2015 23 August 23rd Chittenden, Edenbridge

Confidence was high as I leaped out of bed ready for my next assault on the club's carp lake at Chittenden.

I was up and out of the house by 5:45 ready for the run down to Edenbridge. It takes about 35 minutes with a following wind and so it was around 6:20 when I pulled in to the car park.

Full of enthusiasm, I unloaded the car and quickly made my way down to the far end of the lake where hopefully, my favorite swim would be free.

My luck on this occasion was indeed 'in' as when I passed the island I could see that all the swims were free. As soon as I arrived at the swim I fed both my intended swims with generous amounts of maize. It worked before so why not today?

Next, I set up both my rods, a waggler rod for the corner reeds swim and a feeder rod for the maize fed sleeper swim. By 7.05 I was ready to make my first casts.

For the waggler rod I started on corn and was rewarded with a bream, par for the course really. For the feeder rod the first hour brought a carp that I estimated was about 3 lb.

For the next hour I switched to meat on the waggler rod and managed to bag a carp which weighed around 4 lb.

I got nothing on the waggler when I switched back to corn for the next hour. I did however manage to snag a carp of 5 lb or so on the feeder rod.

Nothing on the waggler for the second consecutive hour, I was beginning to get worried. To help keep my spirits up the feeder rod chipped in with another bream.

The next three hours, which for arguments sake we will call lunchtime, was very quiet. The waggler produced a solitary bream. The feeder rod however, produced the best carp of the day so far, a specimen(!) of about 7 lb.

The afternoon session was all about carp, three of them to be exact. A 7 lb one on meat was the waggler rod's contribution and a duo weighting 8 lb and 3 lb was the feeder rod's.

Between 16:00 and 18:00 it all went quiet again. I was back to using corn on the waggler and yes it attracted just the bream. One to be exact.

After 18:00 and before I packed up at 19:00, I went back on the meat and was rewarded with 3 carp, 2 small ones and one about 3 lb. I finished the day off with a small bream.

So sixteen fish in the day, not my best but a satisfying one all the same.