A good days fishing... + Photos

[natty]

I had a day session at Passies Ponds today, I arrived at the fishery at about quarter past ten in the morning and quickly set up a couple of legers which were both cast in open water. Both rods were fished with hair-rigged 6mm pellet hookbaits, I had a Carp Vader Polar Ice hooker pellet on one and a Carp Vader Schnitzel Wurst jelly pellet on the other, they were both fished with small PVA bags of various sized and flavoured Carp Vader feed pellets.

 

I was still setting up my umbrella, when I had my first bite of the day, the fish didn't put up much of a fight and I soon slid the net under a pretty looking fish. On the unhooking mat, I first thought it was just an F1 or maybe a brown goldfish, but then I showed it to my dad and he said it looked like a crucian carp, I am still unsure of what species it actually is (probably either a crucian, brown goldfish or an F1)?

Here it is (sorry for the strange facial expression!):

 

I recast the rod back to the same spot on 5 minutes later I had a twitchy bite on the same rod, like the first fish it didn't put up much resistance and a few seconds later a nice bream was in my landing net.

Here it is:

 

As I was returning the bream, my other rod screamed off and after a decent fight, i had a mirror carp of around 4lb on the unhooking mat. the action continued fast and furious for another couple of hours, and over this time I managed to land another 5 carp and 2 bream. The bream averaged around 2lb and the carp were all small with the majority between 1lb 8oz and 3lb 8oz.

Here's one of the prettiest carp:

 

the action then slowed down on the legers in open water, so I changed one of the rods over to a float and float fished for a while by some reeds. It took 20 minutes before my float finally slid away, the fight was strange - the fish didn't feel powerful enough for a carp, but didn't feel like a bream either, I was pleasantly surprised when a chub popped up in the margins.

Here it is:

 

15 minutes later after returning the chub, a powerful carp made off with my Schnitzel Wurst pellet, but unfortunately it came adrift after a few seconds later. I checked the hook and it seemed fine, so i recast it to the same spot, shortly afterwards I had another fast take on the same rod and another powerful carp was the culprit, unfortunately like the one before, this one came off after 30 seconds or so, like before the hook seemed fine, but after two losses on the same hook in under10 minutes I decided to change the rig anyway...

 

No more action was forthcoming on the leger rod for the next hour, but luckily the fish by the reeds on the float rod were more willing to feed and I landed another 3 carp (2lb 8oz, 3lb and 3lb 8oz) and another bream in fairly quick succession. I noticed a few pinhead bubbles about four feet further along the reed bed than I was fishing and decided to cast my float on top of the bubbles, a few seconds later the float raised in the water, lay flat and slid away and my strike was met with a powerful fish, I was expecting it to be a 3lb or 4lb carp, but I was chuffed to see I had hooked a nice looking tench.

Here it is:

 

The tench was my final fish of the day and although nothing large came along, I was really pleased with my total catch of 16 fish (9 carp, 4 bream, a chub, a tench and the crucian/brown goldfish/F1!), especially considering I had only managed a total of 6 bream between my last two trips to Passies.

[mjbarnes12]

what a great mixed bag!! that is indeed a crucian carp you have there!! rare for this time of year - although i had a number just before xmas when the pressure went rocketing up!! surprised you managed that off the buzzers, they are notoriously shy biters!!

[mjbarnes12]

on seconds thought that dorsal fin is quite F1 esq!?!?

[Houseplant]

well done, glad to see someone is taking advantage of the mild conditions

[1superken]

Well done good fishing & a nice write up its hard to be 100% certain from a pic but id say that was a crucian

[Peter M]

well done a great haul on a winters day. to my eyes that fish looks mostly crucian but something about its shape just suggests a touch of the hybrid about it although still a very nice fish all the same.

[wayne baker]

Nice one Natty, It refreshing to see someone as young as you so keen on your fishing. Keep it up fella.

[wayne baker]

Nice one Natty, It refreshing to see someone as young as you so keen on your fishing. Keep it up fella.

Sorry somehow i posted that twice

Edited February 18, 2009 by wayne baker