The 'Carping On' Series - Part 5     
by John Kneebone

You may remember that last month was a little bit up and down to say the least, having found myself on the ‘Rock and Roll’ but also enjoying a very productive session with my old mate Colin, only to then have a load of finicky takes from the next trip, a few of which slipping the hook. Although a nice 32lb mirror did save the day. Now the trouble is, I have to make a 4hour journey, to fish the Oxford pits, which to be honest passes by fairly un-noticed on the way up from Cornwall. By the time I’ve had my Macadee’s half way pit stop, and finished running through all the thoughts of what swim I’d like or rather might be free, as well as imagining all the biggies coming over the draw cord, I’m there, hurryingly loading the barrow before someone else might turn up, to reduce the number of vacant swims. So all well and good before a session, but on the way home that 4hour drive gives plenty of time to dwell over any of the sessions mishaps, and the hook-pulls...... (Sorry just had to touch some wood after mentioning the dreaded ‘Hook pu, pu, pu, puu,’ nope there’s no way I can say it again, bloody fishing superstitions!) Ok I’m back, well lets just say the ones that got away, were playing on my mind a bit.  

On lakes this size, there’s no room for tackle worries

In this kind of situation, just before falling into a spiralling black abyss, of changing and fiddling around with my set-up or approach week on week, which inevitably leads to blanks and more tackle alterations, I always try to remember my time fishing on my local lake. As I’ve probably said before, the local lake was large, at around 70acres, and didn’t hold too many carp, so no surprises then that blanks were common, and it could take a while to get you’re head around the place. One thing that fishing this venue did teach you very well, was that changing bait, rigs or tactics for no good reason was the kiss of death. The fact that location was always the biggest reason behind whether you caught or not, meant that rig wise you just had to go with what you felt would provide the safest, strongest hook-hold possible, ready for when you finally get the location right and put yourself in with the chance of a take. That was it, plain and simple, if you had a reliable rig, you just had to keep with it, even forget about it, and concentrate your efforts on looking for signs of active carp, as the main downfall of any rig is when the angler fails to put it in front of the fish. The angler’s doing well on the lake at the moment, are following the exact same principles, Barry Lawrence, and Nigel Cocks, are two anglers in particular that spring to mind, both doing very well this year. Barry has taken full advantage of being able to fish mid-week, keeping a keen eye on weather systems and fronts, always on the look out for a dip in the air pressure, and the best possible time to get on the bank, has come as close to taking the place apart as you can. With Nigel not far behind in numbers of fish, but getting amongst the biggies all the same, with captures of ‘Dent’ and ‘Two Tone Tony’ no small feat from having to make the most of whatever conditions are present at the weekends. Both anglers, along with a whole host of other guys I could mention, that have done well there over the years, always have the same things in common within their approach, a terrific amount of time spent looking for carp, and a focus on location of their quarry only paralleled by their confidence in a good quality bait, on the end of a strong, simple, safe and effective rig.

Nigel Cocks with his confidence rigs. Lovingly cared for and ready to go

Strong reliable rigs to make the few takes you get on the 70 acre count.

Nigel with the magnificent ‘Two Tone Tony’

Thinking back to my own time concentrating on that big open expanse of water, always leads me to remember exactly why I use the rigs I do, because they work well and provide arguably the most important angling quality, you can find - Confidence! For that reason I can find it very hard to change or adjust rigs to better suit the angling situation, a problem I will touch upon again no doubt, but more often than not, these thoughts have saved me from moving from a working set-up, unnecessarily.

By the time I’d made plans to return to Oxford, I’d had enough time to mull all this over, and fully consider the fact that snowman rigs had been extremely reliable on the Oxford pits. The loses of the last session, had been the only time of doubt, and as I said last month, occurred in less than favourable feeding conditions for the carp, and being the only real blip this year could just as easily be a straight forward case of bad luck. So that was it then, no reason to deter from the snowman rigs to much, just yet, not until the niggling thought that perhaps the carp had wised up to the balanced double hook-bait, had been well and truly proven.

