HORSESHOE BEND & BEYOND - REVISITED ... AND NOW RE-OPENED

[nige_LS7]

After a visit to the Kirk Hammerton Mill end on Saturday (didn't actually fish it), I also re-read your epic thread from last year   

leedsdasa.proboards.com/thread/2193/horseshoe-bend-river-nidd

Much respect is due to all the roving heroes who had a go at opening up the jungle last year, especially Jez.

You might be thinking "what would be the point of doing all that again? It won't get fished often enough." 

But it looks like from reading that thread that there's one advantage this year over last -there is now a short-cut mown through the first field - the EU funded woodland plantation - along the line of the overhead wires, so you will be at that first stile quicker. It's just  a few mins walk from Mill gate to first stile. Then the jungle begins, but the strimming doesn't have to start until that point.

I just worked out how far was strimmed at the 16th May working party at the other end, and the total length was not too different to what would be required to get from that first stile  right round Horseshoe bend into the straight.  [Though I assume we couldn't spray weedkiller on the bits which directly adjoin crops without a flood bank or ditch between? ]  

The secret in keeping it open would obviously be not only fishing it this summer  but getting in earlier with the strimmers next spring, then again when the 2016 season actually starts (when working party & fishing can be combined).

Or did the end of last year's high hopes of bringing the parking closer to Horseshoe bend mean that people just lost the appetite for such a long walk to their fishing?

 

[patterdalewilson]

Without regular matches on it I would imagine it's impossible to keep the length easily accessible. I used to fish the horseshoe bend regularly in the '70s and even then classed it as a long walk.
It's not really my thing but fishing roving style is obviously achievable and I would be up for any work required to improve this length.
It holds so many good memories for me fishing with my dear departed dad , often on the way back to the car after a hard days fishing he would carry most of my tackle when I was struggling. We had good sessions and bad sessions back then but its the productive ones that stay in the memory bank.
I look forward to revisiting the swims of my youth.
Cheers Mick.

[quint]

Which is why I mentioned in another thread it needs treating with chemicals down there, it's that bad that's the only way you will keep it open year after year.

We need a path through the Balsam, then we can bash and cut our way into the pegs each season.

It's a great stretch down there going to waste.

[nige_LS7]

Well just 6 weeks later there are good pegs open, fish coming out, and even a video showing how to get to them!

Where there's a will..

[quint]

I was going to go yesterday but blanked on the Wharfe...

[nige_LS7]

It occurred to me as I fished 4 different pegs at Horseshoe Bend on a beautiful afternoon and evening yesterday day that ... IT'S NOW FAIRLY ACCESSIBLE REALLY. Tom's recent video would have you believe it's the least accessible fishing in Yorkshire. But it isn't now - thanks to the working party, the farmer, and then Jez & NickMac especially.

The crops on the inside of the flood bank  have been cut, the track around the small wilderness field has been trodden down, and now that they've been used a few times, NickMac's pegs are now similar to the "working party" standard - and not just randomly thrashed pegs, but he clearly knows where they should be, so at least 3 of them lead to flat spots quite close to water level - in one case in fact the rise in river level yesterday made a good peg unfishable, but others were made into even more promising pegs by the rise. The west-facing peg where the river turns round from flowing due west (full of fallen branches from those big trees),then flows south through the peg, is a dream of fast flow, eddies and whirlpools. However my fishing there was somewhat spoilt by what happened within two minutes of  my first cast (mini report to follow later).

It's less than 20 minutes walk from the very furthest peg on the bend to the mill. Sometimes if dusk is approaching and I'm not catching, I set my alarm to go off every ten minutes so I can "speed fish"  a different few pegs, and hopefully catch first cast in one of them. I was fishing the furthest peg, packed up when the 8.20 alarm went. the 8.30 alarm went as I got up to the strimmed path in the second field, and by the time the 8.40 alarm went, I was snagged in the weirpool at the mill.

I opened up one other peg today too, the next one up from Nick's furthest (so it's now the new furthest, if you like). It's the last peg where the river is flowing due west under loads of fallen branches, the peg where there's loads of debris opposite under the most majestic tall willow, but it's only balsam and nettles on the bank after all. It really was just a ten-minute job with the landing net handle to reveal a lovely hit and hold peg - one which I'm sure was probably enjoyed by many of our predecessors over several generations. 

Every time I go down there I'll try to open up another peg, and every time I leave a peg I will smash at least another 200 stems of balsam & nettles on the way out (yes, tread softly when you're going into a peg, but when you're leaving it for the day .... why not give it hell.. that's my motto!).

