Tag Archives: carp fishing

I haven’t posted a “true” blog post for a while now, I seem to have been abusing this blog and using it mainly as an interactive advertising board for other things I’ve been up to. My own fishing has been very disappointing lately (more on that later), and I turn 30 in a couple of weeks, so I’m in quite a reflective mood and thought this was an opportune time to fill in on how 2011 was for me in fishing… 2011 started off very slowly for me. A multitude of reasons have left me spending far less hours on the bank than I would have liked to, but thankfully most sessions I’ve made the most of the time I had and caught some reasonable fish. I only had chance to fit in one session before March, but then managed a couple more river sessions before the season ended.  The only fish I landed during this period were a few pike, topped off by an 18lb 13oz beauty, which I blogged about here. Once the rivers closed, my fishing mainly went on a self-induced hiatus. Buying my first home became the priority and despite ours being a relatively straight-forward purchase (so we were assured by the estate agents!), …

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I know the weather’s about to turn chillier for a few months, so surface fishing for carp won’t be high on many anglers’ agendas, but I’m going to share a rig with you which enables great flexibility when using Korda Kruiser surface controller floats. The great thing about blogs is that they’re on here indefinitely, so come next spring anglers will be searching for surface rigs and ideas and this may just help them out. The Kruiser, which is a very robust, solid plastic controller, creates a semi-fixed “bolt-effect” due to having a rubber insert which the hooklength swivel lodges into. I have a few issues with this controller design – it’s off-centre shape can be tangle prone on casting (despite what the packaging states) and it also makes much more of a splash than I’d like upon landing – however, it offers brilliant presentation, casts easily when coupled with a light, through-action rod and is very unobtrusive once the float has settled. The Kruiser is available in 3 sizes and if you’re travelling light around a venue, trying to locate different pockets of feeding carp, you can never say 100% which size you’ll need, as you may find fish further out than you anticipated …

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This is another quick post from an internet café.  I’m on holiday, you see, until tomorrow, so burglars you’ve got one last chance! The house is actually the reason for both my blog-slackness and my wider angling-slackness for almost the entirity of the river closed season and beyond.  I finally took the plunge and bought my first place with my girlfriend, Jen. Needless to say, there was a lot more to the whole process than I’d anticipated… Still, I’ve finally started to get a few sessions in, which I’m pleased to say have yielded very few blanks. So far I’ve had barbel to around 9lb off the rivers and a good few carp off the surface on some local lakes too. I also took my 13 year-old cousin Fraser for his first-ever river session a week or so ago where, under my guidance, he managed to land a clonking new PB chub of 4lb 5oz on simple groundbait feeder techniques. Not a bad first river fish at all; I reckon I was 19 before I’d caught a chub of that size. The only thing was the pesky chub was very lively on the bank and every time I pressed the …

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With National Fishing Week/Month (heck, why don’t they go the whole hog and make it last all year, every year and maybe re-brand the country Great National Fishing Britain or United Fishing Kingdom!) upon us, I shall be once again lending a hand at an event being held at Barlow Lakes near Chesterfield.  The day is being organised by my friend – and qualified NFA angling coach – Kevin Miles.  In the past these events have featured tackle stands, taster sessions for novice anglers, fun matches and displays by the Environment Agency.  This year I am not so sure about the setup (I’ll post more details once I know them), but I know that a local floatmaker is coming down, there are demonstrations of various floats and methods – including the unveiling of a new design of self-hooking controller float – and I’ll be in attendance from 10am ’til around 1pm (the event is open until 3pm), so if you want to chew the fat, discuss tactics or ask me questions on any aspect of fishing then pop down.  there’s no entry fee and the lakes are open all day for fishing if you want to combine the trip with your usual Sunday fishing trip.  …

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This post is about something that you won’t catch me doing very often, but last weekend I fished a MATCH at Glebe Fishery (part of Ray Marlow’s Mallory Fisheries) and managed to come second out of 11 entrants. It wasn’t what I’d class as “proper” fishing – just lobbing a bait at a bunch of far-too-enthusiastic water pigs and reeling them in – but it was quite enjoyable to get a decent bend in the rod a few times. I mainly caught bream and carp, although there were a few roach and the odd perch amongst them, but others also caught crucians, rudd and barbel. I ended up with 72lb 6oz, with my largest fish being a 9lb 6oz mirror carp. Match fishing is not something I’m planning to do regularly. It’s just not for me, although the banter was good and it was a very social session, which is good every once in a while. Part of my 72lb Glebe Fishery bag The Environment Agency has released an extremely handy feature on its website, for checking river levels.  I believe it’s based on the same data they use for their “rivercall” telephone service, but it’s more up-to-date and it’s free to …

