I'm Back !

After a few years out, I finally made it back to fresh water fishing.
A new licence, renewed membership to my local club, and a long overdue re-sort of my kit, I went down to the water today for a few hours and fished 4pm till dusk (8:30ish).

My Watercraft is so rusty I didn't overthink things, just walked around the lake until a swim "felt" right, and it paid off!  Instinct better than brains again perhaps?

Fished my Stalker rod in the right margin on boilies, and had fish from the start.
Also had my quiver tip in the left margin and picked up bonus fish on paste.

x10 Carp all around 7lb ish.
x3 tiny Tench of about 6inches long.
x1 Bream of about 5lb that I didn't photograph.

So good to be back !

Im an idiot and cropped this one badly :-(

Stalking

A quick few hours stalking for carp the other evening gave us a surprise.
Mike had a lovely female tench we haven't seen before right off the surface on bread.
Never had one in this way before.

(sorry about the image contrast. Id messed up the settings on my cam and not noticed.)

Mikes Coarse trip

Mike tried the far end of our local pond, where we never really fish, and had a productive day....

A hot spring day, official temp got to 23c but it was probably warmer than that. A gentle breeze was pushing a few ripples straight into this area. Approach was simple, Greys prodigy 1lb 8oz tip, with stonze set up for roach as a margin rod. Harrisons 1lb 6oz Avon with centre pin lift biting just on the shelf in front.
Prodigy in the margin, no feeder mix, a few small boillies as loose feed, within 5 minutes an 11.5 carp started the day well.

It was followed within 30 minutes with a second fish in around 9lb. Both fell to small strawberry boillies. It still seems the bait of the moment.

Next fish on same set up on same spot. A lovely 1lb 10oz roach pure and in great condition.


Exactly the same spot produced two other fish later in the day, a superb roach with a little mouth deformity probably from mishandling when young, weighing 2lb.


Final fish from that area a lovely young tench around 2.5lb, A good sign indeed, but no piccy.

Ground bait was crushed hemp and halibut mix 50/50 with red blood worm. Slightly pink light coloured.

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Lift biting out in front with corn produced two 4oz roach and 5 skimmers to about 1lb.
That area was baited with a few small balls of mix pellet and corn.

Slurping carp in the margin under the tree tempted me to see what the centre pin could do.
I got smashed up under wood work in the margin. Could have been a big (and I mean big) tench. Only saw its tail. I could be wrong but if it was a tench it was in the 6 to 7lb range.
That swim went dead, so changed to the island. You have to get really close in and I soon got caught up and that was the end of one rig.
The Avon was very under gunned for where i was using it . The tree roots and snags cost me two fish.

The day ended with a fine mirror of around 8lb just as the light was fading. the centre pin in a scrap sounds absolutely fab. It was a lovely way to catch a fish. The rod lying on the bank, a piece of crust on a size 10 lowered in off the rod tip a few cm out from the bank. Followed by the scream of the ratchet and the Avon looped all the way over. Yates would be proud.

Notably at the end I put in the left over bread as slices . If I had stayed into darkness several fish could have been taken from open water. They were slurping away like crazy, but only at the full slices, not the small pieces.

Spring Tench and Roach

An evening trip to our local pond. Got there at 6:30 and baits in for 7pm.
Lovely warm sunny afternoon.
Fished in the shallows.
I had a 3lb tench, followed by this cracker at 4lb 10oz. Ive had this tench from this pond before at over 5lb.


Later on I had a couple small roach, and then this little beauty at 1lb 6oz


Fished almost exclusively small strawberry boillies.
Had an awful lot of dropped bites and runs, which we think was down to the hairs being too long.
Mike had 3 small Bream, which we haven't really seen before in this pond, and we've fished it for almost 10 years.

Packed up at 10pm as the temperature dropped.

Tench again

Another lovely evening at a local pond.
Got there at 5pm and fished till 9.
Had some Roach to about 8oz on corn, and a couple small carp to about 2lb one on corn and one on bloodworm paste.
Weather has been sunny and warm last two days, but this day was mild and overcast. perfect.
I sat with fresh tea from my kelly kettle, and at 9pm when I packed up it 'just' started to rain, so timing was perfect :-)

I was very lucky and had 3 of my target species, and this time took some pictures.
Interestingly, all 3 were females.


