Cold night asp fishing session

Hi!
Few days ago I had an interesting fishing session I want to share with you. 

Last autumn I was working late and days were very short in Poland. Even if I leftwork earlier and go straight to my fishery I started fishing when it was already dark. My fishery was Odra river near Wrocław - big river with many different predators. I like to  hunt mainly for chub, asp, catfish and zander although while the water is very cold now my main goal is zander and maybe asp. You can find a lot of information about my night fishing techniques on my blog, i.e.:  Spinning at night

The day I want to write about was a great fishing day.  It was very warm despite it is a late autumn, there was a mild west wind and the air pressure was falling slowly. I knew I had to go to hunt for night zanders. My fishing spot was an hour of driving away. It is a straight and shallow fragment of a river with a lot of small and bigger rocks.

I arrived there just before it was completely dark, and I was able to look on the water and try to notice some signs of fish activity. Unfortunatelly there was none. I started to cast in all places that had a current, were shallow and close to the rocks. Those are places where most of baitfish hide. I tried many different lures - mostly  shallow running wobblers (8 - 12cm) with a very delicate action. Finaly I saw some movement. Undoubtedly some predator was hunting near to me. Delicate splashes on the water and lot of running baitfish. I had a bite after just few casts but I was unable to set the hooks. After that I changed location and something weird and awesome happend. In just 2 casts I caught 2 awesome asps - 73cm and 84cm! Big and fat predators in complete darkness were hunting more intense than you can imagine - splashes all over the place.

After catching those 2 lunkers, making some photos (very tricky alone in a darkness with smartphone) and releasing them i had one more bite, but i didn't set the hook properly.  It was a really great day, but I knew what I was going for after some previous trips. I will write about that soon! 

How to make a good fishing photo?

Fishing is all about those magical moments when we forget about the whole world. Unique feelings after catching a big fish we hunted for months or beautiful sunsets with a rod in your hand in the favorite spot. For me those moments last forever. I remember a big carp I caught in the middle of the night in the full moon light 10 years ago. 

The best way to preserve those memories is to make a photo. Sounds easy - today everyone has a good camera in the mobile phone and we make dozens of photos every time we see something interesting. Unfortunately it is not that easy to make a GOOD photo. I'm sure most of you can tell that there is the difference between his photo and photos we can find i.e. in fishing magazines.  For me it is a big challenge to make a decent photo hen you have only few seconds if you want to release your catch in a good health. Im not a top expert in this matter but I wanted to share with you some of my observations. If you have something to add in this matter please leave a comment.

Most important thing that makes a great photo is its ability to convey emotions. One way of achieving this is tightening the shot. Focusing on one element prevents viewer from distraction and emphasizes one particular scene or moment.

 Next important thing is taking a photo of an angler with his trophy. This simple shot can be very tricky. First of all NEVER take a photo of a dead fish. Instead of good emotions your photo will show nothing but sadness, a nice scene with the death in the background... Fish should be alive with lot of colors in a bright light with no grass, dirt or blood on it. Angler should smile and h should hold a fish in the way that allows to hide his hands and fingers as much as possible.

Another great way to take a photo of an angler with his trophy is to take a shot of some action - like landing or releasing the fish.  Photo like this will look a frame from a movie. It will be natural and full of emotions.

Personally I lake to take a landscape photo the view of my favorite fishery in different seasons, time of the day and weather reminds me of all moments I spent fishing alone or with my friends. Some of them were printed and now they are hanging on my wall. 

My photos aren't perfect, but I'm really happy with them. If there is something I don't like about them I try to correct it. Although photography as well as fishing is a field where you will never achieve perfection... and that is the most addictive in it.  

Zanders in the middle of the mountains...

I have to big passions that drives me to leave my home as often as possible to look or adventure. One of them is fishing. This hobby started for my my father when he took my fishing for the first time long time ago. No we still go fishing together and those moments are really important for me.

Second hobby is trekking in the mountains. This passion began with meeting my wife. She loves mountains and everything related with them.  Now we spend almost all of our vacations in the mountains.

Needless to say, that if it was possible to connect those two passions I didn't have to think twice. Fishing for my favorite fish - zander in a big dam reservoir on a mountain river (Dunajec), surrounded by mountains (Pieniny and Gorce) was like the best idea ever.

Czorsztyn is a huge and deep artificial lake with clear water and lot of different species of fish. You can catch here natural lake species like pike, perch, zander, bream, roach, but also species that usually live in mountain streams and rivers like trout or danube salmon. My goal was of course zander and this year I visited Czorsztyn a few times with success. Fishing in deep so lake is different than fishing in my other fisheries. Normally I look for zanders in shallow spots: 2 - 5m (6ft - 15ft) but now my shallow spots were 10m (30ft) and sometimes I had to fish much deeper - up to 25m (75ft). I had to learn a lot, but many bites and beautiful zanders rewarded everything and I know I will fish n Czorsztyn lake more often next year!  

Night spinning - fishing for big predators

Spinning at night.