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Well, I didn’t get fishing too much over the closed season, but two of the more notable sessions were fishing for Crucian carp at Carr Vale Pond near Bolsover and Tench fishing with my friend and erstwhile www.anglerstoday.co.uk editor, Kevin Miles. I tried fishing light for the crucians, as is normally required to hook one, but for some reason couldn’t connect with the bites. When I eventually swapped to fishing the lift method (which is one of my favourites for close-range fishing) and swimfeeder, I did start hooking fish. The first came to the lift method on a single grain of corn and it went 1lb 4oz. Later on, my “sleeper” feeder rod – which I’d loaded with a big hook, a whole lobworm and a grain of corn in the hope of a big tench – was nearly dragged in by an absolute screaming run, which I assumed must be a tench or carp. After a good scrap for 30 seconds or so, the fish seemed to give up, almost like a bream would. I brought the fish to the net wondering what on earth I’d hooked. It turned out to be another, bigger crucian at a PB weight …

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I very often lumber myself with far too much tackle – travelling light is something I wish I was better at – but sometimes it pays to have a few non-essential items, “just in case”. This is especially true if you’re travelling a long way from home to a fishery and don’t have the option of returning home if things aren’t quite as expected. One can never be sure exactly what to expect when arriving at a fishery; no matter how well you’ve done your homework on weather, etc. there’s always a chance that the water conditions and fish behaviour you’ve planned for are a million miles from reality. I do believe in remaining as flexible as possible in my approach to angling and I know for a fact that having a bit of extra tackle with me has saved me from a blank, or helped me put an extra fish or two on the bank, on many occasions. A prime example of this was a recent zander session on the Great Ouse. I’d taken some frozen deadbaits with me, but zander are notoriously picky feeders, and they will mostly take a fresh deadbait more readily than a pre-frozen one; …

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With National Fishing Month (which has now replaced National Fishing Week) upon us in late July, it is a perfect time to plan introducing someone new to our sport. Whether it’s a friend, relative or partner; showing a non-angler just why you love fishing so much has loads of advantages, both personal and for the sport as a whole. For angling to remain as the largest participation sport in the UK, it is important that new blood is recruited on a regular basis. The fishery and tackle industries rely on income generated by anglers, as do angling clubs. So, more newcomers introduced to angling means a stronger UK angling economy, which is of benefit to us all. Plus, expanding the general public’s awareness and understanding of fishing can only be a good thing. As anglers, we positively contribute so much towards many conservation and environmental issues and I think this needs to be better publicised, to show that we do more than just sit around wasting time, watching an orange blob all day (well, not quite all day!). I have taken several non-anglers fishing over the years, including cousins, girlfriends and friends. Whilst some of them have since taken up …

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Boycott Extreme Fishing with Robson Green Andrew agrees with the Angling Trust and also urges all anglers to refuse to watch Robson Green’s “angling” programmes It is very rare I would discourage any programme showing fishing on the TV, but having watched certain episodes of Robson Green’s programme – now inexplicably into its second series – Extreme Fishing, I feel that I really must. Personally I was horrified by some of the methods depicted as “Fishing” to an unsuspecting UK TV audience (and a surprisingly large one at that!), and also by Robson’s attitude throughout. I do not recognise Robson as an angler; indeed I never knew he fished until his first series came out. From what I’ve seen of his skills, he’s not even a very good angler, and certainly not of the calibre I’d expect to see presenting an angling show on prime-time terrestrial TV. There is nothing wrong with some of the methods he uses – when they are taken in the context of being successful methods for catching fish as FOOD, by cultures which have practised these methods for centuries – but all of this should be properly explained in the programme, rather than Mr Green …

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Each May marks another year since the demise of Chatsworth Angling Fair; a show which in my eyes was much more than an event. It was an angling institution. Its omission from the year’s angling calendar is a sad loss for our sport. Very rarely are so many angling disciplines showcased in one place together; with Coarse, Match, Sea, Fly, Carp and Predator fishing all strongly represented. I have many fond memories of the Angling Fair, stretching back to when I first attended, aged twelve. Two of us were dropped off nearby, and made our way to the main entrance, where we realised children were only allowed free entry when accompanied by a paying adult. Having saved pocket money for a few months, we didn’t want to “waste” part of it on the entry fee. So, being a bit slimmer in those days, we found an area of fence we could slither beneath, and headed towards the tented village that made up the majority of the fair. What a revelation it was to find row upon row of tackle dealers plying their wares, with bargains to be found wherever you looked! We spent hours perusing the stalls, testing out tackle, …

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