Forums Forums Enthusiast Forums A - Z Fishing the over flow on bidston moss

Hi all, I know this thread was started quite a while back but I'm Paul110180's mate. We used to night fish the flow all the time a good few years back and yes I've had tench up to 6lb out of there, I've had sackfulls of Rudd up to 2 1/2lb, small carp up to 5lb, perch upto around 4lb and the usual "bootlaces". The thing with some of your responses saying you know carpies who have spent weeks fishing there without a bite is quite frankly a no brainer. The carp in there are incredibly spooky and it's only been over a few years that people have been using boilies etc. Its not a "Boilie" water I don't think. Carpies would see far better results going back to basics. There are a few small patches of gravel in there so would attack it with PVA bags with dead red maggots/hemp/casters/corn with the same on the hair but maybe maggots on a cork ball to pop it up and also to keep the bits at bay. Spodding is out of the question unless you want to fish a Zig rig in the warmer months to try and get them mid water. It's only a hard water if you over complicate things. Like I said before, back to basics and lighten up on your gear until you get ripped off then you can step up. I'm a match angler but have been fishing for 30+ years having also worked in the industry and have been sponsored by Daiwa not to mention fishing against some of the countries best match anglers like Steve Ringer, Darren Cox, Clint Elliott etc.

spoke to a lad the other day reckons one of this months mags have pics of a 30+ fish..
more legend?
I had a cracking day there years back fishing the pole in the bay down the wall end... crucian a chuck for at one point, on another visit my mate had a 3lb + perch on my rod (maggot on float gear) while I was havin a p...
wild wild place though and those eels..

I reckon this place would make a cracking commercial if somebody wanted to stock it and run it properly..

Hi all,ah the overflow?one of those waters eh?not your average commercial or farm pond by a long stretch!!There are two comments on here,one by tourney pro and another that describe the flow bang on!back in the day.Yes you could get nets of rudd out of it like dinner plates on floating bread behind a double rubbered piece of quill on warm summer evenings,we did.Beautiful fish from 6oz to over a pound quite often,Occasionally you would hit something on match gear that would run you all over the place and it was obviously a decent carp.I do believe the original carp stock in the overflow came from the triangle pit which was drained to make way for the M53.They were mostly commons and quite dark in colour.As for the perch?well back in the late eighties,there were some monsters in there no doubt feeding on the rudd and the millions of Marsh shrimp that all but vanished.Perch disease hit this area in the late eighties and took out a lot of the big fish.my biggest?3lb 8oz on a live shrimp taken at 3.30am.remember it well.I also had a 5.8lb tench out of the bay swim and a jet black crucian of 2.9oz on a single pinkie in the dead of winter.A young guy recently told me he had a 27Lb common last year on a zig rig after pre baiting for days but alas,no photo but they're in there!As for its depth?I think we plumbed it at between 30 to 33feet at its deepest but that was not accurate.I recently returned after an absence of 15 years armed with a box full of perch plugs,lures,spinners and some dropshotting gear.All the reed pegs have gone replaced by a massive bank of rushes covering the whole north bank.The water is gin clear and I didn't have much luck?I think the cormorants have cleared it out over the years,a pity as it's potential has never been realised.

I remember the old days on the Overflow well. I remember once fishing one of those pegs in the rushes on the North bank. A precarious walk over single planks laid end to end and a day spent balancing on an old pallet.

I was miles away, engaged in float fishing for the sensible sized fish, when my daydreams were rudely shattered, the reeds erupted immediately behind me. I thought someone had fallen off the perilous walkway and landed in the water. I saw the back of a huge Carp as it forced its way back through the rushes to the main body of water. I estimated it to have been at least 18lb. In those days that was a monster.

The water used to belong to the Police fishing club and I presume a lot of the fish had been stocked by them whilst they were the controlling body. We often got an over enthusiastic bobby trying to chase us off, claiming it still belonged to them.

I remember too, fishing there with Percius 62 on numerous occasions, especially once when we watched a lightning storm approach from North Wales. Carbon rods had just been introduced and were the "In thing". I watched as the storm got nearer and nearer, my eyes glanced nervously down to the warning on the rod about avoiding electrical storms. Just one more cast! Eventually good sense prevailed and I packed up and beat a hasty retreat, leaving Percius 62 to "enjoy" the delights of the Overflow. He's a braver man than I.

