TELEPHONE NUMBER: 01676 522754

Last week 51 rods caught 350 fish for an average of 6.86 fish per rod

Cocks Close and Park Meadow have been in excellent form this week with lots of fish in the 3 – 4lb range along with a few larger samples.

The best fish of the week was an 9lb 8oz rainbow caught by Paul Fleeman of Redditch who was fishing from a boat on Cocks Close and took it on a white and green Montana Nymph. Harold Pritchett of Atherstone fished the Park Meadow pool from a boat and caught and returned 15 fish to 9lb which all came to Damsels fished on a floating line. Dave Bratby of Birmingham had an 8lb fish from the bank of Cocks Close which fell to a small Buzzer fished on a floating line. James Gillies of Alcester caught a five fish limit including a fish of 7lb 8oz and released a further five fish from the bank of Cocks Close and Park Meadow pools and these came to a black Buzzer fished on a floating line. John Taylor of Birmingham caught seven fish to 4lb from the bank of Cocks Close and these all came to Cats Whiskers fished on an intermediate line.

The best areas have been the road bank and the old boat jetty on Cocks Close and the middle water on Park Meadow.

Best patterns are black Buzzer, GRHE, Cats Whisker, Diawl Bach, Gold Head Damsel and Bloodworm.

This year marks a milestone for the fishery as it is the 50th Anniversary of trout fishing at Cocks Close. In 1967 ‘put and take’ fisheries were rare and it was Tony Chattaway who was the brainchild behind creating the Trout Fishery. In the early days there were a few day ticket waters around and anglers flocked to the new venture (Packington even held the rainbow trout record for a short while with an 8lb 7oz fish from the Burnet Iron pool which opened in 1966). Over the years various changes have come and mainly to the limits and up until 1984 there was no limit and anglers caught and took up to 60 fish at a time. As trout prices rose this was unsustainable and limits were introduced starting with 15 down to where we are today.

In the 1980s’ trout fishing boomed and it seemed that every available bit of water was becoming a stocked fishery but most have fallen by the wayside now. The biggest impact on rods numbers was that the Environment Agency changed the close season for coarse fishing and anglers that fished for trout between March and June were lost to us. Rods numbers were cut by 50% in one go. The highest number of rods in a season was 14,000 across the whole of the Trout Fishery. We are now lucky to get 3,00 albeit on a smaller scale fishery with on Cocks Close and Park Meadow now trout pools.

To celebrate the 50th Anniversary on Saturday 18th March we are offering trout tickets at £10.00 for a five fish ticket with boats available free to the first anglers that book them. This will be limited to 30 anglers so booking is a priority and you can book on 01676 522754 or via email at penny@packingtonestate.co.uk
FURTHER DETAILS AND BOOKINGS, PLEASE RING 01676 522754 or
CHECK OUT OUR WEBSITE, packingtonestate.co.uk
Also see us on Facebook (Packington Trout Lakes).