ouchthathurt

the lead that is good to use is a "tri-lobe" lead - they do not sink as fast due to their shape, and "plane" down to rest on the silt. pop up foam is a good addition, as it will suspend the hookbait above the silt for the length of time it takes for the foam to dissolve - where it will sink gently to rest on the silt rather than be pulled in deep behind a deep diving lead. - longer hooklinks are important in silt to preven the ame thing happening. ouchthathurt

many thanks. ouchthathurt

i dont see the difficulty in tying it, agreed, i just dont see the point of it. my rigs work fine, so i tend not to want to change what works for me. each to their own at the end of the day, so long as we are all happy with what we do, then its all good. ouchthathurt

i used to tie a length of dental floss to the eye of the lead and then the other end of the floss about 3ft up the line, so i had a length of dental floss running tight parralell to the line for the last few feet, then cast on tight line so when the lead sank into the silt, it would stain the dental floss so i could see the depth of the silt and make sure my hook links were long enough... i find that the problem with fishing over silt is that it has to be the right silt, not the thick black stinking rotting stuff as the carp do tend to avoid this as it does not hold any foodstuffs the light, fluffy "ouderless" silt is what your aiming for - looking for carp fizzing over it will give the game away, particles like hemp and pellet are good for silt as it has the carp rooting for hours looking for the particles, with dry boilies, when they adsorb the water when immersed, they can take on the flavour of the silt, which can make them unnattractive - so if you soak them in a booster, or better still the lake water or the water you used to boil the hemp, until they cannot adsorb anymore water, then they will hold their flavour better and resist the taste and smell of silt better as the baits cannot adsorb anymore water - plus they appear washed out which for pressured carp can be a real edge. shaun harrison called them "rehrydrates" and used them to good effect at the mangrove, a lake with metres of silt in places! the use of PVA nuggets on the hooklink to suspend the hook is a good idea, i used to buy old 1-2oz (lead) sea leads and lead sarsely bombs and hammer my leads flat, then rough the edges up so they sank slower, so they were less likely to bury deep into the silt, then by using the pva nuggets, the hookbait would remain suspended until the pva dissolved, then the hookbait would gently sink and rest on the silt, especially if using critically balanced baits. naturals such as maggots are good over bloodworm beds found in silt, i find braided hooklinks such as silkworm the best for use in silt, with running leds, but not inlines as they bury nose first inot the silt and drag the hooklink in with it. also dont forget the margins! i often find it easier to find clear, hard spots in the margins, and all carp love to explore and feed in the margins. also an edge if everybody else is casing out to the clay spots in the middle..., hope this helps. ouchthathurt

another "fashionable rig then... can see what knorty is saying, the KD rig is designed to make the rig act "point heavy" so as it is being sucked into the carps mouth boilie first, the hook is "supposed" to hang so the hook is near-upside down? this would mean the hook is hanging as a grappling hook almost, so if a point heavy hook was to be dragged accross the outside of the carps mouth on its way in, then it is conceivable that it could hook up on the outside of the carps mouth. after all the hook is following the boilie as it is propelled out of its mouth. so surely its conceivable that the hook will act the same regardless of which way its being sucked/blown as it is being forced in a particular direction by the propulsion of the boilie. the KD rig is designed to be point heavy - so the point is designed to drop into the floor of the mouth, and the point to hang low down to snare in the bottom lip, floor of mouth, surely if this action is snaring fish on the way out, as the hook point is hanging so it is the lowest point of the rig, then the same action would be true when it is being sucked in? when the hook point would (perhaps) drag along the chin and hook up. if i'm honest, i couldnt give a monkeys about these so - called wonder-rigs, i find good bait application in the right location is much more important, you can catch a carp that is not there, no matter how hi-tec the rig is, i think the more hi-tec rigs are to catch anglers and make money - in my experience, the more hi-tec the rig is, the more likely it is to fail. i've used the simple silkworm - knotless knot - ESP/JRC hook for years, sometimes with the addition of shrinktube to flip the hook, which has always outfished the complicated hi-tec rigs i've used. i went through a phase where i hadnt been fishing for a while due to work/family commitments. when i got back onto the lake, i struggled to get a fish, so convinced my rigs were at fault, so i trawled the mags and tied up all these complicated wonder-rigs and all i did was get increasingly more confused with each rig change, on the end my confidence was shot, i didnt know what i was doing, what would work, nothing - but i had the best hi-tec in vouge wonder-rig by the mags, so surely that couldnt be it? maybe it was my location? - no, there were carp over my spots, the bait? no it was a bait i had used lots of time in the past to brilliant success, so what was it? i reeled in and looked at my rigs and they were rediculous, shot and tubing and rings and swivels everywhere - but the magazines had raved about these rigs as the next best thing since sliced bread, but in the cold light of day - on the bank in a real life situation, they looked clownlike, cluttered, a useless mess really! so i cut them off, tied up simple knotless knot hair-rigs on silkworm, to simple running rigs, exactly the same rigs i'd started with over 12yrs before - and had been using ever since - as they worked a treat, cast back tothe spots and finally, the alarm went into its warcry - i started to catch again, the bait and location were the same, but the rigs were different, the ironic thing is, if i had looked back to my previous successes on this rig/bait combination, then i should have had the confidence to stick to my guns and ride out the blanks safe in the knowledge that they worked, and worked well, but i fell into the trap of believing that my rigs were at fault and i needed to "upgrade" them to the wonder-rig of the day, which ended up destroying my confidence and doing much more harm than good, that was about 3yrs ago, and i still use the exact same type of rigs now, and have done really well on them wherever i've taken them. its the correct bait application and the correct location that will produce the goods, not the spinning/cutting/blowback/flipper/rythymisadancer rig. in fact, i can think of many occassions when i have been tempted to use more compicated rigs than the situation dictated - because the mags say its the wonder-rig when the simple rig would have been much better - and my catches have suffered as a result. i now refine my basic rigs to suit, silkworm or amnesia - shrinktube or not, and i'm happy with my success rate now. ouchthathurt

