emmcee

Well I had no luck on the bass front, mainly because the whiting and dogfish were on the bait in minutes. Always next time.

100% agree with pan fried bass or cod fillet. I couldn't believe the taste difference from fish I'd caught to shop brought/ chip shop fish. Also plaice is one of my faves. Hopefully bag myself a nice bass this evening 🤞.

I used to use the "K" paddle with my mixer, i found it mixed it together faster. I thought the dough hook was useless, though I guess it depends on how sticky your mix is. Mine wasn't sticky at all.

Had the same on Tuesday myself along with 3 work colleagues. One mate did a covid test and it was positive so guessing we've all got it and you've got the symptoms we've had. Get a test done.

The duck feeding area on Dinton pastures Black Swan lake would often do bites. After the public had gone you'd see a carpet of bread crumbs on the lake bed but in the morning it looked like a hoover had been through there, not a crumb in sight. Personally I'd avoid the pva bags to start with if heading straight to duck feeding area, instead I'd flick out a single with a light lead or a choddy. You don't want to spook any carp with a large splash from a bag as they maybe feeding still on the previous days bread etc. But as Yonny rightly says, on a day session it's all about finding them first. If they're not showing there will still be little signs. These could be small swirls on the surface, the odd bubble hitting the surface in a certain area or the more obvious signs of big fizzers or coloured water.

This is what I use now, especially handy when handling spiny, toothy critters from the sea. Though you do get some odd looks when you shout "shoot" and your on your own holding a fish🤣.

I see they also sell Geoff kemps pink zing, if I was still carp fishing I'd buy a gallon of that stuff. An absolutely belting flavour and in the right bait you'd need new batteries for your alarms as it's a flier. I used to get a copy of it years ago from a shop in Belgium and I'd blend it with 2 other flavours to make it last and then I'd send it to premier to have it rolled in my bait, myself and my mates caught shed loads on it. Whether it's exactly the same along with the green zing I'd not be sure as some chemicals are not allowed or used anymore due to EU laws etc or so I was told. Lots of flavours have changed over the years in fact and base mixes for that matter, not that any of the relevant companies would disclose such things. Its making me think i might have to dust my carp rods off 🤣.

In my opinion it wouldn't matter what colour the green zing pop ups were that dynamite made, that flavour is one of the best winter flavours ever made in my opinion. I used to roll my own in orange and caught some good fish on it. Another mate would roll his in white or red and caught. Great flavour. Not sure if it's still available, it was released several years ago by a couple of companies.

I used predominantly yellow pop ups in probably 75% of all my fishing so if I was going to catch then chances are it would be on a yellow so it maintained my confidence in that colour. I would also change the shade of yellow throughout the year , always starting with sweetcorn yellow in spring and towards autumn it would be washed out yellow with half the flavour levels . Plus I predominantly fished weedy waters and yellow seemed to be the one on all those waters. In winter and into early spring I'd often switch to orange , white or match the hatch as the yellows wouldn't be as effective in winter for some reason. My mate seemed to think their eyesight was affected in the colder months and his go to was white so I tried it and caught a few so like anything if catch on something a few times it gives you confidence and that's a big part of fishing. That and being on the fish in the first place.

The sad thing is some people will buy them no matter how much and yet so easy to make your own. Must admit I used the shot on the hook rig years ago but never noticed a real edge with it. They'll soon be an underwater film with this rig getting spat out or it will get banned for some reason or another.

That's what I use, bargain.

If you don't set your clutch properly then you will lose your rod. As finchey said the initial run is insane.

Nice hound mate. I had my pb Friday night at 11lb 06oz and as you say the power difference with a double figure hound is something else compared to a single and the singles are like torpedoes.

If you can't get any crab then whole king prawn are just as good in my opinion. Had 10 hounds in 3 hours on the south coast Friday night all in prawn.

So with all the talk about the possibility of seeing the northern lights, did anyone manage to catch site of them? I was fortunate enough to be fishing on the south coast and was treated to a nice sunset followed by the northern lights. Must admit I felt quite privileged to witness it. Excuse the pics, had to screenshot my photos or they wouldn't upload.

Think you were unlucky with your bed. As has been said the solar range are top notch in my opinion. I've had several beds from different manufacturers (fox, Nash sleep system plus others) but my solar bed is head and shoulders above anything I've had before in my opinion. I sleep better on that than I do my bed at home 🤣.

Xc weather or "Windy app". But as has been said, the weather can change at the drop of a hat so none are 100% accurate in my opinion.

I would think the results of the blood tests would be needed first. You could go ahead now and say get X amount for having the needle puncture your hand but if the results come back with something (which I hope they don't of course) then your payout will be considerably more and you probably can't sue them twice for the same thing.

I think these solicitors only take on claims they know or pretty much know will win. So if they say no I'd say you've got little chance elsewhere.

Well I'd go no bigger than 15mm for your pop up. I never went shorter than 1.5 inches and no longer than 3 inches for my chods and yes I'd say the bream are to busy with their heads in the silt/,bottom.

Personally I never used a pop up bigger than 15mm on my chod, in fact usually a very buoyant 12mm but I'd still feed my normal boilie irrelevant of size of them. I'd certainly try and find weed that's a foot or more tall which in my experience the bream are less likely to feed on. That said, if the bream are the predominant species it may well be a very hard task to avoid them no matter what you use. Just remembered a mate who went over to double 22mm baits to avoid a load of single figured stockies that got put into the lake we fished. He totally avoided them and though his catch rate dropped a lot he only caught the better fish.

As Nick rightly says, there is no rig that is bream proof. That said, I can honestly say that I've never caught a bream on a chod rig, tench yes but not bream. Obviously not saying you won't catch bream on them but for some reason I never did and I used them a lot and on waters that held large shoals of big bream . Also as has been said above, what you feed and how will determine if bream become a pain. I know a few angler's that only use 22mm / 24mm baits and hardly if ever get bream problems.

Just seen this, was going to say QM services but looks like hes changed the name. He's based or at least was based in Plymouth.

When I first fished a big pit I set my stall out and fished at 40yds or less for 90% of my fishing, especially when seeing most anglers casting as far as they could. I also concentrated on the bays on this particular lake as the fishing was comfortable for me and more into my style. Im not someone who likes to fish as far they can so I only ever launched baits to the horizon if that's where the fish were. Don't get sucked into what you see everyone else doing. And the obvious one is location, location, location. Also Write down where you see them , the wind direction, weather, the atmospheric pressure (in my opinion and my findings were these factors play a bigger part on larger pits than smaller ones)all these will help you get a picture of the fish are up to.