. The most successful method, as is usually the case, at this time of year was to strip larger nymphs or lures at a fast and twitchy pace. This would often result in follows from multiple fish and end in one of them taking. Kelvin Hinton had a fine 11lb Rainbow, which was joint biggest fish with Alan Drewitt, who bagged five fish topped by Rainbows of 7lb, 10lb and 11lb. Tony Roll had a couple of hits of fish with the best going 9lb and season rod Jason Nickless  had a lovely 8lb 8oz Rainbow. Rob Griggs and a 10lb Rainbow and Graham Brown had a beautifully conditioned Brown of 9lb.

Brighter lures such as cats whiskers, appetisers, fritz and blobs are doing particularly well but lots of fish are still getting caught on blue flash damsels and black and green montanas. When the fish have been trickier to tempt and are shying away from lures, smaller bugs and buzzers have done well, especially ‘when all else fails’. It also pays to keep an open mind and watch what the fish are doing as they were often very high in the water and could be tempted to take a dry.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

December 2021

December was generally fairly mild with only a small amount of rain although we did have a couple of cold snaps which saw temperatures drop below freezing for a few days and this helped to drop the water temperatures! The Weather has been so unseasonably mild that the fish were often found sitting high in the water with fish caught on dry fly a fairly common occurrence. At the end of the month we even saw the first signs of the daffodils starting shoot up, which is very early!

The cooler water temperatures meant the fish fought very hard through December with long fast runs often to the backing experienced by many anglers. It is also a great time of year to fish fry patterns with a fast erratic retrieve as the fish will be chasing down and devouring this year’s juvenile roach.

Most anglers have been catching their bag limit with most bags consisting of 3 to 4lb fish. The bigger fish have definitely been a bit harder to catch this month but a few of our anglers have been successful in catching them, Ben Jessup had personal best Sparctic of 8lb, Chris Bright and Dan May both had 11lb Rainbows and Adrian Kruger travelled all the way from Plymouth and was rewarded with a 10lb 2oz Rainbow. Lee Cook had a lovely conditioned Brown of 9lb 8oz, Ant had a 10lb 6oz Rainbow and Neil Perry had a superb brace of Rainbows at 11lb 6oz and 12lb 8oz.

The successful flies have remained the same with brighter lures such as cats whiskers, appetisers, fritz and blobs doing particularly well but lots of fish are still getting caught on blue flash damsels. Some days when the fish have been trickier to tempt and are shying away from lures, smaller bugs and buzzers have done well and stalking is still productive due to the fish still sitting high in the water. As plenty of fish are sitting high in the water fishing a dry, such as a small sedge or grey wulff would often tempt a fish to take.

 That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our Facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery

November 2021

November was much the same as October in that it was unseasonably mild for the time of year, although colder weather moved in towards the end of the month. Most of the leaves have now been shed from the trees and the fishery can look a bit bare but it is still a beautiful and tranquil place to spend a day’s fishing. It is at this time of year that we start to cut back or remove any offending branch’s, trees and some of the marginal growth around the fishery and generally have a big clear up to make sure it will all look its best once Sprig finally arrives.

Some excellent fish have been caught through the month. Steve Vine had a fine 8lb 4oz Blue, Steve Robinson caught a 5lb 8oz Sparctic and Ben Jessup had a superb 8lb Sparctic. Neil Mundy had a fine brace with a 9lb 10oz Blue and 10lb 10oz Rainbow, Steve Perry had a great brace also taking a personal best 10lb Blue along with a 13lb 6oz Rainbow. Lan Langford had a great conditioned 10lb 5oz Rainbow, Ant Brettell had a cracking 11lb 10oz Rainbow, season rod Martin Hill had one of 11lb and Snowbee ambassador Aaron House had a 11lb 6oz Rainbow. Nick Freeman caught a 13lb Rainbow, Elliot Forsyth had one of 12lb and David King a brute of 14lb. Neil Perry had a superb couple of trips, on his first visit he had a brace of 12lb 2oz and 13lb 2oz and then towards the end of the moth he had a colossal, fin perfect Rainbow of 22lb 8oz!

The fish are really starting to favour brighter lures with cat’s whiskers, appetisers, fritz and blobs doing particularly well but lots of fish are still getting caught on blue flash damsels. When the fish have been trickier to tempt and are shying away from lures, smaller bugs and buzzers have done well, especially ‘when all else fails’.

 That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

October 2021

On the whole October was an unseasonably mild month with only a couple of frosts to speak of, we had a drop of rain but as usual it was not enough and as I’m writing this (beginning of November) I have seen some Dragon and Damsel flies around the lakes and a few fish rising, not what you would expect! The fishing has been excellent though with many anglers continuing to tempt fish on dry daddy’s and sedge. The fish have been sitting high in the water and when they couldn’t be tempted on dry fly, emerger patterns fished in the top few inches often fooled them.

There have been hundreds of fish caught this month with numerous 3-5lb fish landed and a lot of big fish. The light levels were still good enough for anglers to stalk fish and this method accounted for the lion’s share of the larger fish that were caught! Big flies also proved very successful with fritz and humungous type patterns often singling out the larger specimens.

Big Fish

Aaron House 13lb 7oz Rainbow and Blues of 7lb 12oz and 9lb 8oz
David Blease 6lb Sparctic
Pat McLaughlin 9lb Blue
Paul Lambert 6lb 4oz Blue
Ivan 8lb 4oz Blue – first ever fish
Steve Skeggs 9lb 8oz Rainbow
Lee Cook 12lb 2o and 12lb 12oz Rainbows
Joan Russell 10lb Blue
Stewart Pope 8lb Blue
David King Blues of 7lb and 11lb 8oz  and Rainbows of 12lb 6o z and 15lb
Neil Mundy Blues of 7lb 9oz and 9lb 14oz, one was tagged, which won Neil £100 and he also had Rainbows of 9lb 10oz and 11lb 14oz.
Julian Bland 9lb 14oz Blue
Helen Gunther 10lb 8oz Blue
Pauline Pendle 12lb 4oz Blue
Chris Bowling 10lb 4oz Blue
Callum Harbison 13lb Rainbow
Bill Rushmer 7lb 8oz Brown
Mr McCrossan 14lb 10oz Rainbow
Barry Reynolds Blues of 7lb 10oz and 10lb 8oz
Neil Perry Blues of 9lb 10oz and 10lb 2oz and a 13lb 5oz Rainbow
Nick Spring 12lb Rainbow
Steve Perry Blues of 7lb 4oz, 9lb 8oz and 9lb 12oz and a 11lb Rainbow

Some fantastic fish have been caught I’m sure you would all agree? The fish are really starting to favour bigger and/or brighter lures with cats whiskers, appetisers, fritz, blobs and humungous all doing particularly well but lots of fish are still getting caught daddy’s (sunk and dry), sedge and blue flash damsels. When the fish have been trickier to tempt ad shying away from lures, smaller bugs and buzzers have done well, especially ‘when all else fails’.

 That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery

August and September 2021

The dog days of August - a challenging month on fisheries and at times it has been so here at Rockbourne. We’ve had a dry month (only the odd rain shower) and the temperature has even been up into the 30’s on occasion and often in the mid 20’s! The best times to fish were the first 2-3 hours in the morning or the last 2-3 hours we were open. Fish were still being caught through the middle part of the day but were definitely trickier to tempt. As is often the case in these conditions, fish were found under the trees or in the deeper holes so the conditions were great for people who loved to target the trout in close using stalking bugs/buzzers. September was much the same, with very little rain and warm temperatures.

Despite the tricky conditions some excellent sport has been had with plenty of fish caught, including quite a few specimen fish. Wayne Little fished with us for the first time and caught a 12lb Rainbow and his fishing companion Martin Bolwer had his first ever Sparctic Trout. Rares had a superb Brace with the biggest Rainbow caught in August at 17lb along with a 6lb Blue, Nick Spring had a 13lb Rainbow, Brian Malyon had a personal best 11lb 10 Rainbow and fishery regulars Neil Perry and Ian Langford both had Rainbows of 14lb 12oz! Tim Watson had a 12lb 4oz Rainbow from Longacre, Mia had some instruction and went on to target a 5lb 12oz Rainbow that was her personal best, season rod Andy Smith caught an 11lb 8oz Rainbow and stalking ace Richard Francis had a Rainbow of 13lb 8oz from Longacre. Peter Burgess landed a 13lb 12oz Rainbow, season rod Steve Bayliss targeted a 12lb 8oz Rainbow and expert fly fisher Charles Jardine stalked a 12lb12oz Rainbow while fishing for an article for Fly Fishing and Fly Tying Magazine. Fishery regular Nigel Kennard visited us a twice through September and had a personal best both trips with Rainbows of 13lb 2oz and then 13lb 6oz, season rod John pike stalked a 9b 6oz Rainbow and Erh-Hsuin had a personal best 10lb 6oz Rainbow. Fishery regular Nick Spring caught a 10lb 2oz Rainbow, Dave Norman landed had one of 11lb 2oz and Snowbee ambassador Aaron House had a cracking 13lb 7oz Rainbow. Lee Cook had a great brace with Rainbows of 8lb 10oz and 12lb 8oz, with the 8lb fish being tagged, which netted him £100 and Paul Dagger fished with us for the first time and caught a personal best 15lb 6oz Rainbow!

 

The successful flies have not changed that much with all the usual suspects taking fish regularly: blue flash damsels, stalking bugs, buzzers, sunk daddy’s, PTN’s and GRHE’s all producing. The occasional fish has been getting caught on brighter lures too. The best tactic was to try and watch your fly and strike as the fish took it as the takes were often very quick.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our Facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

July 2021

July was a month of two halves, with a heatwave through the first half of the month with temperatures over 30 degrees and then noticeably cooler and wetter weather in the later stages of the month. Fishing was not always easy as is usually the case in July but the heatwave certainly exacerbated this, however, plenty of fish were still caught. Generally smaller, imitative patterns scored better than larger patterns or lures. Dries fished particularly well, especially on Longacre Lake with sedge patterns being very successful. Stalking fish as usual accounted for the majority of the big fish caught but was also a great method for anglers wanting to get their bag limit. The fish were generally giving delicate takes, so being able to watch your fly and in turn the fish taking the fly would often put more fish on the bank than to those anglers casting, retrieving and waiting for the tug!

Hundreds of fish were caught through July and I have listed the big fish captures below.

Martin Hill had a beautifully conditioned 12lb 2oz Rainbow at the beginning of the month, Dylan had a 10lb 6oz Rainbow on his first visit to the fishery, regular Ian Langford caught a great 14lb Rainbow and Mark Roll had a 11lb 8oz Brown that had been in Alder Lake for a few months. Phillip Waters had a good day, taking a 13lb 6oz Rainbow that was also tagged, which netted him £100, Richard Francis had the biggest fish of the month with a 16lb Rainbow from Alder Lake, fishery regular Alan Drewitt caught a superb 9lb Sparctic from Pine Lake and James Sillars had a 13lb 13oz Rainbow. Season rod Paul Lambert had a personal best 15lb 4oz Rainbow, Andy Farmer had a superb 14lb 12oz Rainbow, Mr Watkins had one of 12lb and Jon Fuller caught a Brown of 6lb 8oz. Season rod John Pike stalked a 13lb 8oz Rainbow, Jeremy Halford did the same with a  13lb 2oz Rainbow and Season rod Ross Huey had one of exactly 13lb. Nick Spring targeted a 12lb Rainbow from Longacre Lake and the catch of the month has to go to Andy Banting on taking three doubles with fish of 12lb, 13lb and a new personal best of 13lb 5oz!

The choice of successful flies has not changed that much with blue flash damsels still doing the damage but there was a definite shift towards smaller flies with the onset of the hot weather, especially for those who were stalking. Dropping down to size 16-18 flies was often needed with stalking bugs, buzzers, sunk daddy’s, PTN’s and GRHE’s all producing regularly.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our Facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

June 2021

June has seen Summer well and truly take hold of the Fishery with temperatures regularly getting above 20 Degrees Celsius but we’ve also had a bit of rain, which always helps the lakes. As is usual this time of year the best fishing is often in the morning, especially on those hot, bright and sunny days. The afternoons can see some trout more inclined to lay up stationary and seem lethargic. A switch to smaller patterns of nymphs, buzzers or even dries can often tempt them. When I walk around the fishery most anglers are casting large flies and stripping them in and do so for the majority of the day, if it isn’t working change what you’re doing!

Despite the sometimes challenging conditions the majority of our anglers caught their bag limit and as usual plenty of big fish have been caught along with hundreds of fish in the 3-5lb range.