There is nothing more magical than waiting with your rod, until the sun goes down and everything around turns grey and darkness falls. This is the time of big predators going for their prey. This is the time when big river becomes wilder, more mysterious and at any time you can expect a powerful hit at the end of your line. Spinning at night is magical... For me personally it is much more difficult for so many reasons, than spinning during the day, but I love this kind of fishing. And here is why! 

It will start soon...

First of all, if you want to achieve success you need to know your fishery like your own pocket. You need to know exactly how to approach the fishery without any noise, you need to know where to stand to be comfortable and with the possibility of landing a big fish without using light (It scares the fish and you can forget about more bites). You need to know exactly what lure you should use and how and where to cast it. There is no place for trying. Every cast has to be perfect. At night You will cach much less fish than during sunrise or sunset but they give you much more excitement and usually they are bigger...

In Poland at night we usually hunt for wells (HUGE European catfish) and zander (European cousin of walleye). Those are really big fish that feed at night naturally. We use mostly crankbaits (for wells) and slashbaits, minnows for zander. Fishery should be shallow with looooot of prey and the angler should be patient and ready to wait few hours until predators arrive to feed. If you won't catch your main target you can expect many different predators come for your bite - like barbel, asp, pike or chub. Everything can happen at night.

Big Asp caught at night

Not every trip will be successful, but believe me, that it is worth to try and spend a few night spinning at night. If you finally get your bite it will be unforgettable and you won't stop trying. Night fishing is magical. Period! 

Zander at midnight

How to catch a zander or walleye?

Depending on where you live (Northern America or Europe) you have a beautiful and smart fish in your waters. This fish grows big and anglers loves to catch it especially using different artificial lures like crankbaits, slashbaits or softlures. In America you have walleye and his close cousin (slightly bigger) lives in Europe.

Both fish live in similar habitats, they have common feeding patterns and habits. In Poland we hunt for zander usually using boats in big dam reservoirs or fishing from the shore in big rivers like Odra or Vistula. Both approaches are very different and very attractive for me. 

I love to starting my boat at summer sunrise in the morning fog to start fishing on the shallows near to the shore where zanders come to feed at night and are easy to catch in the first hours of the day. I usually look for places 1m(3ft) to 3m(9ft) deep and use softlures on very light jig heads - 5g - 10g. If zanders are there you can ecspect a lot of bites at any minute. If after 1 - 2 hours of trying ou won't find them usually you should move to deeper places with lot of underwater structures or sunken trees etc. Those are places where zanders spent the day hiding in the shadow (they don't like bright light) and anglers are able to catch them all day long in short periods of activity. Depending on the depth of your fishery you should look for places 4m(12ft)- 15m(45ft) deep and use much heavier jig heads (10g - 40g). If you use thin braided line you can use lighter jig head - fishing is beeing more finesse and also more effective if zanders aren't very active.

 Fishing for zander in the river is for me the whole new thing. People fish for zander in rivers during whole season, but for me it starts with the first frost - usually in late september or october. I look for deep spots with some current, and I'm using big softlures on heavy jig heads trying to catch a zander especially during the dusk and down, but also during the whole day if it is cloudy and dark. Lot of people are catching zanders in rivers also at night. I'm trying that sometimes also with some result, but this method is slightly different - you look for shallow spots near to the shore were predators are hunting for the prey. Best lure to use in this conditions are long and thin (imitating bleak) slashbaits or crankbaits.

There is many ways to catch a zander, I presented only my observations and expieriences that I gained during more than 10 years of hunting for big zanders. I caught thousands of those beautiful fishes with lot of big ones more than 90cm (36in) and 7kg (15lb). If you have ANY question or you would like to catch a big zander in polish waters - write me in the comment or on my e-mail.

And for the end - here are some affordable (with free sipping) effective zander lures tested by me. This way you won't have to invest a lot of money and you will be able to try zander/walleye fishing on your own

AliExpress.com Product - MEREDITH 5PCS 10.5g 10cm Lures Fishing Lures soft Fishing Baits Cannibal Soft Lures Shads Fishing Fish JX62-10 AliExpress.com Product - YTQHXY 65mm 1.9g 20Pcs/lot Wobblers Fishing Lures Swimbaits Silicone Soft Bait Double Color Carp Artificial Soft Lure YE-93

Good Fishing deals from Aliexpress

Recently I discovered an awesome way to buy good quality an very cheap fishing gear. Aliexpress is a Chinese portal where you can buy almost everything... including thousands of fishing accessories. What is even more important - shipping is worldwide free for almost all stuff!!!! I've ordered alreadny more thn 100 different things and I wanted to show you some of my best purchases...


 1) Very nice slashbait - very smilar to Rapala X-Rap, but 10 times cheaper - trebles are not the best quality, but the action is for sure very good.

 AliExpress.com Product - 1pcs Fishing Lures 3D Eyes Floating Laser Minnow Hard Aritificial Wobblers Crankbait Plastic Baits Pesca Isca 11cm 13.5g


2) Artificial red maggot Good quality and very cheap rubber bugs. I use them a lot for UL fishing for different species

AliExpress.com Product - Meredith Promotion HOT SELL 20PCS 2cm 0.38g Maggot Grub Soft Lure Baits Smell Worms Glow Shrimps Fishing Lures JXC02-2

3) Nice softbaits for zander (walleye) perch and other predators :) Very good quality for those and because of this price I'm not affraid of casting them ino sunken trees...

