Carp Catchers Blog

After a very long lean spell customer Sean Bowen has landed a nice common from the difficult Pit 6. It’s not the biggest carp in the world, but they all count and when your struggling size doesn’t matter. Sean broke his blank spell using Baitcraft T1 Freezer Boilies  his rig featured a Korda Soft Coated Braid hooklink tied to a size 8  Korda Kurv Shank Hooks . Well done Sean on, keeping on.

Best Fishes,

John

A word now on some new baits now in stock. The new Richworth XLR8 Freezer Boilies were developed from an original recipe from Steve Renyard which was a proven big carp catcher in the early 90′s. Steve has now tweaked it with some new ingredients and is 110% confident with it. They are a nice dark brown colour so they won’t spook wary carp. The XLR8 has a sausage/pepperami type smell and looks to be a real winner.We also have the Xlr8 Pop Ups and XLR8 Impact Boilie Dips  in stock.  The Richworth Salmon Supreme Freezer Boilies  are one of Richworths original boilies from back in the day. After continued requests the Salmon Supreme are back and look set to be as good as they ever were. We also have the Salmon Supreme Hookbait Dips and Pop Ups in stock. For more information or to purchase please click on the above links.

Best fishes,

John

After deciding to change waters for the coming winter and due to busy banks I’ve had a little bit of a confidence boost. On my first weekend session from late friday evening to early monday morning I had a bit of a result in the shape of 6 mirror and common carp to 21lb15oz. After turning up in the dark at 8.30 friday evening I opted for the north bank as I had been told it was free of any other anglers. After watching the water for nearly 2 hours I decided to fish up the dam end in the the deeper water or what was left of it anyway as this is where I’d seen the carp showing the most . The reservoir serves the purpose of topping up the Grand Union canal so the water levels can get quite low at times.

During my session I banked 6 carp to 21lb 15oz from 3 different spots using  Baitcraft T1  boilies over a spread of bait which included a spod mix of hemp, Solar Pure Bait BYT and crushed T1s over one of my rods. Most of the bites came during the hours of darkness which meant I had to have all my spots marked up to get them back on the spots in the darkness.

The rigs I used consisted of 15lb Korda IQ2 tied to 2 inches of stripped Sufix Stiff Silt with a size 6 Korda Wide Gape Hook, a small piece of shrink tubing over the eye and tied blowback style.

Tight Lines

Dave

(I should have turned my head torch off for the night time shots, but had forgotten while sorting the self takes. Luckily they didn’t turn out too bad.)

I’m not a fan of ornamental carp normally but look at this stunning koi-king carp cross. Caught by regular customer Sean on a recent trip to France it weighed in at 36lb 4oz. Sean was using Baitcrafts T1 Freezer Boilies and he and his companions amassed quite a haul. More on Sean’s trip soon.

Best Fishes,

John

James Kirk had a great result recently bagging himself two gorgeous linear mirror carp. They weighed in at 26lb 12oz and 21lb and as you can see from the photos’ below they are absolute stunners. James was fishing to a hole in the weed in 8ft of water at 30yrds range. The successful bait was Dynamite Baits Chocolate Malt & Tiger Nut Freezer Boilies  scattered over a wide area and the hookbaits were double 20mm bottom baits straight out of the bag. James end tackle consisted of 3ft of Ace Hard On Camo Leadcore   running on a 1oz Guru Square Leads . A size 6 Gardner Longshank Incizor  hook featured in James’ rig. The venue was Wellingborough Lakes.

Best Fishes,

John

Rob O’Brien and friends had a major carping haul in France recently. Fishing at Etang Rendevuoz Rob and two friends amassed a hundred carp between them. Rob alone had 37 fish, the biggest being 37lb. The rigs Rob used were constructed from 6” of  Sufix Kameleon  with half inch stripped back, this was tied to size 4 Korda Wide Gape Hook shrink tubed and tied blow back style. The successful baits were Mainline Activ Maple-8  and Nash Scopex Squid Plus Robin Red  freezer boilies fished snowman style with matching pop ups. These were fished over a bed of boilies, pellets and maise. Rob reports that the temperatures were in the 30′s and the water temperature was an incredible 26 degrees centigrade. Well done Rob sounds like you had a great holiday.

Best Fishes,

John

Just a quick update to the last blog on new bait products. For those of you that prefer freezer baits to shelf lifes, the Nash Mach 1 Freezer Boilies  are now in stock. So if you want them, we’ve gottem! For more information or to purchase please follow the above link to the main site.

Best Fishes,

John

Gary and I fished the 2009 BCAC Qualifier at Farlows lake again this year. We got down on the Thursday and had a good look round, then had a nice social in the bar that evening. The next morning we were up at first light and after a cup of tea we scouted the lake again. We had a hearty breakfast in the onsite cafe and then the moment of truth the draw!! Gary and I were fortunate and came out second and got our second choice of swim. We were up against some stiff opposition, The O’Connors, Ian Russell, as well as last years winners, but we felt confident. Things started slowly in our swim but after spodding out 3 kilos of 18mm  Mainline Cell Freezer Boilies  I had a run at 9.30pm on a rod fished to an island gap. I managed to get the carp away from the snag, but half way in it kited to my left towards a gap in the islands. The carp had to be stopped so I held on and gave no line and unfortunately the hook pulled argggh!! Gary had a take that night and was cut off almost immediately. Next morning we found another snaggy spot and had a fish within an hour which weighed 18lb and some ounces.

Finally we were off the mark with a nice common carp. The take came to a combi link rig tied with Rigmaroles  Hydro-Link Silt  with two pieces of  Enterprise Pop-Up Sweetcorn  as a hookbait. In the afternoon we tried zig rigs on top of the gravel bars to no avail. We spodded out about another 6 kilos of bait for the coming night. We added some sweetcorn and  Carp Company Icelandic Red Cranberry & Caviar Freezer Boilies  to the spod mix.  At about 5.00pm I had another bite on the island rod which was cut off after about 20 seconds. Another cut off on the same rod about two hours later had Gary and I pulling our hair out. We both tied on the heaviest Nylon leaders we could (leadcore and braid leaders are banned) in an effort to combat the cut offs. Gary had one cut off and landed one carp that night which weighed 19lb plus so now we were in the running. Next morning saw us land another 18lb pluser, which put us well into contention. It was not to be though and at 12.00 the hooter sounded to end another BCAC qualifier. Had we landed any one of the fish we lost we would have qualified.

Best Fishes,

John

Regular customer Lea also had a successful session on the difficult Pit 6 recently. Lea had two common carp weighing 16lb and two mirror carp one at 11lb 5oz and one at 17lb. The baits that Lea used were Mainline Cell Freezer Boilies and Dynamite Baits new Red Fish Freezer Boilies . No rig details from Lea but whatever he was using obviously worked. Nice one Lea.

Best Fishes,

John

Customer Eamonn caught this nice scaly 25lb 9oz  mirror carp recently still in it’s winter colours. Eamonn used his favourite Mainline Cell Freezer Boilies  to tempt his lovely mirror. His rig was tied with 24lb Drennan Carp Silk to a size 4 Korda Wide Gape Hook  and cast to a silty area.

Best fishes,

John