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Good morning to you all, so as I defrost in front of the fire i shall regale you with a tale of carp, rain and mud! (I’m like a cut price Terry Hearn!) This tale has its foundation in last week, when I found myself once again ensconced in a stuffy hotel room for a “preparation course” ahead of my final exams next week. Chatting to wifey on the phone, she asked why I didn’t take any fishing gear with me, I explained how there wasn’t any time to disappear to a lake for a few hours, so wifey suggested that I get an overnight trip in as she is working and daughter is at nursery and I probably won’t be missed! Still, as the wifey and I have another baby on the way, due in the summer, opportunities to get the rods out are going to become few and far between, so I prepped the gear, my daughter and I rolled some bait and on yesterdays dawn I was gone, heading for zombie sheep lake. In arriving, I found the lake looking grey, sullen and foreboding. The water level was up by a good 2ft, meaning one of the islands had disappeared completely, and the other, only a few sorry looking branches poked above the water! As I was alone, and the wind was piling in, with this being a rather barren landscape, with little to stop the howling wind between the Russian Steppes and my bivvy, I chose to set up on the back of the wind, tucked in behind a sorry line of bushes that did at least act as a wind break. It wasn’t raining, so I took the time to have a lead about to find my usual spot albeit from a different angle. Happy with my spots, HMS Jenny (my bait boat) was launched into the chop, where she gamely battled the waves to deposit two pva bags of boilie crumb, pellet and maggots onto the spots. With that, I was fishing. Both rods being Fox Horizon X3S’s to Fox EOS 12000 reels, to lead core leaders, 3 1/2 oz leads fished as helicopter rigs to fox cortex braid, ESP Clawhammer hooks barbless size 6 fished slip D style. Bait was my usual Premier Superaminos with belachan, shellfish and salmon oil with added robin red, I tend to just keep feeding the same bait all year through here and still keep having bites, plus it helps keep it established for next year. A good quality bait gets better with application in my eyes. With the rods out, it was time to set up house and have a cup of tea. As I was crouching down by the rods, watching the water for any subtle show that there may be fish about, my right hand rod tightened up, so the tea was flung to one side and I snatched up the offending rod, on hitting it, the rod took on its battle curve as the battle was joined. After a spirited 20min scrap, where it bored remorselessly around the flooded margins, it finally rolled over and hit the net. I checked all the fins were flat, popped the hook out and rolled it up in the mesh for the short walk up the bank. As it is rather steep on this side, with all the rain, it was like an ice rink, and I managed to slip over, landing on my bum with a carp in my lap! Still, the fish was undamaged so I laid it on the unhooking mat and unfurled the net. I was faced with another rig in its mouth! Hanging from the scissors was a pink boilie, attached to a rig, safezone leader and a 4oz lead that had no chance of discharging from the lead clip as the tail rubber was jammed on tight! So I unhooked it for the second time and held it up for the happy snaps at 28lb exactly, he was in rude health, I don’t think the other rig had been there long as the mouth was not torn, but I treated both hook holds and let him go, a 4oz lead lighter! I felt that he could be the start of a few, to get a bite so quickly, but alas, it wasn’t to be. HMS Jenny continued to battle the waves to deposit my baits back out there, the rain closed in and started hammering it down, I discovered a few leaks in my bivvy that will now need attention, the bank became a quagmire and it soon became a challenge to stand upright without slipping, let alone walk anywhere! So diving into the stand of trees, I picked up a carrier bag full of pine needles, pine cones and twigs, which I made a path from my brolly to my rods, now I had a grippy surface again, I got my head down and had a peaceful nights rest! This morning, I awoke and redid the rods, or at least tried to! HMS Jenny, my indefatigable little Amazon special bait boat, finally gave in. Her props still spin, she splashed bravely through the waves, but when it came to drop the baits, the hoppers refused to release, the motor working the release mechanism had given up the ghost. HMS Jenny was like a WW2 Escort Corvette who’s used its last depth charge, it can sail gamely on, but not a lot else! I chose to stick on a stringer on each rod and cast them out for the last hour or two, whilst I slowly packed up. Sat on my bedchair, looking at the bags that needed packing away, whilst trying to drum up the enthusiasm to make a start, my left hand rod registered a rapid drop back! I leapt off my backside and promptly landed back on it again as my feet shot out from under me in the slimy muddy bank, and I landed flat on my back, picking my self up I watched the embryonic take fizzle out, I’d missed it! This proved to be the motivation I needed to pack away and go home. With the barrow loaded, I slip and slide my way back to the car park, load the car and head for home. This proved to be a more mentally challenging session due to the conditions, and it did cross my mind to pack up and go home, but I gave my head a wobble and stuck it out. Besides, a 28lb common in February isn’t a bad reward! Now time for a hot bath, get HMS Jenny in dry dock and see if I can get her back to her little bobbing best!

