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The 'Carping On' Series - Part 4
by John Kneebone
The past month can only be best described as ‘Bitter-Sweet’, as it began with my redundancy from my job of 15 years. As a manager at a busy parcel deliver depot within a national network, there were plenty of pressured moments, as well as lots of un-paid hours to get the job done, but in the end it all counted for sweet Fanny-Adams, when someone who I have never met, decided that my position within the company was for the chop, along with 150 other unfortunates. Obviously I wasn’t going to be too happy about losing my job, but on the other hand, I have always valued time over money, time with the family and of course on the bank, cannot be bought, and there never seems to be enough.
On the positive side of things, maybe this was an opportunity to do some things I’ve always wanted to do? Every cloud has a silver lining and all that! Although money and a new job would inevitably need to fit in somewhere along the line, anyway before making any decisions on what I was going to do, I thought it best to take a break and go fishing. Six nights on an Oxford gravel pit, full of lovely carp, felt like just the tonic required, but whether it was down to all the tension over the redundancy or what, I don’t know, because the session turned out to be a right mare. It started off ok, with a low twenty common coming from the first night, but from that point on, everything I touched simply went wrong, casting, baiting, everything, you name it, whatever it was, I managed to screw it up. After breaking two catapults and sitting on my Polaroid’s in the same day, you know you’re in trouble, but relentlessly I carried on, and fished really hard, moving swims, stalking, changing over to floater tactics when the fish were up in the water, only to lose my only other take, to a cut off through the mussel covered weed. Aaaaaah!
Sunburnt, knackered, and generally run through, I made way my home wishing I’d only done a couple of nights, I’d enjoyed plenty of good sessions before this, but the lake known for being a head-banger at times, had decided it was time to remind me of that fact, and had nailed me good and proper. The next couple of weeks were spent with the kids and family, which apart from a day’s sea fishing and catching my first sea trout, was a nice break from carping. With the batteries re-charged, I was well ready for another trip back to Oxford, so 3nts fishing were planned, and for the first time, I would also be taking a guest, a long standing mate of mine, Colin Seviour. We’d both started working at the parcel depot at roughly the same time, 15 years ago, and both having an angling interest it hadn’t taken long to become good mates. Fly-fishing for trout was the favoured style of fishing for us back then, until the local lake was closed, so we decided to go carping instead, and that was when we both really got serious about one single aspect of angling, rather than course fishing or fly-casting one minute and out on the beaches or rock marks sea angling the next.
The pit I normally try and fish is generally too busy for taking guests, so we decided to go onto the neighbouring pit, which without a resident forty at the moment is a lot quieter, all be it having nearly twice the overall number of fish. True to form, there were only a few anglers on the bank, including ‘Doc Martin’, and it was already starting to hit home why he prefers this pit to the one I try and get on, it was so much more chilled. There was no racing for, or booking of swims, as there was a good choice of vacant swims available, there was also plenty of active carp visibly patrolling around the pit, and Colin and I were soon set-up in two adjacent swims on the end of a light, warm SW wind where a good few of these fish were showing. Both swims had casting access to the lakes island, as well as some good gravel features within the plentiful silkweed, and the margins looked well tasty, fully lined with various overhanging trees, the marginal gravel shelf would definitely need a hook-bait. Having spoken to the Doc, prior to the trip we knew that a good bed of boilies had been producing the goods of late, so Colin and I decided to fish a couple kilos of boilie per rod on the gravel spots or island and small beds of particle on a rod waded down the margins, under the cover of the overhanging trees. Colin would be fishing his favoured Cell boilies and I would be using the New Grange and that was the plan to start with, we’d see how we got on and change things round a bit if we thought we needed to.
Only an hour into the session and a good carp finally comes to the net
It didn’t take long to know we were on the right tracks, when one of Colin’s boilie rods was away only an hour after casting in. If I’m perfectly honest, watching the first few minutes of the fight I thought old Colly boy, was fannying around a bit, understandably being careful not to drop his first carp of the trip, but as time went on I was glad I’d kept my gob shut, as it was becoming apparent that my mate was into a good fish. This was Colin’s first experience of a clear water gravel pit, and he was clearly enjoying the tussle of a carp that once in sight of the marginal shelf would use all its power to dive back down the drop-off into the deeper water. All the while our barbeque was cooking away, and I think I managed to scoff a burger and a few sausages before a beautifully scaled mirror finally came to Colin’s net. On the mat the fish looked all of thirty pounds, but was just short as the scales settled at 29lbs 8ozs, and an absolute cracker to kick off the session.
