18th October - Boulthurst Farm Limpsfield Surrey

After the previous Friday's success I was keen to return to Boulthust for another session at the earliest opportunity. It was nice and warm but a tad windy.

Today, someone was in the "beach" swim so I switched to my favourite one at the far right hand side. See photo:.

As usual I set up 2 rods, one fished in the margins to my left and the other in clear water to my right.

I cast rod 1 out at 11:55 with a carp pellet boillie, rod 2 went out at 11:45 with a monster crab boillie.

I didn't have a bite on rod 1 for an hour so at 13:00 I changed baits to a pineapple boillie, there was no action on rod 2 either so I switched baits on that one to a tutti fruitti boillie.

The change to tutti fruitti worked because at 13:25 I landed a nice 7 pound common! (sorry about the quality)

The Pineapple boillie on rod 1 wasn't stirring up any interest so at 14:00 I switched to white chocolate boillie.

There was no further action on the tutti fruitti boilie on rod 2 so at 14:25 I switched to a shellfish one. At 15:00 on rod 2 I lost what seemed like a good one, it spat the hook.

On rod 1 I switched baits again at 15:30 to Monster Crab.

At 16:00 on rod 2 the buzzer went off and a 6 pound common with a taste for shellfish boillies was in the net!

The last fish signalled that start of something good because 15 minutes rod 1's buzzer went off and in came a 4.5 pound common.

Forty minutes later rod 1 also produced a 6 pound common followed 10 minutes by the last fish of the day, a 2.5 pound common.

I packed up at 17:15 as the light was going.

16th October - Boulthurst Farm, Limpsfield Surrey

I had the afternoon off so I decided to head down to Boulthurst for an afternoon session.

The weather was warm but breezy and needless to say there was no one there.

I managed to get the beach swim again as can be seen from the photo below:

As usual I set up 2 rods, one fished to the left, the other to the right on the outside of a set of lily pads.

First out and almost straight away, on carp pellet boillie was this chunky looking six pounder.

Having just returned the above fish the second rod's alarm went off and in came this five pound common:

Six minutes later this seven pound common fell to a tutti fruitti boillie:

Another seven pounder joined the virtual net next. 

Next up was this six pound beauty:

Here's another:

And the last one!

My session lasted from 13:00 to 18:30 - a great session!

10th October - Boulthurst Farm, Limpsfield, Surrey

Anothe Sunday in October and another short session at Boulthurst Farm, 1pm till 6:30.

On arriving at the venue, I decided to fish the 'beach' swim again (see previous post) however when I got to the swim I discovered that the water level was up so high that the 'beach' had all but disappearred. Undetterred I set up in the swim anyway. (See photo below).

The session favourite in terms of bait this time was Monster Crab. All six fish caught in the session were all tempted by this seafood bait.

The best fish of the session was this mirror that went 7 pounds:

Next up was this 5 pounder:

The highlight of the session and somewhat of a surprise was this chub, I didn't even know the club had stocked chub in the pond.

In all I had a good session with 5 carp including a 7, 5, 3 and a couple of small ones plus the chub!

Until the next time.

7lb best

7,5,3 and 2 small ones plus chub!

all on monster crab

lovely day

1 to 6:30

4th October - Boulthurst Farm, Limpsfield, Surrey

The first weekend in October saw me back at Boulthurst Farm for another afternoon/evening (what there was of it) session.

The pond is not that large, around an acre in size. Coupled to this is the fact that we can only fish one side of it so the number of fishable swims is really only 4, one of them is a double.

The double is the one I refer to as the beach swim. This is because under normal water level conditions there is a small 'beach' area which you can fish from as opposed to sitting on the high bank. See photo below:

The rod on the left was set up to fish on the edge of the overhanging tree about 15 yards out. Approximately midway between the tip of the shadow and the tree (see photo below).

The second rod was set up to fish about 5 yards in front of the lily pads. (See picture below).

I had bought some seafood boillies to supplement my supply of monster crab ones and it was one of these that tempted this 6.5lb common on the very first cast! (See photo below). Sorry about the quality.

An hour later the new boillies worked again! See picture below:

Although the 'fishy' baits caught the bigger carp, the tutti fruitti ones worked well for the small stuff.

So, by the end of the session I'd caught half a dozen carp which for an afternoon/evening in October I took to be a good return.

Just to show you that there is countryside a mere 20 miles from the big smoke here's the view I have from directly behind me.

Till the next time.

27th September - Boulthurst Farm - Limpsfield, Surrey

Another Sunday, another afternoon/evening carping trip to Boulthurst Farm.


I was set up and fishing by 13:43 in my favourite swim at the right hand end of the pond which can be seen from the photo below: (sorry about the quality).


The rod on the right of the picture was set up to fish the over-hanging tree in the margins. The depth was about 2 foot. Casting distance was no more than 10 yards.


The rod on the left of the picture was set up to fish the open water about 15 yards from the bank.

