1st A Blank, 2nd A Score!

An Eye-opener of a Session.

I arrived up at the club lake at just before eleven o'clock on Thursday morning, having a wonder round it becomes evident to me roughly where the fish are, I'm just about to walk past a swim I call marginal, for obvious reasons, 2 fish show in the main basin of water, one of them was a mid to upper double, the other a single figure maybe a scraper double, seeing the fish show I carry on wondering keeping that area in mind. 

One Poser of a Robin, Hopefully Bringing Me Luck!

I went back to the car and loaded the barrow, I have nowhere near as much gear compared to when I last did a night, but still seems a lot for some reason? Ha-ha. 

As I slowly walked up the gate bank, I stand in one swim scanning the water where fish were showing in numbers, out about 50 yards I found a soft drop, this came clear to me there was a patch of firm silt, as I drew the rod back after leaving the rods out to see if I could get a quick fish, the bottom was fairly clear as there was no bottom debris on the hook. 

Fluoro Nutty Combos, What Big Fish Can Resist These.

On the rods I've put out, I'm using a hinged rig as before which I'll explain how I'm tying it in the next paragraph, followed by the same fluorocarbon rig from my last session but with a pink snowman presentation, I am using the pink as a blatant highlight in hope to stop fish in their tracks getting them to feed. On the hinged rig, I am using a 14mm Velocity Baits Nutty Combo Popup, this goes in conjunction with the 1kg of P-Nut Plus freebies I have scattered around the area. You’re probably thinking you’re mad putting out that amount of bait to showing fish, as I'm now aware there are fish in front of me which may have backed off a bit, this bait would have spooked them off so I can get some rigs on the deck allowing them to come back for a feed if you like.  

The Fish Were Showing Fairly Consistently there Activity Had To Unfold Into
Something At Least!

The hinged rig as mentioned is something I have been toying with, it has been a killer on a couple of day ticket waters I have fished recently, first I tie on a size 8 ESP stiff rigger onto 5 inches of Mouth trap or bristle filament using a 7 turn knot less knot, then with the tag I have, I thread on a large rig ring and push the tag end through the back of the eye giving you a D on the back of the hook thus creating a chod like section, then I take 12 inches of Nash Missing Link, strip off around 2 inches then form a loop in the end(not tying a loop),  I then thread the chod like section through this loop and do the same, I then tie a 7 turn half-blood knot in the Missing Link leaving about 2mm from the eye of the hook, I then do the same in the stiff filament but only tying 3 turns this time. I then tease the knots down slowly, doing this allows roughly an inch on the stiff section and a few mm of supple braid exposed on the braided section. Finally I thread on an anti-tangle sleeve followed by a ring swivel tied on with a 7 turn half-blood knot. Then it's just a case of attaching your chosen hook bait.  

The Yellow and White Brings A Good Contrast, 2 Colours
Are Definitely Better Than One.

After an hour or so the fish still seem quite active, after seeing a fish crash about 10 yards off the back of the spot, it's still looking good to me, at around 5pm I will put fresh hook baits on both rods and set the traps for the night to see what happens. Usually the fish in this particular lake, to my knowledge, aren't very active in terms of showing so frequently, one of the fish that crashed looked like a better fish, maybe one of the bigger commons.  

Only a light breeze ripples the surface of the lake which allows pin pointing any fish activity a lot easier, especially in other parts of the lake as the ripples won't go unnoticed.  

An Unbeatable Setup, Never Really Used Helicopter Setups
But With Slack Line, It Ensures Good Presentation.(Minus
the Fluorocarbon to the Left)

In some uncertain terms I may have contradicted myself when I say "I don't use slack lines". With the presentations described it makes sense to slacken the lines off to keep it out of the carps way, although fishing for line bites isn't a bad thing as it tells you if there are fish moving into or through the zone.  

After 6 hours nothing had unfolded, I made a quick recast with both rods to make sure everything was spot on for the night, my markers on the far bank is a gap between trees, I have one rod on the left and then one rod on the right fished at exactly the same distance on the small patch of silt out in front of me, the fish are still showing on the back of the spot so hopefully something moves through during the night!  

The Components of the Hinged Rig As Explained.

After suffering a cut off on the right hand rod at 9pm, which I still can't get my head around, at 11pm it all kicked off. Just as I'm lying scanning the water watching a hippo or two show, the left rod on the hinged set up goes into complete meltdown. After a hairy 10 minute fight, a lovely pale, scaly mirror is in the net! The scales spun to 20lb 2oz, not the thirty I'd hoped for but it's a result to bag a fish on my second session! Cheshire cat comes to mind!

20lb 2oz Mirror, First Carp from the New Club Lake
Caught on the Described Hinged Rig + Nutty Combo Pop-up

I've got to be honest here, when I was playing the fish to the net and I caught a glimpse I thought it had only looked 10/15lb until I unhooked it in the net to sort out a mass of tangles, I thought yeah that's definitely a 20.The rod was soon recast and another half a kilo of boilies followed to freshen the spot.  