5:15pm
5lb 8oz on corn


6:20pm
5lb on corn


7:30pm
4lb 8oz on bloodworm paste

....and then, after casting under a dark tree, I had a bootstrap eel, on corn !!
Ever caught an eel on sweetcorn before? me neither...


Tench, Roach, Carp and eels. Not sure Ive ever had that variety before in just 4 hours fishing.

Tench

A trip to a local fishery I hadn't tried before proved very nice.
Coombe fishery has 2 ponds. One specimen and one mixed with nice tench. I targeted the top mixed pond with rod 1 a basic small bomb tried in various places with worm and maggot, and rod 2 a small feeder with groundbait and small boillie under a tree fed with a scattering of pellet and maggot.

Rod 2 with the feeder and light feeding had all 3 fish.
2 tench, of 5lb and 5lb 8oz, (a new Pb for me), and a carp of about 5lb that fought like crazy.
For some reason I didn't photograph any of the fish. I was too laid back and enjoying the fishing.

A Cracking little fishery. I spent a nice hour chatting to the owner.
I hope this fishery gets the respect its due.

Coarse trip

A short trip to our pond had some interesting lessons.

Got there late in the afternoon, chancing the dreadful weather the MET office was warning us all about, only to fish all afternoon in high humidity and sporadic sun.

There was about 6 others on the pond, which is quite a few as its not big. We set up in what we though was the quietest of the swims that were left, and threw out our usual light ledgers.

After only a few seconds, I had a Tench of 5lb exactly (my second 5lb in a couple of weeks after me new pb of 5lb 6oz)and mike had an 8lb carp.

Then bites dried up and we had to think about a change of tactics.

My margin rod had little or no action, but the small feeder I was casting about bought me a couple of nice bream of about 2lb. I also had a huge run next to the island that shot off whilst I was still clipping the bobbin on the line, and smashed me right up. The way it took off and fought has me convinced it was one of the few double figure carp that are supposed to be in there of about 14lb.

After changing position from my left to my right, Mike had a pair of carp, both exactly 10lb during the evening. Pretty good for our little pond!

We are more and more convinced about how much the sound we make on the bank affects the fishing, and how the fish appear to shoal up in very diff places at different times. If only we could work out the pattern or conditions of these times....

Coarse trip

WOW. What a trip Sunday afternoon turned out to be !

Our local pond. It was wet and very grey, but we set up at 3pm, in warmish air and high humidity, which as usual makes me hot, sweaty and grumpy.

This time we were more careful about bait choice and its combinations.
An 8mml natural flavour boillie over a handful of our small particle / pellet mix went into the margin at a little distance so as to be undisturbed.
Our other ledger rods were set up with a small flatbed feeder. The idea being that these rods were to be lobbed out to various experimental spots, to see if we could locate any groups of fish. This way we gave a small amount of high attract ground bait on the spot, without bunging out handfuls of feed all over the place. Also, the different spots and ground bait attack was a different approach from the pellet and static margin rod. The feeder had a super sweet red ground bait mix, and a dipped pineapple or strawberry 8mm boillie.

We had a good feeling about the day, so set up the keepnet to see what our efforts were like at the end.......The approach worked wonders.

We had x6 carp to 9lb, and x4 bream to about 2lb. Both of which are good fish for our pond.
We also had a very nice haul of x6 Tench of about 3lb, with a new PB for me of 5lb 6oz, and x5 Roach, x3 of them over the 1lb mark and one of 1lb 8oz.


The Tench and Roach were keepnetted for a piccy at the end, but one or two were flapping about, so the piccy doesn't have them all in, as we only wanted to take a few seconds on the picture before putting them all back.


All in all, probably the best day of general fishing we've ever had on our puddle, apart from the endless rain, and packing up in the wet :-)

Out of interest, the Air temperature was 15C, dropping to 14C in the eve, but the Water temp was 19C, only barely dropping to 18C in the evening. I'm sure the overcast conditions and water being several degrees higher than the air temp made a huge difference, alongside the fact that we were alone on the pond and kept back and quiet.

