19/02/11 - Fishponds

Weight – 55lb 2oz
Catch – 8 Carp.
Weather – Cloudy damp start. Sunny periods later

Today was a practice session to see how the lake was fishing before tomorrows match. As I was setting up Graham Beevor turned up with the same intention, so any thoughts of a quiet day had gone. Although he did make me smile when he received a phone call asking if he was still coming to his drumming lesson in an hours time! Graham, proceeded to tell the caller he only had 1 arm, which he lost in the war, so was unable to attend. The caller was very apologetic.

I really wanted to see whether I could catch on the waggler, using a 3AA Insert Waggler & 8mm pellet. Started on the tip & double corn. Although I had a carp after 10mins it was slow going. I tried the pellet cone and then a small feeder and caught on each method, but again very slow.

In the meantime, I had started to regularly fire 8mm pellet at 25m. When I tried the waggler, I initially started at half depth and gradually went deeper, until I started fishing on the deck in 9ft of water. I stayed on the waggler for much longer than I should have, but did catch 1 carp on 8mm pellet and 1 on corn later on.

I had also set up a pole swim at 11m, feeding micro pellet, mixed with groundbait, feeding 4mm over the top. Surprisingly I didn’t catch and had to set up a new swim to my left feeding only 4mms & a few bits of corn. I caught another carp here.

A frustrating day, because I was getting phantom bites, which were either liners or small fish pecking at the bait.