Bluemoon Angling Thread

I was brought up in Tameside, in the sixties there would only be a few places to fish, and me and my mates would either opt for Stamford park lake, or a train ride and long trek to Roman Lakes in Marple.
I'm retired now and live in a gated complex of just a few detached houses. The house overlooks a lake, an ex fishery. It's stocked with Carp, Tench, Roach, Perch, Chub, Goldfish, Rudd, Golden Orf, Bream and Gudgeon. There is also a river 50 metres away that we have exclusive access too, about 400 metres long which contains Chub, Bream, Eel, Dace, Perch, Barbel, BrownTrout, Sea Trout and Atlantic Salmon. More often than not I'm the only one fishing. Retirement! I have to pinch myself sometimes.

Fantastic. May your retirement be long and healthy. Hope to be in in the same position myself in 18 months.
 
Had a day on Coldingham loch on Saturday, buzzer fishing. for the uninitiated, a buzzer is the lava form of the chironomid midge and is easily replicated through an artificial fly. Thus:



A team of three or four is cast out on a longish (20 foot) leader and then retrieved very very slowly. Takes can vary from a very subtle tightening of the line, to a violent shoulder dislocating pull. The fish were feeding in the top three feet of water on Saturday, so to keep the buzzers in the feeding zone a buoyant fly can be placed on the point at the end of the leader - that stops the buzzers sinking too deep. The buoyant fly will typically be a booby or a FAB (Foam Arsed Blob). They look like this:





Very often the trout will take these buoyant flies rather than the buzzers. It is thought that this type of lure fly triggers an aggressive response in the trout rather than a feeding response.

Ended up with seven landed to the boat and lost another three so not a bad day fishing in less than perfect conditions (sun and wind). Best rod landed over 20 on the day though so I wasn't close to winning the outing. Will report again after the next outing on the beautiful Lake of Menteith.
 
I was brought up in Tameside, in the sixties there would only be a few places to fish, and me and my mates would either opt for Stamford park lake, or a train ride and long trek to Roman Lakes in Marple.
I'm retired now and live in a gated complex of just a few detached houses. The house overlooks a lake, an ex fishery. It's stocked with Carp, Tench, Roach, Perch, Chub, Goldfish, Rudd, Golden Orf, Bream and Gudgeon. There is also a river 50 metres away that we have exclusive access too, about 400 metres long which contains Chub, Bream, Eel, Dace, Perch, Barbel, BrownTrout, Sea Trout and Atlantic Salmon. More often than not I'm the only one fishing. Retirement! I have to pinch myself sometimes.
do you need a lodger :)
 
Had a day on Coldingham loch on Saturday, buzzer fishing. for the uninitiated, a buzzer is the lava form of the chironomid midge and is easily replicated through an artificial fly. Thus:



A team of three or four is cast out on a longish (20 foot) leader and then retrieved very very slowly. Takes can vary from a very subtle tightening of the line, to a violent shoulder dislocating pull. The fish were feeding in the top three feet of water on Saturday, so to keep the buzzers in the feeding zone a buoyant fly can be placed on the point at the end of the leader - that stops the buzzers sinking too deep. The buoyant fly will typically be a booby or a FAB (Foam Arsed Blob). They look like this:





Very often the trout will take these buoyant flies rather than the buzzers. It is thought that this type of lure fly triggers an aggressive response in the trout rather than a feeding response.

Ended up with seven landed to the boat and lost another three so not a bad day fishing in less than perfect conditions (sun and wind). Best rod landed over 20 on the day though so I wasn't close to winning the outing. Will report again after the next outing on the beautiful Lake of Menteith.
When the Steelhead run is happening in the NW, I try not to carch the spawning females. You can spot them from the bank, they'll got on their reds and may be there for a day or two. The beautiful thing is that the males will line up , often in a V formation behind them, all intent on fertilising the roe. They're not interested in eating so you keep casting a weighted fly above them with the intention of pissing them off, eventually they just lunge at the fly to get it out their way and boom.
Last year I spotted a formation like this in water maybe a foot deep and six foot from the bank. A couple of mates and I waded around them and each caught one of the males, two of them were from the hatchery so we kept two and released one (they smoke up great...if you can get them lit)The next day we went to the same spot and the female was still there, this time with four males behind her. We caught them all again, released all of them though as they were wild. A thirty plus inch Rainbow is fun as hell to try and hang on to
 

whitebeaker.jpg
 
Got back from fishing in Portugal only yesterday. Essentially, it's exploring the country with a fishing rod. Stayed in some magnificent (and cheap) places, drunk some beautiful wine, seen some wonderful sights and caught some decent carp and barbel. If i knew how to attach a photo I'd do it.
Wreckless, whereabouts in Portugal? I am down in the Algarve not many rivers but plenty of reservoirs to fish. Carp aplenty as yet not found a spot for Barbel :-(
Love Barbel, grew up fishing for them on the Severn near Ironbridge.
 
Wreckless, whereabouts in Portugal? I am down in the Algarve not many rivers but plenty of reservoirs to fish. Carp aplenty as yet not found a spot for Barbel :-(
Love Barbel, grew up fishing for them on the Severn near Ironbridge.

My mate has a villa in Lagos and we started on the barragem bravura but gradually moved up country in search of of barbel fishing at places like the Sado at St Margarita de Sado, get on google earth plenty of remote places, and found we were travelling so far it was more time and cost effective to stay in country. The Guardiano is well worth a a trip and my personal favourite is Mertola facing the old town walls.

As regards the Algarve, as you suggest, it's a bit limited. I'm hearing good reports about the Odelouca for barbel but haven't fished it yet. If you get on there, can you let me know how you go on please ?
 

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