Dave Turner caught a superb 10lb 4oz Sparctic Trout , Russell Hayter smashed his pervious personal best of 6lb with a fantastic 14lb 6oz Rainbow from Bridge Lake, Chris Bowling had lovely ex brood fish of 10lb 8oz and fishery regular Tom Humby had a 12lb Rainbow. Season rod Richard Stevenson stalked a 9lb Rainbow, Mr Halford had one of 7lb and Aaron House had a brilliant day taking a 7lb 12oz Sparctic and 11lb 8oz Rainbow. Over a couple of visits season rod Martin Hill had Rainbows of 9lb, 12lb 8oz and 13lb 13oz, Rob Perry braced Rainbows of 12lb 2oz and 12lb 12oz and Baz Whitehead had a new personal best of 14lb 10oz. John Pike had a good brace of Rainbows of 9lb 14oz and 10lb 14oz, season rod Kelvin Hinton landed a lovely 12lb Rainbow, fly tying ace Martyn Williams had a 14lb 4oz Rainbow and Neil Perry had one of 14lb 14oz! Jez Langley and Clive Kennedy both had 12lb+ Rainbows. David King caught the 3rd biggest fish of the month with a 15lb 2oz Rainbow, Richard Francis stalked the second biggest with a 15lb 8oz Rainbow and Neil Mundy caught a colossal 22lb Rainbow, which he braced with a 14lb 1oz Rainbow.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

May 2021

May has been a month full of life at the Fishery, all the vegetation is lush and green, the yellow and purple Iris are in full bloom, there is abundant fly life and the chicks of various songbirds can be heard up in the trees. The trout are voracious at this time of year and can often be seen chasing the tadpoles or hitting in to the shoals of small roach fry. A good tactic is to strip back lures in the early part of the day before the sun gets too high in the sky, when a switch to smaller more imitative patterns will usually keep sport coming.

There have been literally thousands of fish caught through May with the fish averaging 3-4lb. Plenty of big fish have been caught also, which I’ve put below. At the beginning of the month Baz Whitehead had a brace of doubles weighing in at 10lb 10oz and 11lb 1oz, season rod Martin Hill caught a cracking Rainbow of 12lb 14oz, Paul Woodmore had a 12lb 2oz Rainbow and on his first visit to the fishery Stewart Keen had a lovely 11lb 6oz Rainbow. John Evans caught a 12lb 12oz Rainbow, Stevie Booth also visited us for the first time with a 12lb 1oz Rainbow, Dave box had a personal best 12lb 6oz Rainbow and Matt Pope also had a personal best of 14lb 4oz. Joe Quinlivan caught a beautifully marked over wintered Brown of 11lb from Alder Lake along with a 9lb 8oz Blue, fishery regular Alan Drewitt braced Rainbows of 10lb 2oz and 10lb 4oz, Callum Harbison had a cracking Brown on 9lb 8oz and Nick Spring also had a Brown of 10lb exactly. On his first visit to the fishery Tony Dixon caught a personal best Sparctic of 7lb 4oz, Neil Perry had a superb brace of Rainbows of 15lb 1oz and 13lb and Baz Whitehead had another brace with Rainbows of 12lb 10oz and a personal best 14lb 5oz. Season rod Chad travels all the way from Dover and on his most recent visit had a 13lb Rainbow, John Pike caught a 8lb Sparctic, Ray Froud had a 11lb 2oz Rainbow and Ryah Uhli had a superb trip, catching a personal best 14lb 2oz Rainbow that was also tagged and netted him £100! Robin O’Dell had a lovely 13lb 14oz Rainbow, Tony Edmunds bagged one of 14lb 8oz and Stewart Pope one of 14lb 10oz. Aaron House had a great first visit after a few months away with a Brace of Rainbows of 10lb 8oz and a personal best 14lb 9oz, on the same day Steve Perry braced Rainbows of 11lb and 14lb 10oz and Stewart Easey had a beautifully conditioned Rainbow of 12lb. Season rod Martin Hill had a personal best Sparctic of 9lb 8oz, Mr Morris caught a 12lb 8oz Rainbow and Niall Langford had a 13lb 6o Rainbow. Paul Rees caught a personal best 13lb 12oz Rainbow on his first visit to the fishery, Nick Spring had another good visit taking a Rainbow of 14lb and Neil Perry caught the second biggest fish of the month with a superb 17lb Rainbow. The highlight of the month was fishery regular Steve Perry catching not only a personal best but also a fishery record Rainbow, with an immense Rainbow of 23lb 9oz!

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

 

April 2021

Although we’re now in spring, you wouldn’t know it, from frosts we’ve had most mornings through April. It has its advantages though as it has kept the water temperatures down in the lakes and the fish have been fighting very hard. Looking at the trees you would be forgiven for thinking it was still winter but we’ve had a great display of snowdrops and daffodils and you can see the new leaves coming through on the trees. The marginal vegetation around the lakes has grown up a foot and I’m sure it won’t be too much longer until the first iris flowers start to appear. The colder spring has been noticeable in the lower number of fly life around but I’m sure this will change once the frosts stop and we get a few warm days in a row.

After being closed for three months due to covid it was great to reopen at the end of March and as you would expect for this time of year the fishing has been superb with nearly every day ticket angler catching their bag limit. We’ve been very busy with lots of new anglers along with all our regulars. All methods have been working with dries especially effective as the fish have been sat high in the water and stalking, as usual, has been very effective for targeting the bigger specimens.

The first day of opening after being closed for three months saw two fishery records broken. First up was a colossal 22lb 10oz Rainbow to Rob Perry, followed shortly after by his brother Steve with a superb 10lb 4oz Sparctic Trout. That same day saw Steve land two big Rainbows of 11lb 12oz and 12lb 15oz and Rob took another double Rainbow of 14lb 2oz! Ron Huey had a good couple of trips catching a Rainbow of 11lb 5oz and a personal best Sparctic of 9lb, Nigel Morden had a 13lb Rainbow on his first visit to the fishery and Mr Goring caught a 11lb 10oz Rainbow, season rod Norman Drake had an 8lb Rainbow, day rod Jim Rayner  had one of 8lb 12oz and season rod Des Smith had a lovely 8lb 8oz Brown. Phil Glasgow smashed his personal best of 9lb with a superb 13lb 13oz Rainbow, season rod David Phillips topped a 16 fish haul with a fin perfect 13lb 4o Rainbow and Baz was after his first ever double and caught two in one day with fish of 13lb 4oz and 13lb 14oz. Stalking expert Neil Perry landed three doubles with Rainbows of 13lb 6oz, 13lb 8oz and 14lb 8oz, Anthony Brettel had a fishery record Sparctic of 10lb 12oz along with a Rainbow of 12lb and Dave Woods caught a 9lb Sparctic. Andy Banting caught a 10lb Rainbow, season rod Eliot smashed his personal best with a 14lb 10oz Rainbow, Andy Longstaff had one of 13lb, Tony Roll one of 12lb 8oz and Rob Perry caught a 11lb 12oz Rainbow. Brian McIntyre topped his bag with a Rainbow of 9lb, Alan Drewitt had a personal best Sparctic, Tim Perry had a personal best Brown of 9lb 14oz, Steve Perry had a personal best 10lb 5oz Brown along with an 11lb 14oz Rainbow, season rod Nigel Kennard caught a 12lb 2oz Rainbow, Malcolm had one of 12lb 4oz and Dave Hivey had a personal best Sparctic of 7lb. Mark caught a 12lb 1oz Rainbow, Tim Perry caught two personal bests in a day with a 5lb 8oz Tiger and 9lb Sparctic, Jon Patten had superb 10lb 2 Sparctic and Steve Perry had a day he won’t forget when he landed a colossal 22lb Rainbow along with another of 13lb 10oz and a 9lb 4oz Brown. Young Xander had a lesson and caught a 12lb 3oz Rainbow, Nigel Kennard braced a 9lb 1oz Sparctic along with a 11lb 2oz Brown and Steve Dyball ended a 20 year quest to catch a double figure trout when he landed a superb 14lb 7oz Rainbow. Season rod Martin Hill had a 9lb Sparctic and a 12lb Rainbow, Neil Perry braced Rainbows of 11lb 12oz and 13lb 5oz and Ian Langford smashed the fishery record Sparctic Trout with a huge fish of 11lb 8oz. Nigel Kennard had another big Rainbow of 12lb 5oz, Mr Goring visited again and had another double of 12lb 8oz, Steve Perry visited again also and braced Rainbows of 10lb 4oz and 12lb 6oz, Stuart Bryce had a beautifully marked Brown of 7lb 4oz, Jerry Smith had a personal best 6lb 8oz Blue and season rod Sarah Hornby had a new personal best of 15lb! Matt Pope braced Rainbows of 9lb 4oz and a personal best of 13lb 15oz, Rares had a 7lb 8oz Brown, Iain Daniels caught a 14lb 8oz Rainbow and Martin Hill landed a 12lb 12oz Rainbow and a 6lb Brown. Regular Alan Drewitt caught a 14lb Rainbow, Graham Alcroft caught his first ever double with a superb 14lb 4oz Rainbow, that was also tagged, netting him £100, Edward caught his first double with a lovely 11lb Rainbow and Baz braced Rainbows of 10lb 10oz and 11lb 1oz. Martin Hill had another double of 12lb 14oz, Paul Woodmore caught one of 12lb 2oz and Stewart Keen had a great looking Rainbow of 11lb 6oz on his first trip to the fishery!

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

Fishery Closed January-March 2021 (Covid 19)

December 2020

December was a fairly mild month with plenty of rain, which brought the level up in our chalk stream along with the lakes. We also had a few frosts whihelped drop the water temperatures in the lakes. The fish were often found sitting high in the water with fish caught on dry fly a fairly common occurrence.

The cooler water temperatures meant the fish fought very hard through December with long fast runs often to the backing experienced by many anglers. It is also a great time of year to fish fry patterns with a fast erratic retrieve as the fish will be chasing down and devouring this year’s juvenile roach.

The sport has been excellent through December as is usual for this time of year with plenty of multiple captures. Lots of big fish have featured in the bags of our anglers and I’ve noted those below. The cooler weather has also switched the Browns on with plenty of smaller ones showing along with a few bigger fish.

Christian Grant landed 7 fish topped by a Rainbow of 11lb, Martin Hill is never far from a big fish and have a lovely Rainbow of 10lb 2oz, Brian Charlton landed a fin perferct bow of 13lb 2oz, Brian Roffey had one of 11lb 5oz and Jake Hanson caught one of 11lb 5oz on his first visit to the fishery. Rich Power had a cracking 10lb Brown Trout, Steve Perry had a good few visits with 4 double figure Rainbows between 10lb and 13lb, Mr Trim landed a personal best 12lb Rainbow and Jim Fulbrook one of 11lb 8oz. Season rod Michael Evans had a good day taking a Rainbow of 8lb and a Brown of 6lb, Andy Clark caught a 11lb 8oz Rainbow, Peter Jarvis was happy to slip his set under an 8lb Rainbow and only a few days later he went and caught a stunning 10lb 6oz Brown Trout. We also stocked Arctic Char and the first one caught was by Aaron House with a fine fish of 4lb 15oz, Sally Hill took a Rainbow of 10lb 12oz and a beautiful Brown of 9lb 8oz, not to be outdone her husband Martin went and caught a 11lb 14oz Brown. Joel Young caught a brace of Rainbows that weighed in at 10lb 12oz and 11lb 4oz, Steve Budden had a 11lb 4oz Rainbow and Tom Humby had a splendid Brown of 10lb 8oz. Reef Patten caught his first double figure Rainbow of 12lb 11oz and his dad Jon caught his first Rockbourne double with a fantastic 14lb 7oz Ranibow and Rob Perry had a 13lb 4oz Rainbow. The three biggest fish of the month were Rainbows of 15lb to Ian Langford, 15lb 2oz to Ben and a huge 16lb 8oz to regular Alan, which took 15 minutes to land!

Successful flies have been brighter lures such as cats whiskers, appetisers, fritz and blobs but as usual lots of fish are still getting caught on blue flash damsels. Some days when the fish have been trickier to tempt and are shying away from lures, smaller bugs and buzzers have done well and stalking is still productive due to the fish still sitting high in the water.

 That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our Facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery

 

November 2020

We had a bit of everything this month – torrential rain, wind, warm sunny days and cold frosty days! Changeable weather can sometimes make fishing tricky as the fish don’t seem to be as active as when we have prolonged periods of settled weather. Having said that plenty of fish were caught but they were tricky to tempt on some days. It’s been another excellent month for big fish, so we’ve seen lots of happy anglers and we’ve also stocked some specimen Browns, which have also started to get caught. The water temperatures have cooled significantly and the fish are fighting very hard indeed. We managed to get some of the big double figure Rainbows on film and some of these have been fighting very hard, which is great to see as anglers often remark how big fish don’t fight!

