The first spot to try was the ever reliable Weston Lock over near bath and it didn't disappoint, producing a fine jack after a good 30 minutes of fishing. The water lever was really up and with such a chop on the water I was amazed to get any action, but targeting the slack water and bouncing a bigger lure off the bottom managed to tempt a fish so it was definitely worth the hike over to Bath.

After bath I tried the shallows at Saltford (which was flooded) and then the lock at Keynsham (which was flooded) before heading to Swineford which was, you guessed it... flooded! I've never seen so much water, it was almost up to the top of the wall where the inflow pipe flows into the river in the first swim.

Rather than risk the lethal banks I decided to call it a day and head for home.

Which means that's it for the river season and Jim's Lure Challenge is now at a close. It's been a lot of fun and a massive change for me as I've spent the last 4 or so years deadbaiting for pike on the river. So thank you Jim, it's been a blast!

So Lower Kilcott Farm was an obvious choice. It's a small farm lake (more of a pond really) in the Cotswolds midway between Dad and myself and a perfect place for winter fishing as it's rammed with fish. As my daughter Lilly-Grace would be joining us for this session, it had to be a venue that'd keep an enthusiastic 6 year old busy too.

As it's a small venue with limited swims, we decided it was important we arrived early so I organised to meet Dad between 6.30 and 7.00 to make sure we had a bit of choice. I woke Lilly-Grace at 6.10am after having loaded the car meaning we were on the road and rocking out to Royal Blood on the M4 by twenty past ;)

A very easy drive saw us arrive at the lake around 6.50am to see one angler in my favourite far corner swim.... But the good news was Dad had already bagged the other corner swim at the back of the lake meaning we could all fish in a row like gnomes and pretty much have the road bank corner furthest from the farm house to ourselves! Well worth getting up at stoopid o'clock...

As predicted by the weather man, it was grey and cold but fingers crossed the wind and rain would keep at bay - I think even L-G's enthusiasm would be dampened if the weather turned?! After we'd said hello to Coco (Dad's gorgeous spaniel, another requirement of venue choice was dog friendlessness!) we set about getting the rods in the water.

Your gonna catch no at Kilcott no matter what so it's a great place to try out some new or little used techniques. For me, I really wanted to try out float fishing to target the excellent silvers in the lake but I also really wanted to try and find some of the bigger carp. On my last trip, I managed to get fish to around 10lb - nothing massive but I knew from a trip in the summer that a 15 pounder had come out. So rather than going for everything and anything I decided to go big on the bottom bait rod, getting the boilies piled in and a really light float rod for the silvers. Lilly-Grace opted for the feeder with liquidized bread and sweetcorn on the hook and I had a feeling she'd be pasty bashing in no time...

True to form, the initial action was hectic! Lilly-Grace had a good run of 4 or so little carp on the feeder rod using liquidized bread in the cage and real sweetcorn on the hair before Dad and I even managed to get a line in the water! My bottom bait rod rattled off within 10 minutes (no surprise there, that's why we came to Kilcott!) with a little common of around 4lb, about the stamp size of the fish in the lake and a great start.

As mentioned, I was determined to practise my float fishing as I'm really not as good at it as I'd like to be. Using sweet corn on the waggler was only catching me carp so I switched over to some maggots and casters (thank you Dad!) after 10 minutes in an effort to single out a silver. It worked! I missed more bites than I hit but did have a great selection of rudd and roach which was great fun on light gear.

The bottom bait rod had been strangely quiet after that 1st run. I worked through a couple of different popup options and even put a zig out as the sun tried to make an appearance (I'd had great success with Zig's on the last session when it was much sunnier). But the hours ticked by without a bite... Not that it was a problem as a combination of Lilly-Grace catching more fish than Dad and I put together was keeping me more than busy... As was keeping her fed! She can eat that girl... which is amazing as she's skin and bones, don't know where she puts it.

So I Switched the bottom bait rod to Celtic Baits Nut Mix boiles and baited the 'bowl' of water to my left heavily with boiles and a mixture of pellets.

Around 12ish, the bobbin dropped to the floor and the line went slack... Drop back? Just moved the lead? Then the line slowly tightened up! What the hell, struck into what I was expecting to be a liner and realised there was something attached!

To be honest, I didn't think there was much on the end - the fish came in slow and steady and didn't really put up much resistance. But when it came to netting it, we realised it was something of a beast cos it wouldn't fit in the landing net! I'd only brought my small spoon net thinking the fish in Kilcott where quite small but this one was hanging out of either side of the net...

