crusian

Well if you are right , Yonny , which you almost certainly are because you are Yonny , you've just saved me a few bob .
😃
 

Yeah I did years ago. I used live ones, dead ones, dehydrated/dried ones.... and they were all rubbish. Imo the carp get on the (natural) snails simply because it's the easiest food source to harvest at the time. They're tuned into the food sources available in their watercourse and I don't think you can compete with that with any snails apart from those that are plucked out of the venue - so @jh92 has the right idea. Even then, there are other natural baits (maggots and worms) that will do a much better job of competing.
The snail discussion comes up every few years. Lots of guys try it. Hardly anyone has any real success. Imho, snails are just not a great bait.
 

That's some serious next level determination, hope your effort pays off. 

Well I've been out and got around 100 snails, got a special mix on the go in the bucket 😏 tedious picking in the waders 💪🤣
 
I'm off to the canal tomorrow morning for a night or two. Both rods are gonna go on snails. I will update how I get on 👍

Fake ones? 

 
Real ones for a spod mix 🤔
https://www.carpparticles.co.uk/product/micro-snails/
Also don't dynamite cook their hemp in the tins? Does that mean they are unaliving snails in the tin too? 😱
 

Cheers bud, trying to get away from boili3s at the moment, I'm after real snails 👍🤣
Yes mate I've already got myself a tin 👍 I want a couple from my canal that I can drill and rig 👍 I'm gonna get the waders on for next session and pick a couple from the banks and see what happens 👍🤣

https://www.baitworks.co.uk/
I've been on the Creamino for the last few years and I don't know if it's co-incidence but I've had my best 2 seasons since.

1. For the ultimate in being a tart, take a bivvy, brolly and gazebo. Don’t laugh, I saw it last weekend on a commercial where you can park your car behind the swim.
 
2. Have a splash mat under your reels, the ultimate in tartyness.
 
3. Carry 20 different types of pop-up but only use 1.
 
4. Take a 2 man bivvy but you only do over-nighters.
 
5. Take a powered fridge despite the fact you only keep your sandwiches and lager in it.
 
6. Own a 5-season sleeping bag despite the fact you hang your rods up in October.
 
7. Have a power bank that could keep a family home going for a couple of days in a power cut but you only charge your phone and torch.
 
8. Your rod-pod has so much stainless that you have to wear sunglasses to look at it.
 
9. You have a power barrow with so much grunt it could stop an average scrum but you only fish a 2 acre lake with manicured lawns.
 
10. Your phone is permanently on FaceBook so you can keep in contact with both of your friends.
 
11. A pair of 10x25 binoculars is more than ample and fits in your pocket when folded down. So why do you take a set of field glasses that can spot a mouse a mile away?
 
12. You wear bivvy slippers to keep your groundsheet clean.
 
13. A head torch is a necessity after dark but you need to keep it down to keep your night-sight when you turn it off. Your 8000 Lumen monstrosity resembles the Blackpool illuminations.
 
14. You bring your camper van to a commercial that allows rear of swim parking and stay in it all day and night watching TV or reading a book and only come outside once a day. Don’t laugh, I have seen it.
 
15. You own 2 sets of rods/reels/buzzers because you fish different waters and don’t want to handicap yourself.
 
16. Despite having a double burner and family sized returnable gas bottle and associated cookware, your meals are delivered to your swim from the local greasy spoon and pizza shop.
 
17. You have a bait boat with GPS and Sonar despite your lake being as pancake flat as the day the bulldozer created it. It also has a 4kg payload despite the fact you only use PVA bags.
 
18. Everyone loves a bivvy table. A small one just big enough for your tackle box, scales, phone and receiver is ample. A true tackle tart pushes it to the max and I saw 2 blokes in adjoining swims with a decorating table that you use for hanging wallpaper.
 
19. You have a top of the range DSLR with an impressive pixel count but the deal clincher was the 40 frames per second burst shooting rate it offered. Despite the fact you will never use it. You only shoot in Auto and use the photo’s unaltered on your FaceBook page.
 
20. You take 3 nets with you, “just in case.” The water you are fishing is rock hard and 2 fish a season is considered good going.

After a bit of googling yes it seems most fisheries wont allow tents, good job i have not bought one yet, so looks like a bivvy or just forget the idea glad jh92 pointed this out at this stage i can get a wrap skin for my westlake day shelter or get an NGT XPR brolly system

If I remember correctly, isn't there a rule for most fisheries that a tent can't be used? It has to be something that doesn't have a fixed groundsheet? Something to do with insurances I believe?
Or is it just to stop people turning up with blue tents etc? Lol
 
I've given up trying to beat the carp tax, end up buying something [censored]e then buying something decent afterwards anyway 🤣

Hi Jules .
I'm glad your pop up tent is green as my local lake has a green or camo only rule for bivvies .
😄

I have another pond down in the main garden with goldfish in.... the heron can have them!
Otters...... now there's a scary thought. We're 3 miles away from the Nene... but there's a small brook just 250m away. Fencing the pond, or the garden, isn't really possible. Maybe a steel mesh over the top of the pond when I'm not around?