Nearly all the leaves have fallen from the trees and most of the bankside vegetation has died back and we will start the winter cut back in December to keep the fishery looking in great shape until the new growth comes through in the spring.,

I’ve listed below some of the notable captures through November.

Steve Perry has featured heavily in this months captures of big fish and he has really worked out how to target them. He’s caught 8 doubles this month, including Rockbournes biggest ever brace with fish of 17lb and 19lb 12oz, another day when he had three fish of 14lb, 15lb 12oz and 12lb 15oz, a session when he braced Rainbows of 12lb 8oz and 13lb 2oz plus another trip with a 14lb 10oz fish and a 9lb 8oz fish!

Kieran caught a Rainbow of 10lb, Adrian Kruger had a Brown of 7lb, new season rod John Green had a12lb 4oz Rainbow and Danny Titchener also had a 7lb Brown. Martin Hill lost a very big Brown and on his next trip he fished in the same area with the same tactics and had Brown of 10lb 2oz, he shared how he had been fishing with Joan Brock and she went on to catch a Brown of 11lb 8oz! Tobias Hall caught a cock Rainbow of 12lb 7oz, Arthur Perrett braced a 8lb 12oz Brown with a 9lb 12oz Rainbow, Sally Hill had a superb 11lb 8oz Brown and Aaron House caught a fin perfect 12lb 6oz Rainbow. Young Jayden had a lovely 8lb 8oz Brown, Mike had a 10lb 8oz Rainbow, Neil Mundy caught a fantastic 14lb Rainbow and Nick Spring landed a stunning 11lb Brown. Rob Perry caught a personal best 15lb 12oz Rainbow, which he hooked while I was filming his brother Steve fighting his 19lb 12oz Rainbow (film on our facebook page), season rod Paul Skelton had a beautifully conditioned Rainbow of 14lb from Longacre and Michael Recorle had a 13lb 7oz Rainbow. Paul Lambert smashed his personal best of 7lb with a superb fish of 14lb 8oz, Jon Fuller landed a 15lb Rainbow and David King caught a 13lb 7oz Rainbow that was also tagged, which netted him £100!,

                                
The fish are really starting to favour brighter lures with cats whiskers, appetisers, fritz and blobs doing particularly well but lots of fish are still getting caught on blue flash damsels. When the fish have been trickier to tempt and are shying away from lures, smaller bugs and buzzers have done well, especially ‘when all else fails’. Also many of the fish are sitting high in the water and bushy dries such as sedge’s have taken fish while nymphs and lures stripped through the same fish have been ignored.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

October 2020

Following the continuing theme for the year October was fairly mild but we did have some rain, which really helped the water levels and freshened up the lakes. There were still plenty of damsel and dragon flies about and as usual damsel patterns took plenty of fish. On the whole the fishing has been very consistent with plenty of fish caught but it was obvious the fish were not in a chasing mood and often the bigger fish or larger bags came to the anglers that were adept at watch the fish take their fly. Usually as we come into November the fish become increasingly active and chase with gusto, so let’s hope this is the case. The majority of the fish were sat in the upper layers of the water column, which provided good sport for dry fly anglers and the anglers that like to target/stalk fish.

There have been so many big fish caught in October, I think it will be easier to list them below. Highlights had to be the three new fishery records. A colossal 20lb 2oz Rainbow to Chris Bowling, a very large Golden Rainbow of 18lb 2oz to Helen Gunter, caught on a cane rod and beautiful Spractic to David King that weighed in at 10lb 2oz!

Big Fish

Paul Campbell 14lb 1oz Rainbow
Neil Perry 15lb 5oz Rainbow
Mr Griggs 7lb 8oz Sparctic
Scott Brown 15lb Rainbow
Andrew 13lb Rainbow
George 12lb Rainbow
Martin Hill 10lb Brown and 10lb 8oz Rainbow
David King 11lb 2oz and 14lb 4oz Rainbows
Len Quy 12lb 2oz Rainbow
Neil Mundy 15lb 2oz Rainbow
Mick Heasman 15lb 5oz Rainbow
Julian Bland 10lb 8oz Rainbow
Neil Mundy 12lb 12oz and 17lb 10oz Rainbows
David King 14lb 6oz Rainbow
Paul Savill 16lb 4oz Rainbow
Tom Humby 15lb 12oz Rainbow
Chad Goymer 16lb Rainbow
Steve Perry 12lb and 11lb Rainbows
Andy Geddes 11lb 2oz Rainbow
John Pike 9lb Rainbow
Don Cottle 9lb Rainbow
Jon Patten 6lb Brown and 8lb Rainbow
Steve Brett 12lb Rainbow – on dry fly!
Martin Hill 14lb 12oz Rainbow
Graham Henderson 12lb 10oz Rainbow
Mark Graham 10lb 8oz Rainbow
Ray Langshaw 14lb 12oz Rainbow
Steve Perry 12lb and 15lb 4oz Rainbow
Paul Hardy 15lb 8oz Rainbow
Aaron house 12lb Rainbow
Ian Langford 7lb 14oz Brown, 13lb 4oz, 13lb 11oz and 13lb 14oz Rainbows
Steve Perry 11lb 10oz and 14lb 12oz Rainbows
Neil Perry 17lb 6oz Rainbow
Steve Bayliss 15lb 4oz Rainbow
Martin Hill 17lb 4oz Rainbow

Now that’s a lot of BIG FISH! 

The fish are really starting to favour bigger and/or brighter lures with cats whiskers, appetisers, fritz, blobs and humungous all doing particularly well but lots of fish are still getting caught daddy’s (sunk and dry), sedge and blue flash damsels. When the fish have been trickier to tempt ad shying away from lures, smaller bugs and buzzers have done well, especially ‘when all else fails’.

 That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery

 

 

September 2020

September can be a tricky month and it was the same this year. Water temperatures remained warm after the hot summer we’ve had and we didn’t have much rain to cool things down. The cooler night time temperatures did help though and some mornings were noticeably chilly. Although the fish could be difficult to tempt at times, plenty of fish were still caught. Many anglers had great success by stalking fish from the margins and watching them take the fly, especially the larger specimens. We saw the start of a hatch of crane fly’s (daddy’s) which provided some great sport for those that liked to match the hatch. Presenting both dry and sunk daddy’s produced fish.

Lots of fish caught and below I’ve put the bigger fish. Season rod Don Covey had a 7lb 8oz Rainbow from Bridge Lake and on the same day Steve Bayliss had an 8lb’er, Andrew Snaddons day got much better when he landed a 5lb 8oz Blue Trout that was tagged, netting him £100 and regular Andy Smith braced Rainbows of 9lb and 10lb. On his first trip to the fishery Andy Wilson had a fish of 8lb 11oz, Mr Perrin caught one of 8lb 12oz and Russell Dearey and Graham Barker both had 9lb + Rainbows. Expert fly tier Martyn Williams braced Rainbows of 8lb 8oz and 8lb 10oz. Season rod Eliot bagged an 8lb’er, Vincent Webb braced a 9lb Rainbow with a 9lb 14oz Brown, William Mahon had his best Rainbow with one of 9lb 14oz from Alder Lake and Jon Fuller caught a superb 9lb 8oz Sparctic! Season rod Paul Skelton had a Rainbow of exactly 10lb, Nick Spring bagged an 11lb’er, Pete Setchfield had one of 10lb 12oz and season rod Richard Stevenson stalked a Rainbow of 11lb 12oz. Gordon Boyes had a 10lb 14oz Rainbow,  Martin Eastment caught one of 11lb 6oz and Ron Huey visited us twice and stalked Rainbows of 11lb 12oz and 13lb. Stewart Easey travelled all the way from Great Yarmouth to fish fish us and banked 6 fish topped by Rainbows of 8lb and 13lb, season rod Richard Stevenson had another good session stalking a Rainbow of 13lb and Ian Randall and John Pike both had 13lb+ Rainbows too. Mike caught a superb 13lb 4oz Rainbow on only his second time fly fishing and we also had three 14lb Rainbows caught with fishery regular Steve Perry stalking one of exactly 14lb, Dave Broom with one of 14lb 6oz targeted from the edge of Alder Lake and Pat Mclaughlin with a 14lb 7oz brute from Bridge.

 

The successful flies have not changed that much, with all the usual suspects taking fish regularly: blue flash damsels, stalking bugs, buzzers, sunk and dry daddy’s, PTN’s and GRHE’s all producing. As is gets cooler brighter lures, especially fritz based fly’s will take a lot of fish!

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our Facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

August 2020

August was a very hot month and as is the norm with fishing in August, first thing in the morning or early evening is usually the most productive time, with the fish a little trickier to tempt from late morning to mid-afternoon. Stalking and targeting individual fish was the most productive method as the fish were generally not in the mood to chase flies. We often see people casting long lines and ignoring fish that can be seen close in. When the fish are being tricky to tempt watching them take flies close in will see your catch rate improve.

August was a great month for our anglers who like to stalk fish and this can be seen by the number of big fish caught. Tim Watson had a 9lb 8oz Rainbow, Kelvin Hinton had a 9lb’er, Ryan had a 8lb Rainbow and Neil Perry braced 9lb and 13lb 10oz Rainbows. Anthony Brettel caught a13lb 2oz Blue and only a few days later Steve Haines Braced a 13lb 5oz Blue with a 10lb 8oz Rainbow and season rod Robert Tulloch had a 15lb’er. Nigel Kennard braced a 10lb 8oz Brown and 11lb 15oz Rainbow, Stu Bryce had a 13lb Rainbow, Kieran caught a pb 13lb Rainbow and Chad Goymer also had a 13lb’er. Dave Turner caught a 12lb 8oz Rainbow, Alan Drewitt bagged 5 fish topped by a 13lb 12oz Rainbow and Craig Ambridge had a personal best 7lb’er Richard Francis caught his first Rockbourne double with a lovely 11lb 4oz Blue, season rod Eliot had his first double with a 10lb 8oz Rainbow and John Otter had a day to remember with fish of 9lb, 9lb 5oz and 11lb. Expert fly tier Martyn Williams visited and topped his bag with a 9lb 10oz Rainbow, Chaya caught her first ever fish with a superb 8lb 12oz Rainbow and Andy Smith bagged a 9lb 5oz fish. On his next visit Andy bagged 1 10lb Rainbow along with a huge 15lb 4oz Rainbow, James Farge caught a Rainbow of exactly 10lb and David Young topped his 6 fish bag with Rainbows of 8lb 8oz and 10lb. Lenka and Lynn both had 8lb 8oz Rainbows, Steve Perry caught a beautiful Brown of 9lb 6oz, Jordan Smith had a personal best 12lb 7oz Rainbow. Perry caught a 12lb 8oz Blue, Chad had a brace of 10lb 8oz and 8lb, Steve Davis caught a 15lb’er and Neil Perry had the biggest of the month with a very impressive 16lb Rainbow!

Some fantastic fish have been caught I’m sure you would all agree?  Just like July, the most successful fly for August was the  blue flash damsel with the other usual suspects such as small stalking bugs, PTN’s GRHE’s, montanas and sunk daddy’s also scoring highly.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery

July 2020

July can be a challenging month with the hot bright days and the associated warmer water temperatures. We have had some rain which helped to freshen up the lakes and surrounding grounds. As is the norm at this time of the year fishing first thing in the morning or the latter part of the day is usually the most productive with fish always a little trickier to tempt from late morning to mid-afternoon. But tempted they can be! Our six lakes are intimate places and the fish always find some nice shady cover to tuck them selves away under to hide from the bright conditions (and a lot of our anglers!). The keen eyed angler will often find fish in such places and with plenty of stealth and a bit of luck a fish or two can often be tempted. Top flies for ‘stalking’ are usually weighted bugs that sink quickly and a range of colours, usually olives, blacks or browns will take fish and the old faithful PTN’s and GRHE’s in smaller size 16s or 18s can prove deadly. A much over looked method when creeping around under the trees is to place your chosen fly on the bottom and then twitch it up in front of an approaching fish, if you can see your fly watch this or if not, watch the fish to see when it ‘mouths’ your fly and STRIKE!!

