Atmospheric pressure can have a massive influence on fish feeding patterns. It was whilst looking at the weather forecast for the week ahead so I could recommend a venue for a customer to fish, that I noticed a nice South Westerly wind and a significant drop in the air pressure, which meant that I had to get out. After the confirmation I could go fishing I started the bait prep and planning the session.
Turning up at the lake I noticed that peg 11 was empty and the southwesterly wind was smashing into there so I knew straight away where I was setting up. Quickly setting up the spod rod and a 5 oz lead to find a spot I established a shallower but clear gravel bar at 140yards. After the bar was found I set up the spomb rod and clipped it 1/4 of a wrap shorter so that the rigs would land exactly on the top of the bait.The Spod mix that I used was 60% boilies and 40% pellets, I had 6kg of pacific tuna boilies soaking in a whole bottle of CC Moore Tuna Compound and a Whole bottle of CC Moore Tuna Oil, After the boilies had soaked in most of the liquid I added 4kg of 6mm pacific tuna pellets to take on the rest. Throughout the process of the bait taking on the liquids I keep turning the bait so that they all take on the extra attraction equally. After spombing out around about 4kg of bait I set about getting the other rods clipped up and out on the spot. The rigs that I used were three hinge stiff rigs baited with a white and washed out pink CC Moore Carp Freaks pop up on two and on the other was a yellow NS1 pop up. All the rigs were baited and balanced with tungsten putty, after a few casts the rods were out on the spot and the rest of the gear had to be set up before the rain came in so the mad dash was on.
The first night passed and the rods remained motionless until a big floating raft of weed decided to make an appearance and wipe out all the rods picking up all 3 braided lines. I knew that being on the front of the wind the weed would be a problem but that was the only weed bed that wiped me out all the rest were smaller strands that didn’t effect anything. About 11am the second day I spombed out the remaining 6kg of bait to the bar at 140 yards. I put the hinge stiff rig with the white carp freaks pop up back out on the left hand side of the spot, the middle rod was changed to a German rig and a 18mm CC Moore pacific tuna wafter and the third one was a German rig baited with a 12mm CC Moore Carp Freaks pop up pinned to the lake bed so that the bait sat a little higher than the free offerings. After the rest of the bait was out on the spot and the small changes had been made it was all about playing the waiting game.
As the evening was drawing to a close I was confident because I knew every thing was presented right and I was fishing in the right area of the lake. Around about 11.30pm Wednesday my left hand rod let out a few beeps waking me up, as I sat up and switching on the head torch the alarm started ‘one toning’. Quickly slipping the waders on and running down the bank and into the water whilst trying to pull my waders up saw me hook into a decent fish that had already found the nearest weed bed. After an intense 10 minute battle and 3 weed beds later I had a fish in the landing net and a whole net full of weed. The way in which the fish fought I was expecting to see a carp in the bottom, ripping the weed away to see what carp I had landed I was amazed to see a massive ‘slab’ of a bream in the bottom of my net. After a short period of disappointment I realised that the bream is definitely a PB and a great fish to have landed. Getting the fish on the scales the dial span round to 16lb 8oz I was buzzing a new bream PB by a whole 3lb 6oz and a fish I may never beat. I was expecting the night to be eventful with landing that one so early in the evening but again the night slipped past with no further action.
Packing the gear away about 11am Thursday morning the heavens opened and the wind picked up drastically and I got soaked. Whilst packing away the right hand rod decided to let out a short sequence of beeps and I thought it was just weed on the line with the increasing bad weather. However, when I went to reel in the rods all my lines were crossed and tangled that short sequence of bleeps on my rod turned out to be a fish. After a short period of untangling 3 lines I picked up into the fish and it was heavy in the weeds and felt a few heavy plods and a small amount of line taken but unfortunately the hook pulled I had lost one of Rockfords gems but we can only try again. Let’s see what this campaign can throw up in the future…..
Tight Lines,
Will.
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