salokcinnodrog

As said earlier, the fishing can be patchy, you can be blanking, then the fish just turn up. You are limited to the swim you set up in, you are not supposed to move swim, which puts a downer on getting onto them, making an already difficult lake even harder. It may be supposedly a good lake, but sorry for an overnight session, would be my limit, as I can't justify the money on day tickets. In fact 9 nights would cost the same as my whole season on my lakes! The Traditional has a number of fish, location can be the key, regular ground baiting, keep feeding, pellets or groundbait, constant recasting on one rod to try to find the fish.

It came out as a tongue twister even on a keyboard!

On a splice it does not double the whole length of the hooklink, and it will still break at its expected breaking strain, just not usually on the spliced section. A spliced boat rope, is the example of that as I have seen a rope snapped under extreme (gale force) wind and waves, and it snapped above the splice. I have tried the same with a spliced hooklink, and again, the pressure under stress, pulling the hook and swivel, the Merlin snapped along its length, not in the splice. In actual use, I have never snapped or had a break off of the hooklink with a braided hooklink, although I have had a combi-rig knot give way (my fault, I cast out the same rig after landing a decent 20 and had another take very quickly). Correction, I can think of one occasion at Earith, almost an instant take after casting, and I had the hooklink give way, as a cut or bite off. It is possible it was a catfish, maybe a pike, but that is the only occasion. This hooklink snapping midway would leave a fish with a hook and at most 150millimetres of trailing line, and that can be ejected, even if it is a barbed hook. As an aside, double posts happen if you hold your finger on 'post' for an extra second or your internet 'freezes'.

Just been having a think, how would splicing the hook on work for you? It does give a stiffer section near the hook, and then whipping on your hair or even using a sliding ring on the shank stopped with a rig stop bead? If you do splice it, with the stiffer section you could use it for a pop-up or snowman rig with the rig ring, or with a whipped hair as a bottom bait rig.

Outside of the East End of London, probably one of the worst in the country! Gun crime in that area is commonplace, almost all police vehicles are ARV's!

You may find this interesting: http://www.carprus.eu/about-the-company.php Splicing stronger than knotting I knew about, and boat ropes are spliced for loops at the end, learnt that as a kid when using a dinghy on the broads, hence my splicing experiments with braids in the early 90's.

They're big and full of crays Blanked today, the water was the colour of milky coffee. Only a couple of bleeps, I left it for a second of two, then decided to strike, but there was nothing there. Certain it wasn't crays on the bait as the bait was popped up well of the bottom, may have been a liner or grebe swimming through the line. Tried plenty of baits, drifted float fished and ledgered, but no luck. Allus next time!

LILO? Probably Klaus, Phil and myself Busted Merlin is not that hard to thread through, there is a sneaky secret; a long needle and bunching up the material. As you push the needle through the Merlin, bunch it up, and as its bunched pull the line through the middle. It does also work with the line, but takes longer. I also discovered before Octosplice, (any one remember that by Kesmark), that Merlin and Silkworm could be spliced securely without using a knot at all. The splice will hold on both hooks and swivels without glueing. Again a whipping thread hair.

This years pike fishing for me started on New Years Day, when I got up at 3am to drive down to Essex so I could set up and fish a couple of hours in the dark. At 8.30 ish the right hand rod baited with a popped up bluey head went off, and after a decent scrap this 12 was netted. 12.00 and the left hand rod baited with a lamprey tail brought this This fish didn't scrap so well, looking like it had had an argument with something, with cuts and scars around the head, but weighed 13lb. As I had set up in the dark, both rods were ledgered dead-baits, one fished popped up, the other on the bottom, and both produced fish. As you can see, the unhooking mat and sling is ready, with forceps to hand. I can unhook the pike, sling the trace and weight out the way (usually back into the water) so there is no risk to me or the fish, then slide the net out the way and straight into the sling to weigh the fish. Then it's already in the sling to carry back to the lake safely to be released. Tomorrow I reckon I can drive down slightly later, but still be there for an early one.

I went through a stage of threading Amnesia or Fluorocarbon through 25lb Merlin to create a semi-stiff hooklink, loop going through a swivel rather than quick link style, the inner helping the loop to hold true Straight shank hook (I think it was actually a Drennan Super Specialist) with the hair made with whipping thread,and whipped down the hook shank. I seem to recall silicon tubing made up the line aligner. It worked, but was fiddly to keep on doing regularly. By the way, like your Zippo, brass looks nicer than chrome Got one the same myself!

The garlic was so fresh it was still in its skin when a certain catfish hit the headlines. Not the kind of fishery I would consider, and didn't when I was living just up the road a few years ago

The immunised strain of carp can still be carriers of KHV, and so, if stocked into lakes can pass the disease onto fish already present in the water. Carp that have recovered are also still carriers.

Yes Ace have.Shimano own a number of tackle brands as well as their own, and I think bought Max Cottis and Steve out

Yes and No! I work for the company that produces Crafty Catcher Boilies, I know the ingredients; they print them on the packet, I've even used them myself, and caught fish on them. However it's not really for me to big them up as that could be seen as advertising, and it's a bit difficult as I'm sponsored by someone else (before I started working for the company). The Retro baits are as close as possible the original recipes, flavours that made Crafty Catcher famous back in the original Crafty Catcher days. They catch fish as an attractor bait, although I would be happy to use King Prawn as a food bait.

