cal_sutt
Well-known member
Went down to my local commercial today bright and early to (hopefully) enjoy a good days fishing. When I go there I don't ever take very much with me as its quite a walk from where I live; I went with one carp rod, net, half a bag of cheapo groundbait, a tin of hemp, a tin of sweetcorn, a bankstick and one alarm as well as a tackle wallet with hooks, leads, etc.
I got to my peg and chucked out a handful of hemp and a bit of corn while I mixed up the cheap red carp groundbait and added some hemp and used sweetcorn juice and scopex booster rather than water. I then tied on a size 12 hook and a small 15g feeder, by now there were bubbles coming up iny chosen swim! Across from me were two (very) northern blokes - serious carp anglers... they got out their car and set up 3 rods each on alarms (both with spods too) and hammered their swims with bait - massive balls of groundbait, hundreds of boilies and pellets and they put about 3/4 full spods over each swim. Here's me thinking "god I hope this is all worth it" but knowing that the carp in this lake (or should I say pond) only just go up to 20lb. They left their swims for a minute to go to the car and next thing I know, I look up and there's leads flying all over the place. To be very honest, I felt like the British troops at Dunkirk in the second world war in terms of how well equipped I was in comparison to these two.
As I was sat there giggling at how they were overdoing this, my alarm beeped off at me and I pulled in a small carp... I filled my feeder again and cast out and literally within 5 minutes I was into another fish - another small carp.
By mid day, I was almost sick of hearing my bite alarm going off. Since about 10am I'd already had 10 or so carp and tench and the two across from me had one between them. It was making me laugh quite a lot because they were missing bites left right and centre, they were fishing 6 swims between eachother and I was switching between two margin swims and I'd already had a lot more than them... It was quite a good feeling because I'd had more action than everyone on the pond put together already, I enjoyed my triumph for a while and carried on fishing.
As the afternoon got to its midpoint, the two of them had had quite a few fish between them now and I was getting annoyed because my swim had gone quite. I stayed true to my swim and it did pay off, however it was nice to see one of their alarms going off and none of them noticing because they were p*ssing about in their car, I did the right thing and shouted at them to alert them but it was too late already as the fish had taken the line into the reeds and the man lost his hooklength. Oh well, funs over now... At least that's what I thought!
I carried on bringing in carp after tench after tench after carp and I was thoroughly enjoying myself for sure. Both I and one of the carp anglers had a run at the same time but mine was a tench of about 10oz. His middle rod then got a run and his mate ran over to handle it, then it got even better! While they were fighting their fish, his last rod went off too! I was considering just watching to see what they'd do but I knew that I wouldn't want this to happen to me, I did the good think once again and shouted over offering a hand... they said yes so I ran over and grabbed the rod, helping them out landing their fish (best thing was, mine was biggest!) and they were very thankful of course. I ended up sitting over there for 5 or 10 minutes and having a fag and a chat with them, although they were quite annoying, they were a really nice couple of blokes. I decided to be a bit cheeky and point out they were quite out of place and they explained that their local specimen lake had a match on (as they discovered when they got there with all their gear) so they settled to fish in sunny old Retford.
I went back to my peg and continued to enjoy my day, I fished till about 7.30pm and finished the day with a brace that would win a match of about 120-140lb of carp and tench. I did catch a lot more than the two blokes on the other side and it was funny to think that between them, they had 5 more swims covered than me and I covered one and caught more! Maybe I got lucky? I don't know, but the peg I fished doesn't usually produce much so this had me thinking.
Anyway... I walked home with a smile on my face, an aching arm from fighting so many fish and a bit of a headache from my bite alarm. I see this as my proof when I say you can take minimal tackle and still have a great day's fishing.
Thanks for reading and hope you enjoyed, Cal.
I got to my peg and chucked out a handful of hemp and a bit of corn while I mixed up the cheap red carp groundbait and added some hemp and used sweetcorn juice and scopex booster rather than water. I then tied on a size 12 hook and a small 15g feeder, by now there were bubbles coming up iny chosen swim! Across from me were two (very) northern blokes - serious carp anglers... they got out their car and set up 3 rods each on alarms (both with spods too) and hammered their swims with bait - massive balls of groundbait, hundreds of boilies and pellets and they put about 3/4 full spods over each swim. Here's me thinking "god I hope this is all worth it" but knowing that the carp in this lake (or should I say pond) only just go up to 20lb. They left their swims for a minute to go to the car and next thing I know, I look up and there's leads flying all over the place. To be very honest, I felt like the British troops at Dunkirk in the second world war in terms of how well equipped I was in comparison to these two.
As I was sat there giggling at how they were overdoing this, my alarm beeped off at me and I pulled in a small carp... I filled my feeder again and cast out and literally within 5 minutes I was into another fish - another small carp.
By mid day, I was almost sick of hearing my bite alarm going off. Since about 10am I'd already had 10 or so carp and tench and the two across from me had one between them. It was making me laugh quite a lot because they were missing bites left right and centre, they were fishing 6 swims between eachother and I was switching between two margin swims and I'd already had a lot more than them... It was quite a good feeling because I'd had more action than everyone on the pond put together already, I enjoyed my triumph for a while and carried on fishing.
As the afternoon got to its midpoint, the two of them had had quite a few fish between them now and I was getting annoyed because my swim had gone quite. I stayed true to my swim and it did pay off, however it was nice to see one of their alarms going off and none of them noticing because they were p*ssing about in their car, I did the right thing and shouted at them to alert them but it was too late already as the fish had taken the line into the reeds and the man lost his hooklength. Oh well, funs over now... At least that's what I thought!
I carried on bringing in carp after tench after tench after carp and I was thoroughly enjoying myself for sure. Both I and one of the carp anglers had a run at the same time but mine was a tench of about 10oz. His middle rod then got a run and his mate ran over to handle it, then it got even better! While they were fighting their fish, his last rod went off too! I was considering just watching to see what they'd do but I knew that I wouldn't want this to happen to me, I did the good think once again and shouted over offering a hand... they said yes so I ran over and grabbed the rod, helping them out landing their fish (best thing was, mine was biggest!) and they were very thankful of course. I ended up sitting over there for 5 or 10 minutes and having a fag and a chat with them, although they were quite annoying, they were a really nice couple of blokes. I decided to be a bit cheeky and point out they were quite out of place and they explained that their local specimen lake had a match on (as they discovered when they got there with all their gear) so they settled to fish in sunny old Retford.
I went back to my peg and continued to enjoy my day, I fished till about 7.30pm and finished the day with a brace that would win a match of about 120-140lb of carp and tench. I did catch a lot more than the two blokes on the other side and it was funny to think that between them, they had 5 more swims covered than me and I covered one and caught more! Maybe I got lucky? I don't know, but the peg I fished doesn't usually produce much so this had me thinking.
Anyway... I walked home with a smile on my face, an aching arm from fighting so many fish and a bit of a headache from my bite alarm. I see this as my proof when I say you can take minimal tackle and still have a great day's fishing.
Thanks for reading and hope you enjoyed, Cal.