kevtaylor

I'm honestly finding Met Office totally different to the BBC, can't understand why, MET Office saying next to no rain this week, BBC says raining daily. MET Office is the one thats proving to be more accurate at the moment, or it has been on my trips so far, strange! Unless my data for BBC is not refreshing from when I looked days before?

Yeah they are entertaining for sure, the canal seems really shallow. I liked a lot of their older vids, pure lure fishing and setting hooks like pro's cough cough noddies! 🤣👍

I know we're carp, but gotta get one of these from the Snagged Bro boys 🤣

Yes I do really like the natural banks and swims it is a stunning complex, however access road is very bad and parking areas and paths also totally natural which isnt good at all in the wet. Hard to get the balance right I guess. I hope your lake doesnt look too managed for you, remember it grows back pretty damn quick. I do take a lot more pictures of the lake whilst at this complex so I obviously prefer the natural look over man made swims. Our 2nd trip to Italy we found the owner had ripped out all the far bank snags we expected to fish to, looked shocking, ruined the trip and ruined the bay area since, so I know how you must be feeling. 👎

I find the various liquids preserve the bait as they are salty. If I put the food source glug and some liquid krill on the boilies a couple of days before the session in a bucket they defrost, take some glug in and last for ages, I left them in the sealed bucket between session by accident and they were absolutley perfect still 2 weeks later. I don't air dry baits any more as that seems a bit pointless, I've also thrown in frozen baits and had no worries about that - why would you they defrost in the water.

I've got the Powa Pacs Atom which is good but expensive, bought for the plug socket and bait boat charging on the bank. However as has been said you cant beat Anker for a good reliable power bank, got one of those, highly recommended. 👍 Anker is a good brand full stop

No I didn't know, I suspected it but said to myself 2 x MK2 versions 'Nah can't be' - best thing I've seen during the investigation is a photo from someone with the older barrow and the new drop in bag, it clearly doesn't fit or open out fully, but they seemed happy enough to think it's bang on and post pics. Classic 🤣🤣🤣

So you know there are 2 x Carp porter Mk2 versions, pre and post 2017. Pre 2017 doesn't accept the drop in bag it's not clearly stated, or wasn't clear to me. Having a job to return it now 🤬👎

Another weekend blank, racking them up. Left what feels like my peg alone (West end, back of the wind) as there were others either side and only one down the windward end but out the way (East end taking a westerly). Did Friday night in one swim and had a couple show over the rods at dawn but far more were showing in a vacant swim round the corner, so I planned to move midday get the rods in place early afternoon once it'd gone quiet. I knew the swim a little and placed rigs all around the edges of the plateau with as little disturbance as possible. Was absolutely gutted to wake up and nothing showing, just one tiny liner, area seemed dead and noticeably colder than the day before. That's carp fishing in spring, never kind to me, onto next time. Oh and pushing that barrow through floods and sticky clay holes full of random brick ends is not the one and will finish me off pretty damn soon, where's that power wheel 🙏🤣

Ahh another - leave the top bead outside the hopper?

Is it worth sticking a PVA nugget around the bead, not sure if thats gonna solve one issue and cause another tbh, might be worth looking at though

Just received my Drop in bag for the Mk2 Wide Boy Barrow and it doesn't fit (or I cannot see how it would) despite my barrow being in the description of suitable barrows. Totally baffled tbh, are there 2 different Mk2 Wide Boys? Mines got a bar right in the middle of where the bag would sit. When I got the barrow it had a bag but you clipped it on from underneath, this seemed much quicker and I like the barrow to fold flat in transit so leaving the bag on doesn't allow that, so I took it off. Thank fully they sent the wrong colour so it's going back regardless, miffed though coz I wanted one, might have to be the 2 bags either side of the wheel. Anyone got any knowledge on this drop in bag issue?

Yes far too expensive to warrant that price for me, although I paid it lol Good luck with the bait making 👍

It's the huge chunks for me, found them difficult to screw on without feeling that they were going to split, too inconsistent. Odd shapes are the best - when we got the rolling wrong we ended up with pillow shapes - these were the best IMO

Worth doing if it gives you extra confidence, granules will give a better and more consistent result 😎👍

All hookbaits work, but are they better than other hookbaits and worth a premium price? Impossible to say isn't it, I felt I believed the hype as usual and felt foolish after. 🤷‍♂️ Almost £20 for some chunks of cork and paste, not convinced.

Thought I recognised some of the bait names in this thread. Got sucked in by the hype around these baits, bought some and instantly thought they looked rubbish - haven't given them the time of day tbh and won't be, massive chunks of cork, badly hand rolled, just over hyped, over priced. Would I have caught more on these than my bait matching pop-ups and NS1's, can't see it.

Sell stuff we no longer need - crazy talk! Dont know anything about the reels but sounds important, to be filed under angling archive items/spares, coz you never know and can justify it to anyone who asks 😁

I hope so the lake is 4ft up at least on last years drought level, the lowest swim is still over a foot under water and no overflow to speed things up a bit. 👎 I was seriously worried about the lack of rain last summer as all the ressies etc were incredibly low, now they're overflowing, happy days!

Ordered a power barrow conversion kit for my Mk2 wide boy, might keel over long before it arrives (10-12 weeks), pushing through sodden ground getting stuck, unloading/re-loading - going again is about killing me off, although each week seems a little easier.

Current multi version, 25lb stiff end section to semi stiff braid.

Well if we do meet and you seen me catch, it was a Tench that got weeded up for 10 mins, so exciting looked 10lb but went 9.14lb - buzzing mate, get on the multi, spinner, up and down rigs 👍🤣

Whilst I cant deny it's a great rig, all that extra metalwork and sleeve put me right off, My multi uses none of it, just a hook screw and putty and stripped braid turns as good as any swivel for the joint part IMO. I've taken to using 25lb stiff material for the hook loop keeps the hook in place and as doubled over acts like a hook extension. You've also got to consider the ptfe coated swivels coz normal ones rust and dont turn great after a while. The mechanics and shape of the rig are exactly the same, but if anything you can get a multi even lower.

Multi - used nothing else for 5 years - IMO better than a spinner in several ways 👍