My best lure caught pike

My Best Lure Caught Pike
Jon Neafcy (Wigan Piker!)
The memorable capture that I am about to relate to you took place at Easter Weekend 2007, at Coniston Water (Coniston) or Thurston Water as it is less commonly known, which lies in the South of the Cumbrian Lake-district. The lake is over 5 miles long & 800m wide with depths of upto approximately 170ft covering an area of 1.89 square miles, it drains into the sea via the River Crake. It sits in a glaciated valley scoured out during the last ice age, so it’s about as natural a lake as you can get! It is in truly splendid scenery & is much less busy than near by Windermere & it truly is a most magnificent venue to fish.
I guess the beginnings of this story starts when I first fished Coniston as a child, with my uncle, we fished for the lake trout, char & pike & my uncle had pike upto 18lb. My first days fishing at the venue was for lake (brown) trout) off a large rock on the East shore, we caught a few trout that day. Me, my uncle & his mate had some good catches amidst the terrific Lakeland scenery. Ever since my first visit, I have been drawn to the place both for fishing & other pursuits, for a number of reasons. As a Donald Campbell fan the nostalgia & tragic history of the Bluebird has always been of interest to me. The Island from the book ‘Swallows & Amazons’ by Arthur Ransome is infact Piel Island on Coniston, Brantwood house the home of John Ruskin is on the East Shore, shrouded in history & all it’s grandeur, the steam ‘yacht' Gondola that frequents the lake, the mighty hill that is the Coniston ‘old man’, the Blackball pub in the village with its own brewery (good stuff, too good, trust me!) & mouth watering home made food, all bring back fond memories for me. So what of the pike of the mighty Coniston? Well it has produced a 33 that turned up again at 38 (see Neville’s book), & there is a photo of a 25+ in one of the local shops, so it has to be well worth a go, however don’t go expecting to catch such a fish as what there are of such ‘lumps’ are very thin on the ground & they are very, very elusive. Add to this that Coniston is one of the venues covered by the lake-district bait ban of no live baits & no fresh water dead baits, however I like a challenge!
From that first trip to Coniston as a child, fishing for trout, fast forward more years than I care to remember, to just over three years ago when I had my first decent boat an Orkney Spinner, boat storage at Windermere proved unavailable or too expensive, I dropped on & secured a place at Coniston boating centre from Easter, fees were reasonable & for a rolling 12 months as opposed to Jan-Dec, excellent, just what I needed. The lads that have their boats in the yard & who work there are a friendly bunch. Initially I fished from the boat alone whilst I got to know the lake, as usual I ‘did it my way’. One lad from Manchester who has a boat in the yard & regularly fishes the lake for pike told me ‘It will take you 3 years to catch a 20 from here mate, that’s what it took me’! In three years he had had some good catches but he had only caught, & had only seen one over the magical 20+ mark, a low 20. So that was to be my aim to catch a 20+ Coniston pike, quite a challenge indeed! My first pike from the boat on Coniston went 7.10 no monster but a memorable capture as a first Coniston boat caught Pike. Since then I have fished the lake many, many times both from the boat & from the bank, I have had some excellent fishing trips with upto 16 fish in a weekend being boated, & many, many good doubles being caught. It has not been all ‘easy’ I have endured some terrible weather conditions & some grueling blanks. It seemed for a while that just when you though you were doing well & getting to know the venue & getting amongst the fish the next trip would be a total blank! Many experienced anglers who have fished or who do fish the venue have not had a 20+ pike from it, making them very much sought after elusive beasts! A summary of all the info from all manner of sources that I gathered along the way all pointed to the same conclusion ‘can be a good doubles water, very, very few 20’s but it has done the odd ‘lump’’.
I have had some memorable fishing trips in the boat & on the bank at Coniston, both alone, with my family, & with good mates such as John Sands from Chester & fellow Wiganer’s Andy Cooke & Paul Haughton. I have many photos of the lake & of its pike, every picture speaking a thousand words & each & every one a catalyst to good memories for me. It has been good to share these trips with both my family & my good mates. It’s good to see a mate catch his first pike from Coniston on a mark that you have put him onto.