Some superb fish have been caught this month and below are some of the larger fish that have caught by our anglers. Tim Watson had a stunning 10lb 15oz Rainbow, Nick had one of 8lb 8oz, Sally Hill braced fish of 9lb and 11lb, Mr Caton landed one of 8lb 8oz and Jeff Willaims had a 9lb 2oz. Paul Tustain, Ben Williams, Sam, season rod David Porter, Robert Underhill and Santo all had 8lb+ Rainbows and Gath and Martin Hill both had braces of 8lb+ Rainbows. Luke Roberts had a 9lb 2oz, Joel Young landed a 10lb 12oz, Richard Stevenson caught two 10lb+ Rainbows, Nick Spring had a lovely 7lb 4oz Brown, season rod Chad Goymer had Rainbows of 7lb, 8lb and 9lb, S. Tiprigan had a personal best 10lb 8oz Rainbow and Mark Roll caught an 11lb’er. 95 year old Don Cover fishes with us nearly every week and caught a cracking 11lb 4oz Rainbow, Nigel Kennard had a fin perfect 11lb 12oz fish, Steve Perry had a lovely fish of 9lb 14oz and his dad Tim had his first double after years of trying with a great fish of 12lb 8oz. Season rod Martin Hill loves stalking fish and had a Rainbow of 11lb 4oz, Steve Haines had a personal best of 10lb 8oz, David Hivey had a superb brace of 9lb and 10lb 4oz, Mr Thomas caught one of 9lb 8oz, Will had a 8lb’er and John Vincent, Dave Seddon and Vincent Webb all had 9lb Rainbows. Chads second visit of the month saw him catch a 10lb 10oz Rainbow on his birthday, Dave Newman had a 12lb 2oz Rainbow and season rod Richard Stevenson had a huge bag of fish with three Rainbows of 10lb 8oz, 11lb 8oz and a new personal best of 14lb 4oz. Paul Esposti had a big Rainbow of 14lb 2oz, season rod Robert Hall caught a new personal best and second biggest fish of the month with a 14lb 10oz Rainbow and Andy Smith smashed his personal best with a huge, fin perfect Rainbow of 17lb 4oz!

Some fantastic fish have been caught I’m sure you would all agree! Top flies are the stalking bugs already mentioned and the hugely popular blue flash damsel, which I would guess, have taken 80% of the fish caught this month and for some reason the fish have also taken a liking for bright lures stripped in really quickly.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery

June 2020

June has certainly been hot at times with temperatures into the 30’s but we have had some relief with cooler days and heavy showers too. Some may find it surprising that ground water levels have dropped significantly even though we had one of the wettest winters on record but that was followed up by one of the warmest and driest springs on record! Although conditions have been tricky at times, there have been plenty of fish caught including lots of fish over 7lb to a top weight of 14lb 8oz! The most consistent sport came in the first couple of hours in the morning and then late afternoon and into the evening. Fish were still caught through the middle part of the day but the trout were generally unwilling to chase down flies or lures. This called for accurate casts in front of fish where the fly would fall within inches of the fish or blind casting followed by a very slow retrieve. Top flies for this method were various guises of buzzer and stalking bugs or small PTN’s or GRHE’s. Through the morning period or in to the evening damsels and small green nymphs were very consistent in taking fish along with montanas. When the fish are in a more lethargic mood they seem to be less easily spooked so one can afford to keep casting to a fish until the presentation is just right. Most lakes also saw the fish rising sporadically through the day and larger patterns such as daddy’s, sedge or grey wolfs would tempt a fish to rise.

There have been some exceptional fish caught this month and multiple captures of big fish. The biggest two fish of the month were caught be season rod Chris Bright with a 14lb 8oz personal best Rainbow and by Ian Langford and not far behind was Steve Perry with a 14lb Rainbow. Over three visits Alan Drewitt had 9 Rainbows between 6lb 4oz and 10lb, David Croucher had a pb 8lb Rainbow, Sally Hill also had an 8lb’er as did Chad Goymer. Jayden fished with his dad and over a few visits had a Blue of 9lb 8oz and a Rainbow of 11lb 4oz and his dad Mike had a Rainbow of 13lb, which was also tagged and won him £100. Season rod Nigel Kennard had some good fish with Rainbows of 7lb 12oz and a personal best 12lb’er, Bill Norman had fish of 9lb 8oz and 12lb and Keith Thrower had a superb 8lb’er which fought for 20 minutes! Anthony Brettell and Ian Langford both had mottled trout, one blue and one golden, both of 6lb, Neil Perry caught a 10lb 12oz Rainbow and Mike Jenkins landed one of 12lb 12oz! Tony Roll caught a great 13lb Rainbow, John Anderson had one of 10lb, Martin Hill had a breace of 8lb 8oz and 9lb 8oz and Mr Fussell caught one on 11lb 6oz. Season rod Richard Stevenson had three great visits taking fish of 8lb, 8lb 8oz, 9lb 8oz, 11lb 10oz and 12lb 10oz, new season ticket holder David Hivey caught a Rainbow of 11lb 5oz, 95 year old Don Covey had a personal best 12lb Rainbow and Dave Turner had one of 12lb 13oz. Dan Berry visited us for the first time and the first fish he caught was 12lb 6oz, season rod Robert Hall had a superb 11lb 10oz Rainbow and Neil Perry caught Rainbows of 10lb and 10lb 8oz of his first two casts and Andy Smith landed a 12lb’er!

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

 

May 2020

May saw us finally reopening after 2 months of lockdown because of the coronavirus. We’ve setup measures to help keep everyone safe and all of our anglers have adhered to the changes and it was great to finally open the gates and welcome you all back to the fishery.

May has been a month full of life at the Fishery, all the vegetation is lush and green, the yellow and purple Iris are in full bloom, our ducklings are growing bigger by the day as they gorge themselves on the abundant fly life and the chicks of various songbirds can be heard up in the trees. The trout are voracious at this time of year and can often be seen chasing the tadpoles or hitting in to the shoals of small roach fry. A good tactic is to strip back lures in the early part of the day before the sun gets too high in the sky, when a switch to smaller more imitative patterns will usually keep sport coming.

May has traditionally been a fantastic month for fishing and this May has not disappointed. The average fish size is still in excess of 3lbs and many are 4lb+ and there have been literally hundreds of fish caught with too many in the 3lb – 5lb category to count!!

We’ve had so many good captures and big fish caught since we reopened that I can’t list them all. Andy Smith fished with us a few times and caught a 4lb 8oz Brown and superb 8lb 8oz Sparctic and had Rainbows of 7lb 2oz, 7lb 8oz, 9lb 2oz, 9lb 10oz, 9lb 12oz, 10lb 2oz, 11lb and 13lb 4oz! Mark Roll topped an 11 fish catch with a 11lb 4oz Rainbow and Ted also had a 11lb 4oz Rainbow. Anthony Brettell had a personal best 8lb Sparctic along with Rainbows of 11lb 12oz and 13lb 2oz, Steve Bayliss had a 7lb Rainbow and father and son, Ian and Nial Langford, had Rainbows of 12lb 4oz and 13lb 2oz respectively! Neil Perry had a personal best 8lb 8oz Sparctic, David ans Isaac had stunning 9lb 8oz Pinky and 6lb Tiger, Aaron House caught a magnificent 9lb 4oz Spacrtic and Chris Bowden landed an 11lb Rainbow. Dave Smith had a pb 7lb 14oz Rainbow, Mr Sharp had one of 8lb 4oz, Danny Titchener caught a 6lb 15oz Brown and his dad had an 8lb Rainbow and Mr Large caught a 10lb Rainbow. Season rod Mr Esposti had an 8lb 8oz Rainbow, 12 year old Joey had a personal best 7lb 8oz Rainbow, Bryan McIntyre braced Rainbows of 7lb 8oz and 8lb and Nigel Kennard had his first Char. Jed Farley had a fine brace of 8lb and 9ln Rainbows, Aaron House caught lovely 6lb 10oz Rainbow and Rich Middleton had an 8lb 8oz Rainbow,Rob Storer caught a personal best 9lb Rainbow, Steve Perry braced a 6lb 8oz Sparctic and 8lb Rainbow, Mike Jenkins had a Rainbow of 9lb and season rod Carl Taylor had a great session taking Rainbows of 7lb 8oz, 7lb 10oz and 9lb 2oz. Andy Banting caught a 10lb Rainbow, season rod Paul Esposti braced Rainbows of 7lb 12oz and 11lb, Michael Evans caught his first Char, Robert Hall hand a 7lb 4oz fish and Tony Roll caught a 7lb 12oz sparctic and Ian Moran caught the biggest fish of the month with an 13lb 8oz Rainbow.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our Facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

March 2020

March is a wonderful month on the fishery with all the plants literally bursting into life! The bluebells in the woods that had started to pop their heads above ground in February have now formed a carpet of green and it won’t be long until they transform in to a carpet of blue, the daffodils have been in full bloom providing some much needed colour and life, the hawthorn bushes are sporting vibrant green leaves, the Iris are growing taller by the day and the marsh marigolds are giving a splash of bright yellow with their large buttercup shaped flowers along our chalk stream, Sweatfords Water. The birds are certainly louder and much busier too with many seen going to and throw to their chosen nesting place with a beak full of twigs and the unmistakable croaks of frogs and toads can be heard around the lakes as they take part in their yearly ritual.

The sport has been excellent with the fish sitting high in the water for the most part, which has been great for those who like to spot and target fish along with those that enjoy fishing with dry flies. Small emerges patterns fished in the surface film have been successful. Nymphs are always taking fish especially the favourite blue flash damsel.

The fishery closed before March ended because of the COVID-19 outbreak and on a fishing front this was a shame as March to May is usually the best time of year for fishing. We have cool water temperatures, clear water and great light levels, which always provides superb sport. However, up until the closure plenty of superb fish were caught!

We hosted the John Lewis Partnership again and all 23 anglers caught their 4 fish limit, with Graham Brown catching the biggest of the day at 12lb 7oz, Chris Bowling wasn’t far behind with one of 12lb and Julian Bland taking a 11lb 6oz fish too. Neil, Mundy, Pauline Pendle and Bill Bishop all caught 8lb+ fish each and there were some Browns, Sparctics and Tigers in the catches too.

Neil Evans topped a four fish bag with a 7lb Rainbow, Arthur braced 9lb and 5lb 8oz Rainbows, Jasmine Roll caught a 7lb’er, Chris had one of 8lb and Mark Perry caught two Arctic Char. Tony Roll caught 9 fish on two occasion and included a tagged fish, winning him £100 and a 10lb 8oz Rainbow, Louis also caught a tagged fish and a Rainbow of 10lb 8oz and Alan Drewitt caught 10 fish, which included 4 Arctic Char. Alex Pearce successfully targeted his first Char, Neil Magooking, Mr Trim and Mr Tarrant all had 7lb+ Rainbows and Andy Farmer caught two Sparctics. Bryan McIntyre had a brace of 7lb 8oz and 9lb, Robert Tulloch caught a 6lb Brown and 5lb 8oz Sparctic, Clive Watton had a 6lb+  Brown and Mr O’Brien had a 7lb 8oz Rainbow. Mark Roll had a superb 11lb 4oz Rainbow, Mark Farran had one of 8lb, Sam Parry caught a 7lb’er and Martin Hill had a stunning 4lb 4oz Tiger.

The fishery record Sparctic was broken twice this month with fishery regular Steve Perry taking a super fish of 8lb 14oz and his other fish over a few trips included Rainbows of 8lb 10oz, 9lb, 10lb 6oz, 10lb 8oz and 10lb 10oz!!! Only four days after Steve’s record Sparctic his mate Jon Patten successfully stalked a magnificent Sparctic of 9lb 8oz to take the title. Both anglers put in a lot of effort for the fish they caught!

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date information about the Fishery.

February 2020

February continued the theme of the winter - very wet and mild. In fact it has been one of the wettest on record with storm after storm rolling in off the Atlantic! The upside to this is that the aquafers that supply the water to our lakes and many rivers, especially the chalk streams of Wessex are full to the brim and this can only be a good thing for the year ahead.

The sport has continued to be excellent through February with the fish being very active indeed due to lower water temperatures and the high oxygen content of the lakes. On the warmer days plenty of fish could be seen in the surface layers, which enabled those that wanted to, to stalk fish, but the lower light levels and the angle of the Sun did make stalking tricky at times. Everything seems to be springing in to life with the snowdrops just coming to an end, daffodils are in full bloom around the fishery and the bluebells have sprung up all through the woodland and the first green vibrant green leaves are shooting on the hedges and trees.

The Arctic Char have proved very popular through the winter with many anglers wanting to know what lakes they were in and the best tactics to catch them. The Char seem to have a liking for very bright flies, especially Orange or pink and can often be found right in the edge so a stalking approach is best. We had Graeme Pullen from The Totally Awesome Fishing Show, fish with us to make a film and he only managed to catch the biggest Arctic Char for 5 years with an amazing fish of 8lb!

