yonny

I probs have some pics of inside the Lo Pro. Bear with me buddy.

There is a school of thought that barbed hooks, once penetrated, are locked in place by the barb. Barbless on the other hand can move/slide/rotate during the fight which can lead to tearing and similar associated mouth damage.

Mental innit.... it's know as the Black Common for obvious reasons. Very special fish imo👍

Right, so with the horrible run of losses now behind me it was time to get on with the season ahead. The short sessions I'd been doing were not satisfying me so on this occasion I booked some time off work. Enjoy: So I had a decent sesh the weekend just gone. I'd booked Friday and Monday off as I was so sick of these work overnighters I'd been doing... I just wanted a proper sesh. I turned up Thursday afternoon and had a good look about. I kind of knew the area I fancied and while watching said area I saw a carp jump out.... job done, I'd start here. Went back to the car, grabbed me gear, back to the swim, started setting up, disaster strikes!!! I'd forgotten one of my bags which holds my alarms, rod support, distance sticks, all sorts.... I checked the car and the kit wasn't there which meant I had a 3 hour round trip to go and get it... IDIOT! I took the opportunity to borrow some distance sticks from another member and found my spots/baited up before leaving. The area was exactly how it was last time I was in here, a longer chuck for this water, tight to an absolutely MAHOOSIVE weed bed. I spodded a couple of kilos around the spots and somehow managed to lose a spod as it came off the quick change swivel I use to fix it. I was starting to wonder if this sesh was doomed from the off.... but at least I had a spare spod at home. On the drive home it became obvious that every single road user was for some reason intent on preventing me getting back before darkness. There where also 3 sets of temporary traffic lights that had appeared on the journey. All this during rush hour, I was in bits..... This was not how the sesh was supposed to pan out. Got home, grabbed gear, back to the lake... I arrived in the dark, it must have been about 21:30. Got the rods out OK (although I'm never 100% happy with hitting tight spots in the dark) and decided I'd earned a beer so I drank a couple and had an early night. No more sightings at this point which proved to be a recurring theme, no shows at all after about midday for the duration of my trip. My alarm clock goes off at 04:00 and I'm up and about watching the lake for signs of life. I see nothing until 05:15 when I see 2 carp smash out over the top of the weed bed beyond my spots. The next few hours sees the odd sighting here, there and everywhere but the majority are over this weed bed. It's frustrating I can tell you.... there they are, smashing out between 10 and 20 yards behind my spot. They don't seem willing to come any closer for some reason, clearly enjoying the sanctuary of the weed. There's no way I can fish into this weed, it's savage, no chod or long link would present and even if it did it'd be loss-city. The day goes on and nothing happens but I've seen enough to persevere, they are right there, I just need to think about my approach. I start by changing the position of one rod. I'd had all three over there but it was a little busy tbh so i reduced that to two. Just a couple of spods tight over each rod this time, I'm sure there's loads of bait still there. However, this time I get the throwing stick out and peppered a kg of boilies right into the weed in an attempt to get them on it and draw them out. The third rod goes over to my left where I'd seen a couple of carp top, I find a small but solid spot within catapult distance so whack a bait on there with a couple of pouches of freebies. Again, no sightings in the evening so I assume they're still in the weed. This time I set the alarm for 05:00 and I wake up and watch the weed bed from my sleeping bag. It's still pretty dark but I'm sure I can see activity. In fact, I'm pretty sure I can see a few signs directly over my spot. My thoughts are confirmed when my right hand rod absolutely rips off (which surprised me as I thought the clutches were set pretty tight but this fish disagreed). Into the waders and I hit it. It is absolutely solid in the weed. 10 minutes it takes my to extract it and all that while I'm cursing myself for not fishing completely locked up. When it finally moves I take a couple of steps back to grab the net and that's all it takes for the fish to find another weed bed. You literally cannot take your eye off the ball for second here! Another 5 minutes and I manage to get it moving again and the fight plays out in a more enjoyable manner. A few minutes later it's in the net and I'm staring down at a lovely common carp, a decent fish, over 30 I reckon. I secure the net and get the rod back out. As the sky gets lighter and lighter this common gets darker and darker in colour and I realise which fish it is, one