sure thing

if i'm honest - no, i used to drive past it a lot and i know of many anglers who raved about it, i can be very fussy at times, when i get a pond in my minds eye, i just have to empty it. broadlands seems to have a good reputation around these parts - as does todber. i'm on a gorgeous small peaceful farm pond with caught fish to mid 20s and uncaught fish to approx 30+ ouchthathurt

do not jest those with the skill and training who know how... hell what do i know? i'm a medic!!! ouchthathurt

yeah your right, i still like to test all my rigs by laying them in the margin beforehand, sometimes we can really overcomplicate matters. theres something that gives you a good feeling when you look at your rig in the margin and it looks good, it really does help. ouchthathurt

i tend to just hair rig my pop ups using a fine mono hair and micro needles, i tend not to worry about pop ups up staying up for 24hrs+ my sessions are only about 6-8hrs long... secondly, a pop up that dont float is a critically balanced bait is it not? i do like to test my pop ups both on casting and on retrieval, to make sure they are still floating. however we do need to be mindful of wether the pop ups are really floating as we would like in the lake - what with all that water pressure bearing down on it. it is easy - and perhaps wrong, to assume the pop up behaves the same way in 10feet of water as it does in 1ft of margins where water pressure is much less. ouchthathurt.

nash, what type of secret bait then? (dont worry i signed the official secrets act along with the UKSF disclosure accord... ) ouchthathurt

thrust and parried there RAF man, i guess i should take my DPM non interservice winners backside and lower my head and slink on out of here... i suppose when i dont have a leg to stand on i sholud back down!!! seriously, well done on the title pal. (choke choke) regards, ouchthathurt

broadlands lake in hants does a forces discount, plus go mid week and get an extra 24hrs free - check their website. ouchthathurt

no worries. ouchthathurt

yeah, buckshole is a chavhole, best avoided i suppose, spoon is on the top of west hill in hastings (i think) best bet is to call the hastings tackleshops and get the details. (was either redfearns or SH tackle) your willing to travel, then maybe getting a cemex ticket and hoofing it up the m25 to kingsmead etc? i used to do the wraysbury trip to from hastings, not too bad from hove - reading area is kingsmead after all, hawkhurst fish farm is an option as well, or else get into hants along he m27, lots of clubs/syndicates that way, best thing i get googling and find what you fancy. i'm in dorset now, so out of touch with sussex scene. ouchthathurt

i take it us army guys are not invited regards, ouchthathurt

where abouts in sussex? i'm originally from hastings, there was always the spoon, which as lotsa swims, carp to nudging 30s and 250quid. lovely looking water. i used to fish buckshole resivior in alexandria park - rough a hell, club ticket, but my fave lake to date... nearly!

