Had a decent day at Hollows Farm fishery at Thorpe Satchville in Leicestershire, yesterday (17/6/11)
Despite the weather forecast as being heavy rain and blustery winds we decided to go anyway. We are by no means fair weather fishermen here at Blacksilver Baits, but wind is just not fun to fish in. But we thought we'd risk it. As it turns out the rain came but wind did not which was great.
We have a few groundbaits on test and Stu had been given the chance to try our new 'Match Team Green' groundbait. It's a fishmeal based method mix, very light and fluffy but quite inert. It breaks down very quickly leaving a bed of groundbait to fish over. Experience at this fishery has shown us that most fish are in the margins, so Stu decided to use the groundbait by balling in rather than on the feeder. He fished at about 3m from the bank in 4ft of water. Fishing caster over the top he was into the roach almost straight away. Fingers crossed the carp and bream would move in. Despite all hopes, only one solitary bream got caught. Loads of skimmers and roach, with a smattering of gudgeon and perch.
Then at the end of the session around 4pm, he hooked into a carp. A beautiful fin perfect 4lb common. That would be his last fish of the day. At weigh in just after 4pm he had caught a respectable 16lb of fish. The 4lb carp and 12lb of bits.
I had been testing another new addition to our groundbait range, our new 'Bloodworm Groundbait' (working title). I had decided to fish the waggler at about 12m out, as i had seen another angler catching at that distance on Wednesday. Fishing hard on the bottom with a traditional set up for bream to show lift bites (ssg's on the deck), i fished caster over a bed of groundbait. Initially i balled in 4 balls of the Bloodworm Groundbait, and settled in for a spell to wait for the arrival of the bream. After about 15 minutes the float lifted before slowly sinking below the water. I struck and hit into a bream of about 3lb. This would be my first and last in that spot. I gave it another half an hour before switching to the margin swim.
As no other bites were coming on the waggler, i switched to fishing next to a small bunch of lillies, about 6ft from the bank. I had about 3ft of water under the float. I had set up a 3m whip, fishing the flick tip. i wanted roach!
I had already introduced 3 balls of bloodworm groundbait into the swim at the start of the session, so i regularly flicked in a pinch of casters about every 30 seconds or so. It wasn't long before the roach responded. The more casters i put in the quicker and more positive the bites became. Then, as the float buried, i hit into one of many bream. Strike and hit a solid fish, adrenalin surge, and hope that i could hold the fish on the whip. It's a brave option on water that holds carp and bream, but the rig held and 1 bream landed. More casters into the swim and back into the roach. Then another bream, then back into the roach.
It continued like this for a few hours while the rain lashed down onto the brolly. Then it went quiet. The float buried and it was like hitting a wall. Big swoosh and a carp roared off. Luckily the size 18 hook pulled free. I would not have stopped it on the 3m whip. Sigh of relief that i still had my rig, flick of casters into the swim and the roach started again!
In all i had about 8 bream between 2 and 3lb, and lots of roach, for a total of 26lb.
In previous tests at this fishery of the bloodworm groundbait i have had 16lb, 27lb and 42lb, all bream and roach. Tests are going well.
Rain eventually stopped play and we went to warm up with a pint!!