of my targets, and I'm buzzing. I call a mate round and we take some snaps, it's an amazing fish, 100% scale perfect in every way, dark and richly coloured, a truly special carp. It turns a rich gold in the sun and turns black when in the shade, a strange but beautiful hue that I've not seen on any carp before or since. It's weighed at 31+ and we return it to fight another day. Not much happens for the rest of the morning although I can see plenty of fish on the edge of the weed which continues to frustrate me. The sightings slow down as we approach midday. At 11:00 I'm on the phone to a mate who's also fishing, just discussing what we've seen. There I am chatting away when I see the tip of the rod to the left twitch. As I watch the tip slowly pulls round before the alarms goes mental as a fish rips off with my hook bait! Into the waders, I hit it. Now this fight is a bit spesh, I know there's a huge weed bed to my left so march down into it sending the fish the other way into open water. Only one insignificant issue with a small weed bed I didn't realise was there, the fish spends the bulk of the fight charging up and down, left and right, it is not happy... awesome fun and for once I don't feel like I'm a second away from losing it in the weed. As it get's nearer I can see it's a mirror, a grey one, but when I net it I don't recognise it. I secure the net and have a closer look, it's a big fish, slate grey down it's flanks and pure black along it's dorsal, classically shaped, a proper brute of a carp. No wonder it fought so well. A mate walks into the swim, great timing, and we start to do the honours. He doesn't recognise it either and at 35+ we cannot believe we don't know it. The gaffa then shows up (more great timing) and he knows exactly which fish it is; as soon as he mentions its name we click. It's one of the old ones, a proper original, hardly ever mentioned as it's hardly ever caught, a very rare fish, not the kind you can really target, and as you can imagine I'm well happy. It's a stunner for sure and completes a brace of 30s!!! Pics done we send her back..... two special ones on the trot.... buzzing! Nothing happens for the rest of the day so I have an early night. Alarm clock goes off at 5 am again but this time it's not feeling so good, the sky is clear, the sun is bright, the wind has died.... I see a couple of fish but activity is at a minimum. It get's hot so I wander about looking for something to fish for. I find a few carp in a bay and get them taking floaters but the birds come and wipe me out and the fish disappear. I know the conditions are set to improve big time, rain on the evening and night, so I decide to stay that last night and hopefully capitalise with another fish. The rain arrives and it's off to bed after a long and uneventful day. It's now the morning and even though I told myself I'm having a lie in by 05:00 I'm perched next to the rods watching the water, bite time approaching. It is looking perfect, overcast, drizzly, moody.... and I'm watching carp over the weed bed getting closer and closer to my spots. By 06:00 I'm convinced it's gonna happen and I've got the waders on in preparation. By 07:00 I'm at my wits end, literally sitting next to the rods in my waders, staring at them, willing one to go off, when the middle rod lets out a single beep. The bobbin twitches a fraction of an inch, I look at the tip and it's just pulled down slightly. That'll do me I think to myself as I hit it. It's a carp and it rucks like hell. Into the weed bed it goes, everything is solid. I'm used to that now though and I'm happy to to extract it over the course of 5 or so minutes. Once it's free it kites over to my right and I have to go on a wander down the margin to keep up with it. Another great fight and I'm praying I land this to make the extra night worth it. Eventually it goes in the net and I can see it's another grey mirror but with a few scales dotted here and there, it looks familiar but I can't quite put my finger on it. It's another good fish and for a second I think it's a hat-trick of 30s but then have second thoughts. I'm on my own now so self-takes it is. When I get it on the bank I take one look at it's tail and recognise it; it's the big tailed mirror I caught last year (in my September '16 catch report). It's a little down in weight at 28 lb 8 oz but it's looking pukka, and another original to boot. I take some snaps and put it back a happy man. It starts to warm up and the activity slows so I pack up ready for home. It's been a long and tricky session but ultimately a successful one. Two special fish and a high 20 to cap it off. It's the first time I've spent that long in a single swim for years, in fact last year I did 30 nights and didn't stay in the same swim for more than one night in that whole time. My horrible run of 4 losses on the trot are now behind me and this weekends fish were nailed so confidence is back. Can't wait to get back down in a couple of weeks.

