Not a red letter day...

Well,

The plan was to get to Damflask just as the sun was coming up. Even with the best intentions we only managed to get there for 9am. Unfortunately by that time we had missed a normally very productive period for pike. We parked up, grabbed our gear, and walked down to the waters edge. The first thing to greet us was a howling wind and we looked across the reservoir. It looked more like the North Sea than a sheet of water miles from the coast! The wind had whipped up big waves and a lot of silt, resulting in very coloured water.

Damflask, Sheffield

We began casting at the narrow, shallow end to try and pick up a few early smaller fish. Dave started with a small Kuusamo spoon, and I started with a 19cm Savage soft 4play in a natural perch pattern. Working our way towards the deeper water we would make a number of casts and then move 10 yards along the bank and repeat. After about 15 mins my brothers rod hooped over, and I thought we'd had an early success. It turned out to be a plastic bag fish...

Plastic bag fish!

We had a laugh and a joke and then continued casting away. By the time we had arrived at the deeper water in a sheltered bay it was 1pm. A quick break for lunch and a few cups of coffee and we were back to the job at hand. We decided to stay in this area and try a variety of different lures. After a few changes I put on a storm rainbow trout shad. At around 2.30pm I was retrieving the shad and out of no where.... BANG!! A pike smashed my lure around 4ft from the bank. At the same time my reel decided die on me so I couldn't reel in, so I had to hold the line and walk up the very steep bank. After a few tail walks and some thrashing around the pike was on the unhooking mat. We didn't weigh it but I think it was just a double. We fished for another few hours but then it tipped it down so we decided to call it a day.

All in all not a bad day, but not the best...