Old catch reports

[emmcee]

42 minutes ago, yonny said:

Absolutely mate.

My pal had here at 50 lb last year, looking amazing as usual. Lovely fish.

Did she fight just as hard for your mate? Anyone would have weak legs seeing that roll in front you if your attached to it. 

[Pete Springate's Guns]

On 01/04/2020 at 10:05, emmcee said:

Quality fish mate and what a session.  That 45 is a proper barrel of a fish, Perfect proportions.  

Is it 2 Scale from the Mill? Looks familiar, I had it at 44 around 5 years ago.

Great result, mate👍

[yonny]

12 minutes ago, emmcee said:

Did she fight just as hard for your mate?

Yeah, beat him up mate.

1 minute ago, Pete Springate's Guns said:

Is it 2 Scale from the Mill?

That's the one 👍

[elmoputney]

Would you say nen valley or Neen valley carp? 😏

Absolute stonker of a common though and an excellent write up to match, they make great reading these write ups 👍 will look forward to the next one 

[yonny]

11 minutes ago, elmoputney said:

Would you say nen valley or Neen valley carp?

It's 'Nen' where I'm from. As you head East people become more posh and call it the Neen🤣

[elmoputney]

14 minutes ago, yonny said:

It's 'Nen' where I'm from. As you head East people become more posh and call it the Neen🤣

I'm in the middle but would've said Neen until I went to Stanwick lakes in the olden days on a carp. Com social( 3 of us in winter and it froze) 😬

now I just call it the nen when people call it the neen to be contrary 😁 

[yonny]

So after the common I was limited to a couple of afternoons/overnighters due to a trip to Cuba with the Mrs, this took us into July. The fish I caught on this trip is an absolutely awesome looking kipper and was a bit dissapointed with the photos tbh (dodgy self-takes) but there you go. Enjoy:

Since catching the big common last month I've only managed a couple of overnighters on the bank and while I've not caught anything I've put the time to good use through observation. It's become clear all this hot weather had changed the habits of the fish and while they've been easy to find in the day it's not been so easy to catch them in those areas. I had a pretty good idea of where they could be caught having watched their movements during my short sessions.

On Saturday I was able to get out for another overnighter, only one car in the car park when I showed up, lovely......

As usual i found them straight away in a particular area but with the knowledge gained from previous sessions I knew that setting up on top of them was not the one. It really does take a leap of faith to walk away from a swim in which there's clearly loads of carp but that's exactly what I did, instead choosing to head towards the area I suspected they were feeding in. The swim I chose looked, for lack of a better word, completely dead, and I couldn't help but wonder about my sanity as I set up. I took advantage of the absence of carp by having a really good lead about, and after an hour or two I had the swim mapped and found what is probably the best spot I've ever found on this water; it was rock hard, clearly something had been digging around, a natural feeding area maybe? Confidence for the night ahead increased as did the amount of bait I planned to put in. Out comes the spod and 3 kg of boilie and pellet later I whack the hook baits out and sit down with a cold beer.

I was a little restless during the day and evening I have to admit, normally I'd be up trees, on the move, looking, searching...... but on this occasion I suspected the hard work was done and I just had to sit tight until bite time.... around 5 - 7 am. As it got dark I saw a few fish moving which suggested that my thoughts on location might be correct. I stayed up quite late and at around 1 am I got my head down having seen the odd fish but not as much as I'd hoped. At 3:30 am the rod on the new spot signals a twitchy take and I'm on it in seconds only to be disappointed that it's a tench. The moon is almost full and the sun is threatening to breach the horizon already so it's light enough to recast immediately. Two attempts and it's bang on the spot. Back to bed.

I'm struggling to sleep so by 4 am I'm back out of the bag just having a 'quick look' for carp (one of those quick looks that goes on for the rest of the day lol). I know I need more sleep but bite time is approaching and I want to see what develops. I see very little, a few tench, and I'm getting worried that my theory is completely wrong so doubts start creeping in.... wrong spot? too much bait? etc, etc.... until about 5 am when I see a carp pop its head out maybe 10 yards behind the new spot.

And another....

And another....

The next couple of hours is brilliant, I see a bunch of carp head-and-shouldering behind my spot and they appear to be getting nearer. At about 6 am I see one of the real monsters nut out, defo a 40+, and I'm smoking like a chimney trying to stay calm. It gets later, and later and before I know it 7 am is approaching which tends to signal the end of bite time..... and the sightings are starting to slow down.