I took some photos yesterday of the pegs and will put them here in a day or two.

Oh, by the way, I only caught one fish down there yesterday (mini report to follow as I said), but it needs more bait going in, and we've made a start on that. I'm gonna do some trotting down there too next time.

THESE PEGS ARE GORGEOUS... PLEASE FISH THEM !

.

[johnboy66]

well Nige,
after that report I may have to walk further down that river than I have ever walked before. with my health I have good days and bad days so,

1 I will have to pick a good day:)

2 a nice day not to hot because it will drain all the fluids out of me get to the peg and sleep for 3 hours before I fish lol:)

3 travel as light as possible as if I wasn't fishing at all lol:)

4 buy a canoe drop it in at the mill fish a few pegs and pick it back up at skipbridge lol

[nige_LS7]

So here's the tour of the pegs as promised. You will see a huge variety of river over the short stretch between these 5 pegs. Credit to forum member NickMac for opening them up.

Let's start in the S.W. corner of that huge field, near where the farmhouse stands on the opposite bank. Click on the pic's if they are small and they should enlarge 

Nice evening for it, eh?

[nige_LS7]

I know some people will have mixed feelings about publicising these beautiful pegs, but we've all been saying IT NEEDS FISHING! When it starts to produce loads of fantastic fish, that's when we can start to be secretive



(Hopefully more pegs will have been opened up by then so we can all have our secret favourites).

So, you can see where there's a trodden-down 'path' of sorts up the flood bank, just here in the SW corner of the field


Then after a few yards there are a few 'false trails' where people have thought about starting pegs maybe. 
These are like the false tunnels designed to deter those who enter the tombs of the Pharaohs....

...but be ye not deterred ye intrepid explorers, press on westwards towards the evening sun to find the real treasures of the valley of the Kings the Nidd ...

[nige_LS7]

  PEG ONE is about 30-40 yards down the 'beaten path' on the left, just before a willow on the near bank.

South-facing peg, the widest and slowest flowing of these pegs, but probably holds everything the Nidd has to offer except grayling.

[nige_LS7]

PEGS  2, 3 & 4  are on the west-facing end of the horseshoe

PEG TWO    is a poke-the-rod-between-the-reeds job, at water level, and will only be comfortably fishable at low summer levels (not very fishable as pictured yesterday 2 foot up).

[nige_LS7]

You're near PEG THREE when you can see this gate on the far bank. It reminds me of some of the pegs in the mill stretch but wider and deeper and there's plenty of space to swing a cat(apult)

[nige_LS7]

Looking down at PEG THREE oops forgot to rotate the pic for this one

[nige_LS7]

 PEG FOUR  (recently featured in a major motion picture) is utterly unique, as the Nidd swirls round a bend and decides to keep swirling.

You simply will not fish a peg anywhere that has all the features that this one has in the same positions. All sorts of creases  and eddies everywhere you look, at every angle. Most  pegs have just one or two obvious places to cast. This one offers endless possibilities, or it did yesterday when it was two feet up - looks much tamer in that video when the river was low.

And if you like a gorgeous Yorkshire summer sunset, well you're in the right place here.

I just wish a ruddy big pike hadn't taken my spam first cast and caused a bit of a commotion with it's show-off tail-walking.

I'll be back.

[nige_LS7]

PEG FIVE

I thought I'd re- open what seemed to be the dug-out banks of an old peg meself.   A bit different this one, a shady north-facing peg where you could avoid the sun all day long, really fast flowing just before the corner under the massive willow that dominates this corner of the horseshoe,

I thought it looked v. promising, with a few slack bits to look for chub on the far side, but as i say the river was over 2 foot up yesterday  so it may be that this place isn't so promising when the river is lower. Anyway, what do I know? All I know is that The Horseshoe Bend used to have a legendary reputation - but I've caught nothing there yet meself, except an accidental first cast pike on Spam!

I do know this would be a hit and hold peg - much tighter than any of the others!   

   It took just ten minutes thrashing with the landing net handle to be able to fish this one (I left it a couple of hours between thrashing and fishing this one, in fact). And when you've fished it, don't forget to thrash your way out - every little helps keep the pegs open!   Then, by about the second time you visit, you'll be itching to thrash your own new peg!  (at least I think that's what that itch was    )


Well that's it for now - but don't forget that Jez has made some pegs in the Farmhouse Glide too on the other side of those crops, which will be harvested any day now! If you fish one of those east-facing pegs, you could have fished pegs facing N,S, E & W within a short space of time on the same bank of the same river. The Horseshoe Bend is really just part of the "foot" in what could be called "The Boot Bend" !

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