After a month away from the bank, I was keen to get the rods back out. Arriving at my chosen venue, I decided on several laps of the lake, which gave me a good idea of where I needed to be.

It was obvious to me as soon as the first night drew in they had changed their habits from when I last set foot on the venue. If you kept in touch with my writing last year, you may remember how the fish in this venue around the same time last year seemed to go crazy between 10pm and 1am. It was a world away from a month ago, when the fish were most active during the day light hours. I was able to learn a lot by watching the water and I had soon pin-pointed the fishes patrol routes and the perfect times for baiting up (when the fish had travelled down the other end of the lake).

For this session I baited one spot heavily, scaling down to a few chops on the last rod. It gave me something to work on and I hoped it would help me read how the fish were responding to bait.

After the first night, all was quiet and some anglers may have been tempted on a move. I stayed put and at around 10pm, almost right on que the fish started showing. Nearly all of the bites came from the heavily baited area out in the deeper water. I soon got into a routine and baited heavily during the daytime once the fish had vacated the area. Bite time was between 3am and first light, which I put down to the cold nights as the fish moved into the deeper water.

I managed 5 fish through the session, again everyone made it safely to the net once again proving the successful combination of Wide Gape Talon Tip hooks and Trickster Heavy. The Pro XM main line stood up to the battles in the weed and to be honest this line is bullet proof and has yet to let me down. The fish ranged from mid-twenties to mid-thirties and it was a great welcome back. By the way the fish are behaving; it looks like I will be turning up in the dark from now on. Location really is everything!