Fast forward again, this time to three years on, to the day ‘or so to speak’ from my first putting the boat on Coniston, ‘Easter weekend’. The Orkney spinner replaced some while ago by a Dejon 14, now with three years boat fishing the lake ‘under my belt’, a few ‘new tricks’ learned & many fish, including many good doubles caught, but still no 20 to my rods from Coniston, I’ve had 20’s from other venues during this time but not from Coniston, never seen a 20 caught on Coniston either & I have heard of very few over 20 caught during that period! I have not lost many pike on Coniston at all & the odd one I have lost has certainly not been any better fish than the ones I have caught, so no tales of ‘the one that got away’ for me here! During the last 3 years I had on several occasions considered switching ‘target venues’ from Coniston to Windermere which I fished much more lightly & which had a much better pedigree for 20’s, however being a stubborn man I just couldn’t move on without achieving my target of catching a 20+ pike from Coniston! Experience on some grueling waters including some rock hard local Wigan venues over the years had taught me that perseverance usually pays off, so I stuck it out on Coniston. Due to the birth of my daughter restricting my finances the Dejon is going to have to be sold, me & my mate Andy Cook (Cookey two brews) have bought an old high sided Dory between us to do up. No more luxuries of boat storage for me, I will be trailering to & from venues from now on! A mate fire fighter Matt Keoh offers to buy the Dejon, so I don’t even need to advertise it! Matt’s boat fishing experience is on the Norfolk Broads & shallow rivers, a different ‘ball-game’ than the big, deep, glacial lakes. We agree a weekend’s fishing to hand over the boat & show Matt the ropes.
It is with mixed feelings that I make my way upto Coniston, Easter weekend 2007, on the one hand it’s the ‘end of an era’ in some ways to me. The Dejon has served me well, is totally original & in mint condition, I will be sorry to see it go, but such is life, no doubt she will serve her new owner equally as well. Doing up the Dory is hard going, it needs a full re-ferb & we never anticipated that it would take as long as it is doing, I digress as the mind wanders on the hour & a half’s journey to Coniston, one I have made many, many times before! On the other hand, I am also, as always, glad to be going on a weekends fishing trip. It will be Matt’s first fishing trip on the venue, so I’m keen that he catches, I don’t want to let him down. After a very good start to 2007 with many decent pike caught to my rods me & Andy have not fished for a month due to our boat project, we are desperate to get the rods out fishing again!
Arrival & the boat is launched ‘one last time’, me & Andy Cooke fish the morning & early afternoon on the boat, Matt is coming up later. Me & Andy try several what can be often be good spots, we bait-fish & lure fish, we fail to catch, one dropped run to me (very unusually) & Andy lost one on a lure (that would have been his first ever lure caught pike – unlucky Andy mate!). We meet up with Matt in the afternoon & use the boat as a vehicle to trans-ship the gear to an area we can all bank-fish from. The rods go out just over the shelf on ledgered dead-baits, almost immediately, as can often happen on the large glacial lakes, the move produces the results & I’m in, as my rod ‘comes to life’! It’s just below double, the typical stamp of Coniston pike. These Coniston pike are in top condition, the water is so clear they can be very dark backed, they have terrific markings & are good fighters pound for pound, being true wild beats! The rod with the very same bait on is cast back out onto a drop off. Matt’s rod is next to go producing a lively ‘snapper’, Matt is made up even if its only small it’s his first Coniston fish, we all have to start somewhere. Shortly after my rod goes again, with a similar stamp of fish. Again the same bait goes back to the same spot. Andy Cooke’s is anxious & full of anticipation, as he always is if someone else catches before him, his rod goes next & he lands a small snapper, good sport we have all caught! What is now my ‘3rd time lucky bait’ goes & I get a modest double, Matt insists on a quick photo, as it’s the first Coniston double that he has seen. I’m glad we have all caught, all be it slightly for personal reasons, the lads would have given me some right stick if we had blanked! Then it goes quiet & just as quickly as the action started it has ceased. The evening is spent swapping fish tales & giving Matt some more gen-up on Coniston, Andy Cooke re-counts the capture of his first Coniston pike to Matt, I already know the tale as I was their (it was taken on one of my rods that I lent to him & it was an immaculate low double), enthusiasm is, as always high, we always enjoy our fishing.
The next morning the baits are in, mine goes just after first light, & a small snapper puts in an appearance. Andy Cook elects to bank fish & me & Matt go out on the boat. It’s windy early morning that day which makes Matt’s first attempts at deep water anchoring fun! I show Matt a few marks, working our way up the lake as we go. The phone goes a text from Andy he’s in just below double & maybe his luck is flagging as he has also lost a bigger one. Matt gets a run & a lively snapper is boated, Matt’s first Coniston boat caught pike, no monster but good fun. We bait fish a couple more areas to no avail. The silence is broken in a quiet bay on the West side of the lake that we are fishing in by ‘beep-beep’ as Andy’s white van goes past, he has to be back home in time for tea today.
