I joined fifteen members of South Molton and District Angling Club at the Coaching Inn South Molton for their AGM. As always the event ran smoothly thanks to the sterling work undertaken by the club’s officers. Club Chairman Eddie Rands and Secretary/Treasurer Roger Bray gave their reports to the membership reflecting upon a year plagued by low water levels. The environment and river health were top of the agenda throughout with grave concerns regarding pollution from agriculture and South West Waters numerous sewage treatment works.
South Molton Club is a small friendly club that welcomes new members at a very reasonable cost offering superb wild brown trout fishing on five miles of the river Bray. The club also organise forays to the coast with both boat and shore fishing events.
https://www.southmoltonanglingclub.co.uk
(Below) The cup winners for 2022.
From left to right
Richard Power 30lb tope, Wayne Thomas bass just under 10lb,Steve Bendle 5lb rainbow and Steve Edmonds 7lb pollack.
After the meeting I was priveleged to deliver a talk on my fishing and the variuos paths it has taken me on.
Combe Martin SAC members Martin Huntingdon and Stef Jones enjoyed some exciting spurdog fishing on a Private boat off the North Devon Coast. The best at 16lb 8oz fell to Stef with Martins best scaling 15lb 8oz.
Stefan also enjoyed some excellant pollock sport off Beer aboard Orca Charters boating a pollock of 9lb 2oz.
Charter boats Reel Deal and Predator 2 are taking anglers to the deep waters off Ilfracombe where huge numbers of spurdog are intercepting baits. Bull huss and conger are also featuring in catches.
Chris Connaughton who works at Quay Sports has banked a carp known as the bullet at a weight of 44lb 12oz from Hacche Moor Fishery near South Molton. The capture of such a fine carp highlights the journey carp fishing has been on over the past 70 years. In 1952 Richard Walker banked a carp weighing 44lb from the legendary Redmire Pool on the Welsh Borders. The carp made headlines and beat the previous record of 26lb caught by Albert Buckley in 1930. Walker’s record stood until 1980 when Chris Yates caught a carp of 51lb 8oz from the same pool. The record has been broken on numerous occasions since 1980 and I like I suspect many others have lost track of the carp record. Today’s carp anglers are very fortunate to have carp dwelling across the country that exceed those old milestones in fishing history. In North Devon there are numerous waters that contain carp of over forty pounds. This is a reflection on fishery owners, fish breeders, anglers’ baits and the potentially changing climate.
In North Devon we have several waters that would rival Redmire’s stock of carp.
New Lake Record
News from Hacche Moor Fishery
“Congratulations to Chris Connaughton on his capture of the “bullet” at a new personal best and lake record of 44.12… Chris has been quietly plugging away this winter and was probably starting to ask himself a few questions, truth be told, as he was yet to have a bite on his winter ticket after several nights angling. This soon changed thou as he opened his account with a lovely fully scaled mirror then the following day he had the bite he was after; the king of the pond at 44.12.. it’s first ever capture during the winter syndicate period too so well done mate.”
Chris is also the owner of Remix bait’s
Can’t believe I’m writing this second fish of my winter campaign on @hacchemoorfishery and I’ve got ‘The Bullet’ which is a new PB and a New lake record caught using ‘Cellnapple’ pop ups. Buzzing!!!
Sam Passmore with a beautiful, clean 28lb 3oz Mirror from Nirvana’s Day Ticket Kracking Carp Lake.
Sam caught the Mirror using a hinge stiff rig made up of DSD end tackle and finished with a mad baits boosted wicked white cast to a showing fish.The only show in the 3 days of fishing and the only bite he had, and he landed it!
Sam shared – “Another fish from the lake that’s been so good to me and hopefully I’ll be back to finish the business when the time comes!
Combe Martin SAC member Shaun Quartly fished a beach in Somerset targetting ray and was surpised when he reeled in a small red coloured fish that swallowed the hooks down deep. The fish is believed to be a bluemouth a rare visitor to English waters. The fish weighed 6oz and is the first one ever recorded by a club member.
Grayling are scarce in Devon with the River Exe and a few of its tributaries the only stronghold for these ladies of the stream. When I saw that well known South West Angler John Deprieelle had acquired a stretch of fishing on the Exe near Tiverton I was keen to try for the grayling that resided within the fishery.
See below link to video of the fishery produced by John Deprieelle.
Trotting a float down a river seemed the ideal opportunity to catch up with my good friend Martin Turner so on a cold and frosty morning Martin and I both full of cold set off for a stretch of river below Tiverton. Thick mist lay in the river valleys as we travelled to Tiverton stopping off at Wetherspoon’s for full English and a couple of coffees. This was no intensely serious fishing trip just two mates catching up putting the world to rights and hopefully catching a rare Devon grayling.
The fishery consists of around a third of a mile of river much of it difficult to access with steep wooded banks that added a sense of mystery and wildness I had not expected so close to the town. It is always exciting and perhaps slightly daunting to visit a fishery for the first time. John had described a salmon pool in the centre of the stretch that had a deep run that produced grayling on a regular basis.
We scrambled down the bank having located a well-worn fisherman’s path. This was no manicured fishing location but the river and the deep pool looked promising. We fired a few maggots to the head of the pool and set up our trotting tackles. Both of us had elected to use centre pins, mine an ancient Grice and Young Avon Royal Supreme. I paired this with a15ft Dr Redfin roach rod.https://cotswoldrods.co.uk/product/dr-redfin-15ft-float-rod/
I threaded a crimson topped grayling float onto the line, Martin set up with a more streamlined stick float. I waded out onto the rocks at the head of the pool whilst Martin fished from the rocks at the base of the bank. A steady trickle of maggots were introduced and we searched the deep water trotting maggots beneath floats that we struggled to see as the bright sunlight beamed through the trees.
After ten minutes or so my float dipped delightfully and the rod pulsed in my hands. A grayling of perhaps 8oz was guided into the net. Ten minutes later Martin’s float sank and he too enjoyed the plunging of a grayling as it used its large dorsal fin to sail to and FRO in the strong current. The grayling was probably close to a pound and crowned the day a success as we had both caught our target species a rare Devon grayling.
We fished on savouring the delights of trotting a float as dippers flitted past and warm winter sunshine shone into the swirling clear waters of the Exe. From time to time, we managed to tangle our lines as we fished a swim that was really only suitable for one; a good job we are good friends.
We missed a few bites but eventually decided to move on after a couple of hours. We moved to a faster shallower stretch in the Open fields where we could explore a few new swims. I hooked an out of season brownie of around 12oz and lost a reasonable fish hooked at the end of a long trot.
The sun slowly sank beneath the hills and a chill air descended upon the valley. Expectation had drained away and we were both content with our day having caught our target fish. We viewed a spectacular sky decorated in red and golden hues as we headed for home plotting further forays to waters both old and new.
