Time for Tench

 

Familiarity can breed contempt. But not always. This year I celebrate my 30th wedding anniversary and, although I don't tell her often enough, I wouldn't swap her for anything. There's comfort in what you know and love. Last year I started getting to know the Syndicate Lake and, if it's possible to fall in love with a lake, I think I have. So, after the wild adrenaline rush of playing and landing big catfish earlier in the month it was a joy to be unloading my tackle in its familiar and quieter environs. 

Even the drive to the lake had been pleasant, with little traffic on the roads and lanes and several muntjac deer spotted along with jay-walking pheasants to avoid. By 6:00am I was at the lake and setting up two rods in my favourite swim. On one rod I utilised my standard Method feeder and small hair-rigged soft pellet, while on the other I decided to experiment and try a 15mm boilie and small PVA bag filled with pellets. The Method feeder was cast into the central channel, while the boilie was dropped just a rod length out off the edge of some lily pads and several scoops of mixed pellets and a handful of boilies thrown where it landed.

Reports on the Syndicate's Whats App group suggested that the lake was giving up its residents grudgingly at the moment, with members reporting more blanks than fish, and my only previous visit this year had also resulted in a blank which made the fact that my bite alarm screamed into life just twenty minutes after casting out a pleasant surprise. An enjoyable tussle resulted in my first tench of the year, a fish of 4 lb 5oz whcih gave a spirited account of itself before surrendering to the net's embrace.

The morning had an air of sleepy serenity. The lake's surface was unruffled and the fish were loathe to put on any displays of the bubbling and fizzing with which they sometimes give away their presence but about half an hour after my opening fish I was once again playing a tench which, like the first, had succombed to the Method rig. Smaller than its predecessor, the second fish turned out to be a male that tipped the scales to 3lb 4oz. (all tench caught have to be weighed and reported on the group Whats App) In common with a few of his compatriots his tail bore the signs of a previous encounter with an otter, but he faught gamely and appeared to be in rude health and none the worse for his fortunate escape. 

I had the lake to myself from an angling point of view, although I was sharing the surroundings with a host of birds of different types and species whose constant activity, airborne antics, and song were a pleasant accompaniment to my piscatorial task. 

The final piece of excitement before I concluded my short early morning session came when the alarm on the boilie rod sounded its shrill tone. As the bobbin struck the rod butt my heartbeat quickened- had I unlocked the "big tench" code, was I about to be connected to a 9 or 10 lb tench? Such thoughts didn't last for long, as after one very half hearted run, the fish decided to see my side of the argument and allowed itself to be drawn to the net while making only a few splashy token protests at the predicament in which it found itself. Close to the net the reason for its subdued fight became clear- this was no tench, but one of the lakes rarely caught crucians. In fact, it was the presence of genuine crucians that had been my original reason for joining the Syndicate, they being so few these days and among my favourite species. A venerable old warrior who, if capable of speech, could no doubt tell some tales, the fish registered a weight of 2lb 2 oz, just an ounce shy of my current best from the Syndicate lake.

I persisted for a fishless final half hour, before packing up at 10:30 with the rest of the day ahead of me. The lake had been kind to me, the weather and surroundings pleasant (even the two short showers had been of the "soft refreshing rain" type, to steal a line from a harvest hymn), the fish ammenable and, best of all, after one previous blank, my tench tally was now open and my season "up and running."