Plenty of fish have been getting caught through the month with fish averaging over 4lb. Paul Webster caught a personal best 8lb 8lb Rainbow, Alan Drewitt braced fish of 7lb 14oz and 9lb 6oz, Peter and his sons Joe and Francis all had a lesson and went on to catch 10 fish between them up to 7lb 6oz. Season rod Michael Evans caught his first Sparctic, Mark and Issy both caught Char and Marco landed a 7lb 8oz Rainbow on his 3rd cast! Alan Drewitt visited us another two times taking five fish on both visits, which included Sparctics of 4lb, 4lb 6oz and 5lb 4oz. Austin landed four fish topped by a 9lb 8oz Rainbow and his friend Chris also landed four, which included a Char,Mr Warren had a lovely Brown as part of his 3 fish bag, season rod Pete Willingham caught a cracking 9lb 12oz Rainbow and David Arnold braced Rainbows of 5lb 8oz and 8lb 8oz. Season rod Dominic Price caught a personal best Brown of 7lb 8oz as part of a four bag, Paul Bridger landed 8 fish including his first Arctic Char and fishery regular Aaron House had a cracking 4lb Tiger. Andy, Ollie and Jack caught 10 fish between them to a top weight of 7lb 8oz and Jack had a Char, season rod Clive Watton had a Tiger and Brown, Ernie Johnson caught a 10lb Rainbow from oak and 9 year old Archie fished with his Granddad John Rothwell to catch 4 fish between 3lb and 5lb.

As with January lures and larger nymphs have been the order of the day fished on a fairly fast retrieve; blue flash damsels, montanas, cats whiskers, dancers or goldhead fritz.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

January 2020

We’ve had plenty of rain through January and the aquifers are all nicely topped up and the lakes are full to the brim; on the whole it has been very mild with only a couple of frosts to speak of. As I’m writing this the snowdrops are out in all their glory, the daffodils are not far behind and bluebells can be seen shooting throughout the woods. It really feels like spring is in the air but with it being the beginning of February I can’t help but feel winter isn’t quite finished and I’m sure we will get some more icy weather.

January was a productive month for those that braved the elements with most taking their bag limit. With the cooler water temperatures the fish have been in the mood for chasing down lures and generally very active and fighting very hard and the fish seen moving most days just under the surface! Some of our more determined regulars have also been managing to stalk the odd fish in the very clear water when the light allowed it, particularly the Arctic Char, of which we had a second stocking of this month and have proved very popular.

Tony Roll caught 20 fish in one session, which is a fishery record for the number of fish caught by one angler and included Rainbows to 8lb, Sparctics and an Arctic Char, Donna Banfiled also caught a cracking Sparctic, Tim and Steve Perry bagged 3 Char between them and Nick Spring also managed one too. Chris Bright caught an 8lb Rainbow, season rod Paul Esposti had a Char and Alan Drewitt fished with us three times and over those sessions caught Rainbows of 7lb 14oz, 8lb and 9lb 6oz, a 4lb 6oz Sparctic and 5 Arctic Char. Jon Patten had four Char in a session, Adrian Kruger caught 11 fish including 2 Char, a 5lb Brown and 2 x 7lb Rainbows. Mark Perry visited all the way from Loughborough to try and catch a Char, which he succeeded in doing along with catching 5 Rainbows to 7lb 8oz. Matthew Hearne visited from Cardiff and caught five fish to 7lb, Lucas Smith bagged a 7lb 9oz Rainbow, Lubos had 2 Char and season rod Martin Hill stalked a brace of 8lb Rainbows. Richard Ware had a Char from Alder Lake, season rod Steve Forsyth caught a personal best 9lb 12oz Rainbow along with a 7lb’er and Kevin bagged a 4lb Brown and 9lb 12 Rainbow. Fishery regular Aaron House caught a fine pair of Rainbows of 7lb and 8lb, Clive Watton had one of 7lb 8oz, Richard Neville had a Char and Malcolm Boyd caught a personal best 9b Rainbow. We also had Graeme Pullen from the The Totally Awesome Fishing Show here doing a video and while he was hear he caught the biggest Arctic Char from the fishery for 5 years with superb 8lb Specimen. You can find the video on our Facebook page and on You Tube.

Top fly’s for the month were lures with cats whiskers, appetisers, humongous, blue flash damsels, fritz and blobs.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

December 2019

December was a very wet and generally mild month with only a couple of frosts. We did need the rain to top up the lakes and aquafers that feed the chalk springs but we could certainly do with a break from it now for a few weeks as the ground is now saturated; but it is currently raining as I write this! We’ve been busy cutting back all the vegetation and marginal growth in preparation for the spring and bulbs can already be seen popping their heads above ground.

As is usual at this time of year the fishing has been superb. The trout never seem to mind the colder months and could often be tempted to chase down lures on a very quick retrieve, it’s always great fun when a bow wave of a chasing trout can be seen hunting down your fly before you get a rod wrenching smash as they hit your fly!

The stocking of Arctic Char has been very popular once again and we’ve had plenty of anglers in to try and target them. As is often the case with the Char we stock each Winter, the majority have been caught by anglers sight fishing for them and using brighter flies – usually pink, red, orange or purple in colour.

Hundreds of fish have graced our anglers nets through December with fish averaging around the 4lb mark with the odd larger fish making an appearance too.

James Rickes caught the first Char of the season along with a 6lb Rainbow, Aaron House stalked a beauty of a Char from Bridge Lake and Ian Pond, Martin Hill and Kennie Walters all caught one too. Tony Roll landed 6 fish including a lovely Brown, Alan Drewitt visited twice and bagged three Arctic Char on each visit, Terry Chilcott also managed a Char and Terry Cheeseman braced 6lb Rainbows. Phil and Jim both landed 8lb Rainbows, Mark Roll visited on his birthday and landed 3 Arctic Char and a Brown Trout, Tim and Steve Perry caught 5 Char between them and Tom Humby had a cracking Sparctic as part of his 4 fish bag. Tommy and Lee Graham had a 4lb Char and 4lb 8oz Sparctic, Mr Westcott and Mr Hartley both Char and Thomas Atkinson bagged four fish topped by a 7lb 4oz Rainbow. Mr Argent caught 6 fish, which included a Brown Trout, Troy Sait had a 6lb 8oz Rainbow, Mr Lawrence had a lovely brace of Char on his first visit to the fishery, Steve and Tim Perry visited for a second time and caught another three Char and Mr Payne had a 4lb Brown and 7lb Rainbow on his 60th Birthday.

Brighter lures such as cats whiskers, appetisers, fritz and blobs are doing particularly well but lots of fish are still getting caught on blue flash damsels. When the fish have been trickier to tempt and are shying away from lures, smaller bugs and buzzers have done well.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

November 2019

November brought some rain at last and it totally transformed our little chalk stream by scouring the bed and removing a lot of silt deposits just in time for the wild brownies to spawn hopefully. The lakes have also had a good flush through but they are not as clear as they were due to the run off. The fish have generally been sitting very high in the water and large lures stripped fast has been the most productive method. Stalking has proved hard due to the run off and the reduced light levels, unless the fish have been sat very close to the margins but those that have persevered have done well.

As usual hundreds of fish have been caught this month with plenty of good fish caught. Only two doubles caught though with season rod Pete Jarvis catching a superb 11lb Rainbow along with one of 7lb and fishery regular Alan Drewitt has one of 10lb that was caught along with Rainbows of 7lb and 9lb 8oz. John Pike caught a 8lb 7oz Rainbow and two 4lb Browns, Beverley had a lovely Sparctic after having a fly fishing lesson, Mick had an 8lb’er on his first trip to the fishery and Kerry caught a 7lb 14oz fish. Season rod Alan Howard caught a cracking 9lb 4oz Rainbow, John Otter had one of 9lb and Ross had a 9lb’er along with a 4lb Brown. Neil Perry had a superb Rainbow of 8lb 8oz that had a lovely pink flank, his friend Ian Langford caught 7 fish topped by two 6lb’ers and one of 7lb, Grant braced 7lb Rainbows and Mail Evans caught fish of 8lb and 8lb 8oz over two trips. Jason caught five fish with Rainbows of 6lb 5oz and 7lb his best and his mate Guy also had five including three 6lb’ers, season rod David Blease also had five fish with an 8lb 8oz Rainbow his best and fishery regular Aaron House had three good fish of 5lb 8lb 6oz and 9lb 6oz. Mark Roll caught a 9lb Rainbow, season rod Ray Froud had one of 9lb 2oz, Mr Davis also had a 9lb’er and Bob LeFeaux caught an 8lb 12oz fish. Steve Bayliss and Harry Brookwell both had 8lb+ fish, Jim Morris caught a 9lb Rainbow on his first trip to the fishery, season rod Don Cottle had fish of 8lb and 7lb and Martin Hill had a very plump 9lb’er. Callan caught a 7lb Blue and 8lb Rainbow, Tom Humby had five topped by a 7lb’er, Lubos also had five fish with 7lb 8oz his best and congratulations to Tony Roll on winning a half season ticket when he topped our fishing competiton and BBQ with a 7lb 2oz fish.

The fish are really starting to favour brighter lures with cats whiskers, appetisers, fritz and blobs doing particularly well but lots of fish are still getting caught on blue flash damsels. When the fish have been trickier to tempt and are shying away from lures, smaller bugs and buzzers have done well, especially ‘when all else fails’.

 That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery

October 2019

On the whole October has been mild with only a couple of frosts but thankfully we have seen some rain, which has helped bring up the levels and freshened the fishery up. The nights have been cooler so the water temps have decreased and the fish have generally been very active. The fish have often been found higher in the water  and this has seen some anglers have some good catches on dry daddy long legs. Stalking has proved harder due to the lower light levels and the water not being as clear due to rain run-off. Alder has remained the clearest as has been the best for sight fishing.

Lots of stock fish in the 3-4lb bracket have been caught along with a good number of 4lb+ fish. Not as many doubles have showed this month but we’ve had three BIG fish caught along with some low doubles and upper singles.

Season rod Richard Stevenson over two trips had Rainbows of 8lb 4oz and 10lb 6oz with both fish being stalked and taken on a WAEF, Colin Sheppard had a 6lb 8oz fish, Peter Wells one of 9lb and Fred Gill caught 5 topped by Rainbows of 8lb 14oz and 11lb. Fishery regular Alan Drewitt braced two 7lb+ fish as part of a four fish bag and on his next visit he landed one of 8lb 12oz, Chad Goymer stalked an 8lb’er and on his first visit to the fishery Martin Neil had Rainbows 6lb 5oz and 9lb and season rod Philip Cox caught a 7lb 8oz Rainbow that was tagged, winning him £100 and Louis Adams had a superb Rainbow of 14lb!

John Lewis Fly Fishing Partnership fished with us again and between them caught 92 fish!!! Three cracking Sparctics were caught with a 5lb 6oz to Paul White along with a pb Rainbow of 6lb, Stuart Vine had a 7lb’er and Paul Walker caught the fishery record with a superb 7lb 12oz fish. Mike Malloney had an 8lb Rainbow, Mike Parsons caught the second biggest fish with a 14lb 7oz Rainbow and Neil Mundy had a huge 17lb 2oz Bow!

 

The successful flies are all the usual suspects: blue flash damsels, stalking bugs, buzzers, sunk and dry daddy’s, PTN’s and GRHE’s all producing. As is gets cooler brighter lures, especially fritz based fly’s will take a lot of fish!

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our Facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

September 2019

On the whole September was a tricky month, with the water temperatures remaining fairly warm for the time of year, coupled with a distinct lack of rain. Plenty of fish were caught but some anglers did struggle, while others made it look easy. I’ve said it many times but in these conditions targeting fish and trying to watch them take the fly is by far the best method. They were not often in the mood for chasing flies down and giving a good tug to alert the angler of a take; often the only indication of a take was a very small movement on the end of the fly line or the keen eyed anglers watching the fish take the fly. As we move into October we should see some rain and cooler temperatures, which usually livens the fish up! 

The average size of the “stockies” was around 4lb with a good helping of bigger fish caught, some of which are listed below.

Harry caught a superb 11lb 1oz Rainbow on his first cast of the day, season rod John Pike caught fish of 9lb 8oz and 12lb 10oz on two separate visits, Roger Barrey had a 5lb 2oz Brown along with a 10lb 4oz Rainbow that was also tagged, which netted him £100. Andy Smith had two excellent days fishing, on the first day he caught Rainbows of 9lb and 9lb 6oz and then on the second day Rainbows of 8lb 14oz and 9lb, Alan Drewitt was on top form as usual and over a couple of visits had fish of 8lb, 7lb 14oz and 11lb along with some 4lb+ fish. Steve Bayliss stalked a lovely 8lb 10os Rainbow, young Fletcher caught his first ever trout while having a lesson, season rod Kelvin Hinton had an 8lb’er and Aaron House braced 5lb’ers. Marek was made up to land his personal best of 8lb 8oz, especially as it was tagged, winning him £100, season rod Richard Stevenson stalked a 9lb 6oz fish from the corner of Alder Lake, Jim McGuire caught his first ever still water Brown with a superbly conditioned 5lb’er on his first visit to the fishery and Charlie Beshaw on his first trip had a 7lb 9oz Rainbow. Lubos had an excellent day catching 4 fish topped by a 11lb 12oz Rainbow, regular Tony Roll had a 9lb 8oz fish and James caught a 10lb 14oz Rainbow. Neil Mundy had a fantastic bag with Rainbows of 8lb, 9lb, 9lb and 9lb 2oz and Ted Jarvis had the biggest of the month with a cracking 13lb Rainbow from Alder.

