Catching up with Spencer Wright - 2014 Part 1

Living in the location I do on the sunny Isle of Wight, Summer is always a bit of a slow time, fishing wise with the majority of my syndicate waters closing between June and September to let the fish recover from spawning, meaning that my fishing time is few and far between. I do get the odd chance to fish on the mainland, but with the extortionate prices on the local ferry's along with family and work commitments always means that times are few and far between, so I make up for it giving it my all through the Winter months pulling out all the stops in the Spring, when takes are hopefully plentiful and the fish are quite often at there heaviest weights.

 So, with this in mind, I thought that my initial Blog would be a brief year to date covering my fishing and some of the highlights, to which, thankfully there have been quite a few....

  This stunning image was taken very early one morning when for a few minutes the sky turned into a burning sea of colours and I was lucky to experience mother nature in all her glory.

My year started on a local Syndicate called Blackwater. It is a relatively small lake of about 6 acres with roughly 150 fish in to about 40lb's depending on the time of year. As with all my fishing, time is at an absolute premium with only an overnighter available to me, meaning that most Friday nights would see me leaving work at 5pm heading for the lake and reeling in the following morning, which would be my fix for the week. With this in mind, I have had to make my own opportunity to make things happen, so to speak rather than just turning up and casting out and hoping for the best. So, as I have done for many years, Pre-baiting was my key to success. Finding an area out of the way, where hopefully I would remain undisturbed and left to get on with my own devices, or at least that is how I hoped it would go.

Rascal at 40-3

My small secluded part of the lake was prepared with bait at least 3 times a week and thankfully the captures continued to flow, right from the start, proving my tactics and location were spot on. I started with a flurry of 20's up to 29+ before the weights of the fish started to increase. Firstly fish of 32 & 33 before hooking into something really big. The scales settled at 40-3 and a mirror to boot that was kindly named after my best friend and bank-side partner for over a dozen years, Rascal the carp dog who'd we had lost just two moths previously. I was also elated to catch one of the lakes jewels so early in my campaign, especially as the fish of that size were few and far between.

Nailed

Amazingly, not long after this another biggie soon found its way into the bottom of my net, this time pulling the scales down to 39-11 and was testament to the effort that I was putting into baiting the spots and keeping them primed up.

As the weather started to improve, more anglers started visiting the lake, so provisions had to be made to make other area's available to fish, as my area had become hugely sought after. With this in mind, I started baiting other swims to ensure that I had other options available to me with spots spread around, hopefully to take advantage of once again.

I had fished to my absolute limits. It was so hard, wading through floods of water and mud so thick. Setting up in complete darkness in the middle of nowhere, alone, just for 12 hours of angling but the rewards were there and I was willing to sacrifice myself in order to make those gains which seemed to pay off by the catches that I had been fortunate to make. 

39-11

With Spring well under-way and the season changing and mother nature awakening from her Winter slumber things were obviously coming good. Little did I know what other exhilarating moments I had to come, but for now, that will have to wait until my next instalment.

Just remember, nothing is impossible. Its just a case of thinking if you want it enough to make it happen...

Until next time, tight lines....

Spence

Find out more on Team Member Spence here and check out the Diem Product Range too.