Pike on Canal

Another Pike trip with Karl and Alan.
An Overnighter on the Exeter ship canal with dead baits.

After just 10 Min's in the water after arriving late on Saturday, Karl had his new PB of 12lb.


The weather, just like last year, foxed us, and it all froze overnight, as did we.
We didnt get any other fish on the bank, but had a couple of aborted runs.


Sunday was rather odd, with a frozen canal we had to break the ice on to drop baits into the margins, and then a heavy snowfall lasting all of 10 mins......


and then beautiful sun in the same afternoon.



It wasn't the best of trips, but it was still good to escape.....

Pike on Canal

Trip to the Exeter Ship Canal armed with Lures this time.
Karl, Alan and myself.
We arrived at lunchtime and walked from swingbridge down to the flyover by about 5pm.
As advised, we tried large soft shads dragged slowly along the bottom, but no takes, large plastic rapala shads slow at mid depth, again with no takes, and smaller rapala x-rap shads at varying depths, which are what produced.

Halfway through the day we spotted an otter, in broad daylight swimming right toward us and into the reeds at our feet, and heard another in the reeds. Thats the first Ive ever seen them on the canal, and hope they don't start damaging the stocks.

We were very impressed with those little Rapala x-rap shads. They are very versatile with an awesome action worked slow or fast, and suspend a treat with a very slight sink, and have a great slash action if jerked. They also have a weight transfer system and cast like little bullets.


I blanked. (again!)
Alan had 2 fish on, but lost both (gutted!).
Karl lost one and banked his second.
They were all just small jacks of about 2 to 3 pound, but it made for exciting fun.
Karls jack...


It was still quite weedy, despite an obvious start to its die back, but another couple of weeks and we plan to return and try lures again and dead baiting into the night for the bigger girls.

Pike

A Pike trip to the Exeter Ship Canal planned for the weekend had to have a staggered start.
Karl and another new Pike angler Alan, had the day off work, so they went up to the canal Friday afternoon, and I joined them at 8am the following morning. (I'm NOT good at getting up at the weekends so this was no small miracle)

Base camp was at the swing bridge.
Karl managed to get a few live-baits out on the Friday night, and his luck changed at 5am Saturday morning with a run, resulting in his first Pike! (about 4lb)
At last!

I turned up at 8am, and did a little lure fishing but had no hits.
Karl however had another one at 10am of 7lb, again on small live roach under a float.

And another (4lb), at 11am once again on live roach.

We tried moving to another spot further down at the lime kilns, thinking perhaps we had disturbed the swims too much and might need fresh water. We tried and tried but just couldn't get another livebait out despite trying maggots and ground bait.
We tried there for 3 hours, but no bites on lures or deads.

We then drove round to the other side to try the opposite bank of the kilns for an hour, but once again, lures and deads made no difference.

The trip was great for Karl, having 3 fish of his target species.
Both me and Alan blanked, but that just means Alan wants to go again, and I always do anyway.
We had x2 deadbait rods and a lure rod each, and 1 rod for lives. Amazing when you see it all together how much we cart about eh ?

Lessons?
Without a doubt, the way to go is Livebaits fished from dawn to lunchtime. This concurs with most of the info we've had from other sources too.
(Exeter and District Angling rules state no more than 6 lives in any 24h period per person, and not more than 6inches)
Dead baits may pick up larger fish, but they are very much few and far between. On 6 miles of canal, FINDING the fish is the hardest part.
A great day with great sunny weather, if a bit windy, and I burnt the top of my shaved head :-(

Pike Adventure

Adventure indeed. Or perhaps I should say MISadventure.

The trip was planned for Piking on The Exeter ship canal, and get Karl his first Pike.

The trouble I had getting my gear sorted the night before was all the omen I needed, but as the 2 day trip would prove, our bloody mindedness to carry on regardless would drive us through.

Having a late start instead of the early one we arranged was the beginning. Also the warnings of deep snow and traffic being stranded at the halfway mark of our route. When we got to that bit, it was clear enough, so we came out the other side of it and off to Exeter.

We started at the Lime kilns for a spot of plugging for the last hour of light (we were THAT late).
One small jack pike was the reward, but nothing for Karl yet.

As the light faded, we set off to the Swing bridge section to bivvy up for the night.

The empty swim we spotted there earlier was now filled, so we bivvied up next door.

We got the kettle on and the rigs out at least.

The temp dropped like a stone. We chucked a couple dead baits out, but I wasn't feeling well at all, so I crashed out at 8:30 and left Karl to it.

Typically, I spent a fitful night shivering as I had not been able to find my winter sleeping bag, my hand warmer wouldn't work, and my bivvy is single skin.

At 7am I heard Karl wander over to tell me the canal had frozen. It was solid from bank to bank and he had spent an hour trying to get his rigs OUT from the night before.

There was even a layer of ice on my blanket and inside my bivvy.

We stood there wandering what to do next when we heard a noise like roaring breaking glass. Down the the canal came a canoe, with 2 hardy souls using the canoe like an ice breaker, battering their oars through the ice and shoving it forward. It was a surprisingly noisy affair. The noise in this vid is ALL ice, there was not a breath of wind.

Even after the plastic ice breaker, we couldn't get our rigs in, as the lines would be at the wrong angle, and kept snagging on the edge of the ice, so we decided to pack up and move swims to try further up in the hope of finding a clear area.

That's when we found the van was dead. Karl's battle bus made a wheezing sound and didn't even fire. It turns out it had been -4 to -7 degrees C around Exeter that night, and we think the diesel injectors had got gunked up. Of course the battery was also flat after trying to start it. So we sat and waited for a car to pass by.

