Faith restored.........

With bait a plenty left over from Cork and with an eye on the Junior Canal Champs on Saturday, we swung up to Ferns for a few hours this afternoon. It was an excuse to get a canal head on and check
out rigs in preparation for Saturday.
After some very carefull plumbing up to try find clear patches in what is a weedy and very clear stretch,
we settled on three lines of attack.
A .6 Grm rig was set for skimmers down the track. This was kicked off with two small balls of  groundbait with choppy and caster mixed through. A .3 Grm rig three quarters across for roach was kicked off with a pole cup half full of hemp and caster. Last was a .4 Grm roach rig fished less than half way across, this was fed with soft balls of groundbait with pinkie mixed through.
Straight out to the Skimmer line and three quick roach are followed by two perch. On to the close line and again the roach are coming to a single red mag. Taking a few fish of both these lines and swopping back and forth had 20 odd roach in the bag in the first two hours. Not hectic but bites none the less and a few good roach too. A look onto the hemp and caster line after two hours produced a roach but it took to long so back to the other lines having fed all three again. Ten more roach off the two lines in the third hour had us laughing at the idea that he'd have more from a canal in four hours than he had had in four
hours on Inniscarra !!!!
A more serious look at the hemp and caster line for the last hour, had fish coming much better than the earlier look. Adding a pot to the tip of the no 1 section meant for more accurate feeding of a few grains of hemp and a few caster with each put in. If you fed on top of the float you got a bite and if you didn't feed you didn't get a bite. The four hours had whizzed past and exactly 40 fish were bagged, yes he'd caught more than Inniscarra and they weighed more. It's funny how this fishing lark goes sometimes.

So, rigs sorted for the weekend and a timely reminder of the importance of precision and
delicacy on a canal and I still havn't got fishing myself,