Purplepeanut007 PP007 FLOAT MAKING & FISHING ADVENTURES - THE RIVER IRWELL AND BEYOND.

Today I had another session on the Littleton Road section of the River Irwell In Salford. The sun was bright and baring down on me so I wasn't too hopeful of a good catch but as Mike Duddy says " You have got to be in it to win it " !!!!!!!!!! Rod and reel for the session was a 14 foot Acolyte and an Okuma Centerpin My end tackle was a hand made 10 No6 stick float, 16s hook and 4 lb main line. I was feeding straight from the moment I arrived and on my first trot down hooked into a nice dace of around 3 ounces. I had nothing then for around 10 minutes so used the time to alter my shot pattern and depth, fine tuning my set up for when they arrived. ( Here's hoping ) The continuous feeding of maggot and hemp was slowly starting to work and bites started to materialise. 😁 Small, sharp bobs at first but as I increased the feed more positive bites started to show, then a fish. A nicely conditioned roach.  😁 I was getting into my rhythm ...

A long over due trip on the  Lower River Irwell  to test out my new stepped stick floats was tonight's mission. Many in our club would like to know where all the silvers and small barbel have gone ? So tonight was a scouting session to try and find them !!!!!!!!!! I opted for my Abu 704 closed faced reel tonight as the wind was a little gusty coupled with my 14 foot Acolyte Plus. Bait was two pints of white maggots, a pint of hemp. Two stepped stick float rigs were knocked up at home and stored on line winders. All was ready for my little experimental session. 😁 It took around 30 minutes or my first bite and fish, a lovely chunky dace of around 5 ounces.  I shallowed my rig a little and placed a No 4s back shot on about 15 centimetres from the float to aid my presentation and got and instant response, small but very welcome. 😁 Felling a little more confident I steadily upped my feed of hemp and maggots hoping to attracted the larger fis...

The reason I felt guilty regarding the purchase of the Abu 506 was because of this beauty below. 😲😲😲😲😲😲😲😲😲😲😲😲😲😲😲😲😲😲😲 This is the Abu704. For less than £20.00 including postage on ebay I just could not resist this with 3 spools supplied to.  😲  !!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Just goes to show if you look hard enough there are still some bargains out there on ebay. 😉 I have one of these already. 😈 It cost me £30.00 second hand with one spare spool so this is a bargain. I had dropped my older reel on the floor at home. The floor is solid oak so it was like dropping in on a slab of concrete.  !!!!!!!!!!! The reel was fine apart from a small dent in the cowl but just a small dent altered the cylindrical shape of the spool slightly. It also made it very difficult to remove and replace which is a must with these reels. It also hindered the line release from the spool. I have no doubt one of the friendly engineers at work could r...

After my last successful outing catching chublets on the River Irwell I decided to try and replicate these proceedings a little further upstream on a different run and hopefully add some more useful information to the collective. The run I had chosen had various characteristics. At the head of the run the current is very fast and shallow it then calms down a bit and splits into two currents, one on the near bank and the other on the far bank. The currents then split again one down stream and the other back on its self forming an eddy on the far bank. “ Plenty to go at here I thought “ . . . . . LOL To be honest with you all I have fished this run before but the last floods had changed the river considerably .I fished this run last  October and did quite well. It was the Acolyte christening blog,  the day resulting in some nice chub and good brownie. Below is the link to the “ Acolyte Christening Blog “ http://purplepeanut007.blogspot.co.uk/2015/10/acolyte-plus-chr...

I had forgottento do this write up. . . . . . I decided to have another quick hour on the same peg I caught that nice brown trout from  but, unfortunately, it didn't go according to plan. Two chublets and the rivers full population of minnows graced my net. After of arm aching minnow bashing session I packed up and moved to pastures new......... I have been getting out a little more lately so I decided for a change. There is a little known run on the middle Irwell that I have never fished that was going to be crossed of the bucket list today . 😉 I had been warned about the rivers current here  because you have to wade accros it and the river also narrows up next to a sheer cliff face.  I carefully inched over the bedrock to the other side of the river to gain access to the run only known by a few. The journey to the run was not to bad, as I have said, I crossed the river in around two foot of water. It was not as bad as I was expecting it to be to be hone...

Both myself and the Ginger One have been longing to go back to the . . . . . . Little River Yarrow in Bolton to continue our  . . . " Search For Silvers ". The last time we fished it we hammered the trout but only caught one silver between us which was a little disappointing.  We were a little low on bait so we called into "Adlington Angling Centre "  to stock up on some bits. John is a regular at the shop and introduced me to the owner, Andrew Gibbs. A nice guy with a top shop. Andrew sorted us out with our bits and bait. We had a chat about the days horse racing then we hit the road.  John has located a nice stretch of the River Yarrow to fish as the river is in his back yard and directed me to a stretch where he had walked but never fished. We tackle up, while chatting, donned our waders and clumped up the path to the first of Johns secret sections . . . . . . “ I’ve seen chub here Peanut . . . . . . loads of them “  said ...