End of Season on the Mangrove
Unusually I had done very little fishing on the mangrove during the winter. This was probably due to last years winter catches, as there were no fish caught for 3 months!

I was therefore dead keen when I arrived for an overnighter on Saturday at around 3 pm. However, my hopes plummeted when I looked at the water, as it was way up and chocolate brown in colour. This is normally the kiss of death on the Mangrove. However, when I read the log I was a little more optimistic as there had been a few fish caught during the week.

The log is an invaluable source of information as fish sightings are often written in as well as catches. The members of my rota are particularly helpful and we all pool our information, truly a great bunch of guys. There had been a couple of fish caught from lightning tree, so I loaded up a boat with my tackle and attached my electric motor. I believe that an electric motor is essential on this water as it is near impossible to get back from the other side of the lake, if it gets rough, by rowing.

When I arrived in lightning tree I left the tackle in the boat and got onto the platform to see if I could spot any fish. Fish spotting is normally difficult as the water is always coloured, there is no access from the banks and there are huge amounts of lilies, rushes and snags. To my surprise a large mirror head and shouldered just to the right of the swim, see photo.

Mirror head and shouldered here. Fish were caught off this spot

I thought this will do for me (as you do). I set up my rods all in the same area. The reason was that I have seen fish patrolling the margins before when the water is very colour, but I have failed to catch them. I thought that if I give them a large, well baited area to find I would be in with a better chance. My baiting situation was as shown in the diagram below:

I use two marker rods, I cast out the two closest to the edge first. I then cast to the markers and clipped up to set the range of my actual fishing rods. The line was marked using electrical tape, so that I could cast to the same position should I have any action.

When I had completed this I cast the rods into position, took the lines out of the clips and baited up in a line. I wound in the right hand marker and positioned it to the left hand side of the one still in the water. This one was then reeled in and position to the right of the other marker. The positioning of the rigs and baiting up process was repeated.

Bait in the Mangrove is very important, as the bottom is a bowl of very deep silt. You can stand on a platform and push a 15-foot pole into the bottom with minimal effort. I haven’t tried a longer pole. Baits need to be attractive after they have sat in silt for 12 hours plus as the spring, summer and early autumn feeding times are normally between:
Midnight and 3am
5am to 7am
8am to 9am

I don’t like to recast in the morning for the fear of spooking feeding fish. I therefore need a bait that has inbuilt attraction, I had been given some of angling lines specials to try. These have a nice crabby smell, but also has inbuilt long-term attraction which lasts for 12 hours plus. I set up the bivvy and layback to wait developments. I was awoken by the best alarm clock you can get, an angry buzzer. After a short scrap I slipped the net under a 27lb 12 oz common. Fish have to be played very firmly on this water due to the extensive snags and the possibility of loosing fish under the platform.

27lb 12oz common

This rod was clipped back up and cast into the same position. I had given up hope of another fish when the same rod roared off at 9:45 this time the culprit was a very pretty 31lb 15oz mirror. That was the end of the action for this session. I was well pleased and couldn’t wait to get back for the last rota of the season.

31lb 15oz mirror

I arrived back on the Friday of the last rota and the log indicated that Paul Cooper had had a right result on Lightning tree. Paul is a very talented angler and is also on angling lines specials. To my surprise lightning tree was free so I set up there. Baits were positioned in the same spots as last time; this was easy as the line was still marked. This time the result was a 25lb 3oz mirror caught at 2:45 am to the same rod again.

25 lb 3oz mirror

During this session we had one of the worst thunderstorms that I have ever fished through. The lightning was continuous and the storm lasted a couple of hours. At the height of the storm I hooked an eel of approximately 4lb. It was landed in approximately 5 seconds! The time between the flash and the bang was zero, very iffy to say the least. I left it in the landing net dangling over the edge of the platform (eel well in the water) and retreated back into the bivvy. I got soaked and the lake rouse about a foot overnight! I was very happy with the end of season results and with the bait.

If you have doubts about your baits or fancy a change you could do a lot worse than angling lines specials.