What a start! 29lbs 8ozs
The mirrors just kept on coming for Colin!
That early mirror really set the tone for the whole session, as despite the nights not throwing up any more than a liner or two, the days were full of action, if one of us had a take, within half an hour it would be the others turn, and you really couldn’t ask for a better session for either host or guest. The only difference between us, was Colin’s takes generally resulted in mirrors around the mid-twenty bracket, where as my fish were mainly upper double, low twenty commons, although a nice mirror did come my way, preventing any envy of my mate. The ‘Snow-man’ rigs had been working a treat as usual, although tipping the rig off with a red, sweet plum pop-up, rather than a yellow pineapple was producing the bites.
The commons liked my swim
A nice mirror, between the commons
As we sat, washing another barbeque down with a few beers, ahead of the trips final night, one of these rigs on my right hand rod was away again. The rod had been cast to a silt spot close to the margin of the island, and any take was a slow, stuttered drop-back to the bobbin, leaving you never quite sure if you’d make contact with anything when you picked up the rod. Reeling down there was definitely a fish on, rapidly kitting to the right, and a snag tree, applying some side strain to the rod, turned the fish now kitting back towards me, the fish momentarily came to the surface, and I could see it was another common, which this time felt a little bigger than my previous fish as it plodded along the deep drop-off. When Colin netted the beaten carp, my fears of what felt like a heavier fish being another upper double, were dropped by the look on Colin’s face, it showed exactly what he then said ’Its a good fish mate!’ We placed the carp down on the un-hooking mat, and I recognised the fish from a photo I’d seen of it held by another angler, funnily enough a fellow called Colin, it was a carp known as the Banana Common, that had held weights just over forty in previous years, but like all the pits bigger residents had been well down in weight in recent years. Whether it was the Oxford floods or the fact the stock increases year on year from successful spawning, no one really knows why the fish weights have dropped, as they remain in good condition, I was just made up with the fact it was the Banana, and at 34lbs 8ozs I was well happy with the weight as well.
The ‘Banana Common’ 34lb 8ozs!
The first take had come to Colin’s rods only an hour into the session, and we’d both enjoyed consistent day time action right through to our final take that came again to my island rod, just an hour before we left for home. All the kit was packed down, but I didn’t mind getting the dry mat and sling wet again when another top notch mirror came to the net, and not dissimilar to the first, turned the scales to 29lbs 14ozs.
We finished off just how we’d started, with a 29lb mirror!
Back in Cornwall, with some time on my hands, I decided to take a trip to one of the local holiday, camping sites that holds two small coarse lakes, for a fun, day session. The bottom lake at Trebellan Park, known as ‘Smugglers’ to the locals due to the nearby Smugglers Den Pub, holds plenty of carp, commons mainly in the 8-12lbs bracket, with a few bigger fish in the twenties.
Trebellan Park...
and its torpedo common carp
Smugglers and its torpedo commons, was just the place for a few takes and ideal for a little try out with the 10mm pop-ups that I’d had from Mainline, which until now I’d only used on snowman rigs, and not on there own. It didn’t take long for the takes to come, with a small bag of mixed response/bloodworm pellets, attached to a small but simple pop-up rig, flicked down the margins, or under the overhanging trees, the productive method. Although these weren’t the biggest of carp, they didn’t half go some, and with plenty of takes throughout the day, it was a great way to judge the hook-holds I was getting, as well as installed plenty of confidence in the 10millers. The size 9, Arma point, SSSP hooks I used, stood up to the test with ease, with strong hook-holds located just back from the bottom lip of the carp, helped I think from a longish piece of shrink tubing or ‘Kicker’ that I like to incorporate in most of my rigs, to get the hook turning quickly, aiming the point down in the carp’s mouth.