Twenty minutes into the session and this common cap was on the bank:


Both swims then went quiet for a while. At 15:57 this excellent condition common took the bait and found its way onto the bank:

Another quiet spell followed and then at 17:41 I caught my best carp of the season! As luck would have it there was somebody else fishing the pond that day and so I was able to get a 'real' photo!

I can't remember exactly what it weighed but I think it was around the 8lb mark.

Anyway that was it for the session.

13th September - Boulthurst Farm, Limpsfield, Surrey

It had been nearly a fortnight since my last carp outing and therefore I was keen to get out in the autuminal sunshine before it disappearred for the year.

Always one willing to experiment (as long as no one was watching) I'd bought some white chocolate boillies. I'd seen in the angling press that these could be quite deadly.

I arrived at the pond about 2pm to find one other fishermen and a couple of EA bailiffs! As I was only carping for the afternoon and evening I'd only taken the bare minimum of tackle and yes you've guessed it - I'd left my licence at home. A quick check on their computer confirmed that I did have one and all was well! The licence now lives in my car!

Once the embarressment had died down I set to work setting up my two rods. As usual the first was by the margins and the second was in open water.

I didn't have long to wait for the action to start. A two pound common took a carp pellet boillie as expected from swim 1.

The carp pellet boillies were working well because moments later a 3 pound common took one!

At 14:39 (camera timing!) the buzzer went on rod 2 and this 4 pounder with a liking for tutti fruitti boilies was in the net.

15:45, the buzzer on rod 2 went off again and this 5 pounder was in the net. Each fish bigger than the previous one! At this rate the carp record was all but mine!

At 16:02 the increase in size continued as this 7 pounder also to a fancy to a tutti fruitti bait!


That was it as far as the best fish of the session went, I had a couple more smaller ones before I had to pack up as it got dark.

I must say there is nothing better than sitting by a pond on a late summer's afternoon - beats the telly hands down!

Bye for now.

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LICENCE





















WHITE COCOLATE

11th September - Private pond - Holland, nr Oxted, Surrey

This year's summer was showing no signs of breaking so on Friday September 11th, I decided to suspend my carp fishing and have a day float fishing on the club's private pond, just outside Holland in Surrey.

I arrived around 7am and my favourite peg (number 1) was free so I made way round to it and contemplated my plan for the day.

The water was dead calm so that made my mind up to fish a very light waggler tight to the lily pads in the corner of the pond to my immediate ight. The depth there is about 18 inches or so. I would also feed the margin swim to my left in the hope of picking up some bonus carp later on in the day.

I mixed some groundbait and fed two generous balls into the first swim. Coupled with this I also fed some maggots and a handful of hemp. To both swims I added a few grains of corn.

I was using my 12 foot float rod which is better suited for the bonus carp than my match rod. I had 5 lb main line to a 4 pound hook length on size 16 wide gap hook. A 2bb waggler dotted down completed the set up.

I started on swim 1 with a piece of strawberry flavoured corn. Although I could detect life in the swim nothing initially showed any interest in my bait. I put this down to either small rudd and roach or my grounbait doing its job so was not particulaly bothered.

As the first hour drew to a close I hadn't had any action at all in swim 1 on the corn. I decided to have a go in swim 2. I'd been feeding it a couple of grains of corn every 10 minutes or so.

Within seconds the float disappearred and I was into a fairly good fish. I played it within a couple of yards from the platform directly in front of me so I knew it was no monster. A couple of minutes later into the net came a very nice tench of around 2 pound.

Back to swim 1 and a change of bait brought me a few small (very) roach and the occasional small carp (mirror and common). None of them more than half a pound.

On the grounds that the corn and to a certain extent then maggots wern't working I decided to try bread. I wasn't using a punch so the flake on the hook was quite large which gave me the problem of small fish nibbling but not taking the bait. However when I did hook into a fish it invariably was a crucian carp. I couldn't keep count of them but it was something like a fish a cast for the next hour or so.

The only drawback was that once when I put my hand in the bread bag a bolt of pain shot up my arm. I withdrew my hand pretty quick to discover that I had been bitten by a wasp!

The pattern was set for the remainder of the morning. From the margin swim I managed to get another two good (for me) tench and the occasional better quality roach and from the main swim small carp, small tench and a load of crucians.

During the morning I had left the luncheon meat in the sun so that the outer skin hardened enough for me to use it on the hook. I'd been feeding the occcasional lunp or two in the margin swim all morning and at about two thirty I decided to give it a go. I was rewarded with a beautiful common carp of around 5 pound.

For the rest of the day I fished swim 1 with corn and bread taking crucians and small carp mostly and then every hour or so I would dip in the margins and take a bonus carp.

I did lose 2 good carp later on in the day.

I packed up at 7pm having had a great late summer's day. I must have caught around 70 fish including crucian carp, roach, rudd, tench, mirror and common carp. I'd learn't that if one bait doesn't work -try something different, in this case - the magic bread!

Till the next time.

Sorry about the lack of photos but my batteries went in my camera!