Amazing - a really solid (if slightly sleepy!) mirror carp of 18lb. From a tiny farm lake. too good ;)

Over the next couple of hours I had another 15lb mirror and smaller darker common of around 8lb all on the Celtic Baits nut mix boilies. An amazing result on an great bait.

The last hours were spent with Lilly-Grace and I trying a bit of surface fishing, more practice with the float and just whiling the hours away on the bank. We packed down around 4ish having had a great day. Kilcott never fails to deliver!

The only downer to the day was a couple of fellers on the far bank who had no landing net or unhooking net. They were surface fishing and hauling carp out in the edge using their hands which is just not on. There's no excuse, if you don't have these basic items you shouldn't be allowed to fish, it's that simple. A majority of the fish we caught today were in pretty good condition but that won't last if people don't look after the stop. Shame on them!

We only had an hour or so early in the morning and although the action wasn't nearly as frantic as the day before I did manage this fine looking jack after 10 minutes or so of casting around. Unusually, Jim blanked - a bit of a first, he always catches!

The weather had completely changed, going back to cold and grey and although it wasn't raining the day felt very different. After spending some time at the lock I headed onto Saltford where I spied a huge otter fishing under the bridge which may have explained the lack of bites... I also headed onto Conham River Park for a looksee but it was dead as a doornail...

It was always going to be tough following on from yesterday's epic session but today I couldn't help feel a little deflated, even though I bagged a jack. Praps it was the weather than got me down?! That hit of vitamin D sure did seem to make all the difference, both to the fishing and my mental state ;)

Jim (of Jim's Lure Challenge fame) and I have been hitting the Bristol River Avon at Keynsham and Saltford pretty hard over the last couple of months trying to get pike on lures. While Jim has been doing very well, netting a pike on pretty much every session, I've really struggled with only one follow and a lost hook up to show for my efforts (although I had snagged a couple on deadbaits along the way!).

The weather has been really bad recently with a couple of days of snow followed by some heavy rain and although there'd been a run of clear days we knew that the river near Bristol was either going to be flooded or a chocolatey soup. I dropped in at Keynsham for a while but the lock was such a mess so I headed up river. The flow was super fast and with bright, bright sunlight burning off the mist over the fields I knew I was wasting my time...

The next spot was over at Saltford but I could see from the car park that there were two chaps under the bridge and with the water still hacking through it wasn't really worth casting out in the shallows. Jim arrived at around 11ish though and mentioned that he'd spied a stretch of canal over in Bath whilst he'd been working on a job. It was really a 'cut' with a lock gate at the end but he had a feeling it would be worth a shot as the water would at least be calmer.

So we headed to the 'Western Cut' and spent 30 minutes or so casting around the canal and lock but there wasn't a sniff of interest. However our luck really changed when we headed down the steep steps onto the mooring walkway below the lock gates...

And within 5 minutes Jim had a fish on the bank!

I quickly joined him on the walkway and over the next hour or so we managed 6 bites - amazing! Somehow we'd managed to locate some fish and they were very, very hungry. Unluckily for me, only 1 of the 4 bites I had resulted in a fish on the bank but Jim got 3 hungry jacks in the net before we decided to call it a day.

On paper, the day should've been terrible: high coloured water, bright sunlight, really warm for the time of year... It should've been a blank. But luckily for us we managed to find a slack area just off the main flow of the river where a group of pike had decided to hold up until the river level dropped.

So that's it, challenge complete! I've well and truly got the lure bug now and I've a feeling we'll be heading back to Weston Lock for another go in the not to distant future...

The weather looked spot on so I decided to try the lock at Keynsham, mainly as I wanted to try the float out as I was convinced there was a resident pike...

Turns out there was!

I'd seen some swirls while casting the lure around on previous sessions but just couldn't get the lure to area of water due to a moored barge and an overhanging tree...

My plan was to try a single treble on a trace, with a sprat hooked through the dorsal fin suspended 3 or so foot deep which I could then cast and drift into the spot.

It didn't take long! I'd been casting the lure rod around with a micro fry when the float jumped in the air and then shot under... The pike must've hit the sprat from below which was exactly what I wanted it to do - happy days!

Not surprisingly the perch nibbles dried up after landing the fish and although I did try saltford for a while, the water was pretty coloured and pushing through and as the drizzle set in I decided to call it a day.

So I feel like I've slightly cheated deadbaiting...

...but I was lure fishing at the same time and all my instincts have been telling me to try the floated sprat rig for the last couple of sessions so I'll cut myself some slack this time ;)