A date for your diary!  Fishing Competition/BBQ event on Saturday 9th November. Details can be found by following this link. http://www.rockbournetroutfishery.co.uk/compnov2019.html

Some fantastic fish have been caught I’m sure you would all agree?  Blue flash damsels are still taking many fish but there was a definite switch to daddys (dry and wet)  being the most productive fly half way through September. Bright lures, especially cat’s whiskers are also taking more fish with each week that passes.

 That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery

August 2019

The hot weather continued through August, although we did have a brief cooler and wet period in the middle of the month, which really freshened everything up! August has always been the trickiest month of the year for various reasons – the water is often at its warmest due to being the tail end of the summer, high light levels and a lack of rain. The fish can seem lethargic at times and very tricky to tempt but with regular fly changes, scaling down to very small flies on a fluorocarbon leader and adopting a stealthy approach will often bring more success. It may also seem obvious but take the time to look for fish, they are very unlikely to be evenly distributed throughout a lake and will often be in shoals at inlet streams, around springs, in deep holes or under the cover of trees.

Despite the challenging conditions plenty of fish have been caught including a good number of bigger fish.

Elliott spent 3 hours targeting a big Rainbow in Bridge lake and after many fly changes the Rainbow was finally fooled and a new pb of 8lb 1oz was landed, new season rod Richard Stevenson braced Rainbows of 7lb 10oz and 9lb 10oz and fishery regular Tom Crumby had a lovely fish of 9lb 15oz. Mr Hutton had a beauty of a Sparctic at 5lb and 12 year old Evan Hector stalked a 4lb 2oz Sparctic along with a 9lb 8oz Rainbow. 8 year Old Edward was over the moon to catch his first ever Rainbow Trout of 3lb 6oz  while having a lesson, Leigh also had a lesson and caught her first her first ever fish and 14 year old Issy caught a personal best Rainbow of 10lb 2oz from Longacre Lake. Paul Williams landed a cracking fish of 6lb 14oz from under the trees on Bridge Lake and Jay Hewes also had one from Bridge that weighed in at 8lb 12oz. Season rod Chad stalked a lovely fish of 9lb 8oz, fishery regular Alan Drewitt braced fish of 10lb and 11lb 6oz and Mark Lane had 10lb 6oz Rainbow from Longacre! Bruces Foskett landed a beautifully marked fish of 9lb 10oz, which was also tagged, but unfortunately Bruce didn’t pay his £1 for the tagged fish comp so missed out on winning £100. Jim Eames had a 10lb 8oz fish, on two separate visits John Pike landed two double with fish of 10lb 6oz and 10lb 8oz and Warner caught this biggest fish of the month with an immaculate and fin perfect Rainbow of 12lb 14oz that eventually took a black tadpole after many fly changes.

Some fantastic fish have been caught I’m sure you would all agree?  Just like July, the most successful fly for August was the  blue flash damsel with the other usual suspects such as small stalking bugs, PTN’s GRHE’s, WAEF’s, montanas and sunk daddy’s also scoring highly.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery

July 2019

July was a very hot and dry month, which did make the fishing tricky at times. As is often the case through the summer months fishing the first 2-3 hours of the day is usually the most productive with another “easier” period in the last couple of hours also. The fish can be tempted through the middle of the day also but this often requires more finesse and a stealthy approach. There will always be some fish that are more active than others that are willing to chase down a fly but the majority of fish will only give gentle takes at this time of year. If you can see the fish, then targeting them individually and watching them take the fly can be very successful. Fly choice is crucial – fish that are moving fast or sitting deep will require heavy flies to get down in front of them quickly, while fish that are sitting stationery higher up in the water will require flies that sink slowly that can be held in the fishes view for longer. Try repeatedly casting to the same fish even though it may have ignored you fly already as you can sometimes annoy them into taking and also change your fly regularly if no indication is forthcoming.

Although challenging at times, plenty of fish have been caught including some larger specimens. Young Frank had an excellent day while fishing with his dad Nick and landed Rainbows of 3lb 10z, 4lb 8oz and 9lb 1oz and Nick caught one of 7lb 10oz. Season rod Mr Dayeh caught a cracking 9lb 5oz fish from Spring, Bryan McIntyre had a bright looking 8lb 3oz Rainbow and on two separate visits Alan Drewitt landed fish of 8lb and 9lb. Brothers Louis and Oliver had a lesson and then went on to catch fish of 8lb and 9lb 4oz, regular Jim had a 8lb 8oz Rainbow, season rod Robert Hall had a 9lb Rainbow from Longacre and Ayden had one of 8lb. Graham Pullen of The Totally Awesome Fishing Show caught an 8lb Rainbow while filming, Tony Warmington had a 7lb fish, Ian Robertson caught one of 7lb 12oz and Mr Turner caught a stunning 4lb 8oz Sparctic. Jay and Chris had a good day taking a fish of 8lb 12oz and 9lb and David caught a 9lb 8oz Rainbow from Longacre Lake. July also saw 5 doubles grace the bank with a 10lb 8oz fish to Sam, a 10lb 9oz to season rod John pike, a 10lb 12oz to Chris Bright, one of 11lb 4oz to season rod Steve Brett and a cracker of 11lb 8oz to Chris. 

Some fantastic fish have been caught I’m sure you would all agree! Top flies are stalking bugs, the hugely popular blue flash damsel, sunk daddy’s, GRHE’s, PTN’s and WAEF. That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

June 2019

The start of the month saw some much needed rain, which really helped freshen the fishery up. The ground water levels are fairly low due the dry winter and spring and coupled with the warmer second part of the month has made the fishing tricky at times. As is usual at this time of year (even more so on hot bright days) the sport is better at the beginning and end of the day. Fish can still be caught through the middle part but more refined tactics are often needed; namely smaller flies and watching the fish take the fly or looking for very small indications on the end of the fly line that the fish have taken the fly. Fly wise small patterns such as PTN’s, GRHE’s, WAEF’s and buzzers/stalking bugs scored highly. The usual damsel and montanas are still taking fish, especially early on in the day.

The sport had been consistent through the month with hundreds of smaller 3-4lb fish caught and a few larger or memorable fish caught too. Season rod Mr Canterbury had a beautiful Brown of 3lb 4oz, Tony Roll’s granddaughter did exceptionally well catching a 6lb+ Rainbow, Alan Drewitt caught he biggest Blue for a few weeks with a 7lb’er and Mr Roberts landed a superb 5lb Sparctic!

We also hosted a corporate day in the middle of the month and the BBQ food went down a treat! All the anglers did really well with dozens of 3-5lb fish landed, 9 fish caught between 6lb and 9lb and 3 doubles were also caught. Karl Iacoubucci had the biggest at 11lb, Bob Hatton was not far behind with a 10lb 9oz fish and John Otter had a 10lb 2oz fish too.

One surprise capture was a lovely Arctic Char caught by Steve Perry, Steve stalked/targeted the Char from amongst a group of Spartic Trout. The fish was in excellent condition considering it was stocked six months before its capture! Regular Aaron House stalked an immaculate 10lb 2oz Rainbow from Alder, Mr Bennett and John Pike both had 9lb 8oz Rainbows, Chad landed four fish topped by an 8lb’er and Terry and Martin both had fish of 10lbs+ and Terry’s fish was tagged, which netted him £100

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

 

May 2019

May has been a month full of life at the Fishery, all the vegetation is lush and green, the yellow and purple Iris are in full bloom, our ducklings are growing bigger by the day as they gorge themselves on the abundant fly life and the chicks of various songbirds can be heard up in the trees. The trout are voracious at this time of year and can often be seen chasing the tadpoles or hitting in to the shoals of small roach fry. A good tactic is to strip back lures in the early part of the day before the sun gets too high in the sky, when a switch to smaller more imitative patterns will usually keep sport coming. May has traditionally been a fantastic month for fishing and this May has not disappointed. The average fish size is still in excess of 3lbs and many are 4lb+ and there have been literally hundreds of fish caught with too many in the 3lb – 6lb category to count!

Nick enjoyed his first visit to the fishery, stalking a Tiger, two Sparctics and a Char, Ian, Ron Huey, Kevan and Mr Hurring both caught Rainbows of 7lb+. Mark caught a 10lb 4oz Rainbow from Spring Lake on his first visit to the fishery and Neil and Anthony had a superb days fishing both taking Rainbows of 7lbm 8lb and 10lb 8oz. Kevin caught a superb Blue of 11lb, Danny and Alan had Rainbows of 9lb and 7lb respectively and Don, Mr Silverthorne and Mr Magookin all had 8lb Rainbows. Chris and Sam both had 7lb Blues, Father and Son, Roland and Seb took a superb brace at 8lb and 10lb 8oz, Ted Jarvis caught a cracking Sparctic along with a 7lb Rainbow and Andrew Snaddon caught an 8lb’er. The Fishmongers fished with us and caught plenty of fish, topped by a 10lb 3oz Rainbow to Simon Newnes, Alan Drewitt bagged 6 fish including a 7lb 4oz, 7lb 8oz and 9lb. Erh-Hsuin caught a personal best 10lb 15oz Rainbow while stalking, Alan Wolfe braced a 6lb Blue and 7lb Rainbow on his first visit and on a separate visit Alan Drewitt landed a 10lb 8oz Rainbow. Aaron House caught a personal best Blue of 7lb, Sam Burns had a 5lb Sparctic and Rob Burns caught a 7lb Rainbow, season rod Martin Wise had an 8lb and Phil Taylor a 9lb. Mr Booth caught a lovely 11lb 10oz Rainbow from Longacre, Don Cottle landed a 5lb Sparctic and Jason Walker caught a 8lb 2oz Rainbow.

Above are just some of the fish caught but as you can see the sport has been excellent. As always blue flash damsels have been very productive along with montanas, mayfly nymphs have done well and in brighter conditions smaller hares ears, pheasant tails and buzzers/stalking bugs are a great choice.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

April 2019

Spring is here, at last! The bluebells are out in all their glory in the woods and the reeds, sedge and iris are growing taller by the day along the lake margins, providing anglers some much needed cover to sneak up on their quarry! The frog and toad spawn has hatched and thousands of tadpoles are now on the menu for our hungry trout and because of this montana’s are proving particularly successful. The insect life is abundant with alder fly, sedge, black knat’s, midge and some daddy’s giving the dry fly angler a few options to try. Damsels are now starting to hatch on the sunnier days so damsel nymphs are an excellent choice as they make up a huge part of the trout’s diet through the warmer months. Buzzer fishing has also been excellent, especially fishing a suspender buzzer in the surface film when you start to see the trout sipping at the surface.

April will always be a good month for fishing as the fish are always very active with the increase in natural food that this time of year brings coupled with the cool water that they love so much. Our anglers have had some superb fishing, some of which is highlighted in the following catch reports.

Andy Farmer enjoyed a good trip catching his first Arctic Char and Sparctic, Sally Hill landed a 10lb 1oz Rainbow from Longacre, which put up a 15 minute fight, Fred and Harry caught their first ever fish while having tuition, Stu Ellins caught a 6lb 8oz Golden and regular Darren Waters had a 9lb 6oz fish. Season rod Mr Perrett braced Rainbows of 8lb 8oz and 10lb 8oz, Aaron landed a 7lb+ fish and Alan Drewitt had a 10lb Rainbow. Steve Perry stalked a superbly conditioned 12lb 2oz Rainbow and Tom Crumby had one on 11lb 2oz, Tony Roll caught a 8lb fish and John Pike had an exceptional bag of fish with Rainbows of 6lb, 8lb 12oz, 9lb 12oz and 10lb 8oz! The Royal Navy and Royal Marines Angling Association fished with us and all 17 anglers except one caught their 4 fish limit with three rods taking doubles; 11lb to Chris Saunders, 10lb 14oz to Chris Anderson (also tagged, winning him £100) and 10lb to Paddy Hughes! Keith Sherren bagged 8 fish including Raibows of 8lb 8oz and 9lb 4oz, Alan Drewitt bagged 6 fish including Rainbows of 9lb and 9lb 9oz and Mr Shires, Kevan, Phil Glasgow, Dave, Peter (12 years old), Bill, Mary, Bob, Ray Oliver, Andy, Seb and Martyn Williams all caught fish between 7lb 12oz and 10lb!!! Our Trout masters fish off was won by Aaron House with his three fish bag totalling 18lb 10oz with fish of 4lb 12oz, 5lb 12oz and 8lb 2oz and Norman Drake was not far behind and had a great 8lb 6oz Rainbow. Alan Drewitt had another couple of trips and Rainbows of 8lb 6oz, 9lb and 10lb and Tom also had a10lb that he stalked.

