Carp Catchers Blog

Here’s the promised catch report from Jonathans previous blog and a nice suprise, read on.

“I arrived at the lake at about 5pm to find the sun shining on the water and a light wind blowing from the NW. I header straight for the sheltered and weedy “back bay” as I had a feeling there would be some fish present. I used a small catapult to fire out a few freebies to see whether the carp were up for it and sure enough a couple of fish began to feed. I continued to feed little and often allowing them to build up confidence on the free offerings but they didn’t really seem too bothered. I then noticed a fish feeding further to my right on some free offerings which had drifted that way so moved along the bank and put a few more free offerings over the fish this time they started to take them so I decided to cast in, casting over the free offerings and slowly dragging my controller float (one of your ESP jobs) into position.

Twice I had fish examine my hook bait (dynamite 11mm expander pellet) and disregard it so I reluctantly (big fish in weedy water) decided to drop down a hook size from a size 8 to size 10 korda wide gape. This proved to be the right decision as on the next cast my hook bait was taken with confidence and the line tightened into the 28lb 8oz common, a new PB. It put up a really good scrap and I managed to keep it out of the snags on either side by keeping on plenty of pressure. Those Shimano Ultegra XTB 5500 ’s you sold me are bloody great little reels! After the unhooking, weighing and photos I was well happy and ready to head home but decided to flick one last pouch full of freebies to see if any fish left in the bay were still up for it.

I couldn’t believe it when a fish started to take the free offerings as soon as they hit the water so I had another cast over the free offerings and slowly pulled my hook bait closer to the feeding fish. First the fish swirled at the float and then without any hesitation nobbled my hook bait and made off on a powerful run about 30 yards to my left into some heavy weed. At this point it could have gone one of two ways but the weed the fish had picked up seemed to slow it down and it came in fairly easily. I knew straight away that this fish was heavier than the last and it went 34lb on the scales, my first 30lb+ fish and a second PB in less than 20 minutes. What a result!

I had another couple during a quick overnighter on Friday. The first one at 17lb 5oz and the other 22lb 12oz using chopped  Nash Scopex Squid Plus boilies waded out and placed on clear spots in the margins.”