First trip since 19th November! The lake was very coloured. Hard to believe that this was entirely due to fish movement. Perhaps the high winds over the past few days had stirred things up.

Forecast was for 7-9 degrees and calm. It didn’t mention rain, which started at about 10.00 and carried on until around 13.30. January rain is chilling and quite unpleasant. It also made it difficult to spot pre-bite float movements, causing me to miss some of the few bites that I actually had.

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I started off with sweetcorn and at 10.00 a clear bite on two grains of corn rewarded me with a nice 3lb tench. A slim fish that had probably been on a bit of a diet while the lake was frozen over for a month.

After this the rain became progressively heavier and bites remained few and far between. I missed most of them and lost two smallish fish, probably roach, that slipped the hook. Eventually, at 14.45, I landed a nice roach of 10oz. Shortly after, at 14.55, a good bite produced the second tench weighing 3½lb. Not quite as slim as the first but certainly not as fat as the summer fish.

The next fish I think was a dace, taken at 15.15. It was probably about 5-6oz (not weighed) and was in nice condition. This is not the first time I’ve caught what I thought to be a dace at the lake. Any suggestions as to what else it might be would be gratefully received.

A line tangle at 15.40 put paid to further fishing as I had decided to pack up at 16.00. As is often the case, the lake looked absolutely perfect as I packed up. Not a breath of wind and brighter than it had been all day.

Not a lot of fish but, considering the weather, things didn’t turn out too bad. All fish were taken on sweetcorn.