The night drew on and all that persisted was the rain which was no problem as I had my brolly sat low to the ground, as the sun came up a few anglers got set up on the opposite bank, then I took the decision that I would make my way home. It has been a good session that I got on the fish and it may have taken a while but the fish got back on me and decided to have a munch.  

Join me on my next session when I get to grips again with fishing with boilies and the lake itself!

 

Thanks for Reading

Ross.



The Beginning of a Winter Campaign

First Session on a Tricky Winter Venue.

After such a busy week, I have managed to get onto the club lake for a long day session. After having a walk around for a few hours at the weekend, I managed for figure out an area that the fish visit. One swim I go straight into was 2 pegs down from no carp corner, fish were showing in numbers which made the decision to drop into the swim a lot easier. 2 rods were soon fired out to the spot where the fish were showing, only 2 single hook baits, one a chod rig and the other a hinged rig.

The Components of my Hinged Rig

The only problem I came across was it pushed the fish out further, I wasn’t going to keep chasing them and keep casting to the distances they were pushing out to, I knew they’d move off to another area of the lake. After the regular activity, nothing had happened for at least an hour. I took the decision upon me to move to a disabled swim which I know produces fish and another thing that attracted me to this area were the marginal snags and pads on the far bank. I flicked the rods out, one to a small cove in 2 bushes and the other just off the pads on the far margin. One thing that was noticeable when feeling for the drop were the timings so I had to re-adjust where the rods were.

An Underused Method on my Part, Chopped and Whole Boilies

I clipped up the rods and recast them to exactly the same spots and I clipped them up, some bait was then introduced from the far margin, it was pointless using a catapult when I could just throw it in by hand. I used a Korda Kutter to half some 14mm P-Nut Plus and also I halved some 14mm AK4-R with my hands, doing this allows the leakage of the baits to be higher and hopefully keep the fish guessing as to what is in the swim. This was also added with a helping of some whole boilies so it opened up my choices of hook baits.

It Was Easier to Bait Up From the Far Margins, Although I Did
Use a Mini Spomb From the Swim Little and Often

 After an hour of no show over the spot, a lovely dark looking mid double crashed over the spot, this had me buzzing that I was going to get a bit from the left hand spot as it was inches away, or so I thought was the case anyway.

After 3 quarters of an hour I decided to go for a walk and have a chat with some of the regular anglers on the lake and see what I can find out, I wasn’t being a pain just getting the low down on fish that had been caught. When I had returned to the swim about to recast, I had noticed both white hook baits had turned a tainted black, which means I’m fishing on a firm bar of silt along the far margin. The reason why I’m using the bright hook baits is for the colour if anything else, the reason I say this, I now know I’m fishing over silt which is 100% going to overpower the smell of the hook baits as the silt smells a lot more to the fish that an attractive scent off a small pinhead compared to the silty bar.

I Used Helicopter Rigs As I Was Unsure What the Silt Was Like

After re-doing the rods I added some more bait to keep the spot fresh, I soon noticed a sizeable dark shape cruising the far margin starting from a triangular bay where a friend of mine was fishing, I have been told the fish keep the snags on the far bank as a route of safety in some instances.

The Fluorocarbon Rig As
Described.

A Critically Balanced Rig. Tied
KD Style to Kick the Hook Downwards.

 After an hour or so passes me by and the chod rig on the left hand rod in the small cove was instantaneously changed to a fluorocarbon rig. To tie this I have taken 15 inches of fluorocarbon off one of my reels and took 3 inches of weed missing link and attached them together using a back to back half-blood knot. To the braided section I tied a loop and attached my choice of a 14mm P-Nut Plus boilies, I then thread the fluorocarbon through a size 8 Nash Fang Twister and made sure that the knot was sitting opposite the point of the hook which was being pinned in place with 2mm of silicone tubing for blowback affects. I then threaded on an anti-tangle sleeve as it would be used on a helicopter rig and then tied the fluorocarbon onto a ring swivel. I attached a PVA Nugget and flick it out and firmly hit the clip, landing bang on the spot.

16mm Pop-ups Are Perfect for Big Carp, Stand Out Like a
Sore Thumb on Silt As Well!

The rest of the session was fruitless unfortunately but from seeing some of the catches I don’t think these fish are going to give themselves up easily by any mean!  Keep reading my blogs where I hope something is going to unfold and then some fish will appear.

 

Follow me this winter for the journey on this small intricate lake to see if I can slide the net under a winter wacker, I hope all my tips and tricks help you along the way as well, as and from this month I am taking on the editing of the Team Velocity Baits blog page as well, you can also get to know other anglers on the team from this page as well, release will be over the next couple of weeks.

Thanks for Reading, Ross.