Fishing the tiny River Medlock and beyond
Wednesday 21 December 2011
The shortest day, on the Tame
December 21st, the shortest day in the calendar found me nursing a headache after the previous evenings Salford friendly anglers Xmas do. Buoyed up by an evening of tall fishing stories in the fishing call my bluff contest (believe me there are some fantastic liars in the fishing club!) I decided to put a little reality back in to the week and found me heading for the River Tame. Mossley is a small town about 15 miles north east of Manchester, most famous for its football teams exploits in the FA Trophy, getting to Wembley on a few occasions. However running through Bottom Mossley is the beautiful River Tame, a streamy river with some deeper wide bends and reputedly some big fish. I set up on a swim by the Roaches lock pub and tried to battle the raging current on a very high river, switching feeders several times to try and hold bottom. I have fancied this swim for a long time, trust me to pick a day to try it when it was unfishable.
Down but not out I began walking downstream, fancying a bash at the adjacent Huddersfield narrow canal, which really does have some fantastic looking pegs. Determined to bag a river fish I found a slacker corner a few hundred metres on, and plonked my gear down on the first fishable spot of the river I came by. Having only a few metres of slack water to aim at I cast a medium drennan feeder perfectly into the hole, placed the rod down and waited, all of two seconds, for a big rap on the tip. It turned out to be a greedy brown trout which gave a good account of itself in the fast current.
Arriving at this swim around 1.30pm I fished until darkness fell at around 3.45pm and managed to catch thirteen trout of various sizes, nothing big, but all welcome on a miserable overcast afternoon.
All told a really enjoyable afternoon, which started as an exercise to blow the cobwebs of a hangover away. As I walked back up the towpath of the canal to the car park I could see the lights of the Roaches lock pub in the distance, looking very welcoming.
My apologies for the quality of the pictures. Today's trip was so impromptu I forgot the camera. This river rises in the Pennine hills and runs right through Saddleworth and the delightful Uppermill village, on to Mossley, Stalybridge and on through Tameside to Stockport where there are some very large Barbel and chub. We really are blessed with some fantastic river fishing around Manchester, some of it in really pleasant locations, for those that have the appetite to try.
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Hi Mate, Love the blog I used to live in Manchester years ago when the Medlock was an open sewer, it was a different colour every day when I went past on the bus. Great to ir recovering, I lived in Stockport 11 years ago and fished the Tame an awful lot, before the Barbell turned up and It was a fantastic river then, full of pike and huge Pearch, great to see all these rivers recovering. keep up the blog,
ReplyDeleteHey up Meddyman!! Great blog btw. I have been reading for a while and thought it apt to comment.....I'm sat in the Roaches Lock having a pint, had a look at that swim opp the pub and it looks deep. There is some white water to the left which is testament to the low rainfall we've had recently. Saw a rise while studying the surface (expect a small Brownie)....when the river is low, that swim in your first photo is totally locked on both sides....not enough water falling down the wier for fish to move up and to fast and shallow to the left to move down. It is out of season at the time if writing this but like you I have wanted to fish this spot for a good while and have to park up and look at the river here when passing. Looks inviting, could come back with the waterwolf and see whats going on under the surface. I have no idea how deep it is either so will make sure to find out. Tight lines!:)
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