Big fish week

So this is my second year on my new syndicate and I have had many fish out to 29lb but never been able to beat the 30lb+ mark. I have taken many photos of fellow fisherman and also helped land my fair share as well!

I managed to get three days off work and got to the lake Sunday afternoon. The lake was packed and sitting talking to a bailiff, I noted a fish poke its head up in a bay with no one fishing there, so the barrow was walked round and I soon saw another 5 shows of different fish all within a 20 minute slot.

The rods were lobbed out on where the fish were showing and fishing off a jetty with reeds either side I made sure that I kept noise down to a minimum. The kettle was soon on and another 2 fish showed themselves right over one rod with one being an absolute pig. 

As darkness followed the fish did not show anymore and I had a phone call from my mum saying that she had a meeting on the Monday afternoon and would I be able to come and provide support for her!!!! This meant that I would have to leave the lake on my 3 day session first thing in the morning! 

I still went to sleep full of hope and sadly slept like a log and was awoken only but my phone alarm telling me that I had to pack up with nothing to show for the nights fishing. The fish had all moved out and I must have spooked them or something! I left and wanted to get back to the lake as soon as I could. 

As it turned out, by 3pm, I was able to be back up walking round looking for the fish again and with a new South Westerly wind, which I wanted to get on the end of. Sitting with the wind in my face, there were fish all over this side of the lake and decided to fish against the back of an island that commanded lots of water as well.

 

With two rods on the island in about 5-6 feet of water and a mid-water spot on a hard patch, it was only “a matter of time” surely!

The fish were boshing right against the island and I kept having beeps on my left hand rod and at 9pm, the line tightened up and line started clicking line from the reel. I was on it like a shot and lent into a lump of a fish which didn’t seem to have noticed that it had been caught! After an epic battle lasting an easy 20 minutes, with the help of a mate Nigel, the net was slipped under a good fish. With no torch on throughout the battle, we didn’t know how big it was.

Once on the mat we realised it was a sort after fish and pushed the scales round to 42lb 03oz, my first UK 40. After a lot of disbelief, congratulations, photos and a celebratory cup of coffee, I just wanted another one! What a great feeling of a PB and I still had 3 nights fishing ahead of me!

At 5pm I had a one toner and a 15lb mirror graced the net after taking out all my other rods going crazy in the margins and powering off and doing all its fight 10 yards from the bank!

The Tuesday was a hot hot day and the fish were still in front of me all day long. I tried zigs with no luck but kept the throwing stick going on the island spots with 20 baits every hour or so. As soon as changing over to bottom baits one island rod pulled up and I had a 9lb bream.
I really hoped that the bream hadn’t moved into the swim!

As soon as this rod was back on the spot I had another bite, exactly the same as a bream but tightening up I could feel that this was a carp, and another good one. With the clear water and the sun up, playing this fish in was a great sight and I could see that it was another big fish for the lake. Dropping the scales down at 37lb 07oz, this was my first 30lb from the lake and would have been another PB if the fish last night hadn’t come!

Just after slipping the fish back another rod went and another 15lb mirror was in the net. At this moment in time, I had only one rod in the water, so putting them all back out and getting more bait out was a priority!

Sadly, the next few days came and went with only the odd beep but I was chuffed to bits with a great session.

Within 24 hrs. I had had a 40, 30 and 2 15lbers with a bream to round things off.

Tight lines and be lucky!

France 2014

So here it is. After nearly 2 years waiting, the time is here and we are off to Red Mill in Brittany. There are 6 of us going to fish this 9 acre lake with Carp to upper 50lb and big cat well over 130lb. Myself, I will be targeting the carp but if a cat picks up the bait then all fish are welcome.

So after a very rough ride from Newhaven to Dieppe and a 5 hr drive through the fantastic French countryside, we arrive at our destination. After meeting the owners Daron & Yvonne a reccy of the lake and the group talking about the best swims to fish, I chose the “Frogs” – this is a shallower swim of 3 feet all over but commands a large amount of water and was the only swim that had some pads too.

   
I opted to fish with one on the Pads, one on the island and one on the far margin treeline that went from silt to a few harder patches of what I thought was granite. I didn’t have too much of a cast around on the first day and left my marker and spod in the car and just slipped into the swim nice and easily. I had Nigel fishing next to me and he did exactly the same.

The throwing stick was out and a about 50 baits scattered over the areas was my start and with running rigs and braided hook links, it was “French fishing 2014” – now all I needed was a fish!

The night drew in and there were a few fish milling around but nothing on the whole lake as we went to bed but I had a few beeps at 3am and the bobbin pulled tight – and as my fishing in the UK has taught me to “hit everything” I wound down and felt the rod tip thumping round into my fist fish of the session.

It didn’t take long to land and Nigel had heard the splashing and come see what I had caught. It dropped the scaled at 35lb and not a bad start at all. After sacking it and waiting for another few hrs to do some better photos, it was the only fish out for the night. 

Over breakfast on the Sunday Nigel had a 40lb+ and again, we were laughing that this would be a great week. Little did we know that the weather closed in from Sunday afternoon to Thursday and the lake closed shop for me. I lost a couple more with some real odd bites and I think that the fish were “doing me” so I had to rethink my rigs and did some very subtle changes to make sure that everything was perfect and the odd bites were converted.

It wasn’t until Friday evening did the fish get on the feed and I took three fish to 28lb in just a few hrs which saved my week really! 

Again, France has been unkind to me but I will be back to crack it soon enough.

Tight lines and be lucky!