jontain

I have never had a problem with steaming the hook link, once the kettle is boiling properly it will only take a few seconds to fully shrink the tubing down so shouldn't damage the line. I also like to steam in a kicker by leaving about 1cm of tubing past the eye of the hook and whilst steaming hold the hooklength at an angle which will hold once the tubing cools. This can really help with barbless rigs.

I need to get more confident with bottom baits for hook baits, 9 times out of 10 I will opt for a pop-up or balancing a bottom bait.

Ah I see, to be fair my chods are usually fished naked with 4-6 inch of tubing between the bottom bead and the lead. Not only has this reduced hook pulls but also moves the lead away from the fish during the fight. On this particular lake with the small fish and deep silt I tend to use no more than a 1.5 oz lead so hoping that the lead doesn't cause any damage, I can't say I have ever noticed any but I will keep this in mind mate.

Oh really? I did scale it all down as there aren't many larger fish in the lake but I didn't realise these popup style rigs weren't suited to the smaller stock? I have heard that the 360 rig, which has received a lot of attention in the press, can be a death trap for the smaller fish but there was no explanation as to why?

Guilty as charge me laud! I wanted to test it out as it looks a lot like chod rig with a higher curve but I wanted to see the difference in takes/hookholds. I had it in mind for my difficult syndicate which has more than its fair share of the green stuff. I like to test changes out on my nice easy park lake as I can see what does and doesn't work rather than sitting on my hands wondering if the rig is fishing or if the fish have moved on.

Haha, I think you would struggle to get away with it on this lake as every time I've been the balif comes round for a chin wag! Also he brings luck so would likely end up having to unhook a fish in front of him lol

Hook is a wide gape and the curve is made using one of fox's withy pool sleeve. The fish was about 8-10lb

Unfortunately it's a barbless rule on the water so barbs are not an option, good point though. I did think it was unlucky as I have not heard anything negative about the withy pool?

Hi all. Just wanted your thoughts on the withy pool rig. Tied up a couple a few months back. Have had 3 fish on them so far but the last fish suffered torn tissue on the bottom of the mouth (inside by about an inch). I am slightly apprehensive to use it again because of this as I played the fish in gently, it looks as though the hook may have slipped (barbless) and has torn from the initial entry point. I gave the wound a liberal coating of mouth treatment but I wasn't overly happy with the level of damage. Should got a picture of damage but wanted to get him back and recovering ASAP. The other takes on this rig nailed them right in the bottom lip rather than inside the mouth and resulted in no damage at all. Thoughts?

The very same, baliff came round and the best anyone else managed to get out was 3 but none of them really put much bait in. Carp must have enjoyed the mix, which being a park lake consisted of a good amount of bread crumb, a few pellets to break it up and chopped boilis.

On my local park lake that is really only about 5ft deep has definitely woken up. Got there early to put in a reasonable bed of bait over two spots and had 14 carp out of 18 takes over the day.

I had a good couple of days fishing at the weekend. 2 pike out of 3 takes on the lure rod and then 14 carp out of 18 takes on Sunday. Was knackered at work Monday morning!

It might be worth talking to the anglers present first (if friendly enough), find out where they are fishing before you say why your there and then bait up the spots your keen on that they are not in, that way they can't really tell you not to bait up that spot as you know that they don't have a hook down there. They can of course claim that they have been baiting that spot as another option but at least you wont be baiting over their live hooks. Of course it does mean that after you leave you could find rigs being cast into your nicely baited spots. Always a minefield baiting up when not fishing and staying on the right side of folk! If your an early riser getting up at the crack of dawn could help, I've noticed a lot of anglers doing nights that fall asleep and don't stir till 9 the next morning (unless they have a take).

I too bought some of the sweetcorn but never had a take on it. Like others I have had takes on black baits at night, I wonder if the glow actually puts them off as nothing on the lake bed glows naturally Whereas black baits will just create a strong silhouette.

Got both and I've found either dry or full sloppy goes out easier and with less mess with the spoon. Anything in between dry and slop and the spod is fine but can get the odd blocked boilies.