Golden Paws

I'm always up before first light and give the hooks a quick lick with the polishing stone, a fresh bait attached and a hopper full of fresh bait stealthily boated out to the spot. I'm a bit paranoid that I might have been cleaned out overnight and the amount of times the hooks come back with a blob of weed masking it, makes it a no-brainer for me. I don't fish particularly weedy waters but always check when I'm adding more bait. When I read about people fishing Rainbow Lake who cast out and then leaving it for 4 days, my brain doesn't compute! 

I used to do try and avoid casting and still would mainly at first light, but if something is niggling at me that it isn't right, I will now just recast, and I'll spomb at first light too if I need too quite happily, I quite like knowing my spot is bang on and freshly primed for the morning bite time. 

Been doing quite well on tigers nuts recently and this one is the best so far at 33lb 5oz.

New swim, more work done, a fish but overall frustrating 48hrs.  The quicker they spawn the better imo.

Mind boggling session on the syndi, arrived 6am Friday to beat the crowds and more importantly beat the long awaited weather change to westerlies.
Whilst the lake was fairly busy noone was at the East end of the lake and I got the swim I had hoped for.  The Easterly wind had died off and it was nice and calm whilst I quickly found some spots with the boat as you can't cast left with the overhangs.  It was very weedy at 5ft to half way across but then when it dropped into an 8ft gulley the weed became more clumps with clean holes dotted about.
I got 2 rods out and was baiting the last when the first was away after 10 mins and I landed my first of the year - a cracking little stocky, already looking nice and dark.
The wind started up soon after and to cut a long story short I spent the next 48 hours watching the most banging conditions of the spring come to absolutely nothing, they just didn't turn up as expected.  Plans to do an extra night were ditched Sunday lunchtime.
I can only assume they are waiting to spawn somewhere out of sight, come Sunday afternoon the lake was almost empty.

48 hour social at Bluebell lakes. Sandmartin Lake.  Managed one on the first evening but despite looking good for more the following day no more bites.

Went with the kids this weekend. Blanked the first 24hours. Then we got focused. Decided I wasn't happy with my main spot, so I put my big boy pants on and went for it 18.5 wraps, 2 rods or the horizon and one on the edge of some reeds where I had seen some bubbles, I had prebaited my daughters spot the night before with some boilies and left it, naturally that one was the first to go at 10pm, she cast it and felt for the drop herself and we baited it with 5 x spods and a few extra boilies she pulted into the zone, it ripped off when we were tucked in and listening to a book on audible. The summer I robbed a bank by David O'Doherty, if you have kids it's a great book. And naturally it decided to wipe out all my other rods, but we got it in and I cleared up the mess it made. 

(yes I was done in and a bit sun rouged) 
We lost her rod in the carnage and she wanted to sleep so one of mine went onto her spot, one to the long spot and one to the left. We were awoken to a savage take from the long rod. This came in like a ball of weed until it got in range of my other lines. Took the right one out. During the photos I had an out of body experience. 

Then I ditched the right hand rod spot and went long, so with 2 on the spot I whacked out another 10 X spods and had breakfast. Then the right hand long rod was away,we had spotted them all showing in the middle the evening before and this spot gave me the best shout not being able to move, this one came in well and we moved the other rods out of harms way, fought hard close in but without hassle, and although the smallest of the trio of commons but finished off the trip nicely. 

Lovely weekend with the kids, had lots of fun and caught 3 and lost none, we did some bird spotting, saw some fish on the other lake spawning and caught some fish 
Happy days. 

Been doing quite well on tigers nuts recently and this one is the best so far at 33lb 5oz.

Agree. Pre-baiting is a thing of the past on many waters nowadays. Certainly on busier ones.

That's not accurate.
Hooks are made from high carbon steels and heat treated (sometimes referred to as spring steels). While it's true that a finer gauge wire or hook is more prone to straightening (obviously), elasticity (or Youngs Modulus of elasticity to be precise) is a physical characteristic of steel - there is no 'may' about it. A hook is essentially a spring - it is critical that it can flex during the fight (this is known as elastic deformation), otherwise it would just snap because it would be too brittle to deal with the loads applied to the steel. However, it's not possible for the hook to flex to the point of straightening without the yield strength of the steel being exceeded. The yield strength is the point at which the steel deforms under load permanently (this is known as plastic deformation).
So yes, a hook flexes (to a point) but no, a hook cannot straighten and then spring back into shape. The physical properties of spring steel do not allow it.
If a hook straightens, you know about it.

Been doing quite well on tigers nuts recently and this one is the best so far at 33lb 5oz.

