Hall lane fishery , Bessies pool

April 17th , peg 34 Bessie’s pool

After yesterdays long day trip out to Derbyshire with the Mrs and little George I didn’t fancy booking on anywhere for the Sunday because we was up very early and to be honest, I really wasnt in the mood to contest a match preferring a nice leisurely day just catching a few fish so I decided on a couple of extra hours in bed  before heading to Hall lane fishery near Parbold at around dinner time, I choose to go here as it was somewhere that I had not visited for nearly 12 months and I always like visiting as many fisheries as I can for my blog it is also very similar in style as Herronbrook so I could try out a few things before my first Fisho qualifier in the middle of May. I had originally fancied going on Merlin’s lake but when I arrived at the venue there was a couple of club matches taking place which is unsurprising with it being a Sunday and it has always been a very popular fishery, so I settled on Bessie’s pool which is the biggest on the complex with it holding over sixty anglers it is a snake lake style water with the far bank being around 14m on majority of pegs. There was about a dozen other people scattered all over this lake and as I wanted to have a play around with my camera while I was here so I settled on peg 34 which gave me plenty of space it was half way down the long straight with your back to the field it also had a gap between the islands were the two sections of water join together and looked like it should hold a few fish but I had not been down this section before so I wasnt too sure on how things would go today.

As i would be only here for a few hours I decided to set up just two rigs ;

Far-bank swim at 14m were i managed to find a nice flat spot at 3.5ft deep and i used a 4×12 maggie float with a strung out shotting pattern along the bottom half of the rig , my line was the usual 014 garbo which i us on ninety per cent of my rigs and my six-inch hook length was 010 garbo which had a size 18 lwg hook attached .

Top three swim i found quite a big flat area near the reeds towards my right were it was about 4ft deep and i used a 4×14 malman roob float which had an inch spread bulk starting above the four inch 010 hook length , my hook was a size 18 lwg and on both rigs i used NG green 10-12 amber core elastic .

As it was a short session i decided to try something a bit different with the bait settling on ;

Two pints of 6mm cubes of meat and corn

Two pints of micros

Small tub of 4mm expanders

Small tub of white hooker pellets

The weather in the morning when I woke was very cold with frost on the windscreen and cat ice on a few puddles in the front garden but as I headed to the fishery it had warmed up a little with blue skies plus light winds although it never rose above eight degrees all day, so with this in mind i decided to take it easy with the feed and feel myself into the session until i knew just how the fish would respond, I fed half a small cupping kit of micros onto my short line and would top this up every thirty minutes before going on it later in the day, I began by fishing long with a cube of 6mm meat on the hook and half a dozen samples in the kinder pot . It took a couple of feeds before i had my first indication and not long after my first fish hit the net which was a carp around two pounds a couple more of similar size quickly followed before things went quiet, so I made the decision to increase the amount of bait I was feeding this worked very well and i was soon back catching the carp which were all like peas in a pod pristine commons around the two pound mark. In my first hour I had ten carp all caught using meat but with the wind increasing and towing my rig out of position I choose to try a piece of corn hoping this would give me a static bait which it did but surprisingly I failed to get any positive indications when using it, with the increase of feed working previously I decided to put in half a cupping kit of meat & corn onto my long line and give my top three swim a try until the wind dropped enough for me to go back on it.

I tapped in some micros through a small kinder pot then lowered my rig in among it and no sooner had my float settled then it dipped under, a sharp lift of the pole resulted in a hand sized skimmer coming to the bank six more similar samples quickly followed before it went quiet and I was wondering what I had done wrong but I soon found out when I began a run of f1s all around the pound mark , when this swim died a little i decided to rest it and try my far-bank line as the wind had subsided enough for me to present a bait properly, the rest had worked wonders as I was back among the carp again including a couple touching 4lb and when the bites tailed off I would just re-feed with half a cupping kit then I would be back catching. Every so often I would catch a couple of skimmers across and when this happened I would put in a full cup to try to feed them off I then rested it for twenty minutes, while I went on my short line for a couple more f1s and I even managed a nice bream about 4lb on it as well, before i knew it I was almost out of bait and only a couple of carp away from the forty mark so I dragged out my session until I hit this mark but it was noticeable that it took longer for me to get a bite without the feed going in.

All in all I had a really enjoyable four hour session catching forty carp between 2 & 4lb, about a dozen f1s around the 1lb mark and a lot of hand sized skimmers for about 120lb, I felt that I learned a few things that will help on other venues and also on how I played the fish which I could do with the practise on as I haven’t caught a great deal so far this year, not sure where i’m going at the weekend just yet I will probably decide on Weds hope you have enjoyed reading the blog and watching the videos.

Wrightington rivi view

17th September , peg twenty

After booking a few days off work which included my birthday i chose to spend it fishing for a few hours and with me needing to pick the kids up from school i couldn’t travel too far away so decided so settled on Wrightington mainly because it was closest in resemblance to Weston fisheries were i would be contesting the natural bait festival next weekend , the weather leading up to today was a bit iffy with a drop in temperature plus some pretty consistent rain but luckily it was forecast to be a lot dryer although it was still cold . On arrival at the venue i was surprised to see only a few other anglers as it can be a popular place for pleasure anglers and i just hoped that it was the inclement weather that put them off rather than the fact it had fished hard , with all the high numbered pegs being free i decided to fish an area i hadn’t tried before and settled on peg twenty which was towards the end of the island on the rear bay this gave me two nice reed lined margin although I’m  not too sure it would come into play during today’s session .