I would always make cork ball pop ups over those made with a dedicated pop up mix. The buoyancy cannot be matched imo.

You'll be almost dead opposite the Evening Pitch there? See anything spooky?

I am loving these posts mate. That is ridiculous↓↓↓↓↓↓↓↓↓. What a fish, and a fantastic shot too.

We've all been there at some point lol.

Very. Titanium brolly pegs and carbon storm poles are my latest weight saving conquests😂

Decent enough. What kind of bedchair was it buddy?

Confidence is everything in carp angling mate. If you believe in yourself you can make it happen. When it comes to approach i.e. tactics and strategy, just apply logic. It's too easy to mess your head up with weird and wonderful ideas when normally it's the very basics that catch the fish. A half decent bait on a half decent rig in the right place at the right time will do the job. It's my 2nd fave. My fave being "it only takes one bite", which also rings true time and time again.

It was just so weedy, these things happen. Three of those losses were hook pulls and one was an altercation with my other rods. Of course I was racking my brain after 4 on the trot but I was using hinge rigs which are difficult to beat in weedy situations imo. I ended up changing nothing and although I did lose one more fish later that year, what I landed more than made up for it as you will see in due course😀

This. The way I see it if you find fish and do everything as best you can, sooner or later you'll catch something. After all, every dog has his day 😂

For sure. I would go with the Daiwa simply as they are so well established as a manufacturer.

Realistically you're not upgrading mate. Assuming the Wychwood's still work you're not going to gain anything with the BW or the Soniks. I'd save up some cash and go for a genuine upgrade later.

So looking back at my catch reports it reminds me that it doesn't always go to plan. Over the course of that July I have an unforgivable 4 losses on the trot as the weed goes mental. I've not bothered pasting those reports here so we skip to the session where it starts to come good again. Only a small fish here but a very cool looking one imo. The report is short and reading it back, I should probs have had more this weekend. Fished the syndi this weekend. Found a few carp in a particularly weedy swim. Spent a while scaring them away with about a million casts trying to hit these tiny, tiny spots but some of them stayed as I had a couple of bites on Saturday morning. The first @ 06:00 I lost to a hook pull (4th loss on the trot 😣) but 09:30 saw a 24.08 lb mirror grace the net . Not the biggest but it was a proper minter, classically shaped with burnt auburn flanks, a black head and loads of tiny pin head scales dotted all over the place. Saturday night saw another 2 million casts getting the rods on these tiny spots but it was looking fantastic coming into bite time; liners galore from 03:00 onwards. Unfortunately with no cloud in the sky and the brightest of sunshine 06:00 saw all activity stop (where I was expecting the bites to start) and by 08:00 they were drifting about on the top in the shallow bays. So a tricky weekend tbh but I'm just happy to get a fish on the bank after a truly disastrous run of losses. I'm back next weekend so hopefully my new found luck will continue.

Same as I'd approach any water. Boilies/pellets until the carp tell me I need to change something.

You beat me to it, I was just about to type that lol.

Pretty much same here. I'll not bother with doubles but I think it's nice to track growth of the future bigguns.

