2015 16 June 20th Chittenden, Edenbridge

Today it was time to return to Chittenden in an attempt to correct the mistakes I made on my previous visit.

I was up at 5 am and on the road by 5:30. It's brilliant driving down to Edenbridge at that time of the morning, you hardly ever see another car.

I arrived around 6 am and quickly loaded the trolley and headed off down the lake to my favorite swim.

As usual I first mixed the ground bait so that I could get the swim fed. A change I did make was that for the leger rod instead of fishing directly in front of me I was going to try about 15 yards to my right and about 5 yards out. This swim I fed with handfuls of maize which I topped up every hour.

I had the two rods set up and ready to make my first casts at 7:10 am. Learning from last time I had both clutches set very tight so that only a really good fish would be able to take line.

I started with corn on the waggler and maize on the feeder. The first hour was quite productive, at least on the waggler as I caught one good skimmer bream and a 5lb 12 oz carp on the waggler. I did find that I was able to bully it away from the reeds quite confidently.

By the end of the second hour I'd added three more bream to the virtual net, one on corn and two on meat. A good start to the day.

At the close of hour three I'd managed to get another two on meat, one bream and a very small carp.

By 11:05 I'd only added another carp to the total, It did weight 5lb 13 oz and it did fall to meat again.

Leading up to my lunch I had another carp, this one was slightly bigger at 6 lb 7 oz. Again, this one fell to a cube of meat.

It must have been the smell of my lunch because another hour later a caught an even bigger carp, this one came in at 8 lb 15 oz. It also fell to a cube of meat. I was doing well. This carp was accompanied by a 2 lb 6  oz bream, very nice.

Here's the bream.

For the next three hours I went back on the corn as the bites seemed to dry up. Two bream were tempted by it. Close to 16:00 I switched back to meat again and almost straight away a carp of 4 lb 4 oz came in.

Thirty minutes later another carp weighing 4 lb 8 oz was in the net, Yes that one fell to meat as well.

At 17:00 the feeder rod went off and I caught my first Chittenden carp on maize. It was a good one as well, 9 lb 2 oz, almost my first double of the year.

Eight minutes later and the waggler rod was off again. The result was another carp. This one was smaller than the previous one, 8 lb 2 oz, nice all the same.

Was that it for the day? Absolutely not, there was one more card to play. It was 18:00 and I was thinking of packing up for the day when the float dipped and I struck. Very slowly the fish moved away. It took line quite easily despite the clutch being very tight. I began to have flashbacks of my previous visit however this time I managed to turn it, although by that time it was a good distance out. I played the fish for what seemed an eternity before I first got a glimpse of my quarry. By my standards it was huge. I struggled to get it off the bottom, finally when it did come up I saw it was a catfish! I prayed the hook would hold as it came nearer and nearer. Soon it was close enough for me to reach for the net. Don't panic, Ken I thought just relax and don't rush. How I did it I don't know but eventually it was in the net! It weighed, 14 lb 2 oz, needless to say it was a personal best!

At that point I thought it couldn't get any better so I packed up and went home. Eighteen fish caught in the day including a personal best catfish. I'll be back.

2015 15 June 13th Nursery Fields, Edenbridge

After a disastrous session at Chittenden the previous week I needed the confidence boost of a good day so I decided to pay a visit to the club's mixed fishery lake at Nursery Fields.

I was up at 5 am and on my way by 5:45 which meant that I arrived at the fishery about 6:15. Only one car in the car park so effectively I had a free choice of swims. Just how I like it.

I went round the back of the lake and chose a swim that had lily pads to fish to but more importantly some that allowed me to fish right handed. On the left hand side of the swim there were some reeds jutting out that I thought would be a perfect place to drop a small leger. I think it was peg 12.

I had both rods set up and ready by 7:15. The waggler swim had been fed with a genourous helping of ground bait, corn and meat plus a few halibut pellets. The feeder swim had been fed with three or four large handfuls of maize.

I started the session with corn as my hook bait and the initial going was slow. I did catch though, one solitary bream.

The next two hours was much more eventful. On the float rod I had another skimmer bream plus a carp of 2 lb. The feeder rod though produced this bream of 3 lb 1 oz on maize. I was really happy with that one.

Things quietened down for the next hour. I was still on the corn and the only fished tempted by it was a small tench.

It was the feeder rod's turn to produce in the next hour, and produce it did. Another good sized bream (2 lb 13 oz) yet again on the maize

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The lunchtime section of the session saw the arrival of the small roach, two of them to be exact with a liking for the corn.

I switched to meat for the next hour and was rewarded with another tench and a skimmer bream. the feeder rod chipped in with my first tench on the maize.

The next hour was all about the maize on the feeder. Another tench and surprise surprise a barbel. Neither were of any real size but fish caught nevertheless.

Between 16:15 and when I packed up around 6 pm I caught a mixed bag of fish on the waggler and the feeder.

This included a tench and a barbel on meat, two bream, two roach and a barbel on corn.

So my first day at Nursery Fields for the season ended with a total of 19 fish. A good start. I will return.

2015 14 June 5th Chittenden, Edenbridge

The new club season was upon us and today I chose Chittenden as the venue to make my seasonal debut.

I arrived at the fishery just before 6 am. There was one other car in the car park and the sun was shining. It couldn't have been a better start to the day.

I loaded up the trolley and headed down the lake to my favorite swim at the bottom. When I got there the lake was flat calm, the surface only broken by the bubbles caused by feeding fish.

Two rod attack was the plan for the day. A waggler by the reeds and a small leger about a third of the way across. For the first time this year I was going to use maize as a hook bait. I intended to use it on the feeder rod. For the waggler I was going to use corn to start with and then meat later.

With the swims fed I was ready to make my first casts of the season at 7:10 am.

The first hour proved I was right about the feeding fish as I had three good bites, two of them spat the hook but the third made the net. It was this 6.5 lb carp. I was off!

For the next hour I switched to meat. I only caught two fish, the first was a 3 lb 9 oz bream which I believe is a personal best for me. The second was a catfish weighing about 4 oz!

I stayed on meat for most of the next hour and was rewarded with a carp of 4 lb 3 oz. I did swop back to corn for a bit which attracted two hungry bream.

Between 10 and 11 am I blanked. I was not expecting that. The feeder rod had been motionless all the morning so far as well.

The next hour was going the way of the previous one when all of a sudden the float went away and I was into a carp of 6 lb 11 oz. That however led into the situation that ended my day but strangely improved my season.

About 13:00 the float dipped away and I struck into a fish. It ran away from the reeds and out into the center of the lake.As it ran I started to tighten the clutch however this had no real affect. I tightened it more and more until I thought something must give. Eventually it did, I looked down and saw that the fish had emptied the spool. I was gobsmacked, sickened and annoyed. My attention had so been on tightening the clutch I hadn't notice that the spool was getting empty. My spool only takes 100 meters of 6lb line.

Worried that it may happen again I reeled in the feeder rod and packed up. I left the fishery about 13:30 totally cheesed off. I had no one to blame but myself.

Postscript

On my return home I logged onto WWW.MAGGOTDROWNING.COM to seek advice as to how this situation could have been avoided.

The solution most offered was that I should have had the setting of the clutch much stiffer as a starting point than I had so that when I tightened it further if the fish didn't stop the hook length would have broken.

Also I think I lacked confidence in how much I could pull on the rod.

Since this incident I have taken the advice given and it has helped me out. I can now bully the fish away from the reeds and into the open water quite easily. As a generalization, the clutch will only release line when fish 8 lb or over run.