Our anglers have had action on lots of different flies but I would say that if fishing lures or larger nymphs a faster retrieve is working well, stalking bugs or smaller nymphs are great for stalking the bigger fish and some great sport has been had by fishing dries or suspender buzzers as the fish are sitting very high in the water. If you are not getting takes then change your fly regularly and  on the other hand if you catch a fish quickly then the likelihood hood is, that if you do the same thing again, you will catch another fish just as quick! So if you want to make your day last longer, fish a dry fly or be more selective with your casting.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

March 2019

March is a fantastic month at the fishery due to the arrival of spring and the fish are generally very active with most people catching their bag limits. The daffodils are out in full bloom along with primroses and marsh marigolds giving a splash of colour. The woodland is now carpeted in a green from all the bluebells and it won’t be long until they flower and the hawthorn bushes are also in leaf. The frogs and toads have been busy in the lakes and the song birds are noticeably louder and can be seen flying back and forth with twigs in their beaks building their nests.

On the fishing front the sport has been excellent with fish sitting high in the water and combined with the increasing light levels, spotting fish is getting easier by the day. The trout can be seen sipping at the surface most days, delicately taking emerges, so presenting small dry’s or patterns that sit in the surface film or just below has been a great tactic. Lures and large nymphs such as montanas, damsels, cats whiskers and dancers are taking plenty of fish and seem to work best on a fast retrieve and plenty of big fish have caught by those that like to stalk fish.

It’s been a superb month for fishing with hundreds of fish caught including a fair few doubles. Tony Roll kicked off the month with Rainbows of 7lb and 10lb 8oz, Robin landed one of 9lb 8oz and Alan Drewitt had five fish including two Sparctics and a 10lb 8oz Rainbow. Roger Brown caught his biggest Rockbourne fish to date with a  7lb 4oz fish, Richard Hill caught a 10lb 12oz Rainbow and a big well done to young Jack who caught his first ever fish while having a lesson with a fine 4lb 8oz Rainbow. Regular Steve Brett had a day to remember taking 5 fish topped by Bows of 9lb and 13lb 8oz, Mr Christopher bagged 8 fish on his first visit to the fishery, Mark landed an 11lb 8oz Rainbow and Steve Perry stalked a beautifully pink Rainbow of 8lb 8oz. Tony Roll had another great session taking 8 fish topped by Rainbows of 8lb and 12lb 2oz, Jeremy Preston caught one of 8lb 8oz, season rod Eamonn Duggan landed a 6lb 8oz Blue and 7lb Rainbow and on only his third time fly fishing Mark landed a superb 10lb 6oz Rainbow! Pat targeted a big Rainbow in Longacre that weighed in at 10lb 4oz that was also tagged, which netted him £100, Arthur Perrett braced Rainbows of 8lb 8oz and 10lb 8oz and Darren caught a 9lb 6oz Bow. Steve Perry stalked a cracking 11lb 2oz Rainbow and his mate Simon caught his first double of 10lb 6oz, Sam had one of 8lb and his friend Paul Harding caught this biggest fish of the month with a colossal 14lb Rainbow!

John Lewis fly fishing club visited us again and all their members caught their four fish bag limit and in total 4 doubles were caught, topped by a 13lb 2oz Rainbow to Neil Mundy!

We also held out popular fishing comp and BBQ, which was very well attended and we must thank you all for that. Plenty of fish caught with Chad winning it for a second time with a Rainbow of 12lb. Sash was not far behind with his first double at 11lb and Neil Mundy followed up with a 10lb 4oz Fish. Other highlights were Sally with a Pinky of 7lb+, Jim had a sandy of 7lb 5oz and Roy caught a 9lb 8oz Rainbow. Martin with fish of 7lb 12oz and 9lb and Alan Drewitt a 6lb Pinky.

The fish have been very active with damsels, montanas, sunk daddys and other various nymphs taking plenty of fish. Buzzers and emerger patterns also scored well and a few anglers even tempted fish in dry mayfly, daddy’s and sedge! Stalking bugs always do well for selecting some of the bigger fish in close too.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

February 2019

Spring feels like it has arrived as I write this as temperatures have been well into double figures the last few days, the Snowdrops are now past their best and more and more daffodils are in bloom with each day that passes, the song birds are noticeably louder and I even saw the first butterfly of the year a couple of days ago! It’s been a relatively dry month, which doesn’t bode well for the summer but on the upside, the fishery has been busier and hundreds of fish have been caught through the month. The Sparctic’s and Char have proved very popular with people travelling from all over to try and catch them.

The fish have generally been sitting very high in the water and with the increased light levels, stalking has been a very effective method. Most of the bigger fish along with the Arctic Char have been caught by anglers targeting them with the Char, as usual, taking a liking to brighter patterns in pink, orange and red. Some anglers have caught their bag very quickly when blind casting and retrieving as the fish have been very active. If you catch a fish very quickly, the likelihood is that you will catch another one just as quickly if you carry on doing the same. So I would suggest a change of tactic – namely targeting individual fish or putting a dry on as this will usually slow the sport down.

The best fish of the month, which was also the biggest was a superb 11lb 14oz Brown to Steve when the fishery was covered in snow, Alan Drewitt had a fantastic day taking a Sparctic, 4 Char and a 9lb 8oz Rainbow, Mark Roll caught two Sparctics and Steve Perry had a brace of Char. Emily was fishing with her dad Sam and caught a beauty of a Sparctic and on a separate trip her dad landed a 10lb Rainbow, Adrian Kruger travelled all the way from Plymouth and had lovely Brown and 3 Sparctics! David Phillips had a 7 fish haul, which included 2 Sparctics, season rod Kelvin Hinton had a brace of Char and Steve had a stunning Tiger along with a tagged Rainbow, which netted him £100. Stewart Easey visited us all the way from Great Yarmouth and caught 8 fish, which included a beautiful Tiger and his first ever Char, Terry caught a fin perfect 10lb Rainbow along with a Sparctic and Brown, fishery regular Clive Watton had a day to remember when he caught 8 fish, including 3 Sparctics, 3 Char and a 9lb Rainbow. Darren Waters caught his biggest Rockbourne fish with a 8lb 8oz Rainbow, young Jack Bristow caught a 8lb Rainbow while fishing with his proud Grandad George and David, Ian, Joel, Colin and Peter had a big haul of fish when they caught 70 fish between them over three days fishing! Ted Jarvis stalked a 9lb 8oz Rainbow, Danny visited us for his first fishing trip in 4 years and caught a 10lb Rainbow while his cousin Andy landed a cracking Brown of 9lb on his 58th Birthday! There were plenty of other Char and Sparctics caught along with hundreds of Rainbows in the 3-5lb range!

As with January lures and larger nymphs have been the order of the day fished on a fairly fast retrieve; blue flash damsels, montanas, cats whiskers, dancers, goldhead fritz or epoxy minnows are better in the morning with smaller more discreet patterns in the afternoon.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

January 2019

January was milder than one would expect for the time of year but we have at last had some heavy frosts, albeit for only a few days at a time. The fishing has remained excellent with many fish caught, and a few personal bests beaten. There is also a splash of colour around the fishery with plenty of snowdrops in bloom and it won’t be long until the daffodils are in flower too and the resident Kingfisher has been very active and you often seen the blue and orange flash as it whizz’s past in search of prey!

The fishing has been fantastic to those anglers that have visited us as can be seen in this brief description of some of the fish caught through January. The biggest fish of the month was an immaculate Rainbow Trout of 13lb 14oz caught by season rod David Phillips, his bag also included five other fish including two 6lb Rainbows. Young Evan had a lesson along with his Dad and caught two Rainbows of 3lb 4oz and 4lb 8oz and commented that fishing was better than playing computer games! Tony Roll took a 13 fish bag with fish up to 6lb, Calvin Beck landed a superb 11lb 8oz Rainbow and Alan Drewitt had some fantastic sessions including catching 7 Sparctics and 1 Arctic Char and then on his next visit he caught 4 Char!! When Clive visited us he caught 8 fish including three sparctics, Alan Mottershead had a Tiger as part of a 5 fish bag and Terry landed a 6lb 8oz Blue. Sam Parry stalked a 11lb 1oz Rainbow from Spring Lake, Steve Perry used his 2wt outfit to stalk two Sparctics to just under 5lb, Brian Clake had his first Sparctic as did Peter Collis who caught two on dry fly! Shimano and Costa sponsored angler Jon Patten visited all the way from North Devon and had a fantastic days fishing taking 3 Sparctics and 4 Arctic Char and his friend Steve caught a Brown, Sparctic and two Char! We also had Snowbee in to do a feature for today’s fly fishery magazine and it was a great success. Snowbeen ambassadors Aaron and Sash caught two Char, a Sparctic and a Tiger between them and Simon Kidd had a Sparctic, Char and a superb Rainbow of 13lb 12oz!

Brighter lures such as cats whiskers, appetisers, fritz and blobs are doing particularly well but lots of fish are still getting caught on blue flash damsels and black and green montanas. When the fish have been trickier to tempt and are shying away from lures, smaller bugs and buzzers have done well, especially ‘when all else fails’. As usual the Char seem to be taking a liking to flies that are pink or orange.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

December 2018

Following the theme for the year, December was mild with only a handful of frosts. As nice as that is, I miss the cold frosty mornings that we used to get with more regularity just a few years back and I’m sure these milder winters mess with nature, I’m sure daffodils should not be shooting up with so much vigour just yet! The fishing has been excellent though with most anglers achieving their bag limit and plenty of fish to be seen in the upper layers. On brighter days it is still possible to stalk fish but the lions share are now getting caught by those that enjoy casting and retrieving.

Not as many big fish graced the back this month but we did have a colossal 15lb 6oz Rainbow caught by season rod John Rothwell from Alder Lake with the next two biggest fish 12lbs+ caught a Barry and Steve. Mark Roll caught an 8lb Rainbow, Alan Drewitt had a 7lb 4oz fish and Rob Millar had a superb Brown on 7lb and Danny caught a 7lb Rainbow along with a Sparctic. Clive had a stunning Tiger Trout and Tony Roll, Mark Roll, Darren, Mr Whitemead, Jim, Mr Cotton and Neil Perry all landed Sparctics! Along with the above fish hundreds of stock fish in the 3lb to 5lb Bracket have also been caught by our anglers

Brighter lures such as cats whiskers, appetisers, fritz and blobs are doing particularly well but lots of fish are still getting caught on blue flash damsels. When the fish have been trickier to tempt and are shying away from lures, smaller bugs and buzzers have done well, especially ‘when all else fails’.

 That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

 

November 2018

November was unseasonably mild with only a few frosts but thankfully we had some decent rain with some particularly heavy downpours in the last week of the month. These were accompanied by some strong winds, which took most of the leaves off the trees and the fishery now looks bare compared to how it did through the summer!

It is a busy time of year around the fishery as at this time of year we start to cut back or remove any offending branch’s, trees and some of the marginal growth around the lakes and generally have a big clear up to make sure it will all look its best once Spring finally arrives. Saying that though, I have seen a few daffodils starting to poke their heads up above the soil, which is very early indeed!

As is usual at this time of year the fishing has been excellent. The fish are often in a very active mood and are usually more than willing to take a well presented fly. The fish averaged a very healthy 3-4lb and many 5lb+ fish graced our angler’s nets also. It has also been a fantastic month for BIG fish with plenty landed including a few big braces and possibly Rockbournes biggest brace of trout ever!

More fish were caught than I can list here but I have put below the notable captures from the month.

