salokcinnodrog

I can remember a fair few nights getting home at 3am, and before going to bed filleting a few bass or cod and then freezing the fillets, with 1 left out for dinner that day. My bass fishing is often quite cheap, almost like deadbait fishing for pike with a popped up bait. Even my chub fishing is cheap, bread, slugs, lobworm and dog biscuits, those same baits work for other species. On my 'Distances and Wraps' thread I mentioned the 'need' or lack of, of distance sticks, and alliterated to it above. You DON'T need to buy distance sticks, 2 banksticks will do, but there are other products that probably come into the same boat. I'm trying to compare my tackle to other anglers I know, my mates etc, and I'm probably the most guilty of spending money on 'shiny': Five rod holdalls, three bivvies and umbrellas, seven bite alarms (3 Delkim TXI'd and 4 ST's), carp rods, spinning rod, float rod, specialist rods, marker rods, spod rod and reels to suit and two barrows, two bedchairs, oh gawd, stop now... There's still more to say!

I saw this in NCB, and decided it is a topic for main discussion as not everyone (meaning me) regularly go into Non Carp Banter, so I moved it, leaving a link to its new position. I've made the point that as anglers and as people, society as a whole, we are targeted with advertising and marketing of things we don't need, and fishing tackle of most disciplines is the same; products to 'make life easier', that frequently take away personal innovation or make it that everyone is doing the same. Fishing can be cheap and simple, a hook attached to the line with enough weight to get it where we need to cast to, simple barbel, chub and roach fishing, and either a float or rod tip to indicate a take. That is as simple as it gets, BUT, you can't watch a float or rod tip constantly for hours or days at a time. This brings us to our need for bite indication, a buzzer or audible alarm. Tackle has developed, rods that could only cast 50yards back in the 1960's have been superceded by rods that will cast hundreds of metres, and obviously the cost has increased. Reels that could only hold 200metres of line, more modern gears and the baitrunner, or Bite and Run. In alternative disciplines from carp fishing, sea fishing may work out 'cheaper', possibly because some fish may be saving us food money, as well as being leisure, although I admit lug and rag is expensive unless you dig it yourself. In terms of waters, many are overpriced; clubs, day ticket even syndicate waters. I can't justify £25 per night to fish a day ticket lake, nor can I justify £235 for the local club (including night ticket) when my syndicate is £500. There's more to say, but I'll save a few thoughts for further discussion...

You're welcome. There were some massive bream in the big lake, double figures. The tench fishing in the small lake can be fun as well, especially on the float.

Spent a lot of time on GAPS waters over the years, I can go back to 1984! Causeway, lovely lake, but hard work for carp. The sound of the A14 always seems to do my head in. Alderson, nice venue, the big lake can be crowded, and more than 5 carp anglers it will be cutting each other off. I used to prefer the intimacy of the small lake. I never fished the canal. On both lakes the carp can be caught on floaters at times.

That's the Solar buzzer bars with the goalpost adaptors, so I can use either pod or sticks. With the ground being so soft sticks work. Had to keep the tips up, still a lot of weed about.

You might find this interesting:

I googled it, 3552 I might actually have been bored enough myself to play with the mathematics so came up with 3000.

I believe that 1pint of maggots is 3000 grubs for some reason, I've not counted them, but now I might have to, to be sure. I've seen it both ways, a couple of mates were fishing a lake in winter for roach, baiting up with half a pint of maggots in small swimfeeders and getting 'plagued' by carp disturbing the swim. A 20lb carp takes a while to land on a size 16 hook and 2.6lb hooklink to 5lb mainline on a feeder rod. Then as B B says, other places really respond to heavy baiting. Spodding in maggots and fishing PVA bags of them over the top. Not my favourite method but a couple of pole anglers at Suffolk Water Park match lakes were fishing massive pole floats and continually firing in maggots over the float. It may be prolific but they were catching some fish to double figures.

Jim Shelley size...

We grow old and grey disgracefully... Imagine the children of today who don't experiment to find out why or whether an idea works, but simply follow it slavishly from Nash, Korda, Tom Dove, or Elliot Greys social media page...

I do remember you with no eyebrows... Did you end up pencilling them back on? Didn't see pink reels or rods back then! I seem to remember someone did some DPM green and brown alarms, can't remember who though.

By live bait I take it you mean maggots or worms. Saying that I've heard of carp eating small gudgeon or silver fish targeting perch or pike, along with deadbaits. I've rarely fished maggots specifically for carp, although I have put maggots in my groundbait for them. My winter baits tend to be boilies or sweetcorn. Normally I've fished the water all through and the fish are eating my boilies. It will also depend on the water.

Must admit I've been on army surplus combat trousers in olive green, DPM or MTP for years. Some of my olive green ones have faded, but not ripped on brambles and the like. In fact the only rips have come when they are worn so thin after around 10years old. It was information on the Combat Pro clothing I was after more than anything. As I said above, and before, most of my clothing stuff comes from either army surplus or Hoggs of Fife. Not found anything close from a fishing tackle brand.

