September 5th - Boulthurst Farm

My 2010 season finished with this final trip to 'the farm' on the afternoon of Sunday September 5th.

I turned up at the venue around 12:30 to find all the swims taken! The first time ever. I had a wander up the bank to see how things were going for the people there. Bad news - no one was catching. The rain began to fall as well and I thought how could things get any worse?

I mentioned to one of the anglers that I might as well go down to the ponds and try my luck there but he said there was a match on and that's why everyone was here!

I was actually chatting to the chap in the double swim who I had met there before and he said I could share with him to save me having a wasted journey. What a nice bloke!

To be honest it was a bit cramped but I managed to cast a boillie out into a area about midway across the pond. I fed a few freebies and settled back in my chair to see what was what.

To be honest it was a bit of cast fest there that day as it seemed that every few seconds someone had to cast a bait in. I put this down to the fact that apart from me everyone was using floating bread - there was loads of the stuff going in.

I was not really surprised that no carp were feeding considering the noise.

Anyway I was getting nothing on the buzzer, usually I would get some line bites that I took to be the roach initially investigating the freebies but today there was nothing.

As the afternoon wore on people began to pack up and leave. Around 6pm my fishing buddy went for his dinner as well. I started to hope that things would improve when I was left on my own.

However this was not to be as I managed to get my first blank of the season.

Roll on next spring!

September 3rd - Private Pond

Today I decided it was about time I did another afternoon/evening session at the club's Private pond in Oxted.

I travelled down in the rain but by the time I got to the pond it had stopped which allowed me the oppertunity to set up in some comfort.

I managed to get peg 8 which is rapidly becoming my favourite. The lily pads are quite close and the fish can be enticed out of them fairly easily. The margins area in this swim are also very productive.

I mixed up a small batch of groundbait containing mostly brown crumb. I fed a couple of generous balls into the swim along with about a 1/3 of a pint of hemp. A few grains of sweetcorn completed the carpet of bait.

My set up was a basic small waggler, 6lb main line, size 16 wide gap hook with a 5lb hook length.

My first cast (well flick in to be exact) was at 12:25.

There was an almost instant reaction to the bait in the swim but I put this down to the prolific stock of small rudd and roach. However by 2pm I'd caught 6 fish, 4 small carp, a crucian and one of the aforementioned roach.

All six fish were taken on sweetcorn or breadflake. I hadn't bothered taking any maggots as I know these would be snapped up by the smaller fish.

The next hour was much more productive, the tench showed up, a nice 2lb specimen and a 3lb common carp, both taken from the margins. The small carp were still there as I managed to bag 3 of them. The number of roach doubled as well as I had 2!

It was at this point that the heavens opened and I had to start to build a shelter on the platform. Up went the brolly which was attached to my box which was directly behind my chair making it a perfect dry fishing base. This worked well mainly due to the fact that there was no wind.

The downside of the change in the weather was that I couldn't take anymore notes so I'm writing the remainder of this entry from memory.

Despite the rain the fish continued to feed. I kept topping the two swims up with an occasional ball of groundbailt and some loose offerings. The small carp came in at about one every other cast.

I'm not sure how many I caught by the end of the session but it was over 30. I packed up around 7:30 in one of the intervals in the rain.

Was I just unlucky with my choice of days or did it really rain that much this summer?

August 29th Boulthurst Farm, Oxted, Surrey

I thought today I would give this pond an afternoon/evening session.

I turned up at 12:30.The weather was cloudy but thank god no rain. As usual it seemed I was the only one there.

I managed to get my favourite swim (see picture below) and immediately started to feed my 2 chosen lines, the first under the overhanging tree and the second the clear water about 30 yards to the right of the tree.

Under the tree I fed 10ml seafood boillies which I had been very successful with in the past in this swim. The other swim I thought I would try something different. I fed 10ml strawberry boillies (normally I use tutti fruitti ones) with the intention of using 12ml boillies on the hair. I was trying to keep the roach of the hookbait.

I cast in around 12:55. The first bite came at 13:20 but I missed it as the hooklength broke! Bt 14:50 I'd lost another 2 more. Both of which spat the hook!

At 15:00 I caught a fish on seafood but it was a bream not an expected carp. It was a good bream, the best I've ever had at this venue.

The first carp, a 2.5lb common arrived 5 minutes later, again to a seafood boillie.

Twenty minutes later the second carp turned up, this time one of 3lb which also had a liking for seafood.

The second "strawberry" line was very quiet and I was beginning to suspect that I had made a wrong choice. However at 6pm the buzzer went off and I landed a 6lb common easily the best fish of the session.

15 minutes later I lost another on seafood which spat the hook out.

The strawberry boillies struck for the last time at 18:40 when a 2lb common took a fancy to one. 

An hour later I lost another fish and that made me decide to call it a day. This session produced 5 fish with a further 5 being lost! Did the strawberry experiment work? Well it did produce the biggest fish of the day so I think at the very least it's worth another go.