Coarse trip

Another late afternoon /night on our pond.
Targets - Tench and Roach.
Arrive 3pm. Very Sunny, warm/ hot, and humid.

On Mikes recommend, we went to the far end, were the carp could be seen cruising in packs about 6 strong, Mike reasoning that the tench etc would be there too. I disagreed.

We didn't catch, and so mike agreed to move. We had got the choice of swim wrong and ended up moving swims at 7pm to where I said originally was better.
We then had 4 carp each, and a few snotlings (yukky damn things), and just like last week, I had a 3lb 4oz tench at about 11 pm. Very nice.......But no Roach....


One of mike carp was taken off the surface on his Match float rod - that fish led him a merry dance, right through all our other rods. ONLY recommend when you have space to play!
We then sat in silence as I grumped and we re-rigged the ledger rods from the 'knitting' he created.... :-(

One thing I noticed, was that although the carp were feeding well, and they fought very well indeed, they must have expended far more energy than in colder weather, because the amount of time it took for them to recover in the margin was noticeable longer than normal.


Not exactly the great catch I had last week, but its an interesting note, that yet again, we end up catching a good bag of half decent carp, when we are targeting smaller species.

By the same token, we've come here on occasion targeting the carp and caught some big roach, and on very 'carpy' tactics too. Catching a Roach and Tench on boillies of respectable size can be quite a surprise.

This can mean two things. Fishing is totally random, or, we should rethink our heavier carp tactics.

We know from experience and knowledge gained that margin fishing is good, (especially in warm weather) , but what was also a surprise was just how close in we ended up fishing. Literally dropping the baits over the the edge growth, about 8inches out, in about 8 to 12 inches of water. As long as we stayed back, and stayed quiet, whispering our chat instead of vocalising it, we caught.

Id say that the lessons learnt were....

- Use your instinct on choice of swim. Its more powerful than you think.
- Fish in close. Don't be afraid to fish one rod stupidly close in. It'll surprise you, especially into / after dusk.
- Be quiet. I cant emphasize this enough. I'm a Very strong believer that a huge amount of blanks could have been avoided if the angler paid more attention to keeping his mouth shut, his radio off, and his footfall cautious. Banging about on the bank will only catch you unlucky or stupid fish.

Coarse trip

....well well, the fishing fairy smiles upon me at last !

Sunday was originally planned for us to go down to another reservoir after pike, as its near the end of the cold season.

But best laid plans and all that - the weather was very warm indeed, about 16 degrees, so we stashed the pike rods at the last minute and grabbed light course gear, and headed down to our local pond for some tench and roach.

There was a couple of other people there, so we had a look round and decided to go with instinct rather than knowledge, and chose an open bank, with good margins either side of us.

A light baiting with small mixed pellet in the margins was ledgered over.
It was certainly my day today. I had a new PB roach of 1lb 12oz :-)

I had....
Roach of 1lb 2oz
PB Roach of 1lb 12oz

x2 Carp of about 8lb

x4 Tench of about 2-3 lb
Bream of 2lb
Tench of 3lb 2oz


Mike had.....
A Tench of 3lb
A Carp of about 6lb off the surface in true John Wilson style :-)

Overall a great day and a good decision to change plans at the last minute.

Fishing in tight was the key, and possible just being in the right place at the right time, but I think we are getting our small pellet mix right for Tench and Roach, especially when we use small boillies as hook baits, to keep from hooking the small nuisance fish, of which there's lots in our local puddle.

Mikes Afternoon

Working part time as he does (mumble mumble bloody part timers..mumble mumble), Mike sometimes has the chance to fish on weekdays.
He did this last week, and had a rather cracking day.
Here's his story....

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An Interesting quick trip to Our little Pond

Wednesday is a half day at work and the warm sunshine provoked a craven desire to fish . No fuss grab the holdall, bait bucket and trolly bag. 2.45 arrive at pond.
A brisk summer breeze was blowing straight up the lake. Tony, a fellow angler, was set up on the dam wall sheltered from the wind and was just in the process of landing a 10lb mirror. After exchanging pleasantries I headed up to the oak tree and settled to fish with the wind over my shoulder.