It hits 7 am and I've not seen one for a while, I'm guessing my chance has gone, very disappointing,  so I head back to the brolly to see if I can sleep. I lay down and....

BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE..... off it goes!

Into the waders and I hit it - straight into the weed and it's locked up. I've just moved to drop off leads however (don't normally like to drop them but a lot of fish are being lost recently so it's mandated) which helps no end. I tease it out with relative ease and pump it back. I have to say it behaves well once hooked and the fight aint spectacular, which I'm not complaining about with all this weed around. Within 30 yards it's up near the surface and I tease it over the absolutely savage marginal weed beds and straight into the waiting net. Sigh of relief,  job done, get in!

Peering into the net I see it's a proper looker, a very dark double row linear, clearly a male fish, torpedo shaped, long and solid. Good size too, maybe a 30....

It turns out he's one of the oldest fish in the lake, one of the originals, been fished for since the first anglers hit this lake, a slow grower that's been steadily increasing in size over many years. He's a rare one, a once a year fish at most, so I'm feeling rather pleased as you can imagine. On the scales he goes 30 lb 6 oz, the first time it's done 30, which adds to my good mood.

The fish looks awesome in the morning sun, black down it's back, rosewood down it's flanks, and an almost mustard shade to it's belly. It's top half is like a fully scaled, as is it's front end and tail, with just a broad area either side of it's belly clear of these big golden scales. They really do not come much nicer that this, I'm well happy, so I take one last look before sending him back. The view of him snaking his way back out through the marginal weed forest is pretty breathtaking. Lovely.

I hang around hoping for a late morning bite which doesn't happen so I go home. Job done, happy days, I bloomin' love carp angling........

 

[emmcee]

49 minutes ago, yonny said:

So after the common I was limited to a couple of afternoons/overnighters due to a trip to Cuba with the Mrs, this took us into July. The fish I caught on this trip is an absolutely awesome looking kipper and was a bit dissapointed with the photos tbh (dodgy self-takes) but there you go. Enjoy:

Since catching the big common last month I've only managed a couple of overnighters on the bank and while I've not caught anything I've put the time to good use through observation. It's become clear all this hot weather had changed the habits of the fish and while they've been easy to find in the day it's not been so easy to catch them in those areas. I had a pretty good idea of where they could be caught having watched their movements during my short sessions.

On Saturday I was able to get out for another overnighter, only one car in the car park when I showed up, lovely......

As usual i found them straight away in a particular area but with the knowledge gained from previous sessions I knew that setting up on top of them was not the one. It really does take a leap of faith to walk away from a swim in which there's clearly loads of carp but that's exactly what I did, instead choosing to head towards the area I suspected they were feeding in. The swim I chose looked, for lack of a better word, completely dead, and I couldn't help but wonder about my sanity as I set up. I took advantage of the absence of carp by having a really good lead about, and after an hour or two I had the swim mapped and found what is probably the best spot I've ever found on this water; it was rock hard, clearly something had been digging around, a natural feeding area maybe? Confidence for the night ahead increased as did the amount of bait I planned to put in. Out comes the spod and 3 kg of boilie and pellet later I whack the hook baits out and sit down with a cold beer.

I was a little restless during the day and evening I have to admit, normally I'd be up trees, on the move, looking, searching...... but on this occasion I suspected the hard work was done and I just had to sit tight until bite time.... around 5 - 7 am. As it got dark I saw a few fish moving which suggested that my thoughts on location might be correct. I stayed up quite late and at around 1 am I got my head down having seen the odd fish but not as much as I'd hoped. At 3:30 am the rod on the new spot signals a twitchy take and I'm on it in seconds only to be disappointed that it's a tench. The moon is almost full and the sun is threatening to breach the horizon already so it's light enough to recast immediately. Two attempts and it's bang on the spot. Back to bed.

I'm struggling to sleep so by 4 am I'm back out of the bag just having a 'quick look' for carp (one of those quick looks that goes on for the rest of the day lol). I know I need more sleep but bite time is approaching and I want to see what develops. I see very little, a few tench, and I'm getting worried that my theory is completely wrong so doubts start creeping in.... wrong spot? too much bait? etc, etc.... until about 5 am when I see a carp pop its head out maybe 10 yards behind the new spot.

And another....

And another....