Richard Lindsey was pleased to slip his net under a superbly conditioned 8lb 4oz Rainbow, Mr Warmington caught a Sparctic along with season rod John Pike, Bob Lewis and Ian Randall. Kennie and Jim both caught Browns with them weighing in at 4lb 2oz and 5lb 12oz respectively. Alan Drewitt always manages to find some bigger specimens and took Rainbows of 7lb 2oz and 12lb, Callum landed a 9lb Rainbow and father and son Tony and Mark landed Rainbows of 13lb 10oz and 14lb along with a 8lb 2oz Brown. Mr Skelton caught a lovely conditioned 12lb 8oz Rainbow, season rod Bob Lewis had a 12lb 12oz Rainbow and Chris Bright and Will Brown both netted themselves £100 after catching a tagged fish. On a separate occasion to when he caught the 13lb+ Rainbow mentioned above, Tony Roll caught 8 fish topped by Rainbows of 9lb 12oz and 10lb 8oz, Tom Humby also landed a 10lb Rainbow and Nick Spring had an excellent brace with two big bows of 12lb and 12lb 14oz! Kevin Elley visited us from Pontypriid in Wales and was rewarded with a superb 14lb 8oz Rainbow as part of his three fish bag and Ian Perry caught one of the biggest fish of the month with a fin perfect 15lb Rainbow and Neil Magookin won our fishing competition with a cracking 11lb 10oz fish! Aaron House had an excellent month taking a Rainbow of 11lb 8oz on one trip and then catching a huge brace of bows that went 14lb 4oz and 14lb 7oz!!! Not to be out done Steve Perry caught his first double figure Rainbow of 11lb 14oz and if that was not enough he came back the next day and caught (as far as I’m aware) Rockbournes biggest brace of trout ever with two huge Rainbows that weighed in a 15lb 4oz and 15lb 8oz!!! But they were not the biggest of the month, a huge fish of 16lb 2oz was caught by Neil Mundy of the John Lewis Fly Fishing Club when they visited at the beginning of November and Neil also caught 12lb 6oz Rainbow too! In total 63 fish were caught by the club with David King taking a big brace of fish of 13lb 13oz and 14lb 2oz and Graham Brown a 12lb 7oz Rainbow.
Now that is some tally of big fish!!! The fish are really starting to favour brighter lures with cats whiskers, appetisers, humongous and snake flies doing particularly well, especially for the big fish but don’t ignore the old faith BFD as it continues to take more than its fair share! Smaller flies are also catching really well with Steve Perry taking his huge brace of Rainbows on an olive hare’s ear and a black and green montana.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

Simeon Osborn
Fishery Manager

 

October 2018

October was a mild month with no real frosts to speak of and was unseasonably dry and as I’m writing this (beginning of November) I have seen some Dragon and Damsel flies around the lakes and a few fish rising, not what you would expect! The fishing has been excellent though with many anglers continuing to tempt fish on dry daddy’s and sedge. The fish have been sitting high in the water and when they couldn’t be tempted on dry fly, emerger patterns fished in the top few inches often fooled them and as usual Damsels, especially the blue flash variety, took plenty of fish.

The fish averaged over 3lb and numerous fish in the 4-5lb bracket graced our anglers nets along with and a lot of big fish. The light levels were still good enough for anglers to stalk fish and this method accounted for the lion’s share of the larger fish that were caught! Big flies also proved very successful with fritz, humungous and snake patterns often singling out the larger specimens.

Some highlights of the last month are detailed below. Alan Drewitt had a great month and among the fish caught were Rainbows of 9lb, 9lb 10oz, 10lb 8oz and 9lb, two Sparctics, and four Blues between 6lb 8oz and 8lb 8oz! Andrew Quartly caught a fine 6lb 8oz Brown as did Jim Eames and Mr Greenslade and Mark Roll landed a cracker of 8lb 8oz. Mr Davies had a brace of 6lb 8oz Rainbows, Mr Carey caught a 7lb Rainbow and season rod Mr Perrett landed one of 9lb. Steve Brett caught three 8lb+ Rainbows through the month, while his friend Clive Watton caught a personal best 11lb Rainbow, Mike Holloway, Mr White, Tony Roll and Mr Burgess all caught 7lb + Rainbows. Father and Son Tim and Steve Perry had a great day with Steve catching two Sparctics and Tim an 8lb Rainbow, season rod Mr Evans slipped his net under a 9lb 8oz Rainbow and Mr Dench had a 6lb 8oz Blue and a 8lb 12oz Rainbow!Mr Prevett and Mr Christopher both had 10lb Rainbows, Mr Britz had a superb 5lb 8oz Sparctic an d Mr Huey stalked a 9lb+ Rainbow. The last few days of the month saw two very large Rainbows banked with Lee taking a 14lb 4oz fish and Jonathon Newman catching a brute of 15lb 4oz and what makes it even better is it was the first trip to the fishery for both of them!!!

Some fantastic fish have been caught I’m sure you would all agree? The fish are really starting to favour bigger and/or brighter lures with cats whiskers, appetisers, fritz, blobs and humungous all doing particularly well but lots of fish are still getting caught daddy’s (sunk and dry), sedge and blue flash damsels. When the fish have been trickier to tempt ad shying away from lures, smaller bugs and buzzers have done well, especially ‘when all else fails’.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

Simeon Osborn
Fishery Manager

 

September 2018

September was an excellent month for the fishery hundreds of fish caught! We had some slightly cooler temperatures overnioght, which really switched the fish on and lots of our anglers walked away with a new personal best.

This time of year is a transitional one between the Summer and Autumn and we had some exceptionally warm days with some very chilly mornings too. We also had a bit more rain, which always freshens’ everything up at this time of year. As is usual the mornings and early evenings were the most productive periods with the fish a little harder to tempt in the middle part of the day, especially on those clear and bright days. Many fish could be found in and around cover with weed beds and under the overhanging braches of tress particular favourites. As some of the lakes were so clear a little thought on how you presented your fly went a long way in achieving success.

The average fish size for the month was still in the 3-4lb bracket with many 5lb+ fish caught also. There were some exceptional fish caught and I will run through some of them now. Patrick caught a superb Sparctic from Spring Lake, Tom also caught a cracking Rainbow of 8lb 8oz from Spring Lake while having some instruction, regular John Pike landed a 7lb 8oz Rainbow, Mr Marston caught a 7lb 12oz Rainbow and Mr Chapple had a 7lb Rainbow. Alan Drewitt had a superb months fishing taking Rainbows of 8lb 10oz, 8lb 12oz, 9lb 8oz and 10lb 10oz along with Blues of 6lb 8oz and 7lb. One of his Rainbows was also tagged, which netted him £100! We held a corporate event, which was a great success, with 60+ fish landed to a top weight of 11lb 8oz. Tony Roll had Rainbows to 11lb and also caught Rockbourne’s biggest Tiger to date with a 7lb specimen, while his Son Mark caught Rainbows of 9lb 4oz and 10lb 2oz. Clare caught her first fish with a 5lb Rainbow from Alder while having a lesson, Sam had a bit of help can caught a Rainbow of 7lb 10oz and regular Steve Bayliss landed a fine 8lb Rainbow. Kennie caught an 8lb Rainbow, Robert Hall landed fish of 8lb 14oz, 9lb and 10lb, Steve Brett had an 11lb Rainbow and Danny Titchener caught a magnificent 14lb Rainbow from Alder.

We will be holding another Fishing Competition and BBQ on Saturday 10th November. Check out our website or Facebook page for more info.

Some fantastic fish have been caught I’m sure you would all agree?  Blue flash damsels are still taking many fish but there was a definite switch to daddys (dry and wet)  being the most productive fly half way through September. Bright lures, especially cat’s whiskers are also taking more fish with each week that passes.

 That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

Simeon Osborn
Fishery Manager

August 2018

August saw one of the hottest summers on record continue which did make the fishing challenging at times with water temperatures that were higher than average, coupled with the clear water. The fish were often not in the mood to energetically chase down the angler’s flies so a more stealthy approach was needed. Smaller patterns, often fished on the drop or with very little movement presented very close to the fish produced the best results. The most productive parts of the day were first thing in the morning and the last couple of hours of our opening times.

I see dozens of anglers come through the doors each week and although many are good anglers and very experienced, it still astounds me that so many do not ‘look’ for the fish or they walk past some very obvious and usually catchable fish to get their favourite spot! Take your time to find the fish and don’t always be in a hurry to cast out when you do. Try to work out what the fish may be feeding on and if they have a set patrol route and always look under trees and around obvious features such as weed and reed beds! Put in the effort and you will reap the rewards. If you are not catching it is easy to blame the fish “I’ve tried everything today and they are not taking anything” but there is always a way to catch them and part of angling is to find what that is. I will often change my fly after half a dozen casts if I don’t get any interest and will constantly change my retrieve to find what they want.  Oh and another top tip, don’t go to all the effort of wearing drab coloured clothing, only to then put a bright white hat on your head!

Despite the challenging weather conditions plenty of fish have been landed through August with some bigger fish making an appearance too. Bow Lewis caught a cracking Sparctic Trout from Spring Lake on a Sid Knight sunk daddy, season rod Mr Evans caught a 7lb 4oz Rainbow from Longacre as part of his three fish bag, Alan Drewitt caught a two superb Browns from our chalk stream on a shrimp pattern and day rod Stan Stewart landed a Brown from the lakes. Chad Goymer visited us from Kent and caught 5 fish including a stunning Tiger Trout, 9 year old Aiden caught 5 fish on his first go at fly fishing, Robert Hall had a fin perfect Rainbow of 5lb 8oz and 8 year old Cairo landed a 4lb Rainbow. Mr Stevenson visited us for the first time in about 30 years and caught 4 fish topped by a 6lb 8oz Rainbow, Mark Roll landed a 6lb Blue, 5lb 8oz Sparctic and a 9lb Rainbow, Sam Parry caught a 6lb Rainbow and Bob Lewis landed a 7lb 12oz Rainbow. Kalib and Nicholas both caught their first fish while having tuition, Lubos caught Rainbows of 7lb 12oz and 8lb 12oz, Mark landed a Sparctic and Miriam also caugt here first fish with a superb 3lb 10oz Rainbow. Mark Roll stalked a 10lb + Rainbow from Alder, Steve Brett landed Rainbows of 8lb and 10lb 4oz on a black buzzer, Aydee caught a Rainbow of 9lb, regular Norman Drake landed a Rainbow of 10lb, Ian Lott caught a 8lb 8oz Rainbow, Alan Drewitt caught his first Pinky along with a 9lb Rainbow and Tom Humby had a 9lb 4oz Rainbow as part of his four fish bag.

Some fantastic fish have been caught I’m sure you would all agree?  Just like July, the most successful fly for August was the  blue flash damsel with the other usual suspects such as small stalking bugs, PTN’s GRHE’s, montanas and sunk daddy’s also scoring highly.

 

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

Simeon Osborn
Fishery Manager

 

July 2018

The heatwave has continued and July was a very dry month with some exceptionally hot weather and little to no rain. The water temperatures have been higher than average for this time of year but even so, the sport remained consistent with many excellent fish landed by our anglers. As ever, stalking proved to be a superb way of catching the fish in the hot and bright conditions as the fish were often found under the shade of trees. The fish were usually unwilling to chase down a moving fly and fishing on the drop or with a very slow retrieve seemed to work best.

Harry Brookwell caught a cracking Spartic Trout at the beginning of the month, Colin Farley had a Golden as part of a four fish bag and his son Jack caught a tagged fish, which netted him £100. Andy Knight fished with us for five days and caught 20 fish with most of those fish falling to buzzers, Dave Milas caught two fish after having some instruction and Louise also managed a Rainbow after also having a lesson. Fishery regular Bob Lewis fished our chalk stream and caught three beautiful Browns on a hares ear and a couple days after Paul Mason also fished the stream and landed a Brown on a cane rod! Congratulation to 83 year old Joan fished with us as part of a group and during her instruction she caught her first ever fish with a 5lb Rainbow, you really are never too old to learn something new! Cher Brett had never fished before but after her Dad and fishery regular Steve showed her the ropes she went on to catch 11 fish topped by a superb 8lb Rainbow, great angling! We’ve had a few decent Blues getting caught with Alan Howard landing one of 6lb 8oz along with the second biggest fish of the month in the shape of a 10lb 4oz Rainbow, Mr Newfeld caught one of 6lb 12oz, Steve Brett and Mr Taylor both had 8lb+ fish and Mark Roll landed one of 8lb 8oz that was tagged and won him £100. Mr Canterbury caught a Rainbow of 7lb 8oz, Mr Newman, Colin Farley and Dave Morrison all ha 9lb+ Rainbows, Mr Pearce caught a 10lb fish and Aaron House landed the biggest of the month with a fantastic 12lb 1oz Rainbow.

The choice of successful flies has not changed that much with blue flash damsels still doing the damage but there was a definite shift towards smaller flies with the onset of the hot weather, especially for those who were stalking. Dropping down to size 16-18 flies was often needed with stalking bugs, buzzers, sunk daddy’s, PTN’s and GRHE’s all producing regularly.

That’s all for this month but keep an eye on our facebook page for up to date catches and information about the Fishery.

Simeon Osborn
Fishery Manager

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