greekskii

people will be swimming out to retrieve downed drones in the middle of the lakes because of their value which has huge H&S implications flying them around too low and crashing them being an idiot with it to annoy others drone wars in the sky between anglers using them to fish out of you swim and unsafe areas as people do with bait boats privacy issues noise its illegal to do without the proper permissions (leaseholders dont cut it I dont think, has to be the landowner) looks like there is a few reasons..

Agree with Yonny. Do what you are confident in and fish well and catch the fish. Someone has done well on particle, everyone else has fished particle ever since. no fish come out on boilies because no-one fishes on them! "you wont get them to eat sweetcorn or maize in here mate, they dont like yellow baits" I chucked a handful maize in the margin under a snag and watched 5 carp demolish it about 10 minutes after I heard that.

Echo this. Sometimes I do just drop in a swim on my instincts and knowledge because I think it’ll give me the best chance at some point. Whether a change in wind overnight means it may come good in the morning as I pack up or something. A pre-planned attack.

For me I am confident in my bait and my approach (multi rigs or chods). Really the only part of the puzzle left for me is location, and that's where it's all down to me. I sometimes make the wrong decisions but as long as I act on it by moving or keeping a note of it for next time I am happy. I think the biggest downfall in an angler is stubbornness, I've fallen foul of it a couple of times, determined to get a bite from an area or a swim when I know i'm p*ssing in the wind and should be elsewhere. I am confident that I know what I'm doing though and I know how to find the fish. Sometimes you just cant though and you have to make you're best judgement on previous knowledge and the conditions, if that is the case and I blank then I dont worry too much about it.

Anything will work as long as the levels are right.

oddly ive had loads of fish on pop-ups over particle. tench, bream, carp, pike 😂 From real low pop ups to blatant 3 inchers

You're right, they find the most comfortable depth, which is the most stable temperature-wise. Normally the middle layers as cold water is denser and sinks.

not sure what you are trying to achieve with that rig tbh. As elmo says its way too close to the lead and the hook angle is too severe. It is also a running rig which doesnt suit the short hooklength thing you are likely looking to achieve. I have seen people do well straight off the lead with 2/3 inch pop ups using inline or COG leads and a running kit set up does not act in any way the same. How are you expecting the rig to act underwater?

Shocking that the police are at it as well!

Big hooks all the way. I use a minimum size 6 with 4s being my fave. I drop to 8s in winter normally if I switch to a more commercial water. For me I would rather potentially hook less fish but know when I do hook a fish the hook can cope with whatever may happen during the figh (snags, weed, etc) Reasons being: 1 - the larger gape between shank and point means more flesh is gripped so much less chance of losing fish 2 - easier to balance pop ups using less putty or shot so neater rigs 3 - stronger hooks as wire is always thicker than smaller sizes I will also disagree with the whole small fish dont pick up big hooks. I have personally caught 2lb bream & tench on size 4s popped up 2 inches off the deck.

In order to combat this issue is use a hook bead to keep the loop in place.

stiff riggers for pop ups, curves for bottoms baits. and I never use wafters tbh, mainly snowmen but they all work.

I do mine exactly the same, just a different hook pattern.

I'd rather fish somewhere that doesn't have the membership numbers to mean every swim would be taken, but that's just me.

if there is no swim bookings this cant happen

The reason I dropped my ticket for a lake I was was new idiotic management rules. Having to book in 24hrs in advance for night fishing. Only fishing from the platforms, which are made from the plastic stuff so you cant even use a drill for stage stands There were a few other things too, it isnt run by anglers though and the estate have no clue apart from what some noddy anglers have told them in the past. Put me right off, but the lads that did stay on have said everyone just flaunts the rules anyway and nothing happens apart from if you litter. The whole booking thing is not for me. Neither are hook size rules or barbless rules, or lead size rules. Just plain daft.

Always put a rod on a showing fish. As yonny said you have to be on them to catch them!! I’d normally put 4/5 boilies on, singly on the area go gently spook the fish off before using the lightest lead possible to reach it. Minimum disturbance. Ive had fish within minutes after casting at showing fish. Other times I’ve been made to wait 3/4hrs. The chances are the fish was there for a reason, so it’ll likely come back. If it’s not gone within an hour then I put out a handful or 2 of boilies on top with the throwing stick.

Last I heard from someone I know he had 8 out in a 24hr session. Wouldn’t say that’s bad going but naseby was always basically a Drayton type water. Also got told bait boats were becoming a must due to fish moving further away from the fishing bank.

No they won’t and I doubt recruitment is good in there either without cormorants hammering the smaller fish. Just because you haven’t seen them dead doesn’t mean they aren’t there. Management could be clearing them up and keeping it quiet. From what I know of the place I’d put it down to years of heavy fishing meaning the fish are either dying early or becoming harder to catch if it isnt otters.

Second Chillfactor here. From what I gather it’s been run differently recently too? Won’t have been netted, it’s way too big.

I agree too. Difficult to bait up with 10kg of boilie every couple of days though unfortunately unless you get loads for free or you're rich! I like to have 5-10 spots on the go at any one time spread over the lake so I can feel confident when I arrive regardless of the conditions.

I would normally go through 100-120kg a year, at a cost of £5.50 a kilo. Particle would be double or treble that amount but at much less cost. All together roughly £750 a year. throw on the pop-ups, liquid and hard hookers it's probably around £1000 (although its always on a monthly basis so never a massive outlay) I have just been offered a monthly allowance for bait however which is up to 20kg free so I'll be saving a good few quid which will allow me to use more boilie than I have done before. Ideally I would use as much bait as time and budget allows. If I could afford to bait up with 5-10kg every night then I would.

Stanwick mallard or Grendon lakes. As yonny said. Wherever you end up going find the fish and fish for them. Be as quiet and stealthy as possible. Day ticket fish tend to move away from noise and obvious lines a lot of the time.

agree with yonny. I use Kryston, I don't think the quality has got worse at all since the takeover. Couple of extra quid than the rest but well worth it IMO. I've not had to buy any more for a year or so now though so maybe it has changed since I last purchased some 🤷‍♂️

Yeah it’s fact we fished boilie on an unfished pit and caught within hours. Can’t deny that. I think the who wrote what is about the baiting pyramid theory, which is about general baiting principles and not boilies as the top bait however in this day and age boilies are certainly the top level in a baiting pyramid. Yes tench and bream will take boilie. But you can use 28mm+ boilies to avoid them if you really wanted to. A boilie only approach will sort out the larger bream and tench from the smaller ones too and slow the onslaught. I’ve lived it. Fishing any size boilie over beds of particle and if you don’t hook bream and tench they destroy your presentation. Boilie only and it doesn’t happen. Been there and done it on a park lake where I made the mistake and when I changed spots dropped the particle and stopped them turning up for the most part. It all depends on situation but I think if you have a heavy stock of bream and tench then using corn will mean you won’t keep a bait in the water long enough to get amongst the carp. Not saying particle won’t work, just saying boilies will sort out the bigger fish in general. 12lb bream is a good fish and doubt many would be disappointed with it as an accidental catch.