Start of season news from Woodpecker Pool

As I write this our season has only just started, so firstly I will tell you all of a few things that have happened since the New Year.

On the 9th March in absolutely torrential rain we took delivery of 22 new mirror carp ranging from 15lbs up to 21lbs 8oz, there were 12 doubles and 10 twenties. A very nervous time, as is always the case when any new fish are introduced, but we feel this is justified for the long term benefits of the fishery. These fish are from the far east of France from a very cold area, and we have introduced them to give us another totally different gene pool of fish in the lake, which we believe in the long run will strengthen our stocks, plus to give you our clients some more fish to catch.

In March also we had a couple of small work parties when a few friends came out to help us out with a few outstanding jobs. Firstly Mark Doran the new owner of Kingfisher Pools was out to do some work over there with his brother Andrew and friends Rob and Bob (sounds like a double act!!) Rob is a tree surgeon and had kindly offered to take a couple of big trees down for us, the first one a dead poplar and a double trunked oak, these are not for the faint hearted as they are big. As I said not for the faint hearted, and a big thank you to all of you for the help in removing the problem trees.

Later on in the month we had our friends Steve, Jan and Harold out with us and they gave us a hand tidying up around the grounds. We had a massive bonfire to burn all of the tree pruning and general rubbish around the grounds. Jan and Steve fished for a few hours after the work was done and managed to catch a few nice fish which was reward for all their hard work.

Now onto the start of our season proper and on the 5th April we welcomed Ken, Ian (Ken’s son) and Ben (Ian’s son) Lever, three generations of the same family, for their first time at Woodpecker, they have fished several of Colin’s other venues in the past. The weather was very up and down all week with sun (not much), rain (a lot) and cold winds as well as frost, not ideal conditions at all. They managed to catch 33 fish for a total weight of 787lbs 9oz, including as would be expected all three sturgeon a few times and only one catfish, it just shows how cold the water still is. They also had some nice carp, with the best mirror being 36lb 4oz to Ben, on his first ever carp fishing trip, and a new lake RECORD Common of 36lb 10oz to Ian. Fantastic fish, well done Ian.

Ian also had a small pike that was plaguing Ben when he was roach fishing.

We really enjoyed your company and were sorry that the weather was as bad as it was, but I am afraid that is out of our control. Thank you for the comments in the book we really appreciate them and for the way the chalet was left and we hope you will come back to fish again in the future.

That is it for now and we look forward to seeing all of our clients old and new who have still to come this year. Until next time keep well and good fishing wherever that may be.

Best regards,

Sue and Doug.

© Woodpecker Pool 2006-2023