Following a break of just over two weeks, caused by sitting out a hot spell followed by few days away, and then avoiding a period of heavy rains, I decided on an easy day at the side pond on the Clay Pit. This little pond has nearly always been kind to me and with parking next to the swim, and few people around, it was just about perfect for a restful session. The only disappointment was that the water level was down around a couple of feet, not great given that the pond is only normally about four to five feet deep.

I fished bread flake and had brought some coarsely crumbed bread as groundbait. I put four golf ball sized balls in, just tightly squeezing the crumb rather than wetting it. A couple of ducks appreciated those bits that didn't sink. Feeding some young geese that had collected around me also ensured that they would be around on and off while I was there.

There was some movement on the float soon after I cast in and I didn't have to wait that long before a more positive indication resulted in hooking a powerful fish. I guessed it was a tench and after a bit of a battle netted a fine fish of 3lb 14oz. A great start.

My next fish was a crucian that gave a bite that wasn't that different to the tench. It wasn't a big fish but it dashed off in a much more frenetic way than the tench. It was good to see a crucian as there were fears that cormorants might have taken many of the silvers from the pond.

Another tench followed shortly afterwards and on this occasion I nearly missed the bite as I was feeding one of the young geese. The fish seem to know when you're not paying attention. Another fine looking tench of 3lb 5oz.

I switched to sweet corn not because bread was no longer working but just to give it a try. After a bit of a wait a positive bite resulted in another good tench of 4lb 5oz being hooked but unfortunately on this occasion it was foul hooked in the gill cover. The small hook didn't seem to have caused much damage but it's always sad to foul hook a fish. I guess that the tench were rooting around and brushed against the line. I reverted to bread flake after this.

Another tench followed but having got it out of weed just below my feet the hook pulled shortly after. But at least I saw it before it departed. It was a bit smaller than the previous one.

Following this I had a longish chat with another angler and changed the battery on my remote GoPro, and connected a power pack to my body mounted GoPro. So the swim had a good rest. Shortly after casting a positive bite led to a powerful fish running towards the far reeds and I couldn't stop it. As the fish crashed into the reeds the line broke. I guess it was a carp as it exhibited much more power than the earlier tench.

The loss of that fish didn't deter the tench as I didn't need to wait too long for the next fish, this time a hard fighting tench of 4lb 2oz. Things were going very well indeed despite the low water level and my concerns that it would affect the fishing.

This pattern continued and my next tench was 3lb 6oz, once again giving me a good tussle before I could net it.

The next tench was a much smaller fish of probably around ½lb that I caught while I was talking to the other angler as he was packing his car at around 2pm. It was good to see that there were smaller tench in the pond ready to grow into bigger ones for the future. I then lost another fish that was almost certainly a tench when the hook pulled as I tried to keep it from the far reeds.

I was almost ready to pack up at that stage but decided to stay a bit longer to let the net dry. Well, that wasn't going to happen as yet another tench was hooked, this time the biggest of the bunch, weighing 4lb 7oz. This matched my tench PB for the pond that I caught back in 2023. That was to be the last fish as although I was sure that I could possibly have caught more, I try to time limit my sessions these days and I had already done far better than I could have imagined when I arrived.

A really great session only marred by the fact that I had some technical hitches with my remote GoPro that caused me not to capture posed shots for the first couple of tench.