AliExpress.com Product - Goture Soft Lure Swimbait 5pcs/lot 8.5cm/13g Fishing Artificial Soft Baits Black-white Wobbler Fishing Tackle

Winter has come... Ice fishing for Perch

This year it is a little bit colder in december. That is why we are unable to fish for zander or asp anymore, but new opportunieties arrives. My nearby lake has frozen and we tried to catch some nice perches from ice! We started early in the morning because the water and the ice were very clear and it is the best time to catch the biggest fish. Later when it is very bright they can be very suspicious and impossible to fool :)

The ice was very thin  (~5cm) but we had special floatation suits, and we tried to remember not to walk close to each other :)

We caught some really nice perches >30cm with small ice pilkers, We also had some big perches that we lost during fight and occasionally some small pike was interested in our lures. 

Ice fishing could be really fun when you can't go fishing anywhere else... :) 

I also made a short movie when my friend Marek caught a nice 32cm perch. I hope you will like it:)

Awesome movie - Chub spawning in Poland

This year i had no much time for fishing, but despite of that I managed to see something incredible that I have never seen before. 

At 26th June I found a spot where lot of chubs from the whole part of the river where spawning.  We observed them for a while. Most of them were about 30 - 40cm (12 - 16in), but there were also bigger ones - ~50cm (20in). One of them we caught in the movie. We didn't try to catch them. We left them alone and went downstream trying to catch some nice asps.... Did we succeed? I will write about that next time :)

I hope you enjoy my movie. If you want to visit this place with a rod next year and catch big chub like that one below - contact me :)

Hello! I made another video from my trout fishing trip. I hope you'll enjoy! :)

Trout day! Trouts, video-clip and lures

Last sunday I was fishing for trout with spinning rod. I used handmade lures and great trout lures from Smith - mostly D-Contact, but also Jade and D-Incite. 

It was a nice day - a little bit cloudy, but only a few drops of rain dropped. I started late ~8AM because, but we stayed there almost till 2PM - with some breaks.

The day started well with catching a nice 40cm(16in) trout on the first spot. After few casts accross the stream with handmade lure I made a little bit longer cast downstream. My lure dropped in the calm water. I draged it with a few twitches to the stronger stream and BAM! Very powerful bite! After a short fight nice trout was in my hand. I released it carefully after taking a photo :)

Few next spots gave my nothing, but the water was really nice and I knew it is just the matter of time until I will get another bite. Maybe an hour later finally something started to change. I had a lot of missed bites. Trouts were rising to my lure and than just touching it or biting really carefully. Very hard to set the hook. Of course sometimes I managed to deceive some of them. Most of better bites I had with Smith D-Contact and Jade. New lures my friend Baptiste showed and gave me.

Smith lures are very very very good quality. Nice colors, heavy trout twichbaits that are quite easy to use and sometimes they make a difference!

Like this day. They are very lifelike and maybe that is a part of their secret... In fact I think they are one of my favourites now! If you want you can read my post from the past about my trout lures here. Lot of them I still use, but also I've added some new ones:)

This time I was also using a sport camera on my head and I tried to film make a clip from my fishing trip. It was my first time so I think I must learn a lot but it was really fun to do it:) I already uploaded my clip to Youtube. Fell free to watch and comment!

Night spinning for catfish - lures and spots

Spinning for wels

As I described it on by blog previously wels is a big european catfish. it is big and strong predator that can be caught using spinning and that is what I'm trying to do:)

For me spinning for catfish gives the best effects at night. Most of my wels were caught around midnight and it is the best time i suppose. Sometimes I fish in the river, sometimes in a small lake and sometimes in a dam reservoir. I use many different lures, especially crankbaits. But what is important. Lures for catfish don't need to be very big. Sometimes 3in (~7cm) is enough - as long as it is very noisy. Before I start fishing I must choose my spot or spots carefully. I must predict where catfish will come to eat at night. Usually shallow warm waters close to the shore, but not far from deep spots where they rest during the day.

Next step is to chose proper lures - they can't go to deep, they must be VERY noisy and they must by prepared for strong fight(saltwater trebles etc). There are not many bites. Sometimes you have one, sometimes none, but every bite is memorable and gives so much fun! Moreover - catching big predator at night is some kind of magical. As well as releasing him to his kingdom... Wels - the kind of the river... After so huge amount of emotions in the middle of the night I often stop fishing and go to sleep. I'm done for the night. I'm happy and fulfilled... And of course... A drink with the best friend... in the wild... after catching huge catfish is something you won't forget.

Of course you can catch catfish with live bait while sitting comfortable in the chair and just waiting, but that's not for me. I like the action, the direct contact with my target and with the nature. Spinning for wels at night is more like hunting than fishing... Sometimes you could say - why is the night so short?