ANGLING: With Kingfisher

Anyone who has been reading this column regularly of late, may well guess that the venue for this extraordinary event was the Carterhouse stretch of the Sankey St Helens canal, near Widnes.

Though Geoff's 33-7-5 of bream would be enough to win 99.9 per cent of canal matches (at least), the winner of this one almost doubled that weight - and should have had more.

The victor, Mark Webb of Trevis Wilmslow, was understandably elated to draw peg 399 having won from peg 400 just a week earlier.

He was even happier to discover that, with peg 400 not having been drawn he was effectively on the end peg.

Of course, he knew exactly what to do, and rigged up 13 metres of pole with which he fished double caster after an initial introduction of some fine crumb feed. It wasn't long before he was landing the first of 36 bream which ended up in his net, which weighed a magnificent, almost unbelievable, total of 61-2-8.

Nuisance eels did cause Mark to switch to sweetcorn and I understand Geoff Done, just five pegs away from the winner, used similar tactics against far bank sedges for 25 bream, of a slightly bigger stamp.

Day tickets are to be had on this section of canal and, as I have previously explained, keepnets are not allowed except in matches - of which there are plenty.

You could contact Lymm AC directly for further details, but I am certain if you popped into Blackburn to see Geoff he would give you the complete "low down" on the venue - and who better?

Bream have been making up the bulk of any decent weight from local (and some further afield) sections of Leeds and Liverpool canal. It is very difficult to say exactly the situation in regard to spawning, for it definitely depends too much on local conditions in regard to timing. Only you will be able to decide if they have or have not yet spawned. I can, however, tell you that if they have not yet, they will very soon.

The fact that they hadn't, nor had the roach, last weekend was blamed for a very poor match at Blackburn, when not one of the 34 anglers could top 2lbs.

Very small roach and skimmers were all the bread punch of Hyndburn's Alan Lord could tempt, but the 1-15-14 they weighed was enough for a relatively easy win. Dave Shaw was second with 1-8-11. There seems little point in identifying the exact stretch or pegs for this event - better try elsewhere.

Burnley's Barden Lane, for example, where pegs on the Barden Mill side of the bridge have been producing bream (a number of catches over 30lbs I am told) to pole fished bread and caster.

Though the weather was not forecast too good for today it should be better tomorrow, and the effort to get out could prove very worthwhile.

I would get out your walking shoes after your tea today and stroll a mile or two along your nearest stretch of canal - looking for fish of course.

Find some reed or weedbeds if you can and observe carefully. You are looking for lots of movement in those reeds and, maybe, listening to plenty of splashing. If you are lucky enough to find the fish behaving in this way, bream which have spawned, you are almost guaranteed a good catch tomorrow. I would be tempted to take along some corn, casters and groundbait to put in ready for your session tomorrow.

You read much about the value of pre-baiting swims when you go to Ireland, and it really works Though you should not confine the practice to enormous Irish loughs, try it out on the canal (though you should be careful with the amount of feed), and you should be well rewarded.

Trout anglers have been enjoying tremendous sport just about everywhere, in the great weather. Buzzers continue to catch loads of fish, at various depths, but there is a change happening. From now on the most skilled fly angler will definitely stand to take a much bigger percentage of fish.

Fishing the buzzer well is difficult enough, but now that the fish are starting to take what are known as "emergers," and will soon be taking flies known as "dry," getting tactics just right is even harder. As you start to take fish closer to the surface with a buzzer, you will soon need to fish with an "emerger" instead. These flies hang in the surface film, not on top and not sinking, and there are plenty of patterns from which to choose. They look like a buzzer but have a little feather (or even poly-ball) at the head and which keeps the fly just floating.

I am no expert at this type of fishing, but I am well advised that it is essential that your leader is not greased right up to the fly. It must not be on the surface for the last two feet or so.

Another failing of the non-expert who is trying this type of fly fishing for the first time is that, because he has previously been using lures, he wants to strip the fly back.

This is wrong. This type of fly is left to drift, as naturally as you can make it, with the ripple on the water. It's easy to do with the wind behind (but there are no fish here), but not at all easy with the wind from the side.

You can still catch lures but it is not so much fun, or as productive. Blackburn's Ruth Sweeten took some nice fish to 4lbs from Esthwaite Water (solid with fish) on a Cat's Whisker and intermediate line.

Time to dig out that floater Ruth.

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