So after the common I was limited to a couple of afternoons/overnighters due to a trip to Cuba with the Mrs, this took us into July. The fish I caught on this trip is an absolutely awesome looking kipper and was a bit dissapointed with the photos tbh (dodgy self-takes) but there you go. Enjoy: Since catching the big common last month I've only managed a couple of overnighters on the bank and while I've not caught anything I've put the time to good use through observation. It's become clear all this hot weather had changed the habits of the fish and while they've been easy to find in the day it's not been so easy to catch them in those areas. I had a pretty good idea of where they could be caught having watched their movements during my short sessions. On Saturday I was able to get out for another overnighter, only one car in the car park when I showed up, lovely...... As usual i found them straight away in a particular area but with the knowledge gained from previous sessions I knew that setting up on top of them was not the one. It really does take a leap of faith to walk away from a swim in which there's clearly loads of carp but that's exactly what I did, instead choosing to head towards the area I suspected they were feeding in. The swim I chose looked, for lack of a better word, completely dead, and I couldn't help but wonder about my sanity as I set up. I took advantage of the absence of carp by having a really good lead about, and after an hour or two I had the swim mapped and found what is probably the best spot I've ever found on this water; it was rock hard, clearly something had been digging around, a natural feeding area maybe? Confidence for the night ahead increased as did the amount of bait I planned to put in. Out comes the spod and 3 kg of boilie and pellet later I whack the hook baits out and sit down with a cold beer. I was a little restless during the day and evening I have to admit, normally I'd be up trees, on the move, looking, searching...... but on this occasion I suspected the hard work was done and I just had to sit tight until bite time.... around 5 - 7 am. As it got dark I saw a few fish moving which suggested that my thoughts on location might be correct. I stayed up quite late and at around 1 am I got my head down having seen the odd fish but not as much as I'd hoped. At 3:30 am the rod on the new spot signals a twitchy take and I'm on it in seconds only to be disappointed that it's a tench. The moon is almost full and the sun is threatening to breach the horizon already so it's light enough to recast immediately. Two attempts and it's bang on the spot. Back to bed. I'm struggling to sleep so by 4 am I'm back out of the bag just having a 'quick look' for carp (one of those quick looks that goes on for the rest of the day lol). I know I need more sleep but bite time is approaching and I want to see what develops. I see very little, a few tench, and I'm getting worried that my theory is completely wrong so doubts start creeping in.... wrong spot? too much bait? etc, etc.... until about 5 am when I see a carp pop its head out maybe 10 yards behind the new spot. And another.... And another.... The next couple of hours is brilliant, I see a bunch of carp head-and-shouldering behind my spot and they appear to be getting nearer. At about 6 am I see one of the real monsters nut out, defo a 40+, and I'm smoking like a chimney trying to stay calm. It gets later, and later and before I know it 7 am is approaching which tends to signal the end of bite time..... and the sightings are starting to slow down. It hits 7 am and I've not seen one for a while, I'm guessing my chance has gone, very disappointing, so I head back to the brolly to see if I can sleep. I lay down and.... BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE..... off it goes! Into the waders and I hit it - straight into the weed and it's locked up. I've just moved to drop off leads however (don't normally like to drop them but a lot of fish are being lost recently so it's mandated) which helps no end. I tease it out with relative ease and pump it back. I have to say it behaves well once hooked and the fight aint spectacular, which I'm not complaining about with all this weed around. Within 30 yards it's up near the surface and I tease it over the absolutely savage marginal weed beds and straight into the waiting net. Sigh of relief, job done, get in! Peering into the net I see it's a proper looker, a very dark double row linear, clearly a male fish, torpedo shaped, long and solid. Good size too, maybe a 30.... It turns out he's one of the oldest fish in the lake, one of the originals, been fished for since the first anglers hit this lake, a slow grower that's been steadily increasing in size over many years. He's a rare one, a once a year fish at most, so I'm feeling rather pleased as you can imagine. On the scales he goes 30 lb 6 oz, the first time it's done 30, which adds to my good mood. The fish looks awesome in the morning sun, black down it's back, rosewood down it's flanks, and an almost mustard shade to it's belly. It's top half is like a fully scaled, as is it's front end and tail, with just a broad area either side of it's belly clear of these big golden scales. They really do not come much nicer that this, I'm well happy, so I take one last look before sending him back. The view of him snaking his way back out through the marginal weed forest is pretty breathtaking. Lovely. I hang around hoping for a late morning bite which doesn't happen so I go home. Job done, happy days, I bloomin' love carp angling........

I also saw this article and it looks like the kind of thing I'd do to save a few grams, but like you, I just assumed it wouldn't save that much.

Valid point. It's not like rigs that get replaced after every bite or session. The leader might stay on all season.

As said above, you need to go for sleeves to fit the beads on. Beads that grip the leader without a sleeve will struggle to get over the splice/knot so you have a safety issue. The Korda ones recommended by framey and dayvid are the ones. Very good indeed.

Yeah everyone that uses short rods speaks of these swims but in 25 years I've never found a spot anywhere in which I haven't been able to fish with a 12 ft rod. I might need waders to land them, but I've literally never found a spot I can't put a bait on with the 12's.

For stalking I just use one of my 12 ft carp rods.