In terms of tactics it was pretty much of a muchness as is often the case at Toft, being a relatively shallow lake its possible to catch fish pretty close to or on the surface for most of the year and last week was no exception. Washing line tactics with a small Tequila FAB on the point and Red Head Diawl Bach’s on the droppers proved as ever deadly………

81 rods caught 261 trout for a rod average of 3.19

A real mixed bag of a week weather wise certainly hasn’t made it easy for us. As I write (22/6/22) it would appear that the hot weather has kept one or two of you away, perhaps jobs in the garden or a visit to The Lincolnshire Show have been high on the agenda – I must admit a sun lounger and some very cold cider do have a certain appeal attached to them…………

100 rods caught 374 trout for a rod average of 3.74

During spells of variable weather being adaptable is the key to success. In the brighter periods fishing a touch deeper from the boats found good sport though bank anglers can still catch more than their share by fishing smaller dries and nymphs close in – the key quite often is to ‘stick at it’, too many times lately were seeing anglers casting 20 yards when realistically shorter casts of 5-7 yards would put them in front of fish and offer better presentation…….

112 rods caught a total of 492 trout for a rod average of 4.39

Nice steady sport is perhaps the best way to describe the last week, that said its fair to say its that time of year when we need to apply ourselves just a little more and on the whole do things a little ‘better’………………

73 rods caught 383 trout for a rod average of 5.24.

Firstly my apologies for a few less updates over the last week or so as I’ve been catching up on some annual leave.

Its great to come back and catch up on the recent form at Toft and here angling tales and experiences from several of you whom have been out just lately. One of the stand out highlights of the season so far surely has to be the amount of great weather we have had and so many days that have offered us very good fishing conditions indeed – in actual fact I’ve attached a screenshot of the forecast for the next 3 days and…………

Some heavy rain in the middle of last week kept a few anglers away dashing our hopes of an attendance similar to the previous week – that said we still enjoyed a decent steady turnout, we just love you to take full advantage whilst the fishing is so good…………………….

The last week made it in to our top 3 attendances of the season as anglers took advantage of the recent great fishing weather and enjoyed Toft during ‘primetime’.

In keeping with the general trend recently, imitative tactics reigned supreme again with a mixture of nymph and dry fly tactics accounting for probably 90% of the fish caught. Favourite patterns included both olive and black buzzers, crunchers, diawl bach, hares ear, shipmans, shuttlecocks and daddies. Its been great to see that our fish are really piling the weight on with the masses of natural food available, many anglers have reported catching several fine quality fish in the……….

98 rods caught 739 trout for a rod average of 7.54

A real bumper week again!

As we slip into May the season is well and truly in full swing and the fish obliging on the whole to the imitative approach employed by most of the anglers. Those that have fared best seemed to be the ones that could spot when to change depths, during brighter spells dropping deeper seemed to be a decent way to keep catching a few fish……..

123 Anglers caught 360 fish for a rod average of 2.92

A week started with some promise and good settled weather soon turned abit less consistent and tested the resolve of anglers to the limit. A stiff north easterly breeze and bright sunshine for the second half of the week did little to maintain last weeks incredible rod average and those that fished from boat whilst slightly less comfortable probably enjoyed the better sport……………. 

116 anglers caught 794 trout for a rod average of 6.84

Toft keeps giving at the moment and our excellent stock of fish have proved to be very cooperative indeed. At the risk of sounding like a broken record nothing much has changed in the way of tactics – it’s the time of year to generally adopt an imitative type of approach……………………………

75 anglers caught 493 trout (67 killed) for a rod average of 6.57

Windy weather made for a slightly quieter week than we would have liked, the fishing however remained fabulous as Tofts trout gorged on the massive profusion of buzzers throughout the levels of the water column. Both black and olive buzzer imitations played a big part in catches and as lots of quality trout made their way to the landing nets of our anglers.

We spooned several fish this week to help us to ‘match the hatch’ and you can see from the pictures that they were certainly feeding very well indeed – the majority of the sport has been with floating lines and imitative types of flies – the real ‘cream’ of the seasons fishing – its literally buzzer soup out there!

55 rods caught 482 trout for a rod average of 8.76.

Its still exceptional sport though the weather seemed to keep a few of you at home meaning we didn’t manage to replicate the terrific attendance of the previous week – in truth aside from a couple of decent showers it really wasn’t as bad as the forecast would have you believing – they’ve certainly got a lot to answer for.

Fish seemed to move up and down through the layers a little and those fishing subsurface are advised to keep swapping the point fly between a Buzzer or a small Booby or FAB to stay in touch with the feeding depth……

127 rods caught 1123 trout for a rod average of 8.84

WOW! Simply wow!, a fantastic week at Toft with the best turnout of the season so far and fabulous fishing to match. There has really been something for everyone with all methods finding a few fish at one time or another. It has to be said that sport was very much a nymph fishers dream, floating or ‘tip’ style lines provided great catches and a full array of our usual patterns such as Organza’s, Diawl Bach, Hares Ear, Pheasant Tail plus the usual array of Buzzers. For the anglers liking a more active style of fishing, intermediate lines and long tailed damsels have found a few fish and for the ‘pure’ amongst you the dries have certainly put fish in the net with a Palamino Midge pattern doing the business for Tony Smith during a boat session. tony was part of a group from Nottinghamshire

95 rods caught a total of 595 trout giving a rod average of 6.26.

Just as we had predicted the onset of some warmer weather really kicked things into life and several anglers managed to crack the code with some great catches from both boat and bank – the boats certainly cover more fish and have caught bigger numbers but bank anglers can help themselves by moving around more frequently.

Boat anglers fared very well again using sinking lines and fishing deeper throughout the day, bank anglers did very well on buzzer patterns catching the majority of their fish in the warmest part of the day from lunch time onwards. the fish can at times move up and down in the water column and changing between straight line buzzer fishing and washing line tactics can certainly bring results at the right time of the day.

57 rods caught a total 0f 219 trout for a rod average of 3.84

Its fair to say that the boats enjoyed some fabulous sport with the majority of the fish being out in deeper water – that said the last couple of days with some warmer weather have seen a distinct upturn in the fortunes of bank anglers.

From the boats, anglers found sunk line tactics to be by far the most effective method with smallish black and olive lures and boobies on Di5 type lines being by far and away the best option. to get the most out the method you should count the line down to different depths until you find where the fish are holding, vary the retrieve again until you find the most effective style on the day. Many fish have been coming on the hang at the end of the retrieve and adding a line marker to your sinking line will help you to know when its time to hang the flies……..

52 anglers caught a total of 237 fish giving an overall rod average of 4.55.

The boats offered the most consistent sport again over the last week, the bank can at times appear to be fabulous one day and the harder the next – some anglers have definitely got the methods sussed where as others are perhaps a little behind. Anglers taking to the boats are urged to fish deeper with Di-5 or Di-7 lines and either black or………