A Day Out With The Old Man On The Tidal Trent.

13:06 Lewis Gaukrodger 0 Comments

A weekend or two back I took my old man onto the new stretch of the Tidal i am targeting. I decided to let my old man fish the down stream rod, which is almost always the rod that gets the first run and is also the rod that generally picks up the bigger fish.

Introducing around 4-5kg of sloppy mix at the top of the swim consisting of bread crumb, crushed pellets, CSL, 10mm Ambergris Minke barrells, whole hemp seed and crushed hemp seed. This mix i specifically make to ensure the particles fall immediately to the river bed whilst the 'powder' elements create a cloud, hopefully drawing fish from much further downstream.

Learning a lesson from the last session on the stretch i had changed approach and set both rods up on a 5oz cheap lead and PVA bag with a mixture of 10mm and 14mm Ambergris Minke barrells. At the business end a simple size 10 Korda Wide Gape armed with a glugged 14mm barrel.

It didn't take long for the downstream rod to bend over double, resulting in a lively small barbel and it was a nice start to the session.


With the sun beating down the fish were certainly on the feed and it wasn't long before my dad had another even more aggressive take. This time he netted a new PB at 8-00, a real short but fat fish which had clearly been on the munch after spawning and it looked in great condition.


Introducing another wave of bait that would cloud the swim but no doubt draw the fish in again. Wanting to try the other flavour of Ambergris Baits i had in my bucket he replaced the Minke barrell for 2x10mm Orca boilies. Moving to a smaller bait certainly worked a treat and he new PB didn't stand for long. I soon helped him land a real chunky fish and at 11-13 it was another new PB and his first double. Once again Ambergris baits doing the damage!


It was great to get back on the bank together and he clearly hasn't lost it! What he doesn't know yet is that the invoice for a guided days fishing is in the post! (A 2lb bream saved the blank for me on the upstream rod!!)