Wykeham Lakes

Wykeham lakes are a complex situated near Scarborough in the north of England. It has various lakes, and one very special one being the predator lake. This contains some really big pike going upto 30lb, and quite a few 20lb+ fish.

The predator lake is open to the public on a day ticket, but has never been open to access for kayaks to enter the lake. When I was invited to a small competition of ten kayaks I jumped at the chance. This was to be a first of its kind. It was set to be a grand slam format. A pike, a perch and any 3rd species.

On Match day the heavens opened and rain poured down! It’s a good job the fish were already wet! Early on I managed to land a perch of 30cm. I then started my hunt for a pike. I tried for a couple of hours but just couldn’t find one. At this point I hadn’t heard of any other pike landed. The lake has trout stocked from time to time. It adds a bit of variety into the lake but also a good food addition for the larger pike! It takes a good source of protein to sustain such big fish. That in mind I decided to set up my fly rod. I started fishing along some reed beds. With the heavy rain, it also brought some wind. On one of my back casts the wind wrapped my flies around one of my rods just behind me in the J-krate. I looked up to the rod tips and all of a sudden I heard a splash!! It soon dawned on me it was my GoPro that had fallen off my head. I quicky tried to net it to no avail. I them plotted it’s position on my GPS. It was gone!! I completely lost my mojo for the rest of the match and tried in desperation to snag the camera with big hooks and a heavy weight. After the days fishing my bad luck had been reported to the fishery manager, jake. He very kindly asked a diving friend of his if he would mind looking for it and sure enough, a couple of weeks later I received a message to say he had found it. Now that was a stroke of luck! The venue is an excellent place that holds some amazing pike and has the potential for a lot of huge pike. Looking forward to my return!