i used to hate using pop ups, didnt really see the point, my analagy was if you "came across a plate of chips and one was hovering above the rest, you wouldnt eat it would you?" now recently, looking back, i'd say approx 75% of my 20s and 30s have fallen to pop up presentations. usually fished about 3/4" - 1 1/2" off the bottom, usually on their own or with a light scattering of whole boilies about - i'm a fan of the big boilies approach, yet, for years i hated pop ups. these days, when i put a pop up out, i know that there is a good chance that the bait will be presented over the bottom debris, and that the presentation will suffice until i can suss out the best course of action, indeed when i caught a 27 + 31lb common i was fishing red plum double strength pop ups over pva bags of micro pellets over a large - plain silt bed, now i'm sure the micro pellets didnt last long, either dissolved - eaten by silvers or snk into the silt but the bright red stinking pop ups did the biz(za) twice that night, so they do work. ouchthathurt

There could be your answer, fishing with someone who knows the lake will be of real benefit. your likely to learn more, have a better chance of catching and generally enjoy it more. ouchthathurt

how about broadlands? or try this place - google dairy house farm, Nr Blandford, dorset... (keep it to yourself, its my secret water...) theres whitemoors, in wimourne - there are loads of carp lakes around here - google it ouchthathurt

true, the lakes are maturing nicely, but it is all too "commercial" for me, but the lads are sound, they will make you feel welcome and ensure your on fish best they can.good chance of a nice lump too. if you like this type of place, you'll love todber. they are the best at what they do, but i like my swims hostile! ouchthathurt

you wanna give the lads at todber a call, you need to call them to reserve a spot anyway, its many a time i've gone down there to find the lakes totally jammed up and i've had to settle in on wadmill - plenty of fish caught but when your looking for some dedicated specimin hunting and you end up hemmed in by both sides, well it does deflate you a bit. i tend to stay away from todber these days, it does not really do it for me. although dont let that put you off, i just look for something a little more wild and unknown from my fishing, however if i wanna few runs of a sunday afternoon, then wadmill will more than live up to expectations, scrapper high singles and doubles to put a bend in the rod and raise your confidence. but for me, todber could not be my main water. yet, fishing is all things to all people and all you need to do is look at the phenomenal success todber have had to see how much enjoyment people get from going there, and rightly so, as a fishing resort set up, it really does the job. postcode is DT10 1JB tel 01258820384 www.todbermanor.co.uk do gove them a call, oh and find out the going bait and get on it, although todber do their own boilies, last i went, mach 1 nash readymades were doing the business, so whats what i used to good results, give them a bell, they will help you out they want you to catch after all, so you'll go back!! but i do advise you call in good time to book a swim, i have had to, several times, either go elsewhere or go onto wadmill as i could not get a swim on either of the hayes lakes. the lake i am fishing at the moment is approx 30odd acres, with an unknown number of carp, to unknown size, 20lbers have been landed, no swims, all wild and unkempt, no other anglers, no rules, no bait bans, no fees, no idea what the next run will bring... heaven! ouchthathurt

yes i agree, recently there have been many improvements in fluro technology, i even saw in a magazine to steam your fluro, something a few years ago would've weakened it. i am currently using ultima powercarp fluro as a mainline, its really thin for its strength, reasonable abraision resistance and knot strength, its not too bad, however i do need to contsantly clean the line off. ouchthathurt

if all else fails, go back to the good old trusty amnesia! much cheaper than these modern fluros and seems stronger too, modern fluro is a really delicate material, you need to tie rigs with kids gloves, inturned eyes cause flat spots on the fluro which can really weaken it, as can friction if you tie it too "roughly" or forget to moisten it, and by that i mean "coat it in so much spittle that its dripping off" - i find this keeps the friction down! out turned eyes are brought about as they lessened the acute angle caused by the "no-knot" styles, of which many people were experiencing the same dramas you describe. ouchthathurt

my rigs for this year are the same as last year, and the year before, and before etc - only change rigs if there is a need to - i think they are no longer doing the job. i like to keep things simple, silkworm braid, JRC dave lane hooks, helecopter rigs, leadcore. as for all these wonderrigs out there, well i think they catch anglers more than carp - all these new "spinning-flipper-razor-hooker-30lber rig" well you can keep it, i am always amused how tey are sold as the "only big carp rig" and the rig that will "definiatly catch more big carp" - so if i tie one on it will definiatly catch me a big carp? well only if my location was spot on and my baits are well chosen and there is a big carp feeding in the swim to begin with, it cannot guarantee you will catch a big carp anymore than i can. simple is best, KISS! oucthathurt