I'd hate to see the size of the heron if it was to eat "whopper". That said the otter protection is a good shout if near to waterways.  

Hello Yonny .
Don't you mean you bought a Koi Pond , and a house came with it ?  😁 .
I hope you have Heron and Otter  protection  ? .
 
 

Having been back at carp angling for a year after the massive long break, i did not figure to go back to doing any overnight sessions at all, years ago i sold of my bivvy and bed chair, i also promised my good lady i would not do nights, so as a compromise  i have found a lake i can do 24 hour sessions on and my mrs can stop at a good friends house close by in catterick 5 mins from green lane fishery.
Seeing as this night fishing is gonna be limited to less than 5 24 hour trips in a year i have decided to do a bad thing and get a pop up green tent, single air bed and generic 4 season sleeping bag, all this gear is a nice way to avoid carp tax with the whole lot costing less than a bedchair and taking up a tiny bit of room, i have brew making and cooking gear in our main camping kit, sadly this will have to wait till next year before i can go, but moving in right direction 

Sad to hear the fish are dying there @Golden Paws.
The lack of rain this year is really taking its toll.
On a brighter note, took my son up to the little farm lake again.
After trying every lure we had, I foul hooked a small roach with the lure & thought shall I leave it on???
This was the result.. 

Well I can't even upload a screenshot atm🙄
He had a nice little perch about 1 1/2 lb.
Needless to say he now wants try live baiting next time.
Predator fishing is allowed on my ticket from October with some perch around the 3-4lb mark.
Well that is if we get some more rain and increased oxygen levels in the water🤞

No you didn't get lucky , Kev , you just went the extra mile .
I do hope you were able to let the mickey taker who was fishing in your water know how you got on after he had left ? 😁.

I'm positive that my average is well over 20lb over the past 18years on the big fish waters. On Nazeing from 2008-2018 I can recall only 4 fish below 20lb; 3 high doubles from Brackens and a 10lb mirror from Central Lagoon. 
On Alton I did have a couple of doubles, both on snowman baits, a couple of 20's on pop-ups, one on a snowman and the rest of the 20's came on double 18mm bottom baits.
 
I was catching a lot of fish from the syndicate until August and the personal problems.
The syndicate has seen 20's and 30's caught on trimmed down 12mm pop-ups, 15mm pop-ups,, snowman baits and 15mm bottom baits, over just boilies and over particles, with only 3 doubles I think.
To me the base of the pop-up to the lakebed. Be aware though, that not every pop-up rig sits perfectly upright. The rig shown, I may need to trim down the pop-up, and with that balance weight, you need a buoyant bait to lift it to that angle.
 

Bear in mind it'll likely mean less bites..... if you have the time to wait for the ones that matter that's great. If not - you could be screwing yourself over.
I don't measure, I just do it by eye. I guess I'm talking about the bottom of the pop up to the deck/substrate.

To do our 2 acre lake ,12 yrs ago ,I reckon was 900 quid ,we only had one solar panal at that time .
 
also the pics dont show it ,but the mesh is double ,and in one stretch triple meshed ..
battery i showed earlier ,will niw be used as a spare,i have another already on the system in my insulted box ,and on thurs ill buy a brand new one for this winter
 
I did all the work ,and continually maintain it ...
 
 

No I didnt say anything, probably just threw my arms about at the time lol
You see some stuff there my word, swim boundaries are seemingly optional if you're catching, and every swim has a max distance but little notice is taken once they get desperate to catch.
I watched 2 guys arrive taking the windward corner to my left, fair play I tought they're on them.  Well both must have leaded about on their heads whilst they were showing for an hour or more - I wanted to scream at them but just thought well they've pushed them back out onto me.  Honestly clueless - all that casting then they put the rod out with a boat - unreal stupidity on their overnighter 😆🤦 

No you didn't get lucky , Kev , you just went the extra mile .
I do hope you were able to let the mickey taker who was fishing in your water know how you got on after he had left ? 😁.

I've been fishing and re finding intimate waters I visited from 35 yrs ago ,one of which I looked around ,but never fished ,it's all overgrown ,and farmer is 90 yrs plus..
 
Had around 12 fish to 8lb ,no monsters at all ,but the Oaktrees are centuries old ,ps,thats my 50 inch Mhr dwarf ed by just one of these amazing trees