Martyn Russ, Trish Lloyd, Brian Lloyd & John Rees
After having a a couple of weeks break from fishing we had decided to pay our local carp fishery another visit and see what we could catch. Myself, John, Trish and Brian had originally decided to fish the bridge pond at Cefn Mably Lakes but when we got there we saw that the actual pond was a lot smaller than what the pictures on their web site made out and there was no way we could use the big carp gear on this venue as it was really designed for pole fishing or waggler and feeder fishing.
We then decided on fishing the Carp pond and set-up swims close to each other along the one bank. My mother and Brian had decided on fishing the feeder where as myself and John had decided on fishing ledger & Zig rigs. We had chosen a good day for fishing, or so we thought at the time, as there was plenty of sunshine with loads of low cloud cover. I had decided to start of with 2 bottom bait rigs and John had decided on the same to see if we could encourage the fish to start feeding. After an hour and no signs of any life, apart from my mother loosing 3 quite large Carp to the reeds and lilies next to her swim, i decided on changing one of my rigs over to a Zig rig set at 4 foot using a red zig aligner and red foam. Within 10 minuets of me casting the zig out the rod zipped of and i had a screaming run. I struck into a tidy 6 lb. Carp that didn’t half put up a scrap.
As soon as we realise they were going for the Zig John changed one of his rods over to a zig to see if he could get them biting and had the other on a small pop up rig with a vanilla white pop up. Brian was the second person to strike into a nice big carp that was definitely double figures but lost it just after the strike and watched the fish flip its tail in disgust and swim away leaving a huge bow wave. Again my mother lost another fish to the reeds and lilies next to her. This is really strange, i thought to myself, usually Brian and Trish would be wiping out the fish even on difficult venues where other fishermen seem to struggle. No one else around the lake was catching either, we couldn’t work out why. The weather was good the water seemed slightly murky but clear enough, not too clear to spook the fish but clear enough you could make out their outlines when in your swim.
We continued to fish the venue for the day but no other fish was coming out. Martin from Penarth turned up and set up camp at the start of the pond and decided on fishing 12mm halibut pellets on the bottom using a hair rig and low and behold he started to hit the fish. He managed 4 good fish over the afternoon witch was better than everyone else as all round the lake they were struggling for bites. After a few hours i realised that they were just not interested in the Zig’s anymore and decided to put one rod back on a bottom bait. The set up i was using was Carp Force 15 lb. Fluorocarbon fishing line from Total Outdoors and a Core Zero leader from Taska. Using a safety lead clip with a 2oz weight on i was using a 15 lb. braided hook length with a size 8 Carp Force wide Gape hook tied with a hair and knotless knot. I had used a snowman set-up with the bait consisting of a Tuti Fruity 16mm Boilie with a 10mm white tuti fruity pop up on the top.
John had settled on using a running chod with a core zero leader down to a 3oz weigh on the one rod and then he decided on something a little different for the second rod. He took a self weighted waggler, normally used for match fishing, and placed it on his line like a controller float. This ran down to a size 8 Carp Force wide gape hook with a hair with 4 peace's of vanilla corn on it. His other had a Spicy Peanut Pop up on. Whilst he was sat watching the float, fishing close to the lilies in the margins, his other rod ripped off with a screamer but where he had his other rod in his hands and was slightly delayed in getting to the bite he missed the fish and bumped it as the hook pulled from its mouth. This started to get to John and made him even more determined. Then suddenly, after placing the rod with the float gently on the ground, i noticed the float twitch. As i said to him “You better grab that before it goes into the water”, the float shot off and the rod started to move towards the water at an alarming rate. John jumped on the rod and struck straight into the fish. The fish then ripped off taking loads of line with it. John managed to get it under control and played the fish in to land himself his personal best of a lovely 12 lb. Common Carp. This made him more than happy and made up for a difficult days fishing.
I have never known my mother and Brian to ever blank and thankfully Brian managed a couple of fish on the bank a nice little bream and quite a large Rudd. My mother seemed to have quite a difficult time with the fish as she kept getting hook pulls and also the smaller fish kept on stealing the meat of the hair and not giving positive bites. It was one of the most difficult days fishing we have had so far this year. That’s how it goes sometimes and you just have to take the bad with the good. I am sure next time they are out they will get loads more fish as they normally do. At least i got a chance to try out some of my new carp equipment including the new Black Zero Stalking set with Black Zero bite alarms and indicators and John got a chance to try out his new reels and managed to get himself a new personal best. We had a great days fishing even if there wasn’t the amount of fish on the bank we would have liked but there's always next time!
Wet Nets & Tight Lines
