Birmingham Anglers Association

This weekend against most fishing reports posted anywhere since the floods, I decided to take a session on the Teme. All the information around the Teme is constantly about fishing trips ending in disappointing catches or blanks. After falling in the love with the rugged and untamed nature of the river when i first fished it over a decade ago I refuse to believe that having a good day and a good catch is a thing of the past.

To get a full indication on fish stocks I decided to adopt two methods of attack for the day.
I'd pick a swim where I could find a pacey bit of water with a bit of depth, (around 3/4ft) where I could stick a feeder out with a mix of pellet and meat as hook bait and micro pellet, hemp and maggot as feeder mix. I'd planned to put this out at the top of the swim and then stick float maggots and worm downstream of it with maggots going in as loose-feed.
By doing both these methods I felt as if i could cover most species of fish that could still be thriving in the depths of the declining river.

After three of four casts out with the feeder to get some bait into the swim and a catapult of maggots I cast out the stick float. The swim I had chosen had a perfect long run off a shingle beach with a typical teme channel on the far bank pulling through and slowing down out underneath the dark waters of overhanging oak branches downstream. It took a few casts to find the right run down to find a path with the main current to curl off underneath the over hang but as soon as I found it the bites followed instantaneously.

The first twelve casts that took me into the right run under the trees resulted in ten little salmon par, a brilliant sign for the future of Salmon in the river. Albeit not anything of great size but good sport per ounce in the force of the flow.
After that I never caught a salmon par again all day, funny how fishing does that sometimes!

However, the bites kept coming one every cast sometimes these were minnows but clonking great monsters at that. But most of these bits converted into good sized Dace and Chublets, around 4oz- 8oz in average.

It wasn't long before the effort of constant maggot feed and good trotting turned out better results after a short cast out took me into the shallows further down the end of the shingle beach where the float sunk down and the rod bucked under the strain of a fish. Halfway up the swim the fish rolled in the clear water showing its silver shimmering flank at just over a foot long but with much to my dispair this caused a hook pull and the fish swam off back into the unknown. Judging by the fight and colour it must of been either a chub or grayling, the latter of which I am yet to catch on the Teme despite countless efforts.

I worried that this loss would kill off the bites in my swim and so I cast out a few more feeder full of mix and swapped the meat on that rod for an 8mm pellet.

Thankfully the bites were still there and the Dace and Chublets continued to sink the float. Until one swim down the float brushed past the branches of the overhanging tree where I held it under strain into the dark water and a heavy pull and fast run further into the darkness had me sweating under light float gear! I somehow persuaded the fish to come out of the snaggy area and battled it in the fast flow. A roll revealed another bronze flank, much bigger than the last one and close enough for me to know I'd hooked into a fantastic looking Chub, (as seen in the photo).
Despite how lean the fish looked the scales read steady 5lb, I guess the flow it has to live it builds muscle and keeps fat down in river Teme fish especially.

For the rest of the session the steady silver catches continued but sadly nothing bigger showed itself on the float. The feeder which had been in a prime looking spot under a bush all day in the fast flow never had a touch.

To be honest that never surprised me at all, I think people coming down the Teme after the Barbel banging out feeders and leads with heavy tackle I just don't use the right method for the conditions of the river most year round. As most river fishermen now only seem to target Barbel it doesn't surprise me the amount of blanks reported on the internet after people trying out the Teme.

Although the fish don't seem to be there in the quantities anymore I really shake my head at the Anglers that call it a dead river and a waste of time just because it takes a bit more skill and thought into finding and properly fishing for the gems still living in the river. Because good days are not beyond the Teme, not just yet anyway. Hopefully in the years to come the river does pick back up to it's former self, but until then good days are still to be had.