We were in luck. An hour later 2 guys who were looking to pike fish arrived and jump started us.

About 500 yards further up we parked up again and tried in a small area of broken ice, where we actually had a couple tentative knocks but no takes.
At this point I discovered I had somehow placed my fishing bag down into some dog mess, so I had a raving rant about that and threatened to sit in the van till Christmas.
I really H A T E dog fouling.

After an hour here, we then decided to move to the Double locks section, as someone had said it was clear of ice up there. We jumped in the van all excited at the prospect of actually getting a bait in properly. But the fishing fairy was not with us. As we drove the short (3/4 of a mile?) to the locks, we were stopped by the boys in blue. Why? well we had got over excited about the fishing and forgot to put our seat belts on.

£30 fine each and lose about 45 mins light. Its nearly lunchtime now.
Very annoyed with ourselves for forgetting that basic safety. :-(

We finally made it to the double locks, and started to leapfrog each other dropping deads in for 15 Min's a go at 50y intervals.

Nothing - and now its raining too.

As the time was against us, we had a last ditch effort with some lures in the basin of the double locks themselves, but had nothing.

At 4pm we gave up, despondent at our seemingly crap luck and crap results, but trying to stay positive at the lessons we had learned, and making plans for the next trip.

We had, after all, carried on fishing in the face of adversity, and in sub-stupid temperatures, and still managed at least 1 fish and learnt lots. :-)

Baits

We tried ledgering smelts in smelt oil, half mackerels, and also the new Dynamite baits predator brush on stuff, that was actually impressive. Its easy to use, and left a very clear oil slick even in such dire cold conditions, and little 'bits' in it washing off the bait.

Also tried small chunks of mackerel on a large circle hook under a float set quite deep.

Next time you lean green toothy buggers....... next time !

Exeter Ship Canal

Heres a Google Earth shot of the 6 mile Exeter Ship Canal.
Ive marked it with the Car park spots, and the named stretches.
Considered one of the Premier Pike spots of the SW.

Pike

A call from Karl on Friday told me he had a Saturday afternoon Pass for fishing, so we planned the next day for Pike.
As plans often go astray, so did ours. A breakdown in the morning put us back about 2 hours, but we still got on the road. The quest for Karl to catch a Pike was too strong, so we finally got to the Canal - in the dark.
We had the area to ourselves, and soon had the bivvy up and the kettle on. Karl had taken his wagon (a huge van) and so we had the stove on the back plate. The temp was about 3 degrees C, so the kettle wasn't cold for long at any point.

We both had 2 rods out. Each with a Smelt or a Joey Mackerel.
The night was clear and cold, without a breath of wind in any form, and very bright full moon, so we sat and enjoyed a cracking atmosphere of winter Piking.
Not surprisingly, given our luck that day, we didn't catch a anything, but it was still worth the trip out.

Interestingly, we did have a few minor beeps and knocks on the baits, but we aren't convinced at all that it was pike. We do wander if it might have been eels, or even carp investigating the splash down of the baits. There isn't any flow at all really on this locked canal so it wasn't that, and there are a good head of large carp in there.

We packed up when it got to the point that Karl was hugging the kettle to keep warm.
We plan to return, and have another go at bagging Karl his first Pike.

Canal Pike

Last Sunday saw me driving up to the Exeter Ship Canal. Mike was busy, so I was alone.

I haven't fished it before, so it was all new to me. Here I was, with a box of lures, new water, and mental images of the monsters that the website and rumour mill told me about.

It was a bit chilly, but at least the broken cloud was allowing rays of late winter sun to peek through on occasion. The most annoying thing was the wind, whilst not too bad, had occasional gusts that stopped me casting, and put a right riffle on the surface.

Apart from the wind, it was very pleasant, and its always exciting exploring a new water.

The Exeter ship canal runs for six miles, and varies about 5 to 15 feet deep, and wide at some points, with a much narrower section further up. Plus there's the Double Locks pub halfway up, that's very nice indeed :-)

I parked up in the middle section near the old lime kilns, and walked down flow about a mile, then back up the other way the same. The lower section seems very reedy, and good for pike, but not as easy to fish. A small boat or skiff would have made all the diff, and in fact I saw a couple guys Piking in one. The section above the lime kilns is far more picturesque, and easier to fish. In fact one old chap explained that up by the lifting bridge, was usually a good shoal of roach, meaning the Pike aren't far behind.

At the last point in the day, and having a chuck here and there, I noticed a little concrete ledge with a bit of dry earth below it before the waters edge. I dropped down, and chucked the lure sideways down the reed line.

At this point I was retrieving very slowly and daydreaming about a cup of tea and taking my boots off. I felt the usual little knock of a rock on the bottom or weeds, when I realised the reeds were pulling back. This woke me up, and a tingle of 'yes!' ran though me and I'm sure I grinned like an idiot. It was only a little jack pike of about 5lb maybe, but at least I hadn't blanked.

Id tried big spoons on a recommendation, and fished them deep and slow, but no joy, so I started to try others. The jack came to my Megabaits Charlie, in trout pattern, fished very slow.

This lure has the most amazingly realistic action, and for all the world looks like a trout in trouble.

Unhooking was a nightmare, as I suddenly became all fingers and thumbs, and must have looked like a right nancy, plus I had 2 lads watching me across the water, with great sickly wafts of their 'Colombian roll-up' blowing my way - the audience putting me right off and making me uncomfortable. With this attention, I quickly slipped the little fella back into the water, forgetting to photograph it, hence the lack of a piccy.

I wandered back to the car, happy to have caught, and making plans to return and fish the other bank, which seemed to have better access.