Back on the pit, ahead of 6nights on the bank, the fishing conditions hadn’t improved; the high air-pressure weather front remained, continuing to drive a somewhat stale North, North West wind. Not surprisingly nothing had been out, which on one hand was not that encouraging, but on the other was really adding to the air of expectation within the anglers around the lake. After all, we were now well into autumn, and the good feeding spells, regularly shown by carp at this time of year, as they look to build their winter condition, had not yet materialized. We all knew it was going to kick off at some point, with the lake holding a number of big carp that would hopefully get their heads down for a good munch sooner or later, and all the talk was around the new full moon, coupled with a small dip in the air pressure, only a few days away. Everyone was on about it, with eager anticipation, which for me was a new experience, as until recently I‘d always been a weekend angler, not having the luxury of planning my fishing around the moon phase, weather, or anything else other than work and family. What the moon did in particular, was not something I’d previously taken much notice of, as I’d not been able to pick and choose when I fished before, with the fact that this sessions 6nights were across the 3days prior and 3days following a new, full moon, a pure fluke, so I was keen to see what, if any, difference it made?

With the bivy up, it was time to get the rods out, which having gone back into the swim, that I’d finished up in, on the last trip, was a simple case of measuring the line out between two bank sticks, a rod length apart, and clipping-up ready to cast. Every now and again you can really land on your feet with available swims, and this was exactly as I felt, with the none of the occupied swims doing anything, and no one having fished this swim for the past 4-5 days, there was a good chance a few carp could be in the area, just as they had been from the same conditions during my last session. It was definitely a good place to start, if nothing else. Two of the rods went straight back to feature that had provided my previous takes, a clear channel in the weed that ran across the swim between some heavy weed beds in the now un-fishable swim to the right, and another large bed of weed roughly half way towards the opposite bank. The 3rd and final rod went down to the left, just off a long, thick stretch of tall reeds, and another favoured patrol route of the carp.

Recording the casting distance of a swims features in a note book, makes re-casting a whole lot easier

Short of any signs of carp, and considering their recent lack of feeding, each rod was baited lightly, with 20 baits spread around the reed rod, and 50-100 New Grange boilies over the other two. Despite having plenty of bait in reserve, fishing for a single bite, seemed the best way to start off, although that approach was about to change. After a quite first 24hours, a few fish had begun to show in the weeded swim to my right, gradually edging closer to the clear channel as they continued to head and shoulder throughout the afternoon. Activity probably promoted by the north wind fading away during the night, and the mornings flat still conditions, now turning to a light southerly, blowing straight down onto this end of the pit.  With a forecasted dip in air pressure, and of course all the convincing talk of a big moon equally big fish, a good feeding spell from the carp was surely on the cards, and I looked to be in pole position, so I didn’t hesitate in dispatching roughly 3kilos of boilie over the clear channel rods. As night fell these rods began to receive an increasing number of liners, and as I sat on a bucket, looking out into the darkness you could hear the reassuring sound of carp topping out, over the baited spots. The decision to get a decent bed of bait out there was looking to be a good one, as the carp were clearly on it, and it didn’t take long before one of them came across one of hook-baits, generating a strong take to the middle rod. Now I’m usually fairly calm when first playing a carp, and can enjoy the experience, only getting a bit twitchy after it’s been on for a while, or nearing the net, but on this occasion I was a nervous wreck from the outset. Having spent the last week going over an over the failure to land hooked carp on the last session, my legs were like jelly, as I tried to persuade whatever was on the other end of a hooped rod, not to bury it’s self into the nearest weed bed. Luckily for the colour of my pants it didn’t take too long before what felt like a good fish came to the net. My mate Adam came down to help with the un-hooking, weighing procedure and take some pic’s of a deep bellied mirror carp, at 35lbs 10ozs. That’ll do I thought, as I returned the mirror none the worse from our acquaintance, with the sound of carp still rolling on the surface, seemingly preoccupied and regardless of the fact that one of their buddies had just slipped up.

