I mentioned back in May that the west bank had been rather violently cleared, leaving deeply rutted ground. This has now overgrown with weeds and thorns, and is extremely hazardous to negotiate as you can’t see the ruts beneath the weed cover. The rushes around the lake have grown to such an extent that most of the ‘platform’ pitches are unfishable.

I started at what I call the lily-pads swim, but to the right of the platform pitch. This meant I was casting at an angle to the gap between the pads, making it difficult to place the leger weight where I wanted it.

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Returning to the lily-pads I decided to sit it out and hope for something to develop as dusk approached. A drop-back bite, which I missed, had all the signs of being a roach, as did a more positive pull, that I also missed. I hooked the next pull, which as expected was a roach, albeit a nice one. I didn’t weigh it but suspect it was near a pound or so.

My hopes that a carp may patrol the pads didn’t materialise and in fact after the roach I didn’t get another touch. I started to pack up about 17.45 as darkness descends fairly quickly at this time of year and, to be honest, if I had got into a carp I probably would have started to run out of daylight as I played it. And I didn’t fancy negotiating the undergrowth-covered rough ground in the dark.

That makes only four fishing trips this year, which is really sad!