Much of June came and went with little or no action from the carp for me. I had slogged away hard on tench corner for most of my fishing since May, all I seemed to be catching was more and more tench and big bream on the pellets, so had decided to fish the Active8 mix with a bit more regularity, often using the bait on two out the three rods, This was still producing tench but not so many bream, thankfully, as its no fun getting dragged from my slumbers in the middle of the night for the greedy, slimy bait stealing critters. During this quiet spell for me, Ritchie was still producing the goods, showing that the application of bait is paramount to producing  quality fish on this venue, with many ocean fish coming to his rods, but his target fish were still proving elusive.

Sighting  fish was easy at this time due to extremely low water levels, The lake is usually around three foot deep, but was averaging less than two foot in most swims. Coupled with the weed and algae growth, which was now breaking surface all over the bottom end of the lake in large rafts, the fish were very obviously feeding well and cruising in all areas of the lake. The weights of the fish were on the increase now after spawning but they would soon drop down again after a second spawn towards the end of the month. I felt the need for a move again, even though I found I could see and target fish in and around tench corner I was having little or no action from the carp. My next session saw me make the long walk to the back wall. On arrival on the Friday morning I pushed myself to ignore some obvious simo’s and ocean fish in tench corner, instead carting my kit all the way round to the back wall.

After positioning baits in the now rapidly disappearing clay strip I settled into the alders for some serious lake watching, I could see fish cruising all over the lake, many were just hanging off the sunken island in about a foot of water. I was not too keen on fishing baits tight to these snags in such shallow water, as the fish in here fight like animals; usually they strip line from the reels at such a rate that if you were off the rods the fish would easily get themselves into these snags. By mid day a cooling southerly wind had sprung up and started to push into the reeds and the bay to my left, in no time at all fish were starting to show tight into the reeds. They were rolling and crashing right out, not one to miss out on an opportunity of some surface fishing I quickly set up a rod, grabbed my stalking kit and walked back the way I had come to the entrance of the reeds. Upon arrival on the boards I moved along with caution as the fish were just behind a weed bed in front of the third platform.  I crouched down low and made my way onto the platform, immediately a fish bowed out from underneath my feet, how had I not seen it? Thankfully the other fish in front of me did not seem too bothered by this and continued to roll and rise at anything drifting across their heads. I let fly with a few pouches of dog biscuits well beyond the fish to allow the breeze to carry them back towards me. I cast my controller well beyond them and gradually drew it back towards the fish. unbelievably they would not take even a single biscuit off the top let alone my hook bait. After a frustrating hour of this I realised there was a hatch of flies in progress and thought my chances of catching were slim if non existent, they were far to preoccupied with the natural food larder.

As I was leaving the boards I noticed two fish just hanging off the first platform, with little commitment I flicked a bait towards them, it landed on top of one of the fish which turned and sucked at the bait. I struck, far too early, and missed the half hearted take, I felt like doing myself in as both fish left the swim at speed, causing bow waves right across the lake. Annoyed with myself I felt like I had missed out on a good opportunity and decided to try the other fish again. As I crept down towards the third platform I could hear them slurping and rolling tight in to the reeds. As I turned to enter the platform I realised the fish were right under my feet. I flicked out some bait and they attacked it with vigour as if they were starving. Why now and not half an hour earlier? I was sure these were the same fish as before. A mirror with large plates rolled, it was ‘Albert’, a fully scaled mirror carp I badly wanted to catch, I dropped a bait just in front of it and with a flick of it’s tail it rose and took it . I struck and was pleased to see my rod arc all the way round, he was on! The fish thrashed the water to a foam and all the others shot out from the area. I was obviously going to have to give line, and did so, but not quick enough. The line parted from the hook length like the crack of a rifle being fired next to my ear.