The 10mm pop-ups from Mainline
A simple set-up provided plenty of fun at Smugglers
Playing around at Smugglers had been a lot of fun, and although I could probably have got takes on a few different methods, freshening up the use of pop-up rigs within my fishing had been a worthwhile exercise, as I probably neglect their use a bit, and lean towards bottom/balanced baits most of the time.
The next outing for the carp-mobile was back up the A30 out of Cornwall, and onto the motorways Oxford bound, for a 7nt stint on the pit, that I’d now not fished for a few weeks. Not too much had changed the abundant weed was still flourishing, although arriving on a Monday rather than Friday meant the lake was a lot quieter, giving me a good choice of swims. It was a nice change to be able to take a lap around the lake for a look, but nothing showed, so I opted for a mid-lake swim, that fished up to, two of the main weed beds, which should hold a few carp, and gave a good view of most of the lake, if the carp were going to show elsewhere. By the afternoon a good few carp were beginning to show out over the weed, with the odd fish showing over or near my baited spots. This activity continued for the first two days of the session, yet produced nothing more than the odd liner to the rods. Normally having fished a swim for this amount of time without a take, I’d be looking to move, but I simply had no choice other than to stay put, as that was where I was seeing all the shows, in and around my baited spots. The carp looked well up for a munch, as you’d expect with it being early Autumn, and the fish wanting to build their winter condition, but something just wasn’t right, something seemed to be preventing them from properly getting their heads down. The high air pressure front, driving a northerly wind was the most likely cause, and not something I could do too much about, but I did think if the carp were going to be a little finicky, perhaps scaling down one of my rigs might help.
The Smuggler rig, developed for Oxford and critically balanced
Catching the lean, mean commons at Smugglers with the 10mm pop-ups came to mind, so I set about tying up a rig, with a few modifications. With the bigger Oxford fish, and the weed, I couldn’t really go lower than a size 8 hook to which a blow back ring was added, but the biggest change was to add a small piece of zig-rig foam to increase the buoyancy of the bait, so the same No4 soft shot, I’d used at Smugglers would barely sink the hook-bait, and take the rig down ever so slowly leaving the rig critically balanced. A PVA funnel-web bag of pellets containing 5 boilies, 3 whole, 2 broken (It has to be 5 for good luck) hung from the hook, once this was cast tight to the weed, a further 3 identical funnel-web bags were catapulted to the baited spot, in an attempt to further confuse any carp investigating the area.
My Funnel-web bags of response pellets along with 5 New Grange boilies. It has to 5 for luck!
Just before first light at around 5am the following morning, the small change in approach paid off, when the pop-up rod received a nice slow take, the attached carp rather obligingly plodded up and down the edge of the weed beds, instead of burying into them, and apart from swimming under the lines of the other rods came to the net without too much drama. At 32lbs 4ozs I was well pleased, and safely sacked up my prize for some pic’s once the sun came up. It wasn’t until then that I could really see, and appreciate how nice a carp this was, with fins like saucers, and in top condition.
With fins like saucers! A mint 32lb mirror, to the new rig!
This 26lb mirror fell to the Snowman
The pop-up rig produced another take the next night, where the carp fell off no sooner than it had been on, there was a chance that it could have been a fish trailing a lead, but to be honest I’m sure it had just been a careful pressured carp, only half fooled, resulting in a weak take and hook-hold. The theory that the carp pressured by anglers all year, being tempted to feed in less than favourable conditions, were acting a bit cagey was perhaps proved over the remaining nights of the session. Three more takes came to the rods, all on the normally reliable snowman rigs, but none of these takes had been full blown runs, instead only a few bleeps as the bobbin slowly bounced a couple of times, and only one of these takes resulted with a landed fish, a nice 26lb mirror. Of course a couple of fish dropping off can happen from time to time and can just be a straight forward case of bad luck, but I’m not so sure, as I’ve said before the carp in these Oxford pits receive a terrific about of angling pressure, pretty much 24/7, so their bound to be very cute and wary, every now and again.
Anyway we’ll see how it goes, so until next month, enjoy your fishing and tight lines.
Cheers
John |