just joined for a nose and seen this about the overflow, the overflow has got nothing left in it not saying its not got any fish in it but it was destroyed years ago it seems to have gone un noticed by most local lads that fish in birkenhead. the one'ns that are describing it as a hard water why do you put this. i am 38 i fished the o.flow first when i was 9 my dad was sick of puting a new hook on for me because the eels would swallow it. cast, eel cast eel an cast eel. my mates dad caught a double pike back then he was in the anglers mail his second name was heskith can not think of his first name but his son (my mate) was called Paul heskith. there where massive pike in there there where massive perch in there there where massive carp my brother in-law and his mate nick named one the LADY. it wasn't hard to fish whats so ever then, why would it all of a sudden become "REALLY HARD WATER" "OH WELL YOU NEED TO NO HOW TO FISH IT ITS NOT A BOILIE WATER" oh get a grip what a stupid thing to type.
HERE IS THE FACTS ABOUT WHY THIS WATER IS FINISHED because we can not look after our fishing lakes in this neck of the woods ARROW PARK the good old farmer sprayed the field next to the lake with a substance fertiliser or insecticide not sure but when it rained what ever it was washed into the lake NICE ONE MR FARMER you have just near finished off a good fishing lake, BIRKENHEAD PARK cheeky f**+ers removed the fish that had been in that lake years some amazing sized carp,pike,eels (was surprised myself to see eels this big) shipped them off to another lake OH THANKS FOR DESTROYING OUR PARK LAKES STOCK OF FISH SPOT ON, another lake ROYDEN PARK it froze over did this AWAC attend to brake the ice naaaa the fish suffocated (most of the big one'ns) this de-rated the lake to no where near as good as it was, another water CAPTAINS PIT ruined.
THE OVERFLOW remember it used to have a dock in front of it that was filled in years ago now. its the way they decided to fill the dock in that destroyed the over-flow lake. they advertised for tipper drivers to come free of charge to tip there hardcore, soil, bricks, into the dock but you can imagine what ever else was being tipped other than what should of only be tipped i no my mate had a skip firm at the time. BUT THEY DIDN'T EMPTY THE DOCK COMPLETELY the trucks turned up tipped and tipped and tipped it was filling up but the water left in was to much so it soaked into all this sh*te and turned the hole site into a death zone with this toxic runny sludge ouzing everywhere the wagons in the end where sinking one wagon had to be left to sink THIS SPILLED INTO THE OVERFLOW AND IT DESTROYED IT the area was a no go zone for a long time the environmental agency cleared the dead fish away (hush hush) they then spent a load of money to make it look all nice (did you not wonder why they had decided to tidy the pathways up and build fishing platforms (even when they new full well that there where no fish left hardly) BUT IT THEN GOT TOXIC ALGAE there where signs KEEP AWAY TOXIC, NO DOGS TO BE BY WATER, DANGER bails of hay floating every where. because of what happened to it with the contamination from the dock sludge this probably caused this to happen .
so don't bother fishing the overflow for carp,tench,pike,perch because there isn't any think in it its lovely and clear now you can see a good way into the water but no fish

Not sure what else they could have done with the fish in Birkenhead Park because they drained it to remove the years and years of silt that were on the bottom. Fish were restocked into it. Cormorants were roosting there and eating loads of the newly stocked fish. Royden Park was a great shame i saw all the dead carp in the ice but as a fishery it still fishes really well as other species were not killed by the ice. Arrow Parks problem was not the council but the farmer. The real problem with the park lakes was the lack of anglers who were prepared to help look after them. The AWAC did the best it could given the resources of manpower but one of its problems was that it was an association of angling clubs , the members of which had to look after their own respective clubs so the park lakes were down the pecking order. Lets see if the cash strapped council can do a better job.

Deffo fish in the still chaps! This gent went scuba diving in there last July! Heres some vids on his profile! Concrete end, by the reeds!

https://m.facebook.com/100000631430442/posts/1978826772148351/

Not long started fishing but been the overflow a few times seen some giant carp but they dont seem to feed caught big roach rudd perch am giant eel I'm not sure what people mean by hard water I know its deep and weedy at the bottom I've lost 3 method feeders if theres pike left in there no one has said there is that I've heard just some other fisherman said some people let sturgeon an catfish go in there but I think that's bullshit this could be an amazing place to fish if it got looked after properly but the cormorants eat a lot and the grebes still a nice place to fish imo always get something

Fished thete 30 yrs ago did get some quality crucians and rudd .the big carp topped early mornings then .but its plagued by rats from the tip .andvthe dock eway in by the cranes was closed off for a number of years .

Is peter or wadda as we knew him by still around .i did work in his shop for a while .we did a night fish at barton basin with two others one who had a grey transit caravanette .i remember his son and his mrs .gaynor i think was her name .

I remember fishing the overflow with my husband many years ago. If I remember right, he only used to catch eels. Is it still there?

I used to fish it many years ago when Bidston Dock was still there, and I only ever caught eels as well. And yes, it is still there.