Weight – 36lb 13oz
Catch – 9 Skimmers, 6 Carp, 5 Roach, 2 Crucians.
Weather – Mild, cloudy, sunny periods. Breezy
Snowdrops on the verge of the road, means spring is definitely on its way and I won’t be sorry to see the back of this winter.
Went fishing with Mark today, who following resigning from his job, was told he had take some unused holiday, so a fishing trip was arranged and tickets organised. I was just glad to get out, following a bout of proper flu and then looking after Sue for the last 2 weeks after she slipped a disc.
Have to say I’ve missed fishing matches regularly, however I sincerely hope as from April I will be more financially secure and as such will be able to get out more regularly. Following a period of turmoil at work, it appears my hard work over the last 18 months seems to be bearing fruit, with March and April potentially providing significant rewards, so fingers crossed.
Back to today and the mild weather meant we were really looking forward to a good day, particularly since Mark had fished the lake a few weeks ago catching carp on the lead & bread, including a PB of 21.5lb. The controlling club for the lake has a rather odd rule regarding bait. Pellet is banned, but you can use fishmeal based groundbait and paste, yet there is no limit on the amount of meat you can use. Weird.
Anyway, Mark organised the bait, unfortunately the 2pts of caster to be shared, included 1¼pt of floaters, which meant feeding options were a little restricted. Mark also gave me 2 bags Marukyu groundbait courtesy of Roy Marlow who was looking for some feedback on what is a new product. Marukyu are a Japanese firm who are trying to break into the UK market. They are different from the standard commercial or continental groundbaits. I tried the EFG130 which was a cold water formula, which had what looked like bits of seaweed in it, but apparently the amino acids, unique yeast extract and NORI (the sea weedy bit) trigger the fishes appetite. My initial assessment was the colour was too light for cold clear water, so mixed ½ a bag with ½ bag of black lake.
We settled on pegs 9 & 10, which would provide shelter from the wind. We both set up a lead rod and pole rigs to fish at 13m which was 7ft deep.
3 balls of feed were deposited at 13m with a pinch of caster and a few bits of corn, after which I tried the lead & double corn, but after 45mins and no fish it was time for the pole. Although I was looking for skimmers, there was a chance of a carp, so I set 0.6g Jean François, .11 hook length tied to an 18 silverfish pellet hook.
First put in with double maggot and a 3oz roach was soon swung in, but bites were difficult to come by. After a couple more roach, decided to pot another ball of feed and netted a skimmer almost immediately, but then nothing. This was strange.
Mark only had 1 small carp on the tip, but had fully expected a few more and the day wasn’t going according to plan. I thought the wind may have pushed the carp further down the lake or they were sitting half depth, but they certainly didn’t appear to be on the deck. I went to grab my waggler rod, but realised I hadn’t packed the right rod. Mark had similar ideas and did set up a waggler, but other than a couple of knocks from roach no bites were forthcoming.
As for my swim another pot of feed, produced a fish straight away, before bites dried up again. An extra couple of cm on the depth helped present the bait better, since there was a bit of tow. The fish seemed to be coming to the feed, before backing off, so decided to start feeding a nugget of groundbait, with caster & a couple bits of corn via a large toss pot every put in. This definitely improved matters. The roach disappeared and although I had to be patient for a bite I started to get a few skimmers as well as a couple crucians, with corn being the best bait. However, the fish definitely seemed to be sitting above the feed and I would have preferred to start regularly feeding caster and fishing half depth, but due to the caster disaster had to stay feeding the groundbait.
With the fish appearing to sit higher in the water, I started feeding the margins with caster, maggot & corn. Mark had been doing the same thing and with the day drawing to a close promptly caught 7 or 8 carp on corn, including 1 fish about 12-13lb to make up the bulk of his 65lb. My margin swim was very slow to get going, but I kept drip feeding caster & corn and eventually had 6 carp on corn.
As for the groundbait, did it make difference? Who can tell after 1 session? Mark used a darkened Sonu F1 mix. My silvers net went 8.12, whilst Marks weighed 5.10, so it certainly didn’t do any harm.
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