2016 12 May 20th Silver Lake, Gabriel's Farm, Edenbridge

This was going to be my second planned visit to Silver Lake at Gabriel's Farm fishery just outside of Edenbridge in Kent.

As usual I was up and on the road in plenty of time to arrive at the fishery bang on openng time. When I got there I unloaded the car and made my way over to Silver lake's peg 1, which is my favourite.

When I arrived at the peg I noticed there was a lot of blossom etc on the surface of the water which had obviously been falling from the nearby trees. I made the decision to fish at that peg anyway.

Just the one rod today, so it was to the standard waggler set up that I turned to. I fed the swim (about two rod lengths out) and was ready to make my first cast at 7:50.

It was a disaster, the flotsam and jetsam on the water just proved to difficult to fish through. The stuff was getting on the line and sinking the float and even when I tried to sink the line the debris went down with it. I decided I had to move.

I took a stroll up the lake to see if the situation was the same there, luckily peg 2 (or the next one round, can't remember which) was clear. I made the decision to move there as i could cast in the vicinity of the feed I'd put in at peg 1.

It was 8:50 before I was ready to start again. For bait, I commenced with single maggot. I immediately got a roach and a rudd which was a good sign.

By 10:20 I was still on the maggot and I'd added another 5 fish to the virtual net, consisting of roach and rudd again except for a chub which when weighed turned out to be my personal best! I was over the moon (cliche' time).

The next hour was very slow going - just a roach and a perch made the net.

For the next two hours I decided to switch to corn. I managed to get a rudd and a roach however it wasn't a total disaster as I lost what had to be a carp.

After capturing another roach I decided to switch to meat. It was a bit early in the afternoon but I felt I had nothing to lose. By 14:40 I'd bagged a carp and a bream.

My penultimate fish and my fifteenth of the day came in at 17:00 and was another carp.

My last fish and my sixteenth of the day came in at 17:30 and was another carp so at least I ended the day on a high.

2016 11 May 15th Hare Lake, Gabriel's Farm, Edenbridge

Today was going to be my first visit of the year to Hare Lake on the Gabriel's farm complex just outside of Edenbridge.

I was up and out of the house by 6:20, ready to make the journey down to Edenbridge. The trip was nice and uneventful and so dead on 7 am I arrived at the fishery.

I normally choose a swim car park end of the lake however today I drove to the top, depositting my tackle at my swim at the top of the lake on the way, before parking the car in the car park.

Just the one rod today, a waggler set up that I intended to fish close to the lily pads on the far side of the lake.

Bait wise my plan was to alternate between corn and meat. I knew from previous experience that the lake was full of roach and small carp. There are bigger carp in here but as yet I've never caught one.

I made my first cast at 7:50 and after an hour I'd caught 5 fish consisting of a rudd, three roach and one of the lake's small carp.

The next hour brought much the same results only this time is was six fish and the bream entered the picture for the first time. The alternating of hook bait between corn and meat seemed to be working.

The action slowed down somewhat in the next hour. The corn appearred to be working better than the meat as I only caught three fish, 2 roach and a bream, all of them on corn.

The last hour before lunch didn't bring me anymore fish however I did hook into one that I lost when it ran into the lily pads. Could that have been one of the lake's bigger carp? We will never know.

From 11:50 to 14:50 I caught absolutely nothing. I wasn't unduly worried as most venues take some sort of dip during the middle of the day.

Unfortunately things had now slowed down to a complete crawl. By 16:00 I'd caught just one more carp and one more roach, both on the corn.

By the time I packed up I'd only caught one carp. This made my total for the day 17, not exactly what I was hoping for.