Small amounts of pellet and sweetcorn were placed in a couple of spots in the margin to my left. A simple lightweight rig presenting 2 grains of real corn on a size 12 was lowered into place.
I settled into float fishing about 6m out in just over 2m of water. Corn and pellet alternating as hook baits small amounts of pellet and corn being catapulted in a tight zone around the float ever 5 minutes.

First fish, a skimmer to the float, then a classic screamer announced the arrival of a 9lb mirror carp to the ledger rod
The session continued with 5 more bream [slimy bloody things - mark] to the float rig and a fine pair of tench of 3lb 8oz and 4lb 2oz to the ledger.

At 6.30 I decide to try my favourite big roach bait on the float rig. A cut down boillie to the shape of a pellet. Seconds later a 12oz tench fell to it - a very good sign the tench are breeding well.
Four minutes later the float slipped away and I struck into what I first thought was a tench but the unmistakable dink dink fight and the size of the bend in the rod started the adrenaline flowing.

In the net was the most special fish I have caught in recent times. Perfect and in no sense a hybrid. Weighed once, weighed again, witnessed and photographed by Tony.



A 2lb 4oz roach. A fabulous specimen for this part of the world.
Exactly the same as The Newton Abbot Fishing Association record that has stood since 1978.

One more fine tench of 4lb 2oz closed the days catch and at 7.30 (possibly responding to a sharp drop in temperature) the bites dried up and it was time to retreat home.

It had been the finest spontaneous session in many many years and a true expression of the term “seize the day “ and to that maybe a reminder of a simple fact you can plan all you like but you cant beat being in the right place and following instinct.

Mike.
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Thanks Mike :-)

Coarse trip

The old bugger did it again.....

We went back to our pond on Sunday, with light gear, after roach and poss tench.
We tried 2 pnts of white maggies and a little groundbait to tempt the piscnine ghosts this time for a change.

There was a storm brewing, the like of which had not been seen in some time...apparently. Yet here we were, sitting in bright winter sunshine, with very little wind. It felt odd.
Mike was telling me all about the scary shipping forecast and the emergency services all being on super standby for the south coast to be submerged, with the hurricane winds forecast, 6ft spring tide, and 1.5 inches of rain etc etc.
Because of the weather warnings, we had the pond to ourselves.
We think the weather and the HUGE drop in pressure put the fish off, (apparently it was one of the lowest on record)

Despite this, we had a couple small carp, and Mike managed another lovely tench.


A brief day, but a stunningly nice window of sun and clear skies with very little wind, in otherwise dreadful weather of epic proportions both before and forecast for after.
Maybe the fishing fairy was just giving us a break :-)

Coarse Trip

I should probably call this "Mikes grand day out".......

We left at midday for our local pond, armed with light gear for roach hunting.

It was very cold, so thermals and layers were packed on. Thankfully it wasn't windy.

We huddled under my bivvy out of the cold, drinking tea, with both pairs of light leger kit out to the left (me) and right (mike).

All rods used a combination of small boillies, with either a small maggot feeder or small breadcrumb feeder to just add the smallest amount of attractant. No feed was thrown in.

To cut a long story short, it rained like hell for 5 mins, then hailed, then snowed for another 5, then stopped and a cold winter sun came out.....briefly....to be overcast again.

I only had a couple of small roach all day, and they were only when I drowned a couple of maggots to induce a bite, but I had a steam train run from the margin, which I hooked into. It was a heavy fish, probably a carp, but my knot on the end rig gave out, and I lost the lot - NOT happy.

Later, I had a great run, which again I hooked into. I reckoned from the more gentle plodding and plucking that it was a tench, of good size too, but then all went slack and I discovered my hook knot had broken - even LESS happy - Grrrrrr!!!!!

The knot had been my fault, but a pre-tied hooklilnk failing on a smaller fish wasn't.

Most infuriating.

Mike had a very different day.....

He must have been on the right spot, as through the day, he had 2 carp, one in amazing winter orange colours, the other a common carp, which is stunning as in 7 years fishing this pond, Ive never seen one come out. Maybe its the only one? :-)

Then he had a stream of bites, resulting in 4 perfect skimmer bream of about a pound each (slimy things bream- I hate them).

THEN the jammy bugger had the target species - a Roach!

Stunning silver armour shining, at 1lb 6ozs.

