emmcee

That's what happens now on dinton pastures i think, they close for 4 weeks or so once the spawning starts. The other lakes I had tickets for had a similar policy. In fact I have kept one ticket for a lake in colne valley. Took me years to get the ticket after being proposed and seconded by a couple of mates who were members, so I may return to it one day.

I think the March 15th til June 16th was because you have different species spawning at different times. Correct me if I'm wrong but the pike and probably perch spawn first early spring so that their young then predate on the fry of the fish that spawn later so the time scale was to hopefully cover all the spawning of all the species. Always certain lakes that buck this trend . My old lake dinton pastures white Swan lake nearly always spawned a week or 2 after the season opened on June 16th and the anticipation was something I looked forward to. Used to spend the close season pre-baiting, sorting gear out, rigs etc. Maybe the odd day ticket session but everything geared towards the opening night. You had to do a work party if you wanted to fish opening night and the draw for your peg was a buzz. I obviously don't fish Freshwater now but if I did i certainly wouldn't bother me if the close season was to return. When dinton scrapped the close season the fishing that first spring was insane to the point that a fair few members literally only fished it for the 3 months of what was the close season each season after that because it was so hard the rest of the season.

I've only heard good things about this coolbox, albeit from youtube anglers. Be interesting to hear what you think instead some paid angler saying how good it is.

Oh yes they certainly move a lot. I was in 30/31 one night and had 3 fish by 9am. The wind turned towards "big no dogs" and the fish were rolling towards there within half hour. I packed up and moved to "big no dogs" and had 3 more that day. Knowing the weather and air pressure was a big thing for me and a few others in my time on there. I've only ever seen " petty's" twice, once in Lee's photos and the other was close up in some snags in "spooky bay". It was only a few weeks after Lee had caught the fish so roughly knew the weight and I saw a mirror roll up in the snags with it that absolutely dwarfed it. It's certainly a special lake/complex with special carp.

Is that "Petty's comon" or another one? Either way top angling fella. I'll have to pop down one day and meet you, I'm only a 20min cycle ride away. As for them being on the back of a SW, they always used to be on the back of a low pressure SW but would follow a high pressure SW. I used to love a big low pressure SW on there as most would be down the boat club/golf bank and leave winter bay well alone. Congrats once again on a magnificent carp.

I used braid on both marker and spod rod when carping and I use braid now for sea fishing. I only ever used whiplash whilst carping and did get occasional wind knots. Sea fishing I use a cheap braid off Ebay and never had a wind knot with it (spectra braid). Not as thin as whiplash mind but that's possibly the reason for no wind knots. I no doubt lose a bit of distance but I'd swap that for no wind knots and obviously I always wet the spool before any casting.

Also depends on how hard you hit the clip with stretch in mono you can end up feet off the spot. I had a similar thing with using 4oz leads on a session and caught a few fish and only had 3oz leads left. Could I find the spot again, could I heck.

The only Scopex I ever user was nashy's scopex no.1, only because mates of mine who'd been carping a lot longer than me told me that it was the better one in their opinion. The only hutchy stuff I used was his Nouville fizz, secret agent and his R.S.A. , both belters. As Elmoputney says, Johnson Ross do some of the flavours so I guess keep an eye on their stock. Might also be worth a check on a Facebook page called "biological bait". The bloke has untold amounts of flavours of every kind and I mean boxes upon boxes of the stuff and copies some if them so might have what you want.

I used a Coleman for years and it never stopped me catching.

Exactly, if you know where to look or think outside the box you can make your bait totally different to the norm and its a huge edge . The bait firms pretty much use Tiger nut , be that flour or meal and peanut meal, be that blanched or roasted and yet there are so many more nut varieties out there.

BL was the one who renamed the long linear to bernies, just because he caught it and astra to astra max. My mate had the long linear 5 times but not once did want to rename it haha. The other angler was a yateley angler that obviously wanted to be "known".

When I was on dinton one particular angler wanted to name every fish it seemed and some of the names were ludicrous. An example of some of the names, Rudd mouthed linear, two sides (all Carp have 2 sides🙄), the bay fish (because he caught it from the car park bay), heart tail (haven't they nearly all got tails that are heart shaped in some way). Then he would add extra names to already named fish. On dinton if you caught a new 40lber you got to name it. A mate of mine caught one but he wasn't fussed about naming it but it ended up being named after his nickname which was sid. Sid was then called sid the pig by this other angler as it put on 1lb by its next capture, it's a carp for god sake. He wasn't the first angler to add extra names to already named fish mind. A fish called The long linear became Bernies linear, astra became astra max, not that I called them that, I stuck to their original names. I think half of it is to name a carp for the sake of it as that angler wants to be known for naming a carp 🙄. There's never going to be another Mary, Black mirror, shoulders, Heather, bazil etc , just stick to mirror, common and leather. Though now I do sea fishing I get to name a fair few of my fish , they are either called lunch or dinner .

If I had to chose a swim solely on the map alone then it would be peg 4 . Any south westerly wind will blow from your right to left in to the bay in front of pegs 1, 2 and 3 so any fish following the wind will potentially pass through your swim and if they back off the wind then they will come back through your swim potentially. You'll be on the back of any northerly/easterly winds (cold winds) which the fish tend not to follow but there is always an exception to that rule and any rule for that matter, always have an open mind. You also have a choice of water depths from the shallowest water to the deepest, just a matter of finding the magic depth. You can also see a good chunk of water so if you see any signs and the swims are free you can move.

When I made my own bait, I used an old landing net mesh instead of a basket in my burco.

Totally get what your saying there with you can be different by rolling your own. Though you can still use fishmeal, nut bait etc and still be different. The bait my mate designed used a few of the ingredients used in other nut baits but the process in making the bait would 100% not have been used by bait manufacturers due to the aggro of preparing it the way he did and the time it took to prepare properly and that was his edge. The lucky few who got to roll his bait absolutely rinsed lakes with it, some of which were hard lakes , though that bait at times made them look easy.

I recall one year when I switched baits in January, it also coincided with a change of lakes as well i might add. Ditched my fishmeal that I'd been catching on on the first lake to try a bait my mate had designed which was a milk/nut bait. It wasn't an ordinary milk/nut bait mind being really high in milk protein and the nuts used will 100% not be used in any nut bait on the open market , it was a nightmare to roll and the process of mixing/rolling it was long winded. I ended up preparing it one evening and rolling the next evening. So started baiting up in January onwards. Didn't catch for a month or so but when they switched on coming out of there winter slumber I caught plenty and wasnt far off top rod even though i only fished 3 months til the end of the season. So my advice is, if you think you can knock up a decent milk/nut bait then go for that.

Especially when "tarsals" are bones found in your feet 🙄.

Still might be worth an email to someone or a letter so you can stay anonymous if you want.

Why don't you speak to the lake owners or something and tell them you feel like you're being bullied, victimised by their new bailiff. Shouldn't want to leave a lake you love for those reasons , that's just rubbish.

Can't comment on the Alpaca socks but I do have merino wool socks and think they are excellent.

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.