Just had a couple of interesting adverts appear on my Facebook feed, does anyone know anything about Combat Pro clothing and the streetwear trousers? https://coral-clay.com/products/combatpro-defender-jacket?_pos=1&_sid=f545427af&_ss=r https://coral-clay.com/products/combatpro-defender-set?_pos=3&_sid=f545427af&_ss=r https://coral-clay.com/products/urban-cargo-streetwear-trousers?_pos=2&_sid=96121b9ec&_ss=r

@newmarket might be the person to ask. He did used to live nearby I believe

I used to use special shaped ones particularly as hookbaits, avoiding round ones the same size as my freebies on the hook. Glugged cubes or larger baits that stood out meant I never mixed my baits up.

Post it on Facebook and the male and female Karen's will accuse you of racism. I pointed out that economic migrants were being housed first to a local councillor, who I actually knew, and got unfriended on Facebook. He didn't physically speak to me for 5years. I'll stop there, this is a new purchase thread, not a rant at the iniquities, rights and wrongs of migration. I've bought another 20kg of RH KMG in both 15 and 20mm. I found it more consistent for takes than Infusion and the Infusion is currently not available, so it's an easy choice. I also added a kilo of Monster Crab 20mm boilies for chub and barbel. More PVA bags, leads and bits on the same order. I think that the winter will be fishing over small amounts of boilies with KMG and the dreaded pink pop-up in my favourite flavour as well as using up my pink Infusion pop-ups.

The housing system is screwed. Local authorities have taken away many homeless units, for other purposes. In Ipswich the big homeless unit on Woodbridge Road was converted into an offshoot of the hospital. One of the others was turned into private housing, no local authority accommodation. The hotels that were for British homeless, don't ask, I'll get accused of racism. I spent a year sofa surfing, and 6 months living out of a backpack in a tent. It wasn't the local authority that picked me up, it was a charity. When the local authority eventually offered me a flat, the first one was in an awful state as it stood, in a very rough area. Cracked glass in the double glazed windows, concrete floors that were pitted and electric wires hanging out of boxes. This was the state I was expected to take it in, and make it liveable myself. I'm not fussy, but safe would be nice!

If what you are doing is still working, keep on doing it. My gradual changes would be to fish slightly further away from the islands, basically until takes stop. Increase the 'dissolvable' or soluble items in the bag, so faster breakdown pellets, or even powdered groundbait. When bites stop start fishing different areas, to find the fish. There are often specific features that the carp hole up in year after year. It could be snags, near drop-offs, dead weed, even by the rushes. Carp don't always stay or even live over the winter in the deepest water. I've seen carp holed up in the rushes in 3feet of water where the maximum depth of the lake is 6 or 7 feet deep. They didn't want to be in the clear silty bottom. The lakebed around the rushes was absolutely filled with bloodworm. Nazeing Meads has depths down to 20feet, my winter catches were nearly all in 6feet of water. My approach changes depending on whether I am fishing a water as a 'campaign' or as a one-off. I don't change my rigs, or my bait. I use less bait, I don't normally feed as much, although I still bait up when i leave. I don't tend to use many particles in winter, my exception is sweetcorn; carp love sweetcorn, it's rich in Lysine, and can provoke a take when boilies just aren't working. If it is a campaign then it is the same bait I've been using and feeding all the year so far, although one rod (out of 3) is often fished with a high attract bait, usually my Garlic Spice pink pop-up. If it is a one-off trip I do tend to recast around regularly with various high attract baits until I've found the fish. For further trips, I start where I left off or caught.

Funny, but not funny...

Treated my 10year old Solar pod to a new bag as the old one is splitting. My alarms and indicators will all fit in as well

Oh believe me, I try to do my bit for the environment and I don't take the immediate environmentally friendly statement of a product or technology as fact. The truth is that some 'green' technologies are just as damaging but its not obvious. I save my batteries after use, and take them to the recycling ♻ bin after use, my soft plastic goes to the supermarket recycling. As @Golden Paws has said, rechargeable batteries have an unreliability issue, the charge does not last, so it is use the best battery available. For my alarms, my Duracell batteries are currently on a year, it would be longer, but I bought new alarms in August 2022. My Energizer camera batteries are on 6months, my Petzl headlight batteries are on a year. My rechargeable headlight had to be charged after 4hours.

Back up again, a Carpology article by Bill Cottam https://www.carpology.net/article/features/carping-allegedly-october-23/

I'm not sure new technology rechargeable batteries are more friendly to the environment! Mining lithium, cobalt, chromium, and other rare metals? Here's something for you, I use power banks to recharge my phone and my tablet when I'm fishing, so no problem with rechargeable batteries, however, the 3 power packs, between them only last 4 days. The phone battery is used up faster when phone signal is low and it struggles to pick up. It is not like they are cheap power banks as one is strong enough to jump start a car! Convert the shorter battery life to alarms, your power bank is now being used for 3rd purpose. A fish is at risk if the battery has died. I've used rechargeable batteries in alarms, I have a home charger that recharges PP3, AAA'S and AA's, all of which I use in both camera, torches and alarms. Again, battery life is limited. Cold weather and rechargeable batteries don't mix well. Rechargeable batteries have a life, before the battery dies. We seem to advance technology without thinking of the actual ramifications, moving too fast.

I use my local shops as much as possible, Birds and Breakaway on the north and west side of Ipswich, Markhams if I need anything heading east. If they don't have or can't get the items I want then it will be online or personally to Johnson Ross and Tackle Box. I'd much rather not go to Angling Direct.