On getting to my peg i choose to fish just two lines ;

Bottom near slope where it was 4ft deep and here i was going to use paste so i used a sconezone jadz float with 014 garbo direct to a size 14 tubertini 808 hook and the new Nick Gilbert size 10-12 red elastic .

Eleven meter line where it was 5ft deep and here i was going to fish corn+pellet rather negatively so i used a 03 joof float with 012 garbo main line and the same line for the hook length which had a size 16 matrix bagger hook , elastic was the same Nick Gilbert size 10-12 red .

My bait for the fishing session was ;

Two pints of green swim stim paste

Two tins of corn

Two pints or 4mm soaked pellets

At ten o’clock i was ready to get started and deposited i small cupping kit which was half full of corn+pellets and rather than pour the bait in i choose to scatter it over a one meter square area i hoped this might help with the peg fizzing as it can be a problem on here as like most venues that are quite old they usual have a heavy buildup of silt , i carefully lowered in my rig with a piece of corn on the hook and after about five minutes my float dipped a sharp lift resulted in yards of red elastic streaming from the pole tip after a spirited fight i struggled to fit a low double figure carp into my landing net which was a good start to the session . After going back out i had a ten minute wait before i had my next carp which was a more manageable 5lb but it wasn’t long before the solitary bubbles changed and i began suffering with the dreaded fizzing , this also coincided with lots of missed bites as i had expected so i choose to change my shotting pattern to a bulk+dropper plus i squeezed the middle out of the corn so it could slowly flutter through the water layers i hopped that this would allow me to grab the attention of any passing fish before it got to the deck where it would be harder to find among the muddy bottom and by doing this i caught a couple more carp but i began getting plagued with small 4oz mirror carp this was a good sign for the fishery because they haven’t been stocked  but are a proper pain in the neck at the moment .

After an hour my long line did not show any signs of getting any better so i went on to the near slope paste rig i had dropped a few conker sized balls of paste on this line every ten minutes to allow a few fish to settle , it took a few attempts to get my rig to settle correctly and after having had no indications on my float for fifteen minutes i began to think it wasn’t going to be a paste day then bang my float buried i didn’t even have time to strike before the elastic ripped out this resulted in another double gracing the bank this time a mirror carp . Another long wait before i had my next fish this turned out to be a nice sized skimmer before a couple more carp got in on the action but unfortunately i began getting all sorts of strange indications on the float and it took me a little while to figure out what was causing them i hopped that they might be from finicky skimmers but no the tiny carp had returned so that was the end of the paste swim for the time being .

So back i went onto my long rig still with corn on the hook and another couple of quick carp before the attack of the dreaded tiny carp which began doing my head in , it was at this point that i had a light bulb moment it must be the pellets drawing the small fish as it was only when they began breaking down did they move in with this in mind i set up a new swim more towards my right here i just fed a couple of grains of corn and after a few feeds i began getting the odd bite but at least they was from a better stamp of fish mainly carp with the odd big skimmer mixed in . I felt that giving this line a rest would be beneficial but i did not want to go back on my paste line so i jumped off my box and set up a margin swim i wasn’t to sure it would work although with it being nearly three-foot deep i might just get away with it , i put in half a cup full of corn as i didn’t want to over do it until i knew what if any fish would be present and after picking a couple more carp from my long line i was eager to try my margin swim because secretly it was a method that i am beginning to enjoy , it didn’t take too long before my first bite which resulted in the jag jag of a barbel next exactly what i wanted but at nearly two pounds it was a nice fish pristine condition as well and a few carp got into the action too .

 

I was spending longer and longer on my margin swim before i knew it i was beginning to run out of corn as i was feeding a large kinder pot after every fish , i had no option other than to start mixing pellets in with the corn i just hoped it wouldn’t be a mistake to do so as i was catching quite well and didn’t want the small carp to make an appearance and strangely or luckily my peg got stronger and stronger with more carp making their way to the bank , with just an hour of my session remaining i just concentrated on my margin and i even tried the tactic of dumping all your bait in like you was packing up this produced some more near doubles i had to keep a couple of sections close to hand because when hooked they shot off like a scalded cat but by following the fish out on their initial run it meant i suffered minimal breakages or hook pulls .

After about four hours it was time to pack up so i could get home in time to pick my little lad up from school and it called time on another enjoyable session on Wrightington fishery with plenty carp and a couple of low barney roubles too i can not wait to get back but I’m afraid that will have to wait till next year as the nights are drawing in so i doubt i will get chance for an after work session and my weekend matches will be taken up with Partridge lakes of course that is after the little matter of the natural bait festival at Weston pools , regular readers might remember that a couple of blogs back i said i was getting a birthday surprise well as it turns out my lovely wife booked me a coaching session with the f1 master which I’m really looking forward to as it will no doubt help my fishing immensely .