Leaderboard

A delightful pic of my tackle box, its 2sided tool box i use, sorry no pictures of carp adorn my tackle box. The other side. all very chaotic but it works for me. I mainly use helicopter rigs, as i use leadcore often (have for 14+yrs) and think the helicopter rig is safest. basic helicopter rig arrangement with spliced loop. If i get snapped off then the hooklink will slide away like this. you may note thati dont have any tubing/shrink tube on the leadcore to temporarily affix the top bead in place, nor is it altered or doctored in any way, for instance, not threading the bead on sideways! There is nothing in which to impede the movement of the top bead if required. the 100% most important most imperative thing is that the bead and hooklink swivel ( with big bore ring) must be able to pass over the spliced loop like this. then the 'core with lead attached is now seperate to the hooklink.

I'm also a believer in keeping things simple when possible. Sometimes though when setting a 'trap' you have to be rest assured that if it gets tampered with , it's still fishing for you. Through most of my carp angling, I've angled on silted up meres (27 yrs) and for a fair bit of that time I used rigs fishing in the silt, 'where the food is' . It's so easy for your hook to foul up and then your sitting there unbeknowing what condition the hooking arrangement is in. Many a time I've watched carp bubbling over my bait and not had a bleep, I've wound in, recast to the same spot and had a take within the same feeding spell. I prefer bottom baits than pop ups when fishing in silt and if I'm fishing in daylight where I can watch for activity, I will happily use them. When I use them at night and I get unexplained bleeps, I tend to give it 30 min, then I feel like I need to wind in and re cast and in most cases I will. That's where stiff rigs with pop ups are effective from a re-setting perspective, along with the other obvious advantages.

Screaming reels!

I'm sure they do the trick for ya mate , when i first saw 'em i thought it was something out of a terminator movie tbh Im a firm believer in keeping it as simple as possible even if it is mostly because i'm lazy lol . The most complicated rig you see me using is a bit of fluro tied to a piece of braid . Excluding the ready made choddies i buy of course

They do look scary close up lol. I mainly use the flouro combi if I intend leaving a trap out for a longish period. The middle is for a snowman or double bait for when the fish are feeding/ digging amongst the silt. Although I've put a chod in the picture, I hardly use it tbh.

A Passion for Angling is the greatest angling program of all time, and will never be bettered. Catching The Impossible I would probably rate second, although I do love the original Go Fishing series with JW. When I was a kid, I used to sit in front of the TV making notes during Go Fishing. I'd then try out what I'd seen next time I went. It didn't always go well but it was a massive part of my early fishing learning. How long before someone mentions you know what or you know who?

when it comes to rigs keep it simple imo