I love tying my own rigs, the attention to detail of getting it just right, the little adjustments you make to length and pop-up height for instance - it's all using the grey matter.
I will always remember sitting in my bivvy all day trying to work out why my non tangle rigs were suddenly tangling every cast, chucking fast and low under pylons, did my head in completely.  That day I came up with huge loops over half the length of the boom effectively lengthening the anti tangle sleeves properties if you like, and giving you a set place to mould the rig putty stopping that ever slipping.  By the end of that day I'd come up with better anti tangle properties and more importantly realised that if I tied the hook end section almost in reverse order I had total control of how much stripped braid was left exposed, instead of ending up with whatever you got after tightening the knot.  So I tie the hair last if that makes any sense at all - hard to put in words.  So one problem ended up improving all elements of the rig I'd been tying for years and years. 
I thought about tying rigs many years ago for those who struggled to do it themselves, like a complete custom set-up, was a good idea, couldn't be arsed in the end lol  same as all my other great ideas 🙃🤣 

My super bargain basement bait boat arrived today, super fast delivery and well packaged all works just as it should but already started the mods, as its a flip hopper i have added some elastic to damp the eject also added a runcam 2HD action camera to get video of on lake footage, should get to use it at weekend but for the mega price of £60.34 posted really cant fault it at all

Just ordered the Korda long sleeve SPF Factor 50 shirt for those swims where you have no shade or you're up floater fishing all day. Hopefully money well spent.
Fortis look to be bringing out mozzie proof summer clothing - deffo buying this when possible! 👍

Been doing quite well on tigers nuts recently and this one is the best so far at 33lb 5oz.

Been doing quite well on tigers nuts recently and this one is the best so far at 33lb 5oz.

Been doing quite well on tigers nuts recently and this one is the best so far at 33lb 5oz.

Been doing quite well on tigers nuts recently and this one is the best so far at 33lb 5oz.

Been doing quite well on tigers nuts recently and this one is the best so far at 33lb 5oz.

One caught on Friday after putting a rod on some fish bubbling. 

Thought i'd fill in the blanks from a couple of recent syndi trips. 



Back out tonight for another go, buzzing 🙏💪

Got out for a night over the bank holiday. The syndi is closed for spawning so I visited a day ticket down in the Nene Valley. It was absolutely rammed as one might expect given the timing, but I managed to find a few carp in a quiet corner. It was dead hot, so I flicked a couple of zigs out just under the surface. It was clear the carp were just sunbathing, so I was expecting to have to wait for the sun to drop behind the trees for any action. So it proved with a take around 19:30 which resulted in a lovely grey linear.

Onto the deck for the night and I realised I had a problem – I’d forgotten the spod rod! I found one of those Wolf X-Spod jobbies in my bag (bought it ages ago and never used it) and bodged it onto one of my carp rods. It worked a treat…. those X-Spod thingys are great! I put 2 on the deck and left one up in the water. At 02:30 I was away off the baited spot and a nice little cricket bat common was landed. Re-did the rod and 04:30 saw an awesome chestnut linear landed - worth a pic this one.

Photo’s done, I was half expecting that to be it but at 09:00 the zig rod went. It kited to my right past several other anglers and the hook pulled when I over-gunned it trying to stop it. Still, a good sign. In come the rods on the bottom, zigs on all of them, and back out they go. About 10:30 I get another take and another cricket bat common is in the net. I planned to stay a bit longer after that but as the heat increased, I decided I was happy with what I’d had so called it a day. A great little session in the end.

At Hanningfield reservoir today... took this of a lovely Great Grey Owl (had to use the phone camera for this shot) 
His name is Atticus...

If your boilie is breaking off when you withdraw the needle, it sounds more like you are using a baiting needle with too harsh a barb rather the knot causing the problem. Boilie recipes have undergone a change from being hard, which was supposed to put off smaller fish and make them easier to catapult or stick out, to softer which requires less boiling and so they retain more of their nutritional profile and allow water to penetrate them and release their attractants more readily.
I use a Korda needle which is fine enough to penetrate boilies without causing any damage to them.
 

If your boilie is breaking off when you withdraw the needle, it sounds more like you are using a baiting needle with too harsh a barb rather the knot causing the problem. Boilie recipes have undergone a change from being hard, which was supposed to put off smaller fish and make them easier to catapult or stick out, to softer which requires less boiling and so they retain more of their nutritional profile and allow water to penetrate them and release their attractants more readily.
I use a Korda needle which is fine enough to penetrate boilies without causing any damage to them.