With two salt water sessions under our belts we decided to switch to a couple of freshwater marks on Thursday last week. First up was a trip to the section of the Forth & Clyde Canal that runs past the Falkirk Wheel. It's been very productive every time we've visited so far and this time would prove to be no exception although it did take us slightly longer to find the fish. Heading East along the canal and crossing over to fish from a long pontoon opposite the towpath Jake and Ross were first of the mark with a few small jacks and Jake also catching a perch.
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| Jake's small jacks were all very cute... |
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| ...but still demanded respect! |
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| Jake gets the first perch of the day on a silver Lake Fork Live Baby Shad. |
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| Ross wanted some tiny pike action and soon had one on the bank after an epic battle. |
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| Ross quickly also discovered that Lake Fork Live Baby Shads are a perfect mouthful for small Jacks. |
I was slightly further along from the them and after missing a couple of takes I finally connected with one and landed a small jack that took a Savage Gear Soft 4Play in dirty roach.
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| Greedy little jack almost swallowed the lure whole! |
Whilst Jake and Ross continued fishing from the pontoon I headed to a spot back towards our starting point where I caught a nice fish during my last visit and whilst I was fishing there they landed a few more jacks and then Ross got a perch.
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| An even smaller pike for Ross. |
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| A perch too meant I was now due one. |
Hoping for a better fish I began slowly working the area from a pontoon. Casting to the reeds on the far side and slowly bouncing it along the bottom back to me. After a while everything went solid and I knew I had a fish on. It wasn't moving much though and at first I suspected it may be a decent jack that was about to go crazy at any moment but as I slowly wound in and the fish came to the surface I could see it was a nice perch. After a bit of head shaking it was in the net and straight away I thought there was some thing familiar about this fish. The scarring on this perch looked similar to that on one I'd caught about 3 months ago from the same stretch. Later examination of the photos would confirm it was indeed the same one!
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| Hello again! |
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| I've decided to call it Tony on account of the scars it has. I don't normally kiss blokes but made an exception. |
The fish was weighed at 1lb and 4oz making it a new PB. Tony has put on an ounce per month since I last caught him and obviously has a little patch in this section of the canal so I may run into him again in the future perhaps!
A nice way to spend the morning and for the second part of our freshwater day we headed off to Loch Lubnaig. Jake had a score to settle with a member of the salmonoid family and Ross fancied one too. I on the other hand was after more perch and hopefully some big ones from a spot I discovered last time Jake and I were there!
Tight lines, Hutch.
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