BRYANS ANGLE

Recently i have been drawn towards having a bash at catching some lovely Essex flounders like i used to many years ago. I actually havn,t caught, or fished for, flounder for a good 10 years now. In fact probably the last time i caught one would of been when i used to fish the platforms near Westcliff Leisure Center for anything that would take my bait. I used to love fishing tides that would be at their highest around 9pm, during the winter this was, and would use light gear and cast to the moored boats and end of the groins and would have great fun catching pouting, whiting, flounder, dabs, small bass and sometimes even rockling. My other half at the time thought i was mad as i would go out in all sorts of weather, i loved it that much. Anyway due to reminiscing about my past fishing exploits i decided that i needed to scratch this itch and early one morning last week saw me and Oscar The Wonder Dog walking along the pathway at the bottom of the sea defences at a mark on Canvey Isl...

A couple of weeks back i took my dogs for their usual long weekend walk along Benfleet Creek as a change to our local haunt of South Fambridge. I guess i should of checked my tide app as when we got there it was at dead low water so there basically wasn,t any water for Harry to have a swim. It was a shame as he does love the water, and sometimes i have a right job to get him out of it when we have to go. Unfortunately Oscar doesn,t like to swim, he can swim but just chooses not too. He,s happy just running around splatting in the mud and searching through the scrub grass. Anyway, as we were walking along the creek i was taking note of the gully left behind by the receded tide. In places it came within 10 yards of the bank where i was, and also in a couple of places the water was a foot or so deeper than the average. I know this as Harry was wading through the remaining water and i was keeping an eye on how far up his legs/belly the water was. Seeing all this mud and the dee...

Last week i knicked the morning of work as i fancied spending a few hours after the perch at a small local pond which i,ve been told holds a few biggies within its shallow waters. Weather was perfect, overcast with a slight breeze, as i set up in the last swim to the left of this tiny water. One rod was set up with a ledgered lobworm cast to some reeds where i had seen a big perch lunge at my lure last year. While my other rod was to be floatfished to the right in front of some more reeds with the hope of some silvers that i could use as bait, as well as causing some activity in the hope that this might draw in a couple of perch. Unfortunately the perch didn,t materialise, but i did have an enjoyable mornings fishing catching some gorgeous roach to three quarters of a pound along with a couple of bream to 3lb and 5 carp to around 4lb or so. All the fish were caught on a single floatfished maggot on a size 18 hook to 1.8lb hooklink attached to 3lb mainline. Great fun........ ...

I managed an afternoon after the perch on a local venue 2 weeks ago as i was ' itchin to go a fishin'. The weather wasn,t the best for perch fishing as the sun was strong with only a slight breeze to ruffle the waters surface. First task was to catch a handful of silvers to use as bait, my favourite technique being free roaming a small roach beneath a 1 swan shot loafer incorporating a 9 inch wire trace with a small semi barbed treble hook attached at the end. This set up has accounted for a lot of good perch upto 3lb 14oz as well as pike to upper doubles. As per usual a couple of micro pike snaffled my livies and put up turbo charged fights on my light gear, but they soon paid a short visit to the bank. The speed of these small pike is quite amazing. I could see their every twist and turn through the clear water as i was wearing that most vital item of fishing kit, polarised glasses. Small they may of been but they still had some impressive chompers.... After...

Suday just gone i ventured out to my local estuary with aims of catching a flatfish or two. I was hoping for a nice plump dab as the area i chose is reputed to throw some nice ones up this time of year, or even a nice flounder would of made my day. Baits were fresh lugworm, mackeral strip and slivers of squid, all cast at varying distances. Unfortunately all i managed to catch was 10 of these little blighters which were giving me rod rattles from the off. I,m not going to complain though as i enjoyed my few hours sitting out in the dark watching the tips of my rods silouhetted against the skyline.

The sunday before last saw me whizzing along the A12 racing the rising sun to get to the swim i fancied on my syndicate water. There was other swims on this large body of water that were probably just as good as the one i wanted but i had made my mind up as to where i wanted to go. Arriving in the car park there was only the one cart there so with a 'haste in my pace' i shot off to check if my swim was free. Fortunately it was so i went back to my van and proceeded to load the barrow with all the kit needed for a days piking as well as the bait boat, damn that things heavy with the batteries etc. By 7am i had 3 rods set up and fishing but unfortunately i,d not checked the batteries on the boat hand set, which were flat, so had to settle with casting. There was fish topping and jumping all over my swim at around 30 yds so i dropped 2 baits there and launched the other as far as i could manage. At 8am i had a run on the distance rod which after a cracking scrap resulted in th...

With a heavy heart i had to sell my lovely little fishing dinghy a couple of weekends ago. Unfortunately due to my fishing partner not having enough time to actually go fishing i have not been able to use here as she is just too heavy for me to handle up and down the bank let alone put on the top of my van. So my plans are to build a lightweight fibreglass flat bottomed punt style fishing dinghy that i can handle on my lonesome. Watch this space...  A couple of years ago i bought a kayak hull from a chap who makes them in the Fens. I then employed the talents of my Daddio to build the rest using some very expensive hardwood i had left over from a decking job i did. And he did me proud as always and i had a cracking looking kayak ready to paddle up the river. Until 2 weeks ago the only water it saw was when i gave it a hose down when it got dirty in my warehouse.  That all changed one saturday afternoon recently as i was bored in the office and for some reason decided...

