Chesterfield canal

[Vole]

Wot a swizz! My Dad, a Brimington/Calow lad, always told me there was nowhere decent to fish up there (not that he fished, so I shouldn't be surprised that he didn't know)... maybe he was worried I'd badger him to keep visiting the clan; not a journey lightly undertaken in a 1936 Morris 8.

Pound canal roach, eh? Very well done!

[Hannay]

Some great photos, takes me back to my first days fishing on the Lancaster Canal about 30 odd years ago. No bikes (or fish come to think of it) back then but plenty of barges in Summer.

[Tench Dreamer]

On a personal note I can think of not many more pleasant venues than nice canals , light float fishing ... In good surrounds too ..

[Hovis]

I'm planning a trip here shortly and post a few more pics and a report of how I get on.

[Stathamender]

Interesting day on the CC at Shireoaks earlier this week (of which more later) but for now a query: anyone know anything about the Kiveton Park end of this stretch? On the Canal & River Trust website map of the CC for fishing, the Shireoaks section and the KP section are marked in different colours but no key to what they meant that I could see, although I may just have been being dozy.

[Ian.R.McDonald]

normally the maps show a different colour to show club controlled and waterways wanderer section

but then some sections change for no obvious reason!

[Stathamender]

The club control stops just south of the Shireoaks bridge I believe, don't think any club has control of the KP stretch but I'll take a stroll down there over the weekend and see.

What I was interested in knowing though was how it fishes up that end. Hovis, you're our local expert do you know owt?

Incidentally, the big Marina just below the bridge is another of those reminders, like the eerily deserted landscape at Orgreave behind the Rother, of 1984. It's on the site of the former Shireoaks Colliery, closed in 1990.

[Hovis]

Ah ownership, there are signs up along the length towards "turnerwood" that states its owned by a club but they are donkeys years old. I have not see a bailiff up there for years but would happily pay for a day ticket.

The higher you go -above turnerwood to kiverton park is free fishing as per the Canal & River Trust website.

[Stathamender]

Thanks for this, Hovis. I was up to Shireoaks last Wednesday. First few hours just tiddlers but in the last hour from 5.30 two nice chub c. 1.75 lbs. That's norra bad chub for a canal said a passerby. I agree with him, pulled like the devil right up to the net.

[Stathamender]

Out to Kiveton Park today and walked the canal down to Shireoaks. A very pleasant walk with spring obviously well on the way. The canal at the KP end looked very unhealthy: the water a peculiar light grey green colour and lots of floating brown debris from what appeared to be dead fragments of either weed mats or algae, lots of sub-surface weed (which may have been cut recently) showing accretions of the algae/weed. Did not look at all promising. I have to say it looked polluted to me. This went all the way up to the entry of the feed from the reservoirs to the summit pound above KP station. Is this perhaps the source of the problems because of agricultural run-off?

Downstream, however, the problem continued to but diminished considerably from the Thorpe locks onwards, as the locks appeared to be blocking the onward transmission of the waste. This could be because there is currently little or no boat traffic above Shireoaks so there is not any way that the waste could go further down. And from Thorpe top lock onwards the inter-lock pounds looked very fishable with obvious signs of fish activity.

Above Kiveton Park Station bridge (more formally Dog Kennels Bridge) and below the bridge for a mile or so, the water is signed as belonging to Wales and Kiveton Park Colliery Angling Club but I think they may be out of business as I can't find any Google reference to them after 2006. YMMV. No more club signage until you get to the Grafton/SYPAC signage below the Shireoaks marina.

A very large swan nest, complete with aggressive looking pen, just above the Turnerwood locks. The name Pressley appears to be common locally. Almost but not quite but what's an extra 's' between friends?

So if we're going to have a TFF trip to the Chessie (and I think this is a very good idea) we should concentrate our activities between Thorpe Top Lock and the Shireoaks Station bridge.