On Thursday I held my first course of the year at Twynersh Fisheries Complex. My student had fished when he was a young boy and was returning to the sport on his retirement. Roger had fished a couple of times with some friends but had experienced some trouble with modern techniques and felt that he was not catching as many fish as he ought to.
I took him to pit one ( the lake on the left as you enter the fishery) and quickly found that he already had some skills and knowledge. He was able to cast quite accurately and was soon asking all the right questions. We started off with a standard waggler set-up and I showed him how to fish the bait on the bottom. This is difficult at Twynersh as the water is very deep (nearly fourteen feet under the rod tip). Bites came instantly and a few small rudd and roach soon showed me that he could handle a rod and reel with some confidence.
Constant loose feeding of hemp and maggot had the larger fish feeding very near the surface, so I set the waggler very shallow and Roger was soon into the better fish.
He caught a lot of this size fish each giving a good account of themselves on fairly light tackle and his confidence grew. Meanwhile I had set up a fifteen foot Shakespeare Aerial Gold carp waggler rod with six pound line on one of the Shimano reels I spoke about last week. This rod was set up to fish the lift method but I was trying out a new hook to nylon from Middy.
As you can see from the picture these are hooks ready-tied to nylon with a metal wire coil on a “hair” (or short extension of line comming off the shank of the hook). This enables a ball of paste to be fished moulded around the coil and clear of the hook, to enhance hooking. As you can see the size twelve hook we were using is tied to six pound line also.
This method produced a couple of tench that put up a better fight but small fish were making bite indication a problem.
Since the beginning of the lesson I had not only been feeding close to the bank but had been firing balls of pellet laced groundbait thirty yards out with a heavy duty catapult and I set up a Harrison heavy float rod with another Shimano fixed spool reel (a 5000GT bait runner) loaded with eleven pound line. The float I put on is called a “baggin waggler” and Roger had never seen anthing like it.
This float is attatched to the main line justlike a normal waggler but is fished with a very short hook length (four inches of ten pound flourocarbon). I used a size eight hook with a hair attatched by a knotless knot. A ball of ground bait again laced with pellet and consisting of a high percentage of powdered pellet was moulded around the coil at the base of the float. A special groundbait can be purchased for this, it is called Method Mix but dampened pellets can also be used instead of ground bait. A soft hooker pellet was then mounted on the hair and I cast it out to the area where the balls of ground bait had been fired. I did the cast because a gentle lob is required or the ball of ground bait will break up and Roger was not an experienced enough caster.
The result was the ugliest carp I have ever seen but it did give Roger a good fight and I was able to give him some advice about his playing techinique.
The rest of the day was spent with the paste rig on the fifteen foot rod fishing an area I had been constantly feeding with hemp, pellet and the remains of the groundbait. The paste we were using was made from Dynamite Baits Source base mix and raw eggs with a little of the Source liquid flavour. I have caught tench, carp, barbel and chub on this paste.
Roger caught another tench and then the rod really arched over and a fish began taking line. As the fight developed Roger followed my instructions to the letter (so much easier when a student does!) and even on only six pound line was able to bring this lovely mirror carp to the net.
It weighed sixteen pounds ten ounces and more than doubled his previous personal best.
I have since had an email from Roger and I think his words sum up the reason I do this job.
“Martin — Thanks for an instructive day out — I not only learned — I also caught — especially the double figure Carp & the nice Tench. Very enjoyable day helped by the nice weather.”
I hope I have set him on his way to a hobby that will enrich his retirement.
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