Dark moody and damp February session

The NGT canisters if you are talking about the 500's are actually some of the best gas canisters out there. The ones to avoid if possible are Coleman!

I bought 20kg of S7 and failed to catch anything but 3 tench from St Ives, might have been out my depth at the time though. So possibly not a fair reflection. Their hookbaits never seemed to set the world on fire for me either though. But might again be me.

Personal experience is years and years ago now so probably not much use. Tried the switch when first released and found it poor compared to fishmeals. a friend has done extremely well on the bug in recent years.

sorry i should of been more clear, its a slightly different design from the other 2 alarms - whereby a circuit wire keeps the back cover close to the main cover, i'll post a pic next time i do a battery change...

Obviously you’ve not seen the hookbaits yourself. None of them are bright colours, like fluoros. The coloured ones are pretty muted. The white is an off white, washed out pink, yellow is a dull yellow, even the orange isn’t fluoro and washes out pretty quick as orange always does. So depends on what your definition is of “bright” is. they’ve also sold hookbaits that are white, yellow and Red for years and years. Whatever grievance you have with SHB, you’ve not seen the hookbaits, used them nor know much about them despite what has been posted by SHB themselves. Kinda makes anything you’re saying moot tbh. zero credibility in trying to put people off using SHB. im sure you’ll be back here in a year under a different username or on the other forum saying the same things once again, all whilst the hookbaits are catching fish up and down the country all year round for thousands of anglers.

Is this the right room for an arguement? LOL

The colour doesn't affect the process which is what you were questioning originally though. I guess it makes them more saleable as most pop ups are bright. I take it you have read the part about the process though? Also you are now calling them liars, even though you don't really care. 😂 So you can't recommend any but having not tried them you are keen to slate specialized hook baits. Also you spelt your best mates name wrong It's Bryan Jarrett. 😉

It's written on the website.

Pretty sure he’s gone in to some level of detail about the process and how long it takes. Also in to how the cure works on the baits and why. I thought I recognised your style and tone from the other forum. end of the day, you don’t think they are worth £22 a pot, plenty do. Personal choice eh. As I’ve said, can’t deny the baits catch plenty of fish and they are used by plenty of sponsored anglers on the sly, or more recently publicised that they use them. This speak volumes on its own when people that get free hookbaits chose to buy something different. plenty more expensive air balls out there that are nowhere near as effective based on catch reports. Massively publicised in mags and things, SHB is irregular social media and a paid for thread on a forum and has an incredible customer base. Again, that says a lot. Enjoy your fishing as you say, probably don’t focus on continually trying to discredit SHB. Especially when you obviously have no idea about what goes in to creating the baits 🤷🏻‍♂️

That's a can of worms Kev, I'm sure someone will be able to assist but I used Co pilot to try and understand bio active ingredients a bit better. Still don't properly but this is something I learned which may help 😱 😂

And my biggest common came on a white shrimp cork ball...... ....... so it's settled..... yellow, pink, orange, white, and match the hatch are good for big commons. And mirrors. 🤣