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Instant carp fix

30/04/2007

Instant Carp Fix

April 2007 my good friend Timmy arranged a nights session on a hard water known as Redlands. On a guest ticket he lent me all the tackle which included two good rods, pod, bivvi and bite alarms.

He wanted to lend me some new rigs that he was tying with the Nash Trigga link, I know some good anglers using the stuff, but I had one of my low visible mono rigs I had all my confidence in. That’s so important in carp fishing.

When I arrived at the lake light was fading and like a true friends they set me up good and proper. All I needed was to set my end tackle and cast out.

The left hand rod I opted for a snowman rig with a Red Shrimp & Garlic 18mm bottom bait and a florescent pink smell less 15mm pop up. I got this from the factory as we have had a sourcing problem when making OF pop-ups. I put this rig into a pva bag full of method mix bloodworm & Shrimp and followed the instructions of Doug who recommended fishing about 20m out.

The second rod I used a Gardner Tackle ready tied D rig and a OF popup which was Tutti Megafish I soaked it in the Amino crab liquid for a couple of seconds and then cast it out as hard as I could and it landed close the opposite side of the lake, what seemed to be heavy weed. All my old fishing mates were there and they thought I was crazy and said I was only going to catch bream all night. My confidence in my own rigs and bait application is strong and I will not follow others and just stick to what I know best.

We then relaxed and all stood around my tent talking and drinking beer. As this was more a social event then anything serious.

Suddenly from know where my left rod alarm bleeped into life and line was ripping from my reel. With mouths wide open my friends were in complete shock as my so called bream rig was into a fish. The fight was strange with the fish constantly changing directions left to right and as I was a little tipsy my legs were shaking with the pressure as my friends watched on. Everyone had put this fight as being a carp but to all our surprise it was a Tench!!

"We didn’t weigh it but I insisted on a picture"

How can a tench fight like a carp? When I removed the tench from the net we discovered that the fish had somehow foul hooked itself in the top of the head. Ouch! But the hook was in bone so little damage to the fish. It looked about 4lb and none of us could believe what just happened. My excuse was the tench was head down feeding hard on the method mix with bloodworm and shrimp. It must accidentally foul hooked himself and with the head of the fish pointing away from the surface had the strength to fall us into thinking it was a strong carp. The jokes started to flow. But I didn’t care, it was my first English fish in five years and I was happy to get my hands wet until I realized I had no towel to wipe the slime off.

I took the rig and in pitch black I just opened the amino crab bottle and put the whole thing in for a quick soak. This time the rod went over my shoulder and I cast hard out into the middle of the lake. After a dozen or more beers between us it was time to call it a night, which was around 1am then.

Carp anglers are used to two different sets of alarms. There’s one alarm that goes off in the early hours of the morning and we are reluctant to get out of bed the other alarm that goes off and we are out so fast life depends on it. Thankfully this time it was the second one and at 8am on the dot my borrowed Fox micron beeped and kept on beeping as line was coming off the reel fast. I was scrambling out of the bivvi with the sleeping bag still firmly stuck around me. I couldn’t get out of the thing so on hands and knees I crawled to my rods. It was the left hand rod again, the tench rod. I picked it up and thanks to the help of Ian who kindly got me out of the bag and put my boots on I was now playing a real carp. The boys came over to see and as I played the fish the jokes of another fouled hooked tench were flowing but to their amazement this time it was a carp. With some begging G helped me land the fish in the net. I guess everyone was in shock that I had turned up and caught one of there fish knowing nothing of this water and using tactics they wouldn’t dream of.

Tim said it was one of the original stockies and I was well pleased to get into a good fish on tricky water.

On this side of the fish you can see the scratching marks where the fish has been spawning. A few more days and all the fish would be off the feed and into some serious mating for a couple of weeks.

The morning view from my swim, it was a little tricky to cast through the trees especially at night. I’m more used to the long open banks of Europe, though I do prefer the beauty of English rivers and lakes.

Doug caught also early in the morning around 7am. He landed a common of 22lb about 30m further up the lake again on a snowman red shrimp & garlic boilie. The rest of the guys were not so lucky but they could come back again. For me this was a one and only chance and I made the most of it.

Great angling if I don’t say so myself

Thanks Tim and England, bye for now.

Leigh O’Keeffe

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