ouchthathurt

I found the avid and Gardner ones to be pretty good, the Nash unleaded leader is very thin and I found it fiddly to splice but it’s another option mate

I find that down here in the south east, they usually start waking up about now. Personally, I look for signs from nature to know when the “right time” is, I look for the first buds on trees, when the days start to lengthen out, snow drops starting to bud, spring lambs etc. It might seem daft, but I find that when the trees first start budding, that’s a good natural sign. Waters that are shallower (hopefully with good sunlight to warm it up) usually wake up sooner, they seem to react to rising temps quicker. I’ve got 3 waters that I keep tabs on, the lake that’s got max depths of 6ft is already producing fish, I had 5 out in 4hrs on Monday. The 2nd lake is only 2 acres, with depths of up to 9ft, but it’s very sheltered and doesn’t get much sun this time of year, it’s quite dark and dingy and hasn’t produced a fish in months. The last water has depths of 18-20ft and usually doesn’t regularly produce fish until mid March - beginning of April. It’s slower to warm up. Yet this year, after a stocking of 15 carp, it’s done half a dozen bites over the last few weeks, which is against the norm, we think the new fish have spurred the old stock into having a munch. Simple way to know if your lake has woken up is to fish it really, but when I see the hours lengthening out, blossom buds on trees and bushes starting to open out, I feel more confident. I think the increasing light hours wake them up, although cold deep water can keep them more sluggish longer then carp in shallower water.

That’s just catch and release at its best nick! 😁 good result mate, well done

Any joy?

You’ll do it mate, it’s all about the willpower!

Many thanks all, just to recap the quick session, I got to the lake about 0920, had a quick mooch about, just had a really good feeling about the swim I chose, the wind was trickling into it and it was quite mild, there was some bubbling in the silt about 6-8ft off the reeds and you could see the reed stems knocking fairly regularly. The swim I chose gave me the best angle onto a snag tree buffered by large reed-beds. I used helicopter rigs made up of Nash heli kits to tungsten tubing. 3 oz leads with trig-hammers size 6 to 8” 20lb Esp striptease two tone in brown, fished as a blowback rig. First fish came fairly quickly, and fought quite hard for a little one, it partially straightened the hook, second take was missed, the hook point had turned over on the strike, so tied up new hooklinks swapping the trig-hammers for wide gape barbless in size 4. All hook holds were solid in the bottom lip, all about 1/2” back. After every bite, I put a handful of bait out over each rod, plus pinged out half a dozen every 8-10mins one by one - this produced a bite within seconds of them hitting the surface. Ran out of bait after doing 2/3rd of a kilo, I didn’t bring the whole kg as I thought I would end up with some left over which I don’t like re-freezing once defrosted. I was fishing up against the snag tree with the L rod and up against the reeds with the R rod. 4 bites came to the R rod. Fished in 3-4ft of water on silt. Packed up just after 1pm and headed home.

Well as we used to say in the army mate, “at least they can’t make me pregnant” unless you happen to be female I suppose...

Deep breaths mate, deep breaths! This will all be over soon, hopefully!

Shame that the fly tippers are out... just chucked over the fence by the lake entrance, left something with their address though... oops! That’s with the bailiff now... for me it home time!

Carp no5 of 6 runs, that’s it I’m out of bait! Fished from 10-1, so well happy with that, no monsters but it’s broken the 2021 duck. this one beat me right up, had to chase it down the bank with a landing net and unhooking mat over my shoulder!

Carp no4, I’m popping the barbless hook out in the net and letting them go, rather than bank them as it’s pretty mucky and slippery in this swim. This one probably scraped double figures. I’m looking at having to pack up soon, I’ve done all my bait bar a handful, that’s about 2/3 of a Kg since 10am. It’s raining, (I haven’t got a brolly!) I’m soaked through but still!

Carp no3 7-9lb (ish) unhooked in the net. 3rd fish from 4 runs so far, bumped one fish off and found the hook point turned over. Was using trig-hammers, now switched to fox wide gapes as I’m having to hit and hold, fishing to reeds on the other side.

Carp no2 ripped off as I placed the bobbin, 6-7lbish. Unhooked in the net.

First blood! 7-9lb (ish) common, unhooked in the net.

I’m on the bank, rods out, gentle warm breeze drifting into this bay, had a few liners... fingers crossed!

This is an excellent point... motivation is extremely important! Lol!

Every journey starts with a first step mate. When I left the army, I wasn’t in a good place, wracked with PTSD, several physical wounds/injuries that caused issues, I was smoking 30-40 a day, drinking 6-8 pints + a hip flask sized bottle of vodka a day and taking far too many prescription painkillers a day, I ate maybe one meal every other day and dropped to 7 stone. I ended up in hospital with repeated pancreatitis, I got taken on by SSAFA, underwent CBT, was told by my therapist to start going carp fishing again! I then met my now wife, I gave up smoking, switched to vape, (which I still do) gave up alcohol, (last drink 2016) went to drug rehab and kicked the painkillers (I took more opiates daily then a long term heroin addict) which took 18 months, put on 5+ stone and sorted my life out. In fact, during lockdown, I went up to 14stone, I’m back at 12.5st which is ideal. I started walking everywhere and doing light workouts, the increased weight and muscle-mass supports the physical injuries to the point I can cope without any painkillers whatsoever. Now planning to cut the vape down, then drop it all together, but baby steps! I wish you much luck guys, just take it a day at a time!

There are loads of hidden gems in health food shops and supermarkets. I often look at baits I would use regularly that were brought from Tesco’s (other supermarkets are available...) that were cheap, easy to use and did the goods. Chick peas soaked in whiskey was a cracking bait, I still buy egg white powder from the baking aisle, back in the day, a lot of boilie ingredients came from health food suppliers, baby milk formula, muscle building powders etc, we are spoilt with our ready formulated base mixes these days!

When’s the book/DVD out? “Elmocarp Inc” lol! Can I pre-order a copy?? (Signed preferably) if I want to subtly mash up some bait on the bank, I reach for my trusty boilie smasher... otherwise known as a mallet!* Now THATS modern carp fishing! (* I don’t really!!)

Yes, I believe that’s how it works!

Well looking on metcheck, I can expect sunshine and clouds with 11c temps, I’m feeling optimistic about my chances.

That would be my concern, the boiling process could negate any of the vitamins and minerals found in the additive, you may be able to use egg albumin to firm it up and keep boiling times to a minimum, this may help protect the colostrum. There are probably other vitamin and mineral compounds that would be easier to use. It’s worth a try though, milk proteins and milk products are obviously successful!

Many thanks mate, I’m just praying to the weather gods now!

I don’t know what i would have done without fishing, especially after the ptsd diagnosis. I’m itching to get out on the bank again, just seen the weather forecast for next week, it’s going to be mild with temps around 12 degrees... gonna get out Monday!

My go to curve type pattern is the Nash fang x pattern, they are sharp out of the packet and I just give the points a polish rather than trying to sharpen the granny out of them, I do worry about making the points more brittle. I have used the Korda kurves in size 4 for Ronnie rigs, but regardless of wether I catch on them or not, they are discarded at the end of each session as I’ve noticed that they don’t hold a point either. I’ve not tried the kamakura sharpened patterns, so I couldn’t comment on those patterns.