Another good month

Many events have happened during this past month, all of which had been good. A sponsor which K.M. (the editor), had kindly referred me to, came up to meet me, and gave me my sponsorship gear and also had a bash at fishing the Glade.

Martin Lamb, the sponsor for the Lineaeffe brand came to my house at around midday and we had a chat, then we set off to the Glade for about 2:00pm. Luckily, Martin loved the lake and wishes to come again in the summer.

The lake was fishing slow because we just had a snap of bad weather, but it still didn't mean we wouldn't catch.
Martin was into his first fish on the float after about 45 minutes into the session - and it turned out to be a lovely roach of about 7 or 8 ounces. I then had a small roach and the rest of the fish for the day ended up being small roach or rudd, all being suicidal we guessed. Nothing on the carp rods but it was still nice to get out and for Martin to have a long chat with the lake manager, Cliff about the old Mitchell 300's and how good they were in comparison to todays reels.

A few weeks prior saw me going to Woolwich dockyard for a couple of sessions. The first session was on the west lake where I thought I'd do a spot of float fishing which turned out to be a pretty productive session, ending up in 15 perch and 7 roach.

I then switched on to the east lake, where I had spotted the carp rising, but unfortunately had no luck trying to get them off the top. I switched to float fishing the east lake at around 5pm with a friend, Alfie, who is also in the Greenwich team with me for the London Youth Games.
Two other anglers had been fishing the east lake all day and had a tench and a couple of roach between them, I go there for about 20 minutes and as I'm adjusting my tripod, my clutch started buzzing away. I struck and played the fish for around 15 minutes and it ended up being a lovely 8lb mirror carp...on double maggot!

I then took my little 12 year old sister Keira to fish with me up at the Glade a couple of weeks back. I was fishing with my new Lineaeffe gear and my sister was floatfishing a swim beside me. I had a float and carp rod out. My bait for the day was maggots, sweetcorn and groundbait - and on the carp rod I had a scopex boilie that had been soaked in a Scopex glug with a PVA bag of Scopex pellet. The day started off well - with my little sister catching a couple of roach. She then asked if I could set her float so she was on the bottom, when I changed it, she soon caught her very first perch!

The day was progressing along nicely with everyone around the lake catching. My sister came up to me to ask me something about her swim and as we were chatting my clutch went screaming off, I struck into it and after a good fight, I landed a 4lb 1oz tench.

My sister and I were still catching well, but before we knew it - it was time to start packing up.
Keira had packed up quite quickly and came along to tell me to hurry up. I had just put away my float rod when my carp rod went screaming away again, this time it felt bigger and after what seemed a good 5 minute fight, I landed myself a tench, this time bigger than before ,weighing in at a respectable 5lbs 8oz.

So overall....it has been a good month.




Tip of the month
As the days are finally starting to get warmer, look for cruising carp on the surface. Use a chum mixer or a bit of floating bread crust or flake.
Remember, looking constantly at the water on sunny days can damage your eyes.
If going for a fish on a hot, sunny day, always remember to wear a set of polarised sunglasses to avoid glare. Having the sun reflecting off the water into your eyes is as bad as looking at the sun, you don't want to risk your eyesight for a fish.
Also, now is a good time to go on the method feeder. Look for gravel bars in the water and remember to re-bait every 20 to 30 minutes or so - to ensure you get a bed of bait out, use a hook length of about 5 inches with a size 14 or 16 hook baited with double maggot or a single grain of corn - expect to catch!


Your questions answered:
I will be happy to answer any fishing questions you throw at me!

Tight lines all

Ash