Distraught I left the platforms and the reeds behind me and headed back to my swim. I was in a mess, my face and arms were burnt to a crisp from the direct sun I was receiving whilst sitting on the boards, it was only now I realised how much pain I was in. I coated myself in sun cream, too late I’m sure, and put my rods back out onto the clay bar. I felt like I was suffering from sunstroke and decided on trying to get some sleep. I awoke hours later with the arrival of Ritchie. Having told him of the days proceedings he decided to dump his kit and get onto the boards for a go at them off the top, good lad, it wasn’t long before he was back round getting his camera kit having just successfully landed ‘Albert’, how gutted was I? And where was my hook? Gone! The following morning brought a cold cloudy miserable day, this was a relief to my sore, burnt extremities. The fish had disappeared overnight and I believed them to have moved up to the shallows, too sore to carry my kit back round there, I stayed put and brewed up, breakfast done, all eyes were on the lake in front of us. Fish were showing at range, well out of my casting ability, but nevertheless out went two single hook baits as far as I could thrash them. Later in the afternoon one of these bolted off and produced a fish that tore off to the right with tremendous power, I managed to turn it, only for it to take more line and head left towards the boards, eventually Ritchie netted it for me and as we looked into the net we found it to be ‘Z’. A recapture, but I was happy. He was down in weight at 18lb 4oz since my first capture of him over 20lbs but at least it was a fish. After the previous day anything, even a bream, might have made me smile.

Out went the rod again to the same spot, and within minutes away went the other rod, a short but hectic struggle saw me manage to net a stunning ocean fish of 15lb 11 oz with a reverse ‘C’ scale on its left tail wrist. Made up with myself I felt like I had more than made up for my losses earlier in the session, but losing Albert still troubled me. Other than Ritchie persevering on the boards with the surface baits the remainder of the session saw little action on the back wall and the following morning saw us pack up early and leave for the long drive home. Still it was good to be back amongst the fish.

I could not wait for the following weekend to come but wait I did due to work and family commitments. I arrived to find fish showing all over the lake, many of which I’m sure were bream. The water level seemed to be dropping every week due to the distinct lack of rain. Some of the larger framed carp such as Big scale and Scartail were permanently swimming around the back wall with their backs out of the water, this made them really easy to locate, but gave rise to panic attacks every time they came close to our baits. It was whilst watching Scartail that I saw him tilt up and then settle himself.  Suddenly he froze. This is when he seemed to realize something was wrong with the hook bait in his mouth, he shook his head violently trying to expel the pellet but to no avail, and as I ran towards the rods he decided he wanted to find sanctuary on the other side of the lake. Away he went and after a short but spirited fight he was on the bank. His colouring had changed from a deep chestnut on his upper body to an olive green colour; I think this was due to the lack of depth for him to hide away from the sun. Other than a circular scar on his left flank he was in beautiful condition. 

From what I could see and from information I could gather from the other anglers he was the only fish to be caught that weekend. The following week saw me set up, again on the back wall, this was due to the lake now being virtually un-fishable on most of the meadow side. The rafts of weed had now joined together to produce a solid mat from peg two all the way into the reed beds, covering ninety percent of the lake. The Friday afternoon and night were very quiet with neither of us seeing any action. Over the course of the Friday I must have introduced about a kilo of 21 mm pellets with a dozen large pva bags of 3 and 6mm pellets. Ritchie and I were now the only  anglers on the lake who were working hard at their fishing, we were up before daybreak re-baiting as the pellets were starting to break down after only six or eight hours in the water. By being awake for first light gave us the advantage of seeing where the fish were before any body else thus enabling us to move onto the fish before anybody else awoke.