Like that? Line Aligner using fake maggot to disguise the hook To camouflage the hook in this pic I have used a fake maggot and created a line aligner with that. Again, the hook was tied on with a knotless knot and then the fake maggot threaded on with a needle

Yes I guess that is what is now a kicker. The other alternative to the bent hook was invented or credited to Jim Gibbinson (really worth reading his Carpworld articles, and books), the Line Aligner. It also created the same difficult to eject the hook effect that the bent hook did. The inturned eye I think helps with the 'kicker', it sits more naturally. The line aligner I think works better with a straight shank hook. Now I know the barbed and barbless debate has come up many times, but I have also seen and read of barbed hooks being ejected after a fish loss, dependant on certain conditions. Ken Townley also wrote about this in Big Carp. A lost fish, trailing the hooklink and possibly a short length of line (with no added weight, lead or leadcore) can eject a barbed hook. The barbless issue is that hook cuts deeper, and wobbles in the mouth during the fight, creating a bigger hole, and obviously more damage. The barb holds the hook in place, preventing wobbling, therefore less damage. The barbed issue is the hook is harder to remove, and people sometimes rip it out as opposed to seeing it is deep hooked, and cutting the hook rather than trying to force it out.

Strangely enough, I think it's the B175 that was the original bent hook, a quite intentional bend being put in the shank of the hook. It is the mouth damage that bent hooks did that saw them being banned on most lakes. Longer shanked hooks or an additional length created by tube seem to have a better hook up ratio than shorter shanked hooks. I think the first shank extension on hooks was probably on the Savay rig? Just a lengthening of the shank with tube, then a sliding hair, but in many cases it was this shank extension that created more hook ups. You then have the tubing being used to create the bent hook effect, but without the damaging effects of the actual bent hook.

It depends on how you attach the hook to the hooklink. If I use a Kamasan B175, I knot the hook on 'properly' with a very precise shrink tube to form a bent hook effect. A stop bead on the hook shank, and a rig ring running up and down the shank. The alternative way I fish it is with a Uni-knot loop with the pop-up tight to the hook and knotless knotted with a braid hooklink. I do occasionally use a Chod hook, but again, I always have the bait tight to the shank. I have found that inturned eyes on the hook, tend to give (me) better hook holds than out turned eye patterns. Most of my pop-ups are fished close to the lakebed, only just above bottom rubbish.

Tackle shops are finally receiving deliveries at the moment so those who didn't pre-order should be able to get them in their own Fox stocking tackle shop from this week

I have, and had fish on it. The coating is softer than other Kryston coated braids, and I had to be really careful when tightening knots up to prevent breaking and removing it. I had a fish go through a snag, when I got it in, the whole length of Jackal had been stripped. It works out expensive to replace the hooklink every fish, as I usually manage a number of fish on each hook and hooklink. My favourite Kryston coated braids are Mantis and Snakebite

I do believe that Gardner Tackle are now selling ready made Hinged Stiff rigs. Not saying you have to buy them, although I do think Gardner stuff is well made and probably one of the best suppliers of fishing tackle, but they may be worth looking at for 'copying'.

Dog clicker, and a compressed air spray. It's not a spray as such, but you press the trigger, and the escaping gas hisses in such a way that the dog jumps. Plenty of attention, good behavioural treats, positive reinforcement, and not negative reinforcement, but other than the jumping up and barking, ignore much of the negative. Be firm when telling 'sit', 'stay' and the like. If you remember Barnaby, my mum and her husbands Retriever, she and Ian could not get him to behave, stay or sit very easily. I could do it with raising a finger or eye contact. The spray and clicker I mention above, it may be worth diving into a certain Rayleigh shop and see if they have one Also Labradors and Retrievers can pull a bit on leads, so a lead to harness could be better than a lead to collar.

Liverpool looking a lot better team yesterday against Manchester City under Jurgen Klopp, even with the difficult start he had. Chelsea only managing a 1-0 win over Norwich seems to show how far off the pace they are.

I have had mixed feedback from Cuton lakes. A lad was fishing the lagoons this weekend and said that he has stopped fishing Cuton as its getting a bit cute and he's been blanking plenty. I have a feeling it may be lack of experience and knowledge of the water but... Have you thought of Fennes Fisheries near Braintree? I haven't been round there for ages, but it may be worth a look http://www.fennes-fisheries.co.uk/fisheries Not too chuffed with barbel in there, but for other species may be worth a look

When fishing the Method, you want to wait for proper runs. The bait wants to be close to the hook, and normally a short hooklink as the fish are just digging right into it. I use a simple method mix, Vitalin dog food, mixed with breadcrumb, particles and pellets, and often a tin of Sweetcorn so I can use that as a hookbait, maybe some peperami or sliced or crushed luncheon meat, all various hookbaits. Must admit Cyborx recipe does look good though