Day 7 - 20th May 25
Up with the Larks
I had not intended to fish "silly hours" - it is my holiday after-all. Still, best laid plans an all that, I decided that I needed to try everything to find fish. Perhaps I could have a good 3 hours before the sun/heat spolied the day. With that in mind I headed off to Square Lake.
Square Lake
The sun was just rising as I arrived at the Lake. Apparently it was once possible to drive to your peg but several anglers abused that resulting in the farmer/owner erecting a fence with a parking area. So, this was only the 2nd time that I needed to use my trolley wheels.
The lake is connected to the river Vechte so anyting is possible. It was beautiful early morning: -
I was fishing at 33m in 11 feet of water. That is where I had pre-baited the previous night. I had a bite on the 1st cast and missed it - good sign! I had another bite quickly on the 2nd cast. I assumed it was a Bream but as it got closer it started kiting left and needed to be controlled. When it broke the surface I was delighted to see, what to me, was a huge Ide of 3lb 15oz - another PB : -
I then caught a couple of nice Bream. However, on the next bite - I struck and nothing. When I retrieved the feeder, I saw that the hooklink had been severed. I was using a 6lb hooklink. This happened twice more. A quick look around confirmed what I suspected - mussels! I therefore switched to one of my Barbel hooklinks - a size 10 hook to 10lb line. This cured that problem and didn't seem to deter the fish.
The next problem I had was that I started catching small Perch. When unhooking one, it spewed a lot of chopped worm. So I decided to stop feeding worm and only used as a hook bait. Voila, no more Perch.
The next challenge was spotting proper bites. Within seconds of casting, the tip was tapping. I assumed this was fish attacking the feeder but I tried to hit a few because many of the bites that I had on other venues on Holland had been finicky but resulted in good Bream and Tench. I never hit any of them, confirming my suspicion. So I started using a window feeder - this cured the problem and allowed proper bites to develop. Soon a lovely Tench of 4lb 6oz came to the net: -
I also landed a Pike that took a fish. It was about 6 - 8 pounds I guess.
I then had a chat with David (who had recommended this water). He said that I was fishing on the shelf and that a bit further out it dropped to 17 feet. I therefore deployed the sonar and could see that the dropoff was about 41m and I was fishing at 33m. I was a bit reluctant to change as I had been building up feed. However, whilst I'd had a few fish, the bites were not fast/positive.
So, I reset my line clip to 41m and fired in half a dozen balls of bait to that line. It took about 15 minutes but the bites came and were more positive. Also, the stamp of Bream seemed better.
The main encourgement I had is that the fish continued to feed even when the sun was high and bright. 17 feet of water probably helps them feed more confidently. One thing I hadn't expected is that the level of the lake rose throughout the day. I had to remove the bottom tray of my box as the water came close to flooding it.
A few bites and fish
I finished at 4pm with 13 Bream, a Tench and an Ide (not counting the half a dozen Perch and the Pike) for 53lb. This is more like it: -
The end result