Dave Coster's Fishing Diary - June 2018

This entry was posted on 3rd July, 2018

First club match on my venue list for June was to be at a place called Lockey’s, somewhere near the Lower River Witham. I hadn’t heard of this fishery before and despite searching around the Internet there was zero information, apart from people saying they couldn’t find it! In the end I managed to unearth a postcode, but the satnav kept taking me to White House Farm, a fishery I have visited before. In the end (after touring half of Lincolnshire!) I stopped off at White House for a third time and found two locals fishing the match lake there. They were catching a few and had a good laugh when I asked them where Lockey’s was. “Right here”, they said! It turned out the fishery was sold a few years ago and has since been re-named!

I got my gear out of the car and decided to try a peg on the far side of this snake lake, well away from where I had fished previously, aiming to get a better feel for the place. I like well-established snakes like this. When they become properly greened up they resemble canals, places I used to fish a lot. But sadly, many of my favourite old tow path haunts now lack any nearby parking, also being crammed with moored boats and generally have been turned into short cuts for speeding bikers.

Snake lakes are very popular in Lincolnshire. White House is very similar to the match lake at Stretton (shown in the accompanying photograph) offering lots of interesting features, short walks and most importantly, a quiet day’s fishing.



The main dilemma I have when fishing snakes is whether to use traditional baits like maggots, casters and worms, or to take an all-out pellet/fishmeal approach. On this occasion I decided to try both regimes. Most of the snakes I have fished in the past tend to offer a diverse range of species and it can be a bit confusing knowing what baits are best. Carp, tench and skimmers love pellets, but if there are chub and perch present, I find maggots, casters and worms a better option. Then of course you need to assess if there’s a big head of silver fish like roach and rudd, to see if targeting these is worthwhile.



I only set up a pole and cupped in a mixture of soft groundbait, casters and chopped worm just short of the far bank to my right. I then fed some fishmeal groundbait and pellets to my left, next to a weed bed in the middle of the channel. It turned into a very hectic session. I caught plenty of rudd, roach and skimmers on casters and segments of worm. Loose feeding casters soon got silver fish swirling on the surface, before carp moved in. I was using a relatively light 0.10mm hook length and 18 hook but managed to land several up to 4 lbs without any trouble.

I then had a go to my left with a much stronger paste rig, finished off with a 0.16mm hook length and a big hook. The float buried instantly and black hydrolastic streamed out of the end of my pole. I wasn’t expecting anything quite this big and couldn’t stop the unseen beast from ploughing through two weed beds. I suspect it was foul hooked, because I gave it some serious stick before my rig twanged back as the hook pulled free.

After that I caught several decent carp on paste and pellets, finishing off by going back on the caster line and adding a nice tench. I went home non the wiser regarding which baits to use on the club match the coming Sunday.



Match day I drew a cramped peg with the front part of the stage I was sitting on missing. This made it awkward shipping my pole back, with my pole roller positioned precariously halfway up a sloping

bank behind. I planned to fish three lines: tight to the far bank, in open water to my right and down the inside margin by an overhanging tree. It was a blazing hot day and I had the feeling it was going to be hard going.

At the start I tried a small dibber rig tight to the far bank rushes, looking for a quick “mug” carp but only got a few bits on expander pellets. I then dropped short with a lighter rig and caught a quick flurry of small skimmers, roach and rudd before that died. A big dollop of paste was then lowered into the water down the nearside margin, but nothing happened there at all. I managed to nick a few more small fish and a couple of 12 oz skimmers using small pieces of worm, but I was going nowhere fast.

With just 40 minutes to go I decided to gamble and go for it. Pellet wasn’t working so I began to catapult good helpings of casters tight to the far bank. I then pushed my dibber rig right up against the far side, a trick which sometimes gets you bonus bites when the fish are not really having a go. Suddenly my pole elastic was shooting down the snake and something big and heavy was attached. I held on hard and a decent carp was soon in my landing net. Ten minutes later another followed, and I was back in the race.

As the all-out was called I was playing another beast close to my landing net, but this crafty fish made a last-minute lunge around the scaffold pole at the front of my fishing stage, snapping my hook length. As it turned out the lost carp didn’t matter. I won with a fraction under 20 lbs.



