Tough lure session ends with shock big perch - Adam Melton

“When lure fishing for autumn perch, I prefer to target the deeper water in the middle of a river, but by fishing a small slack during my latest trip to the River Thames I managed to bank a new personal best.
“It had rained extensively for the two days leading up to the session, so when I got to the banks at 9.30am I was greeted by relatively high water with poor clarity – but I’d caught in conditions like this before on creature baits. After tying on a crayfish-imitation lure to a 5g jighead, I began casting into the middle of the river.
“For an hour I roved along the bank, making loads of casts to areas I’d caught from before, but never managed a bite. The flow was just too strong – I couldn’t hold bottom and my lure was being dragged all over the place.
“By 10.45am I’d clipped on a ned-rigged Z-Man TRD lure (one of my favourite patterns) but even that failed to draw a response.
“I contemplated calling it a day, but by that point I was near a road bridge with a concrete wall leading up to it. The wall had a 3ft-wide slack area in front of it, with the main flow on the outside, which was now boiling. The slack gave me the best possible chance of presenting my lure well, so I decided to give it a go for 15 minutes before heading home. I flicked the lure out parallel to the bank, jigged it along the bottom a couple of times, then it was fish on!
“It was only 20cm long, but it was a good result on a tough day. After slipping it back I made the same cast, followed by another couple of twitches, before there was a thud on the line.
“I set the hook into a really powerful fish which stripped line and headed into the main flow. Judging from the surge of energy, I thought it was a pike, but the murky water meant I couldn’t be sure. You can imagine my shock when the fish surfaced and I saw stripes and a fat white belly!
“She went in the net at the first time of asking and straight away I knew I’d beaten my old PB of 3lb 6oz. After weighing and measuring her I got a few quick snaps before slipping her back.
“It just goes to show that even when the river looks out of sorts, there are still areas where you can catch the fish of a lifetime!”