230lb of bream from Tidal Thames

“Old Father Thames is probably the best bream river in the country at the moment.” These were the words of Chris Gadsden who shared a 230lb-plus haul of slabs from the capital’s waterway.

Fishing aboard ‘Windy Day II’, a boat he co-owns with Angling Times columnist Keith Arthur, with his friend Nigel Newport, the duo landed no less than 42 fish averaging over 5lb to a best of 7lb 13oz.

Targeting the Richmond area just below the town centre they started fishing at midday as the tide was starting to run and started getting bites from the off.

“Casting to the deeper water mid-river, we both used feeder and worm tactics and only got through about 2kg of bait during the session. There was no need to ball in large amounts of groundbait as the bream were obviously already shoaled up in front of us,” Chris told Angling Times.

“Towards the end of the session the bream starting to shy of the worm hookbaits but a change to maggots soon sorted this and the bites kept on coming. We called it a day at 7pm as we were both exhausted but we could have easily carried on catching had we stayed on.

“I have caught many big bags bream from the Thames before but nothing like this. It was just a great day’s fishing. We didn’t have anything under 4lb and had four over 7lb as well as several six-pounders. It proves that you don’t have to be catching massive fish for a successful trip. We both retired to the pub dirty, smelly and happy for a much needed pint!”

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