Learning the Leam

Saturday 10th July - River Leam, Offchurch. 8-30am to 12-30pm

I had a change of plan and decided to spend a morning doing something I've managed to put off for almost 20 years! Although I've been a Leamington member on/off since the early 90s, I haven't fished the Leam all that much. Indeed, I've never fished it at Offchurch at all - until now.

Previous experiences of the Leam have not been too kind to me. With large sections of the club waters running through urban areas, I don't really have the inclination to fish them all that much. I generally figure that if I'm going to travel about 15 miles, then I might as well make it a few miles more and have some guaranteed peace.

Offchurch is a bit more appealing though, as it's well out of town. However, apart from having a look over the bridge in the past, I'd never got round to a serious walk along the stretch. First port of call was the end of the stretch and then I'd meander my way back to the pool below the bridge to finish with.

I was pleasantly surprised by the peg at the end of the stretch - a very fishy looking pool immediately below a narrow section:






































I didn't have a great deal of action though, but a Roach and a Dace put in an appearance.






































Although I'd have liked to stick around and try other methods, I was intent on moving around a bit as I wanted to make some mental notes about as many pegs as possible. Next time I think a pole might be the order of the day here.

I moved further upstream and spotted a couple of Chub around the 1lb mark in a reasonably accessible swim. They soon buggered off though and my "stealthy" approach definitely needs a bit of refining I thnk! Bull at a gate springs to mind. However, I did go on to catch loads of small Dace. The next peg was quite similar, but I did also manage to catch a small Chub.

I carried on upstream and found an area I really liked the look of. It was relatively deep run of maybe 6-7ft and looked perfect. It didn't produce a single bite though, which surprised me.

The bridge swim failed to deliver anything other than Minnows. Again, my clumsiness approaching the swim didn't do me any favours. When I finally stuffed my float up the willow while trying a clever cast, I called it a day.

Nothing of any real note to show for my efforts, but I now know what to expect from the stretch. I know it holds a few decent fish from various things I've read and I think I have a fair idea of the spots to head for now.