Come the start of the river season I had a quick look at the lower Witham area. An angler I had met mentioned Chapel Hill, where the Kyme Eau enters, but as far up as the lock it’s all boat moorings now. Above the lock, which locals call the Sleaford cut, was totally weeded. Next, I went to take a look at Reedy Bay as its known, a famous bream hotspot on the main river above Tattershall Bridge.

A bad pollution hit the river higher upstream earlier this year, so I was pleased to see a few anglers on the bank. Apparently, some good-sized bream had been showing opening day but only one tench had been caught on the Sunday. I resolved to give this place another go soon, but decided I still had some unfinished business at White House Farm, just down the road.

Back on the snake I picked a swim with a fishy looking far bank bush, which turned out to have good depth tight against it when I plumbed up with the pole.



After my last gasp match win on this snake after changing to a caster attack, I wanted to fish the place traditional canal style, using casters tight to far side cover. Someone told me there are decent chub and big perch in the water and edging a tiny pole float tightly against where these fish are likely to live seemed like a good plan.

I set up a very small dibber float, taking just two spread out number 11 Stotz Weights, with a 0.14mm hook length and strong size 16 wide gape hook. I was going to use double casters.



One of my favourite canal tricks was to feed casters over to any features on the far bank, but to leave this area alone for a couple of hours before actually fishing it. What this used to do was get big fish freely competing for all the free grub, while I was catching smaller samples somewhere else in the swim. I decided to do the same thing here, so while I primed the far side bush, I enjoyed catching a mixture of carp, crucians, roach, rudd and skimmers down the middle on soft expander pellets.



I was expecting my float to sink out of sight when I eventually switched to my long pole, but nothing happened. I kept dinking a few casters against the cover and deliberately fired a few into it, so they trickled down the bush into the water. I then missed a really fast bite, then another, before I was in business with an elastic stretcher. This was a lively fish, darting around a bit too fast and erratically to be a carp. When it eventually surfaced I caught sight of its bristling dorsal fin and striped side. A decent perch. Result!



I caught a few smaller perch after that, then some quality roach and rudd. I found I had to get my float right in amongst the overhanging leaves to get positive bites. Suddenly all hell let loose as I hooked a big lump, which steamed off at a rate of knots. I eventually managed to tame a carp close to double figures, but it wasn’t really what I wanted today. I carefully built the swim up again with a steady stream of casters and was rewarded with another elastic stretcher, a lot faster and more dogged than the last one. Eventually I got the fish up and into my landing net, a clean looking chub, just like you would expect from a river. Another nice result!



The last club match of the month was on another snake lake: Stretton. It was a steaming hot day again and the only real cover in my peg was an overhanging tree to my left. There was no shade tight to the island opposite, so I only gave that a quick look, catching a few sprats. My open water feed line also only produced a few small fish, so for most of the match I concentrated down the side of the margin cover. I simply cupped in soft fishmeal groundbait and expander pellets here, switching between paste and pellets on the hook.

It was a slow start, with only one small carp and a skimmer showing up during the first couple of hours. So, I went into attack mode, feeding more regularly and gradually my swim started to fizz with bubbles.

For the rest of the match I caught in short spells, a mixture of small carp and skimmers, ending up with just over 24lbs. I knew this wasn’t going to be enough as I had heard other anglers had been catching more regularly. I followed the scalesmen around and my mate Graham on the other side of the lake weighed in a nice catch of mainly carp.



Next peg there was a decent perch, which stood out from the usual carp and silvers. I took note of this because commercial fisheries can turn up some monster perch later in the year, when the water loses a bit of colour. An all-out attack with chopped worm and lobs might be worth a try, maybe even prawns, I thought to myself.



The weigh in continued and there were quite a few half-decent mixed catches of carp and silvers. It was looking like I would end up just a few ounces out of the frame, but never mind, I had enjoyed the day - in good company. It was also interesting to see all the different tactics the lads in the club had used. Some had caught on pellets, others on bread, paste, worms…even dead maggots had scored.



The winner by a mile weighed well over 50lbs, mainly carp caught on the long pole over to the islands that run down the middle of this long match lake. Just over 30lbs came next, followed by a cluster of 20 lb plus weights, making yours truly fourth.

So, June was the month of snakes for me and I loved it. These types of fisheries are proving very popular and important to our sport. I have noticed the anglers fishing these venues are well kitted out with top of the range poles and all the accessories that go with them. It’s interesting fishing too, because there’s lots of diversity. I’ve just worked out that I caught 10 different snake lake species during the month of June.