This morning the fish were hanging around in the vicinity of our baits so we stayed put. From about six that morning I was up the willow tree on the left of my peg watching Big scale come in over my baits every twenty minutes or so. This was exhilarating, each time feeding for a short while then leaving the swim and cruising around the sunken island then back again for another bite to eat. She knew where her breakfast was and couldn’t help herself; well she did have a lot of weight to put on after her spawning. Last time she was caught she was in the regions of 26lb being down 3lbs or more! Each time she arrived in the swim my heart started to race with anticipation of catching her. In she would come, down would go her head, and out would come her tail and a good portion of her body.  This went on for hours. I was getting baffled as to why she had not picked up my hook bait. I was getting line bites every visit but no pick ups. This time as she left my swim, following the same route as she had all morning, I reeled in to find my hook had pricked the lead core on the cast earlier that morning and was stuck fast. A quick sort out and a re-bait saw my rig in position before she returned. Still she didn’t pick it up. At around midday she made her mistake, picking up my pellet and slowly moving off for what seemed like another mouthful. As the line tightened she froze. Realizing her mistake she powered off up the lake. After an untroubled fight she rolled across the front of my landing net. I turned to Ritchie to apologise. He smiled knowingly and shrugged, saying” I didn’t want to catch her anyway till she gets her weight back up”. She was unhooked quickly and put in the sling just to monitor any weight gain since her last capture. 27lb 8oz went the dial and after a quick photo-shoot away she swam, straight out over my baits and into the snags. Brew on. Smiles all round. In hindsight I realise that I might have been putting far too much bait in, seeing as the fish were not in front of us in numbers, but it also shows how much of a pig this fish can be and how effective these baits are at triggering a response from this greedy fish.

July came and went with no other fish gracing the banks for me, I had fished on the surface off the platforms in the reed beds on many occasions and had quite a few takes. All of the fish had either snapped me up or just come off for no real reason whilst trying to control them and bully them away from the thick weed beds. Nearly all of my fish had come during the hours of daylight but the first weekend in August saw things change. Typically, I was on my own on the back wall. Ritchie had spent the last few weeks doing uncomfortable night sessions off the boards in the reeds. He was still catching some quality fish whilst all around the lake many of us were struggling to buy a bite. The light intensity, extremely low water levels and high temperatures throughout the summer days had seemed to put the fish off feeding. That weekend I had a frantic Friday night session after seeing little activity through the daylight hours. Just after dark I had a short tussle with a fish that was just happy to plod around on the end of my line. Either this fish didn’t know it was hooked or it didn’t care. After gently guiding the fish into the margins it slipped quietly into the waiting landing net. It was Scartail again, at a weight of 21lb 3oz, a little down on its usual weight. After photographing and returning him and repositioning the rod on the ever decreasing clay area, got a brew and went to sleep, content to have caught. My eyelids had barely closed when the middle rod belted off towards the right; this was ripping yards of line off the spool, and trying to have the rod away at the same time. As I reached for the rod it bounced off the rest and into my hand. Scaley! I thought, and about time too. This fish had still not graced the bank to any anglers since we arrived on the lake the previous November, rumours were flying round that she no longer lived in the lake, either having died during the winter or been stolen. I was and still am in the belief that she had gone. Surely she would have been sighted by myself, Ritchie or another angler. Even Bash and the other bailiffs were starting to believe she had gone!

I played this fish with the utmost of care anticipating the sheer bulk of the fish. To my surprise when I finally had the fish in the margins I realised she was not as big as the powerful fight had suggested. Once in the net I saw a stunning mirror carp with a group of 4 vertical scales in a cluster on her right flank. After weighing her at 17lb 12oz and some more self photography, (not easy at the best of times, let alone in the middle of the night, with a frantic fish) she was returned to bow out right through the middle of my swim, scaring off a couple of feeding fish. Cheers 4scales.What a night, I was buzzing, finally a fish that was not a recapture. I dropped Ritchie a text to let him know of the happenings so far. No response, he must be asleep I thought. Back to sleep I went full of smiles. Again I was awakened by the monotone screech of my delkim, as I flew off my bed the run stopped, had I dreamed it? No a light was on, as I crouched next to the rod it went off again. A very short fight saw me with another small fish flapping about on the unhooking mat. This time a baby common. Weighing 10lbs 2oz. From what I had been told there were only 2 commons in the lake, the big one and the little one at around 17lbs. And now the baby common, I smiled to myself.