Yes its true i have actually had a few short fishing sessions over the past few months, not many mind you.. I,ve had a dabble for perch on a local river which resulted in a few tiddlers, a couple of lost Jack pike and a nice sargeant of around a pound and a half. That was a 2 hour sessions after work on a bright sunny day, so i was pleasantly surprised when i actually had a bit of action. I started of catching a few small livebait which proved more difficult than you,d think as all the silvers i was catching were too big for perch, so i fished closer to the river bed and managed few nice size gudgeon. I had a days fishing with a friend on his syndicate water which was enjoyable even though neither of us caught any carp. In between the torrential downpours we could see some cracking size carp showing over our baits but not one fell for our traps. I had a couple of hours deadbaiting for pike a week or so ago at a local water and managed to bag this lean 10lber on a floatfished sa...

Its been a while since i last posted anything on here. Unfortunately the trappings of modern life have caught up with me and like the rest of the country i,ve been feeling the financial pinch so have been working extra hours to make ends meet. I,ve actually designed and built 3 different websites for my various ventures recently. My main income being the design, construction, modification and maintenance of ornamental garden/koi ponds, www.waterbouys.co.uk  . The second site is for a new venture of mine manufacturing fibreglass model boat hulls for the modelling community, www.waterbouymodelboats.co.uk  . And finally i,ve been running an online tackle shop for the past year but have recently been building a new website as the old one wasn,t up to my standards. This will be an ongoing project as i,m increasing stock every week,   www.waterbouytackle.co.uk . Although i,ve been working long hours i,ve still managed to have a couple of short holidays with my fair lady Sharo...

Welcome fishing friends, i hope you all had a good Christmas full of good food, good company and hopefully a few angling related presents. I know i,ve had a lovely couple of days in the company of family and friends but i,m itching to get out fishing but unfortunately i still have a couple of days left of family visits before i,m let loose again. I guess my only consolation is that its pissing down here so i probably wouldn,t of gone anyway. Who am i kidding i would just don the waterproofs and got on with enjoying myself. Well i managed a couple of trips before christmas which proved to be both a blessing and a bind. First off i spent the afternoon fishing a very small local pond which i,ve heard rumours of large perch being caught. This water is less than an acre in size and shallow with depths no greater than 3ft. Its a pretty little water though and i enjoyed my few hours fishing there. I started off by fishing for the silvers to get an idea of how prolific the water is and...

A couple of evenings ago i decided to have another go at catching a thornback ray at a local mark. I got there a good 4 hours before high tide to fish the tide up in hope of catching some bass as well. Fortunately the mark i wanted to fish was free so i quickly set up my rods and started to cast various squid, herring and ragworm hookbaits out at different ranges. I use 3 rods whenever i can as it gives you more scope, most fish come to the 2 rods cast to the horizon but its surprising how often the short distance rod will produce the bigger fish. There was no action until just before high tide when as i was having a little beach comb i noticed my ragworm baited rod start to nod then pull down. As ran up the shore whatever was on the end of my like just kept on pulling until my tripod and all 3 rods had come crashing down on the rocks. Once the active rod was picked up mi started to pump in a heavy weight which thumped every so often. I wasn,t sure what was on the other end but was p...

Recently i,ve heard a few rumours that some big tench have been caught from a local day ticket lake, just a couple of miles away from WATERBOUY TOWERS, with at least one confirmed double figure beastie being banked. Well as you,d expect, these catches got me interested so at the beginning of last week i paid a little recce visit to the aforementioned water. I,ve known of this water for the past 6 years since a couple of locals took on the mammoth task of renevating the, long left wild, water. When i first had a look at it all those years ago i had to admit it didn,t inspire me as it was just an overgrown hole in the ground with huge piles of rubbish and soil everywhere, so i didn,t bother to pay any attention to it. When i turned up there a week ago it looked like a totally different lake, the overgrown reeds, bushed etc had been sympathetically cut back. There was plenty of good size clean swims which had been built, but with plenty of space between them. And there was a pleasant arra...

I ventured onto the rivers a day after the new season had begin as the weather was beautiful and i couldn,t be bothered doing any work. By 3pm i had walked the mile and half to the small weir pool that i fancied having a fish in. I,d stopped of in a couple of chubby looking swims on the way and had spotted a couple of small chublets drifting about but seeing as the water was really clear and the sun bright i decided on not giving them a go. The weirpool on the other hand looked great, slightly coloured with plenty of turbulence and a lovely slack area in front of my swim. I set up my quivertip rod and cast a maggot feeder out just into the flow with a 2 maggot baited hook attached. Straight away i was into fish, mainly small chub with some roach to half pound a few nice dace, i havn,t caught any dace for years, and a few perch to around the half pound mark. All the fish i caught were in immaculate condition, well fed and hard fighting. I did somehow manage to lose a much bigger p...

Last weekend i took my other half Sharon and our two dogs to a secret mark for the day to have a picnic and  see if i could bag a thornback ray. The weather wasn,t particularly good being very overcast with a strong wind blowing and a bit chilly. Sharon didn,t mind and neither did the dogs so of we set. After a nice offroad drive along the bottom of the sea wall we were at my chosen destination and carting the gear over to the otherside of the sea wall to fish on top of an old pill box. Sharon took her camera and the dogs for a walk as i proceeded to set up my tackle on top of this comfortable fishing platform. After one slip cast resulting in a big birdsnest i had my two rods cast out, one with a 2 hook flapper baited with ragworm for the bass and the other with a big herring fillet for the thornies.  Just as Sharon got back from her walk i had a knock on my herring rod followed by a big slack line. Quickly winding in the slack i felt another thump and walked backw...