A pint of mags and a pot of worms

It was Sunday morning and the alarm clock rang it's happy tune at 4.45am!

I was off to nine acre with a float rod and a feeder rod with the intention of catching whatever came along, armed with some hooker pellets, a pint of finest reds and a pot of worms.

The plan with the early start was to attack the margin with the hooker pellets for the first few hours with the hope that old tinca might fancy some breakfast.

Also I would be fishing a second rod of which would be a simple feeder set up, with regular casting armed with the red maggots.

The wind was blowing towards me from the west but there was also a few spots of rain with it, conditions looked good and I was there to chill out and enjoy.

Carp and cat anglers that had been there over night were packing up and slowly departing one by one.

The pellet rod was getting me the odd bite which turned out to be a few quality looking roach but as soon as they were on the feed they were off again and I presumed that a predator of some description had moved in?

I wound that rod in for a while and concentrated on the feeder rod which I was casting around thirty yards out to a shallower hump that was all of eleven feet in depth with an odd scattering of weed.

Bites were soon to be coming thick and fast - again it was the lakes vast roach population that were finding me the quickest but along with them came a hand full of skimmer bream and the odd perch.

Just after lunch there were just two anglers left bivvied up that were staying for another night in pursuit of their quest... the wind had picked up by this time and at one point big dark clouds were above my head and looking like a heavy shower was about to hit me bang on!

It was during this period of darkness that I decided to swap the float rod over from pellet to a big old juicy lobworm but continue to fish it over the area I had been baiting previously with the pellet and caster combination.

I continued to spray pouch fulls of maggot and casters above and around the float fished worm when all of a sudden the float bobbed and glided away.

A perch of about 12oz was netted followed by another half a dozen more all of which were similar size and all looking like peas in a pod.

The next bite turned out to be a jack pike between three and four pound that was luckily hooked in the scissors.

The switch to the worm in the darker conditions looked like it had payed off and it just shows it only takes a quick change to swap species to suit the conditions we're given.

I continued to fish on till 4.30pm, but before the feeding spell on the worm had slowed, I managed to hook and land a fine looking perch with bold black stripes of 1lb 12oz to end what turned out to be the last fish of the day and previously my biggest perch from nine acre pit.

I'm sure there's a surprise to be had, and I'm currently looking at a new method which might just unlock a few kippers for me!!

But I'll save that for another day.....

Be lucky!