After ticking off chub so early in my annual lure only species hunt, I took a punt at something a little different this weekend.
For the 3rd year running we stayed in a golf/sports/craft hotel down in Devon for a post Christmas weekend away. Only this time I had some time to spare where there weren’t really a great deal of activities available which also coincided with some Ok weather. The hotel just happens to be a 50m walk from a small commercial lake which stocks coarse fish including carp to 20lb so this had to be the perfect opportunity to try something a little different and tempt a new species?
I did some research including watching some very helpful youtube videos and starte off by rigging up some various ul jig heads with lures in the 1/2 inch (cut down) to 1.5 inch range. I tried casting and retrieving at different depths.
It didn’t take long before I started feeling nibbles and eventually saw those unmissable stripes of tiny perch. I couldn’t resist and started working the perchy looking overhangs and weeds and hooked up with a few very quickly and to be honest didn’t stop finding them throughout the session.
But of course I had already had a handful of perch in my opening couple sessions of the year so decided to start concentrating on finding something else.
I walked circles around the two lakes and started to find plenty of carp in the 2lb to 5lb range and even had a couple of follows but none of them bit or took any lures I tried on them. I even swapped over to some scented worm lures cut down to around an inch and although the carp came for a sniff they didn’t ‘take the bait’. Very frustrating, but then I suppose these carp are likely targeted and caught all year round and weren’t about to be tricked by a bit of astic and an amateur like me.
I decided to try my luck at going even smaller to see if I could find some smaller more naive fish. Last years hatch perhaps. I rigged up a dropshot rig using a small splitshot and a size 22 hook. Perfect for an extremely thin 1 inch length of isome worm which I know would move loads with very little action needed to be put into the line.
It was very very effective, almost every time I dropped it into little snags around the lake/pond I was getting bites and I saw flashed of silver. My hopes were high. Then tap tap tap tap tap and a good pull on the rod. I gave the lightest of strikes and reeled in the prettiest little perch. But not the silver I had seen. Grrr. Back down the same hole I went in between some reeds and the second the line slackened as the splitshot hit the bottom I felt it again tap tap tap tap, I genuinely though that perch had come straight back to try again but as I raised the rod I saw new colours. 
I wasnt certain at what it was at all but I knew it was a new species and it had come with about 15 minutes left before I had to leave for lunch.
A quick few snaps and I put it back buzzing at ticking of a lifetime new species and my 3rd of the year.
It turns out the fish is a rudd (I initially thought it might be a roach but was put right by the boys on the favebook book ‘UK Lure Species Hunt’).
I had a couple more drops with even more confidence but was plagued by perch and what is definitely my personal worst and the smallest fish I have ever caught.
Check this out……
Cool hey! Super cute predator!
I left very happy with 3 out of 3 in fish species caught on lure to sessions fished in 2020 so far.
What to target next??????
If you want to find out more about catching UK fish on lures, I strongly recommend you try this great book here which provides info on everything you might want to know about lure fishing in the UK and how to catch a huge variety of species.
How To Trick A Fish 