Big Fish Column: Clewlow bags a beast of a trout at Haywards Farm Lake

Sportfish team member, Nick Clewlow

Mild, wet conditions quickly transforming into heavy frosts and icy wind and freezing rain made it a mixed week for local fishing. Last weekend, with the demands of Christmas shopping chores combined with torrential rain, was particularly poor made for and a total write off for most of us. The good news is that Christmas week is looking better.

Thames barbel for Lisa

There were barbel to be caught before the weather changed for the worse and it was, of course, the River Thames that was the in-form venue. The Thames really has been the stand out river for big fish for a few seasons now and, with the Kennet in dire shape and the Loddon seemingly in decline, this is unlikely to change in the short term.

The captor of what was by far the most outstanding local fish was 33-year-old Windsor angler, Lisa Loveridge who fished a local beat of the river with legered garlic-flavoured luncheon meat to bag a barbel of exactly 14lb. The fish set a new personal best for Lisa, who used a big chunk of the bait with a long hook length and 12lb line.

The Thames is head and shoulders above all local rivers at present and with a few chub over 6lb netted after the cold snap last week it has to be the pick of the flowing venues for a few bites over the Christmas period. With the weather forecast for the holiday period currently suggesting fairly consistent dry and cool conditions without too much in the way of rain and no frost the fishing should be good with chub and perch the likely target species.

Thames chub

Chub were the mainstay of sport for those who did get out last week and the top specimen reported was a 6lb 10oz fish to noted big fish man, Adrian Eves, who presented a milk-based boilie to fool the fish. Also weighing in a Thames cracker was Cookham’s Justin Beale who used a cheesepaste hook bait over a bed of mashed bread laced with cheese flavour to net fish of 5lb 1oz and 5lb 14oz from his local beat.

Holiday trout prospects

The strong winds and rain really stirred the trout up at Haywards Farm Lake last week and Jonno Randall reported that the weed has now died back fully, and the bank fishing has improved as a result. There were good numbers of fish caught on small buzzers and the best fish of the week was caught by Paul Eaton at 7lb 2oz, the average weight for the week was 2lb 15oz and the rod average was 3.9.

The best news for local trout anglers looking to get a few fish during the Christmas break is that the fishery has just made a big injection of new fish, including a good head of double figure specimens. Of course there is always a regular input of fresh fish but the long, hot summer made it tricky for fish farms to rear on large trout and, apart from the occasional grown-on fish, the average weight of fish introduced into most waters has been a little down on usual. Thankfully this has now changed and anyone out over the holidays could well find themselves attached to a fish like the beast pictured here by introduced by Sportfish team member, Nick Clewlow. I don’t know about you, but I certainly fancy a bit of that this Christmas!

Any anglers wishing to report catches may contact me at ian@bigfishtrail.com