After freezing my what's its off in January, I waited until things warmed up a bit before making another trip to Fields End. The weather had recently shown a marked improvement, with March 14th, the last day of the river season, being really quite nice. By Tuesday 16th the wind has also relented; so I set off.

I got to the lake at 08.00. It was completely calm and there was nobody there. The forecast had been for a westerly / south-westerly breeze, which would blow right into the reed corner. None the less I went to this swim, as I had some good early spring success there last year.

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I set up with my new 13ft Fishtec multi-float rod and a waggler with 4lb line. I started with bread and missed a few bites so switched to sweet corn. After a short while (at 08.50) I had a more positive bite and was into something good. A delicate tussle with the light tackle resulted in a mirror of 9¾lb.

It fought strongly but with nowhere near the ferocity of a summer fish. I doubt I would have landed it in the summer; it would have gone into the reeds and I wouldn't have been able to stop it. This was the first good fish on the Fishtec rod and it performed well.

After this I amused myself taking small roach and rudd, and one small chub, all on sweet corn. I then tried luncheon meat and a positive bite led to a nice 2½lb tench.

By now the wind had freshened. I continued to take roach on sweet corn, some I guess around 4 - 6oz. Good sport on what was a bright but still quite chilly day.

By 16.30 the three other anglers that had arrived after me had left, and the wind had freshened more making waggler fishing quite difficult. Just before 17.00 I decided to have one more cast. At this point I had switched to luncheon meat again. A good bite resulted in solid resistance that didn't seem to move. I had already lost three hooks on a snag and at first thought this was going to be the fourth. But then there was movement and a fish somewhat lethargically took line into open water. After a dogged but lacklustre fight, a 4¾lb common was netted. Obviously this fish had only just come out of its winter torpor.

This was a good day considering I have been more or less fishless since last October. Spirits have been uplifted.