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

 Got a call this weekend from John Derbyshire asking to fish a certain stretch of the River Irwell. We arrived on the river at 09.00 I set up the new "Shallow Water Loaded Stick Float " and my Acolyte Plus.  ( New section aquired).  🙄 The run was only two and a half foot deep so ideal for these floats which are almost fully loaded. The Ginger Assassin was on the next peg up with a MK I Irwell stick. (You have that some years pal) so at least we could take the piss out of each other if we blanked.....lol The previous night I had been grayling hunting (pics below) on a stretch higher up river so I had a rig nearly ready. The liquidised bread went in first followed by some seed. Maggots  and seed would the be dripped in constantly with the odd ball of bread to top up the swim when it died a little. Basically I caught from start to finish. 09.00 - 14.00. Plenty long enough for me as I am not getting any younger. All caught on a centerpin and stick float set up. https://...

Hi all, I haven't been fishing since the last time I ventured out with Adam Mack but managed an aftetnoon yesterday on a couple of intimate streams most anglers would walk past. After some previous assistance from Adam I gifted him with one of my 5 no 4  Irwell Sick Floats below..... I'm not to happy as he used it better than I did on this outing.....🤬......lol. Not the best days fishing as Adam would admit.....but caught a few and as always a good laugh in his company. The plus side with going with Adam is its always a work out for me. He pushes me the go scrambling up and down swims a mountain goat would think twice about. 😆😆😆😆😆😆 Looking for ward to the next one Adam. Always a pleasure my friend. .............  Adam Mack putting an Irwell Stick to work on an intimate stream we fished yesterday Irwell Stick Floats. Prime Irwell Stick  territory. No lumps for me on this occasion but Adam had a couple just to show me what these stream can produce. TTFN   Peanut...

Hi all. After sorting out  my fishing gear after a two month lay off it was time to christen my new ...... B.J. Centerpin Real. I fancied a grayling and chub session using my Acolyte Plus for the christening but as I arrived at the tackle shop........ HORROR struck..... it was Closed !!!!! " Well, thats that " I thought. I drove home sulking as the earliest I could get bait was 10.00am Sunday morning. I gave  " The Casterman " a bell to see where he was off to on Sunday and inform him of my situation !!!!! " Don't worry Mike. I have enough maggots for the both of us ". With that problem solved we discussed where we were going to fish. I wasn't to bothered so Casterman chose the Ribble as he was after big roach as per usual !!!!!! When we arrived it was hammered !!!!!! We managed to find two un-fancied areas.....not real pegs.....just nice looking glides. I quickly realised that I didn't have a float in my bag for the job as it was a very deep g...

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...

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 ...