The baits are not producing the goods for us in the boat today & it’s a little warmer now, maybe the pike want a moving target. Never one to give in easily I suggest a change of method, it’s time to try some deep water lure trolling in a different area of the lake, a method that I have had some success with & a method that Matt is keen to get to grips with. I let Matt use my most productive deep water trolling lure a deep invader, it’s a bit battered showing the war wounds of it’s conflicts with many a pike! I opt for a depth tail, this is a second generation version of the ‘infamous’ raider lures, it has a solid front body with a grub like rubber tail, this lure has produced a few fish for me. I show Matt the gear & explain the technique. We use the fish-finder to troll along the shelf, using the hand-held GPS to retain what I have founds to be the optimum ‘take’ speed on the lake. We troll for a couple of miles along marks which have produced well for me in the past, but they are not producing today, not so far anyway! At the end of the ‘productive area’ I suggest to Matt that we turn round & go over it again at a slightly different course, a ploy which has worked for me in the past. Matt offers to steer the boat & off we go, Matt is a quick learner & is doing well steering us over the drop off & adjacent to other underwater features any one of which could hold our sought after prize, a feeding pike! We get about half way along our chosen area & just as Matt steers the boat around a shallow ‘rock finger’ that comes up in the lake, working our lures in the deeper drop off just beyond it, suddenly my rod loops round, it’s not ‘springing or bouncing’ like it normally does with a fish, but it’s not quite the steady curve of a snag either. Engine quickly in neutral, bait run off, rod up & wind down! Initially there is totally solid resistance, is it a snag? Then it comes to life! The wind has got up again & we are very close to the shelf now & the back anchor is dropped down & tied off to keep us out of danger. This is no snag, I gain line, it’s a good fish, as she come to the top for the first time Matt says ‘she’s a 20 mate’ I agree, the adrenalin is now flowing & the old heart beat is racing, the anxious moment, so near but yet still so far as she nears the boat, her ample frame thrashing for freedom, to wait three long years to hook such a fish & then to lose her at the 11th hour would be a tragedy to me! I normally net all my own fish, I always have. Matt offers to do the honors of netting though & on this occasion without hesitation I accept, I pull her over the net & Matt nets her expertly (thanks mate). She is swiftly unhooked in the boat, as I look at her she is a true wild beast of a fish, immaculate, superb markings, pure power, in top condition, maybe she has not seen a hook before, who knows? We are both truly in awe of this awesome creature, she is carefully placed in the wet weigh sling like the precious treasure that she is, the Rueben Heaton scales are at the ready & Matt does the honors. As he lifts her in the sling we both guess her weight, Matt goes for 22 or 22.8 & I go for 23.8. Matt lets the needle settle on the scales & then shows me, we go for the lowest possible weight which turns out to be 23.7! What a guess I was only an once out! We are both absolutely made up & Matt takes a few quick photos before she is carefully slipped back no worse for wear, she swims off & straight back down to her deep watery home, flicking my face with water from her large tail as she goes. Matt is genuinely happy for me, never have I seen an angler so happy for a mate’s capture in fact! The mind strays to all my previous experiences on the lake as the achievement sinks in. We do a bit more trolling but no more fish are forthcoming. We decide unusually to celebrate by retiring to the pub, the Black bull I the village, we eat Haddock & chips each & sink a few pints of Bluebird bitter, nice! It sank in that not only was this my first Coniston 20+, it was in fact my first 20+ lure caught pike! It had took some time in coming, but in the end through sheer perseverance I had got their.
What was that the Manc lad said to me when I first put my boat on Coniston ‘It will take you three years to get a 20 from here’, I took this with the proverbial ‘pinch of salt’ at the time, but little did anyone know how right he would be, it actually took me 3 years to the exact weekend to catch a 20+ from the lake! Subsequent further enquiries about other 20’s from the lake reveal them to me most illusive & what there are of them to generally be ‘scraper’ 20’s with most ‘ceiling weights’ in high doubles, making the 23.7 extra special to me. There is no doubt that this was a very fitting way to end the era of my association with my Dejon boat & the boat storage yard at Coniston. We have very little time to admire the pike that we catch ‘in the flesh’, pike welfare must always come first & we need to get them back ASAP, however we have the photos to capture a ‘moment in time’ & this is a capture that will always be in my ‘minds eye’. My uncle Graham Boyle died tragically many years ago after a day’s boat fishing on Windermere & he never did get to catch a Lakeland 20+, so I hope that in his memory that this is a capture that he too would be most proud of.
Will I be back to Coniston again having now accomplished my ‘goal’? You bet I will as an enthusiastic piker they don’t all have to be 20’s do they? I enjoy fishing & each & every pike I catch is welcomed, looked after & returned safely. This is not the story of the capture of my personal best pike but it’s certainly the story of one of the most enjoyable & memorable ones.
This winter I will be setting up a PAC region in the area where I live in Soth Lancashire (Wigan), maybe I will see you there? I wish you all well in your own fishing.
Tight Lines
Jon Neafcy
Wigan Piker