The one thing I love about this time of year are the long summer evenings. It is so nice to finish work and head down to the local lake, for a few hours fishing in the daylight and then into the night. My intended species was the rudd, but these seemed very elusive on this particular evening.
There was hardly any surface activity as it was getting dark, so I set the float a bit deeper than usual to see if I can pick up a bream or maybe a tench. Armed with just a tin of sweetcorn, I hooked a single piece and cast out. Once cast out I threw out some loose offerings and waited for the isotope float to disappear into the depths. I was getting plenty of pull downs of the float, which I reckon was mostly small stuff, which I missed, then just as it was getting dark, the float dipped a couple of times, then sailed under the surface, I struck into the fish and it was a small skimmer. I had a few of these, then I struck into something more substantial. Th fish shot across the swim and tried to bury itself in the lilies, but I was able to pull it free into open water. After a few minutes, a beautiful tench graced the net, which happened to be my first for a very long time from this venue.
After a few photos, I released it back into the depths. Not long after this one, I hooked into a second one, which unfortunately for me threw the hook, which was gutting. I also lost another lump which snapped me up. Overall it was great fun on light tackle, and looking forward to few more over the next few months.