35lbs 10ozs, that’ll do!

Wrapping the line around the two bank sticks, and lining with the silhouette of a tall tree opposite, had a fresh snowman rig, back on the spot first time, the lead going down onto the bottom with a nice ‘Donk’ and an excellent chance of one to the re-cast, although I wasn’t too sure I’d be ready an able. From a mix of eating too much chilly, and all the excitement my stomach was turned in knots, walking up and down the bank didn’t help the discomfort, so I made for the bed-chair, and hoped that getting my head down would also ease my full belly. Yeah I know, I shouldn’t be such a pig, and I was just promising myself not to overindulge ever again, when the bobbin on the right hand rod pulled up tight, and I was into another fish trying its best to weed me up. Just like the first fish, some early pressure, plus the lead being dumped from the clip on the take, saw the fish come up in the water, away from the weed. Being full of nerves was the problem, with the feeling of a tight line suddenly falling slack as a hooked carp gets away, still firmly at the front of my mind from the last trip, making every turn and shake from the carp a heart in the mouth moment. It probably sounds like I’m making a right meal of it, but everyone around the lake knew that any take now could be one of the biggies, and it really did have us all on edge. Like I’ve said I don’t normally mind a carp pulling me around a bit, that’s part of the fun, but under the circumstances, shivering with nerves and with a stomach full of knots, I was glad when my second take of the trip resulted in another carp coming to the net. As I drew the carp over the cord, I thought it must have been a good fish, because it took a few seconds and a couple lifts of the net for its tail to finally follow its head and flop down into the net. It wasn’t until I switched on my head torch, which I don’t like to have on while playing carp at night, that I could properly see a very large flank of a carp with two isolated scales in the middle, I reached down into my waders for my phone and rang Adam. ‘Think I’ve caught the Hamster mate, but don’t really want to take it out of the water on my own, be better if two of us weigh it I think’ was the message, and Adam was straight round getting the mat and weighing kit ready, while I held the fish safely in the net, out in water. It was so much easier with two of us especially as we were handling the pits largest resident, a mirror carp known as the ‘Hamster’ weighing in at 47lbs 1oz!!!

A second extended cord from the sacking pole to a tree. Tied with a hundred knots

Waking up a monster

Buzzing!

With the carp safely and properly sacked up ready for some daylight pics, I stayed awake checking the fish every so often, although it was fine, understandably I couldn’t sleep anyway, completely buzzing with my new PB!

My new PB, the ‘Hamster’ 47lbs 1oz

The Hamster swims away safe and sound, ready to make someone else’s day

The clear channel in the weed produced a 24lb common, two 25lb mirrors, plus a beautifully scaled mirror just short of thirty, at 29.12, that really had me wondering whether I’d hooked another biggie, as it continually held the bottom, before the four day rule meant I had to move swims. Adam who’s also been testing the New Grange of late, moved in and kept the spots going, holding the fish in the area, and putting a few more on the bank, a 32lb mirror and another one of the biggies, ‘The Long Fish’ at 39lbs 14ozs the pick of the bunch.

Another night time mirror

The second 25lb mirror of the trip

A stunning mirror to finish, just short of thirty at 29.12

Adam’s 32lb New Grange mirror

‘The Long Fish’ at 39.14 the best of the bunch for Adam Smith

Over the next few days nearly all the other target fish came out, a few of which I was fortunate enough to see on the bank. The few days before and after the full moon had certainly lived up to all the hype, like a big fish on/off switch, and will definitely be something to keep track off from now on. Hopefully, with winter just around the corner, the Oxford pits will keep fishing well a little longer, and give me something to tell you about next month.

Until then enjoy your fishing, and tight lines, I’m off to howl at the moon, in thanks for my new PB!

Cheers,

John Hooooowwlll!!!