We had to source our tickets from a local newsagent and then dash to the venue in the hope that not too many beat us to it, there were a few spots I had in mind that I hoped we could secure. We needn’t have worried though, there was one chap fishing opposite the causeway on the smaller pond and he was our only neighbour throughout the whole day. It was really misty when we arrived, and wonderfully atmospheric.
The causeway separates the two ponds, with the far end being my favoured spot. Dad fished into the smaller pond and I was right behind him fishing into a snaggy corner of the larger one. I set Dad up with his feeder rod and his pole and away he went catching fish before I’d even got a rod out. He was going great guns until something big and boisterous ruined his pole, so I set up a float rod for him to use for the rest of the session.
Once I finally got going it started off slow but picked up nicely as the day wore on. I had a good 6 feet of water directly under the rod tip, and my prawn hook-baits started off getting pestered by small perch, some of which were barely as big as the prawn! Two better fish were hooked and landed, both around the pound mark and couldn’t have been more welcome. The nature of the swim meant that anything slightly bigger might cause me a problem due to underwater obstacles, an issue I’d just have to deal with as and when.
Dad was having great fun, small but very pretty carp were coming regularly and the odd crucian and better rudd and roach kept things mixed up and interesting. He steadily fed his margins and started catching with the float rod too, he was in his element, it was just strange that there weren’t more people there enjoying it, and on a Sunday with the sun starting to break through.
My swim was getting busier and busier, small mirrors were starting to find the bait and were causing me more than a few hairy moments as they dashed towards the margins and tried to become entangled among the low lying brambles. A tench of around 3lbs was hooked too, followed closely by two similar sized specimens; it was as though the fish were coming through in waves. More perch were caught, and even a nice sized roach. It was awesome fishing.
Then it seemed the larger carp came to see what all the fuss was about, I spotted them out in the main lake cruising in the sunshine, but eventually they’d found their way into my dark little corner. Luck had it that the first one I hooked sped out into the lake and not deep into the corner, so the 4lb mainline held up and soon I had a glorious looking common posing for the camera. Its colours were delightful, just how common carp should look.
Dad continued to catch steadily after our little lunch break, mostly small scaly linear mirrors, fish that will certainly be little heartbreakers in a handful of years. One particular crucian he caught didn’t look quite right, it was quite long, and certainly had most of the right characteristics, but something told me it was a hybrid. A lovely fish nevertheless.
More good commons came into my corner and were loving the juicy prawns I was drip feeding. A couple did manage to take me into the corner, which resulted in the hook link parting, but the majority of them went out towards the island resulting in a victorious end. They were old fish, not particularly big, but long and built for speed, it was exhilarating fishing.
Reluctantly we started to pack down somewhen around 4pm. Dad had to get back and tend to his pigeons, and I wanted some play time with Jessica before her bed time, I’d not seen her since the Saturday morning. As we loaded the boot and strapped ourselves in we both agreed that we’d have to return soon.
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