salokcinnodrog

Yes Mate.

Boot was on the other foot today at Lemon's Hill on Alton. Dave had 2 roach, I ended up with 12 roach, 1 skimmer and 1 ruffe which took double red maggot and a dendrobena

My bait bill is different every year, dependant on where I fish. This year so far has been cheap, around 5kilos of Ballistic B, some sweetcorn and a fair bit of bread crumb for Method feeders. Earith was around £75 a month on base mix so around £1000 on bait for the year, although that was 15years ago now. Brackens was around £30 a month of field test boilies, which I paid around 50% off retail price. I would much rather spend money on bait than tackle. My biggest season outlays are usually tickets and bait, I only buy tackle if I do need an update or upgrade.

As Kev mentions, there can be a spot within a spot. I have had rods very close to each other, yet one rod produced all the action, again the left hand rod from 3. The left rod was cast to a showing fish, the middle around 2/3 metres away. It was only the left hand rod that produced 4 carp, nothing on the others. I've seen carp entering an area, always coming in from a particular direction. If you create a baited area it would be the first rod they come to that produced, take that away the next in the line would go as they worked along. Not every water, or even swim is the same. On Brackens, a swim named Suicide, the gravel bar threequarters across, fish came up the bar anywhere along from the weed and trough behind it. Yet the margins to the left, the fish always swam along the margin (when an angler was in the swim) from the left, never from the right. On the Central, if you were lucky enough to get multiple takes (a rarity), the fish tended to work their way along the main bars from the North or South. The first rod they found was what you got takes on. Even though the South was joined to the Central, there was no pattern as to where the fish approached from, and it was the same fish able to swim through both lakes.

Lemons Hill on Alton today, Big Dave managed to find a couple of large skimmer bream, I ended up with 7 small roach

Had a couple of 2lb roach a couple of years ago, but summer the average size goes down. Such a large water the fish can be difficult to find.

Alton Water today, and my biggest fish from a catch of 40 odd roach. Dave in the next swim had a total of 3. All fish came to an open ended groundbait feeder, with red maggots on the hook. I played around and went to a 16 with double red maggot, where Dave stuck with a 14. I stil had a number of sucked maggots, lost fish and missed bites, even on the smaller hook.

Sky enjoys it, she gets a walk along the river, we take one rod and net between us and take turns for fish, often one feeding and smuggling Sky the occasional floater, the other casting for the fish. The other can then do the netting if required. Dave's fish came on a new spot we'd not seen chub in before last trip, and was a positive take on his first cast, that fish was actively looking for biscuits. Mine came from over the gravel behind my shoulder, the largest of the shoal as well.

Couple of hours chub fishing with Dave, all on floating dog biscuits

As long as it is aged properly in the case of wine corks. 😉 Not that I could ever of thought of using a sliver of a used wine bottle cork with fake or real maggots superglued to it for pop-ups or zigs...😖😉

I would avoid fluorocarbon as a hooklink because it sinks more and faster than mono, most definitely heavier than water. I would actually use a surface or neutral fishing monofilament like Drennan Double Strength, Drennan Fly Leader.

Just under the tree to the left is where I had my first carp from Earith, and the same night my first 20. The first carp was an absolute wood carving double figure common, and the 20 was a beaut.

The only place I prebaited on the main open part was the margins on the path between Pingrees, the rushes at the lake junction, and the brambles by the old brick pump station. Most did go in the island section. I did see fish swim between the two sections, so I was sure that in the islands and open water they were finding the bait.

I went through a stage of carrying a whole bag of various pop-ups; Scopex, Monster Crab, Squid and Octopus, Strawberry Jam, Chocolate Malt, Pineapple Nbutyric, Garlic Spice, Tutti-Frutti, Aniseed and Bunspice On almost every water with one exception it was the big three that produced. I got to the stage I found I only needed my own recipe Garlic Spice, Pineapple, Plum.

Those guns do die quickly, especially if the mix is too dry, the caulking guns are the same, I have killed a number with thick mastic or putty. As much as I hated spending the money, https://www.anglingdirect.co.uk/gardner-deluxe-sausage-gun When it comes to rolling tables, don't bother with the longbase, just use the standard rolling table. I found it faster than the longbase.

As much as I agree with any prebait is a benefit; at Nazeing baiting up the inlet sluice was a waste of time and effort, we didn't want them to stay in there, and if people prebaited there as well as the daphnia they could stay in a tiny area for months at a time. On Earith I tended to bait up the whole lake, various areas, so the fish got used to bait all over. Prebaiting one spot what do you do if when you get down next time if your swim is taken by someone else? There are some who will go on your work, or it could be a genuine accidental choice.

On my runs water this year bright yellow pineapples and pink plum were the main pop-up baits that produced fish, even though the water is quite murky. Last year on Nazeing, very clear water, even brown baits were found in water as deep as 15ft by tufties. Now I've explained that, for years my favourite pop-up colour has been a brown/red colour , even fading to washed out in the garlic spice flavour of my own. It produced as part of a snowman, (over a food source bottom bait) or as an individual on its own in numbers of waters. Possibly because it does work so well, I have complete faith in it almost everywhere; in fact last year it produced most fish on Bromeswell, although this year I did not use them for some strange reason.

I do use standard shop bought liquid food colourings, and have done for over 20 years. The better ones are those used in sweet and cake making, the taste is palatable. As the food colour is liquid, they tend to be soluble, so gradually wash out, although red and yellow wash out faster than blue or green. You will also find you need more colouring than you think you would, probably about half a 25ml bottle for 4-6 eggs, but play around with a few mixes until you get it right.

I would be looking at Solar buzzer bars, they do three rod bars in fixed or adjustable. The P1 adjustables are really nice looking in stainless. Years ago I had the fixed 3 rod bars, they took some serious abuse, lasted for years, although on the centre I fitted a blank as I was only fishing 2 rods most of the time.

I know that around a few of the mills when FMS had some of the bank rights there were some barbel caught, but FMS members kept their catches very tight lipped.

Around the chub shoals the biggest I have seen is maybe 12ozs, but I reckon in some of the deeper weirpools and bridge flows there are some better fish. I was watching some of the winter match weights last season, the perch weights from the Bramford and Sproughton areas didn't show many big fish.

You can add it to groundbait, or just use it neat. 50/50 is just a cheap carrier mix mainly for attractor baits.

I keep going back to it, but at Nazeing in a winter session I had 4 carp; three were 20's, and one was a 17lb mirror. I thought the mirror was the prettiest and enjoyed catching that the most. At Ardleigh, the first fish I caught was 13lb, a heavily scaled mirror on my second session, that meant more than the second which was a 20.

Every fish is worth a smile, a 5 is worth an ear to ear goofy grin.😉😖😆