Three Recent Sessions

[natty]

Last week was my half term - so no school! I managed to fit in three fishing sessions over my half term. This is how I got on:

 

Session One:

 

For my first session, I went to a local match lake (Passies Match Lake) with my 11 year half brother. We fished with one rod each on the bottom, our rigs were simple knotless knot hair rigs to a size 12 barbless hook with a 1oz free running lead, for hookbait we used 6mm Carp Vader Halibut Crab jelly pellets and fished over a handful of Carp Vader 2mm Halibut Crab loose feed pellets in the margins.

 

My set up for the day. One rod legered in the margins.

 

Throughout the day we both caught steadily, unfortunately all of them were small, but we still enjoyed a fun days fishing.

 

I ended up with a total of 14 carp and 2 bream. My brother ended up with 9 carp and a bream.

 

A couple of small carp I caught, although tiny, they were fun on light tackle.

 

My brother’s biggest carp of the day.

 

A pretty common carp for my bro, with a massive tail.

 

My brother’s only bream of the day.

 

 

Session Two:

 

I fancied a go after some larger carp after my session with my brother on Passies Match Lake. So I decided to go to Borde Hill fishery in Haywards Heath for a day.

 

I set up in a nice looking swim, that I had done well in this time last year. I was told by the regulars that the carp were spawning, so the carp fishing was harder than usual.

 

I decided to have one rod legering on the bottom with a Carp Vader Schnitzel Wurst jelly pellet with a PVA bag of Carp Vader feed pellets in a variety of flavours and sizes. This was cast about 30 yards out in open water. I set up the other rod with a controller float and fished bread crust on the surface.

 

During the first couple of hours, 3 carp (between 3lb and 5lb) came to my leger rod and I also managed to catch 2 carp off the surface. All 5 carp were between 3lb and 7lb.

 

A couple of the carp.

 

Around mid day the action stopped and I struggled to get any bites either on the bottom or off the top. So I decided to grab my surface rod and the landing net and go and try and stalk some carp. I spotted 3 carp sunbathing around the corner from where I had been fishing. They all looked between 7lb and 10lb. I hid behind some reeds and flicked in a few dog biscuits, after 10 minutes of careful feeding, the carp started to take the dog biscuits with confidence. I carefully cast my bread crust past the carp and slowly reeled it back into position. Seconds later a nice dark looking common carp came up and slurped down my hookbait.

 

The common put up a great fight.

 

Yes! Finally in the net!

 

The lovely looking dark common.

 

I managed to stalk another pretty mirror carp in the margins shortly afterwards.

Long, lean fighting machine!

 

I then returned to my swim and cast my leger out and tried to get the carp feeding on the surface in front of me. The carp seemed to be very wary on the surface, but I managed to catch another 3 carp off the top during the remainder of my session and also managed another 2 carp on my leger rod.

 

A nice common to finish off the day.

 

I was pleased with my final catch of 12 carp, especially considering the carp were spawning and were not feeding as well as usual.

 

Session Three:

 

For the final of my three sessions, I decided to go for a 5 hour session down at Hydneye Lake on Sunday. Originally I wasn't planning on fishing at all on Sunday, but because it was such a nice day and I had a few hours spare, I decided I may as well get a few hours fishing in.

 

I arrived at the lake around 4pm and I went and talked to a few regulars, a few were struggling, but a couple were having a good day bagging up on skimmers and the odd tench and larger bream. A man fishing the far end had spotted 2 carp cruising through his swim early in the morning, which was encouraging as there are not that many carp in the lake.

 

I set up both rods were leger rigs. As hookbaits I had corn on one rod and a Carp Vader 6mm Breamax jelly pellet hair rigged on the other rod. Both were fished with PVA bags of Carp Vader Breamax feed pellets and some corn.

 

I had no action at all for the first two and a half hours, not even a line bite. The bloke in the swim next to me had also struggled with only one bream to show for his efforts, he packed up and left rather disappointed at how slow the fishing had been where he was fishing.

 

Around half past six, I had my first bite on corn, I struck and hooked what felt like a nice bream, but unfortunately it came off after a few seconds. As I was rebaiting that rod, the other rod with a Breamax pellet screamed off and I was delighted when I realised I had hooked a tench, after a spirited fight, I slid a nice tench into the waiting landing net.

 

A lovely tinca.

 

Over the next hour and a half I managed to land 6 bream between 2lb and 3lb, 4 coming to the corn rod and 2 coming to the Breamax pellet rod.

 

The average size of the bream.

 

I had just packed up my unhooking mat and was about to reel in, when I had my final bite of the day, a tench had taken a liking to my Breamax pellet. It came straight into the margins and then woke up and tried it's hardest to get into a bed of reeds, luckily I managed to steer him away from the reeds and into the net.

 

A nice way to end the day. My red eyes match the tench’s!

 

Overall, it had been a nice few hours fishing and I was pleased with my final catch of 6 bream and 2 tench, all coming in the last two and a half hours of fishing.

 

To conclude, I thoroughly enjoyed all 3 of my sessions and caught some nice fish, unfortunately nothing that large came along, but overall it was enjoyable fishing in splendid weather.

[Guest tigger]

Well done natty, nice pic's also.

[Janet]

Excellent report Natty, and some very nice pictures. All those fish look to be in excellent condition.

 

How good to see a young man who can write a good story and has the skill to adapt his tactics, and how refreshing to hear that you still enjoyed the fishing trips despite not catching any "big" ones.

 

The fish on my club lake don't tend to get much larger than the ones you caught, but they always put up one hell of a fight for their size!

 

Keep it up Natty, and I think I speak for most of us on here when I say that I'm looking forward to your next write-up!

 

Janet

[natty]

Thank you Janet for you really nice comments - very much appreciated

 

Thanks as well Tigger

[dapper64]

Well done natty,its not always about catching big fish

[lyn]

Well done natty, another good session, write up and photos. It is one of my things on this coming seasons wish list to catch a carp off the surface but I need to drag myself away from my barbel fishing first! (Being a river angler my season has not begun yet)

 

As Janet said, nice to hear you had a good session without catching monsters. As we have always said to the kids on my junior barbel fish ins, every fish is worthy of your respect no matter what the size of it. I was also impressed with your change of tactics to suit the fish. My brother was one of the early pioneers of 'crusting' for carp back in the 1960s/70s so it shows that the old tried & tested methods still work

 

Well done again and tight lines for the next session.

 

lyn

[KAYC]

Great write up natty, good to see a couple of young lads think about their methods. do not get obsessed by size ( yet ) continue thinking about your angling and I look forward to many more reports.