The next couple of hours is brilliant, I see a bunch of carp head-and-shouldering behind my spot and they appear to be getting nearer. At about 6 am I see one of the real monsters nut out, defo a 40+, and I'm smoking like a chimney trying to stay calm. It gets later, and later and before I know it 7 am is approaching which tends to signal the end of bite time..... and the sightings are starting to slow down.

It hits 7 am and I've not seen one for a while, I'm guessing my chance has gone, very disappointing,  so I head back to the brolly to see if I can sleep. I lay down and....

BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE..... off it goes!

Into the waders and I hit it - straight into the weed and it's locked up. I've just moved to drop off leads however (don't normally like to drop them but a lot of fish are being lost recently so it's mandated) which helps no end. I tease it out with relative ease and pump it back. I have to say it behaves well once hooked and the fight aint spectacular, which I'm not complaining about with all this weed around. Within 30 yards it's up near the surface and I tease it over the absolutely savage marginal weed beds and straight into the waiting net. Sigh of relief,  job done, get in!

Peering into the net I see it's a proper looker, a very dark double row linear, clearly a male fish, torpedo shaped, long and solid. Good size too, maybe a 30....

It turns out he's one of the oldest fish in the lake, one of the originals, been fished for since the first anglers hit this lake, a slow grower that's been steadily increasing in size over many years. He's a rare one, a once a year fish at most, so I'm feeling rather pleased as you can imagine. On the scales he goes 30 lb 6 oz, the first time it's done 30, which adds to my good mood.

The fish looks awesome in the morning sun, black down it's back, rosewood down it's flanks, and an almost mustard shade to it's belly. It's top half is like a fully scaled, as is it's front end and tail, with just a broad area either side of it's belly clear of these big golden scales. They really do not come much nicer that this, I'm well happy, so I take one last look before sending him back. The view of him snaking his way back out through the marginal weed forest is pretty breathtaking. Lovely.

I hang around hoping for a late morning bite which doesn't happen so I go home. Job done, happy days, I bloomin' love carp angling........

 

Proper wood carving mate. Once again weight is immaterial.  Result  

[Pete Springate's Guns]

That’s a proper ‘un👌👏

[elmoputney]

Another day another stunner, great stuff yonny 

[B B]

Yonny please no more....just can’t take seeing another pic of a great fish 😉

 

[yonny]

So looking back at my catch reports it reminds me that it doesn't always go to plan. Over the course of that July I have an unforgivable 4 losses on the trot as the weed goes mental. I've not bothered pasting those reports here so we skip to the session where it starts to come good again. Only a small fish here but a very cool looking one imo. The report is short and reading it back, I should probs have had more this weekend.

 

Fished the syndi this weekend. Found a few carp in a particularly weedy swim. Spent a while scaring them away with about a million casts trying to hit these tiny, tiny spots but some of them stayed as I had a couple of bites on Saturday morning. The first @ 06:00 I lost to a hook pull (4th loss on the trot 😣) but 09:30 saw a 24.08 lb mirror grace the net . Not the biggest but it was a proper minter, classically shaped with burnt auburn flanks, a black head and loads of tiny pin head scales dotted all over the place.

Saturday night saw another 2 million casts getting the rods on these tiny spots but it was looking fantastic coming into bite time; liners galore from 03:00 onwards. Unfortunately with no cloud in the sky and the brightest of sunshine 06:00 saw all activity stop (where I was expecting the bites to start) and by 08:00 they were drifting about on the top in the shallow bays.

So a tricky weekend tbh but I'm just happy to get a fish on the bank after a truly disastrous run of losses. I'm back next weekend so hopefully my new found luck will continue.

 

[snowmanstevo]

1 hour ago, yonny said:

So looking back at my catch reports it reminds me that it doesn't always go to plan. Over the course of that July I have an unforgivable 4 losses on the trot as the weed goes mental. I've not bothered pasting those reports here so we skip to the session where it starts to come good again. Only a small fish here but a very cool looking one imo. The report is short and reading it back, I should probs have had more this weekend.

 

Fished the syndi this weekend. Found a few carp in a particularly weedy swim. Spent a while scaring them away with about a million casts trying to hit these tiny, tiny spots but some of them stayed as I had a couple of bites on Saturday morning. The first @ 06:00 I lost to a hook pull (4th loss on the trot 😣) but 09:30 saw a 24.08 lb mirror grace the net . Not the biggest but it was a proper minter, classically shaped with burnt auburn flanks, a black head and loads of tiny pin head scales dotted all over the place.

