LeicesterCarl

He does. I only know as I asked him how long my "evening ticket" (we got there at 5pm, he arrived at about 6:30pm and charged us £3 each) would last and he said, "you can stay all night if you want!" (several people looked like they were, indeed, planning on doing just that... So - Peatling Pools... still got that weird bloke running it? Ever such an odd old chap I used to think... plus the stupid rule of shutting the place down at some ludicrous time of night when you're bagging up big time - is he still doing that? I may venture out to Mill Farm again at some point and see if I can whack out some of the cruising carp from the corner (sort of enclosed) pool with the gravel spit. Had a whale of a day there one time with a huge tubful of maggots. Ended up freelining a single maggot on a size 8 hook straight through to 10lb mainline they were going so mad. Lost three fish for every one I banked... it was funny to hear the boilie brigade dsicussing the odd use of "maggots" to catch carp... like they didn't think they ate them...

Not sure how well placed I am to judge! I only go down very rarely... nromally on nice evenings as my younger daughter likes to fish. I spend most of my time sorting out the little crises that she manages to create (hooking huge carp on a 4m whip, for example) and precious little time fishing myself... On the night I was there I fished the smaller lake and saw one bloke hammering out what looked to be good sized carp every 15 to 20 minutes. Myself & daughter had no end of action with bites coming every few minutes (we were using breadflake) and we landed a fair few carp in a few hours, up to about 6lb or so.

Managed a few hours down at Watery Gate fishery near Thurlaston last night and in the last few minutes before packing up, my daughter decided to try a quick fish in the river section up near the smaller pool... fishing with a small piece of breadflake, she responded to a legitimate (but slow!) bite and I thought she'd hauled up a bit of stick or something at first.. then saw the waving red claw! Was amazed to find it was actually legitimately hooked in the mouth, which was a bit entertaining to unhook with my forceps with that claw attempting to remove my finger! Here's the (un)happy captor with her specimen. I didn't realise you weren't meant to chuck them back in! I'd never have got away with killing it - even though we were just returning home to have a barbecue!

I can see we're just going to have to go back and catch the damn thing again! I'll take photographs from every angle next time, ok...? I'll make it our summer mission to get it on the bank again then we can find out the parentage of the illegitimate Brudd/Chudd/Ruddoach/Broach/whatever... [ 18. July 2004, 08:06 PM: Message edited by: LeicesterCarl ]

There's another pic here: The other side showing the other side of the fish. It was great when she caught it - it was in the area of her floating breadflake sipping in other bits and just circling her bait, she was getting more and more excited as it got nearer and nearer, then it just rolled over her bread and pulled away - didn't half pull the elastic on the small pole I'd set up for her! 5 minutes before packing up as well and then we were treated to an aerial (and nearly aquatic) display of bats zipping along the water surface picking off insects - great night!

Nope - compare it side by side with a picture of a chub - the scale pattern is different, the mouth is too small, the fins are in the wrong position... it *may* be a hybrid with a chub, if such a thing exists, but there is no way that is a purebred chub!

Agreed about the hand/cloth although the bit that the fish was in was wet and I didn't trust her to hold a "lively" fish with her bare hands! The lower lip did protrude quite a bit - in one of the other pics I have it has a right pout on its face! That's what makes me think it's more Rudd than roach or hybrid - most of the hybrids I've caught in the past have had similarly-protruding upper & lower lips. Anyhow - She'd been ever so patient for 3 fishless hours so I was really pleased when she caught this fish - guided it into the landing net herself too!

Best tea towel? Nah - that's my fishing towel - had it years! Not a top secret venue at all - it was Watery Gate Fisheries near Huncote in Leicestershire! I know I've caught Rudd from there in the past - no idea if there are Chub in there though - I've never caught one from there before. I reckon it's a Rudd. Fits the classic id - lower lip out, deep red fins, golden tinge, dorsal fin starts significantly behind pectoral fins, small mouth, feeding on top, thin body... The *only* thing is, as people have pointed out, it's not very "deep" as Rudd classically are... However, is that enough to preclude it from being a Rudd?

Ooh no - not a chub... I catch loads of chub and it was *way* off being a chub - the mouth was only half the size for a start! Most chub of that size would swallow a golf ball - this fish would have struggled to swallow a boilie! It was much less thick-set than a chub too. Can Rudd & Chub "hybridize" for want of a better term?

Rudd Picture? (Warning, pic is quite big to allow people to zoom in and check the fish out as closely as possible!) Hello all. Last night my daughter managed (after several fishless hours) to hook and land this fantastic fish. (as you can see in the pic, she's pretty happy about it!) I'm pretty sure it's a rudd and, if so, it's an absolute specimen as it tipped the scales at 2lb 10oz! Certainly has the golden tinge, reddish fins and upturned mouth - the lower lip was distinctly protruding beyond the upper and it was caught off the top on floating breadflake - hardly conclusive, I know, but fairly circumstantial evidence!

No problem... are you on broadband or do I need to reduce the 2.5MB pictures to something a bit smaller?

Small but perfectly formed... (the mullet, that was, not me!). Can I just put on record my gratitude to Chippy, Phil & Chris for showing me the ropes whilst on my holiday to Jersey. Their time & efforts were much appreciated - cheers fellas - hope to see you all again soon. I left the boys yesterday morning, deserting the ferry terminal (almost) fishless unfortunately... Phil hooked into a fish just as I got there but unfortunately lost it shortly afterwards. The fishing gods attempted to appease him with a 4" sand smelt shortly afterwards... The last I knew was that they were heading for 'Phil's Rock' at Fort D'Auvergne - how did it go there chaps?

OK, so they weren't huge fish, but all the same... Last night, fishing with Chippy at Havre de Pas we had about 30 huge bites between us - Chippy managed to land a mullet scale (without a landing net too... ) and I finally managed to connect with one and landed a small thick-lipped mullet of about a pound and a bit... That's not all... This morning I joined the legend that is Phil the Fish on the end of Albert pier (he'd been there since 4am, I arrived at 6am) and had 4 more bites of which I connected with 3, landed two and lost one. The two I landed were again small (15-16 inches) but one was a golden grey and one a thick-lipped. The one I lost felt like a right great lump... headed very purposefully for the end of the pier and wasn't stopping in a hurry... the hook pulled out before I could do anything sensible... Few more days to go... here's hoping for a big one!

Reporting from Jersey here! What Chippy didn't tell you is that he was trying out a novel new technique at the time he caught that mullet - spinning with bread... ahem... Seemed to work anyway. Have some good pics which I'll sort out soon. I had a bite or two, but couldn't connect. Had some mackerel and a scad off the pier last night freelining a (frozen) sandeel. Had another bash at chippy's venue but didn't see a thing or get a bite. Must be the smell of his feet in the water that attracts them More soon!

Oh and I've printed out a few posts from here for cooking reference should the need arise! Cheers all - here's to a bit, nay, a lot of rod bending action for all of us over the next couple of weeks... particularly those on Jersey! [ 17. July 2003, 08:53 PM: Message edited by: LeicesterCarl ]