By the time I got settled into the swim and found a few spots it was well into the afternoon. I decided on this occasion not to use a marker, spod or any bait. I just felt the lead down and used a throwing stick to scatter a few kilos of boilies over the area as I wanted to make as little of a disturbance as possible. The bait I was using on this trip is a little unusual. It comes in two colours in the same bag, black and white, it is called contrast and is part of the new range of baits from Steve Renyard.
I decided to use the black bait on two rods and the white bait on the third to see how it went, if the fish were having one colour over the other then I had the option to change. All the baits were bottom baits straight out of the bag. I have been using a lot of wafter baits up to now and although I did have some with me, for some reason I decided not to use them. Within a few hours I had a run on my left hand rod cast close to the island, after a hard fight I landed a mid-20 mirror so I was 'well happy', first fish on the bait and with it buckets of confidence.
The night was very quiet and still and I didn’t hear much at all. I was up at first light and saw a few fish in the area. Once I have put my baited rigs out I very rarely bring them in for no reason, usually opting to leave them in place until I get a run or leave the swim for one reason or another. But on this occasion I decided to recast the middle rod as it had been on my mind all night that it needed to be a little further to the right. About an hour after recasting I had a screamer and after a long battle landed a cracking fish of 33lb 4oz. A result! Two fish in 24 hours and confident of more.
The weather was now taking a turn for the worse, high winds and rain, normally I would welcome this weather but it was making casting to my spots impossible and on the couple of occasions I did recast I must have put the rig up the tree on the island about half a dozen times, luckily I managed to retrieve it each time.
Nothing else happened all day but I did see more fish and again I was confident of another bite. About an hour before light the next morning the middle rod was off again this time the fish got weeded and I had a right old battle getting this fish to the net, but once I did I was over the moon as it was a lump! A stunning mirror of 41lb 14oz and I was made up! I had now had three fish and a 40 to boot. Two of the fish had come to the white bait and the other to the black so I decided to put all three rods on the white for the last day and put out another kilo or so of bait scattered over the area. Just before packing up I managed another fish, a common of about 23lb.
I decided on this trip to do things a little different and it paid off. The major thing was the amount of bait I had used. I usually use anything between ten and fifteen kilos on a three day trip at this time of year, but on this trip I only got through about five kilos. I just didn’t feel the need to use anymore and all the baits were put out with a throwing stick and nothing was spodded.
I will hopefully be back down there soon and I will let you know how I get on.
David