Saturday night saw another 2 million casts getting the rods on these tiny spots but it was looking fantastic coming into bite time; liners galore from 03:00 onwards. Unfortunately with no cloud in the sky and the brightest of sunshine 06:00 saw all activity stop (where I was expecting the bites to start) and by 08:00 they were drifting about on the top in the shallow bays.

So a tricky weekend tbh but I'm just happy to get a fish on the bank after a truly disastrous run of losses. I'm back next weekend so hopefully my new found luck will continue.

 

2 million casts 😂😂😂😬😎

Top draw mate ! 👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼😬😎🎣

[crusian]

4 hours ago, snowmanstevo said:

2 million casts 😂😂😂😬😎

Top draw mate ! 👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼😬😎🎣

A " normal " person would have just given up , that Yonny is a persistent devil isn't he .

This would be why he catches the big fish , doesn't know when he's beaten , and none of that " that's more or less in the right place , and / or probably presented o.k. " .

😁  

[snowmanstevo]

3 hours ago, crusian said:

A " normal " person would have just given up , that Yonny is a persistent devil isn't he .

This would be why he catches the big fish , doesn't know when he's beaten , and none of that " that's more or less in the right place , and / or probably presented o.k. " .

😁  

I just think on his 1,999,999th cast he got the poor blood y fish on the head and it came in for some TLC 😂😂😬😎🎣

[yonny]

17 hours ago, crusian said:

none of that " that's more or less in the right place , and / or probably presented o.k. " .

This.

The way I see it if you find fish and do everything as best you can, sooner or later you'll catch something. After all, every dog has his day 😂

[elmoputney]

I'd be happy with that one stunner again, did you work out what was causing the hook pulls? And did you change anything? The reason I ask is because I probably would have gone mental and changed everything perhaps needlessly 😁🤣

[yonny]

7 minutes ago, elmoputney said:

did you work out what was causing the hook pulls? And did you change anything?

It was just so weedy, these things happen. Three of those losses were hook pulls and one was an altercation with my other rods. Of course I was racking my brain after 4 on the trot but I was using hinge rigs which are difficult to beat in weedy situations imo. I ended up changing nothing and although I did lose one more fish later that year, what I landed more than made up for it as you will see in due course😀

[elmoputney]

2 minutes ago, yonny said:

It was just so weedy, these things happen. Three of those losses were hook pulls and one was an altercation with my other rods. Of course I was racking my brain after 4 on the trot but I was using hinge rigs which are difficult to beat in weedy situations imo. I ended up changing nothing and although I did lose one more fish later that year, what I landed more than made up for it as you will see in due course😀

Thats good then they do make good reading 👍

I just find it very easy to lose confidence in my approach, like now I've got a plan and I plan to stick with it, I am confident now as it seems to be working, but I wonder how I would react in that situation, I guess we will see 

😁

[snowmanstevo]

43 minutes ago, yonny said:

This.

The way I see it if you find fish and do everything as best you can, sooner or later you'll catch something. After all, every dog has his day 😂

Every dog has his day is my fave fishing quote ........ probably because it’s true ! 😬

[yonny]

16 minutes ago, elmoputney said:

I just find it very easy to lose confidence in my approach

Confidence is everything in carp angling mate. If you believe in yourself you can make it happen. When it comes to approach i.e. tactics and strategy, just apply logic. It's too easy to mess your head up with weird and wonderful ideas when normally it's the very basics that catch the fish. A half decent bait on a half decent rig in the right place at the right time will do the job.

7 minutes ago, snowmanstevo said:

Every dog has his day is my fave fishing quote

It's my 2nd fave. My fave being "it only takes one bite", which also rings true time and time again.

Edited April 21, 2020 by yonny

[B B]

Agree wholeheartedly with Yonny. 

[elmoputney]

This time away has made me realise what I need to do this year, I have the plan and am ready to rock, tbh i got lucky catching one first time out so it's given me the green light to fish how I want and believe it should work out, OK, 

I like the old spurs Motto to dare is to do 😁

[greekskii]

brilliant Yonny

[crusian]

7 hours ago, elmoputney said:

This time away has made me realise what I need to do this year, I have the plan and am ready to rock, tbh i got lucky catching one first time out so it's given me the green light to fish how I want and believe it should work out, OK, 

I like the old spurs Motto to dare is to do 😁

Except that before The Lockdown Spurs weren't doing anything , we can't end up below Arsenal , can we ? 😱.