As if that wasn't enough, one rod flung into the margin in very shallow water, produced a tench. In the coldest weather we've known so far this winter, he catches a bloody tench!

All 4lb 8ozs of beautiful green silk.

So, after all this, what did I learn?
Check my knots Twice.

When we settle down to fish, make Mike swap swims.

Coarse trip

A last minute dash to our local pond today, just for fun. No real intended targets.

Arrived to empty banks at 2pm. It gets dark at 5pm at the mo, so we got rods in the water asap.

Usual light leger and quiver tip for me / light leger and float for mike.

There were loads of floaters on the surface so someone must have thrown them in earlier in the day. This seemed to have spurred some feeding, which surprised us, as it was quite cold, (but thankfully, no wind).

At 4:40, I got a steaming run on the leger rod, that turned out to be a 3lb 2oz male Tench. Lovely :-)

15 mins later, the same rod went off from the same position and bait, with another Tench. ALSO 3lb 2oz exactly (fish cloning?). This was a female, and far darker in color.

Mike had a classic lift bite on his float rig, that turned out to what we 'think' might be a hybrid Roach / Bream'. The picture doesn't do the fins justice, which were very red indeed, making us think it was yet another big roach for mike, but something about the shape of the head just made us think twice.

So a brace of lovely tench, an odd genetic thingy, owl calls in the static winter dark, and fresh tea - suits us :-)

Packed up about 7:30 as it just started to rain.

Roach trip

A very murky and damp Saturday afternoon indeed.

The plan was for a few hours hunting specimen roach, and also tench, because despite the fact that its horrid weather and the temp is dropping, mike (very bizarrely) caught 2 decent tench during last week in the same pond. A 3lb and a 4lb in cold weather is very odd. Maybe they are feeding up for the winter? The temp IS dropping, but maybe is just isnt actually 'cold' yet?

We arrived and got lines in the water by 4pm. A few other people were there so we had to 'chance it' in a swim we aren't used to, but didn't mind - its more fun trying something new.
It was getting more damp by the minute, so we got the brolly system up and dived under cover.

A leger rod (1.5lb test curve) went out to our sides each, with small method feeders feeding red crumb mix, baited with small red fishy boilies for specimen roach.
The light Avon rods (1lb test curve) were just swung out in front only 3 feet or so, on very basic lift bite floats baited with sweetcorn for tench and/or roach.
Now this may seem odd, and indeed actually seem backwards, but from experience fishing for carp and tench in this pond, its turned out that the best way to catch big Roach, is actually with tench and carp tactics - that is, a feeder and 10mm fishy boilie. This was discovered mainly by mike and by accident, as while fishing for other species we often picked up some very respectable roach. The feeder brings them in, but the boillie is only taken by a bigger roach - we guess...
Anyway, at about 5pm mike had a 3lb tench, in perfect condition.

After many hours, and no other action, about 8pm, mike had a good target species Roach of 1lb 5oz. A real bar of solid gleaming silver...

As usual, the Kelly kettle kept the tea going, and yet again we ran out of water for it.
(note to self - take more water - more water=more tea - this is a good thing.)


I only caught 1 little roach about half a pound. :-(
Probably cos I was too busy constantly making the bloody tea!

Now some fish.

OK, now for some actual fish :-)
These are from some past trips, to kick off this diary....



Here's my first double figure carp. 13lb. Caught from an old irrigation lake that turned out to only have about a dozen carp in it to 20lb.
I was very pleased :-)


First ever rudd, which is more likely to be a goldfish hybrid.




Introducing Mike "two sheds" Mallet, with a beautiful tench and a very lucky picture on my camera phone :-)

Mike again, with the smallest pike weve ever seen, caught on a lob worm meant for perch just as the light was about to go (hence the bad picture quality)




My first and only Mullet to date !



I love the look on this carps face...
"oh god how embarassing, Im caught first cast...."
Stunningly perfect fish though :-)




My best Carp to date. 20lb 2oz :-)




My best Tench to date 4lb 2oz.



Mike being a jammy git with yet another 2lb roach.


Now hes just showing off. A brace of 1lb 8oz roach caught at the same time on both rods ! lol


Lastly, my mates son Alex, with his first carp of 9lb.

The daft grin says it all really :-)