Steven Manktelow

Field Tester

0

It was 04:00am on 21st May, the alarm had just gone and it was time for another session at linear fisheries, Oxfordshire. After another inspection at what the weather was going to be like it looked as if it was going to be very hot with a light N/E-N/W wind. On arriving at Linear  I decided to fish on a quiet side of Brasenose two lake.

After chucking the marker around for a while I decided on two spots. The first of which was a small gravel area of about 7 feet deep. The second area about 7-8 feet to the right was the start of a deep hole of around 18 feet deep, both spots were about 56 yards from my peg. I baited both areas with spod mix which consisted of cooked pigeon food and hemp along with SBS Premium Pellets - Phaze1 and SBS Bio Premium Phaze1 boilies as well. [Insert Sbs baits pic] Both my rods were set up using the same rigs as the picture SBS Bio Premium Phaze1 boilies hair rigged to a Nash Fang Twister size 8 tied knotless knot to Korda N-trap soft 20lb gravel with a few bits of silicone tube to hold the hair in place.

All this is joined to a Nash diffusion camo leader with Diffusion camo lead clip, 3oz lead, 18lb braided mainline on Stillwater bp12000 reels and Chub Outkast 3.5lb 50mm rods.

The traps were then set and it was time to await a result. On waking the next morning feeling a bit disappointed after not even a bleep, the sun was just coming up and I knew it was going to be another hot day.

After a while I refreshed my bait, spodded a little more and carried on waiting for the carp to get their heads down. The day went and it was evening before I knew it. I decided that if I hadn’t had anything by the morning I was going to move further down the lake, more into the main body of water. The next morning arrived and yet still nothing had happened so it was time to bring in the rods and go for a walk further down the lake. After seeing several fish showing I had decided on my new swim.

I found a gravel area at about 80 yards out in front of me and baited up with about 30 spods to start with. My right hand rod was put out with the same set up on as before using the SBS Bio Premium Phaze1 boilies. My left hand rod I decided to use a multi rig, baited with SBS Dark Firefly – squid & octopus pop-up. Using a Korda choddy size 8 and N-trap soft with diffusion camo leader and lead clip and 3oz lead.

The traps were set by around 1pm and it was time to wait. At 17:20 my left hand rod went off, after a short battle I landed this 9lb 4oz mirror making the move a success.

The rest of the day was quiet, although there were quite a few fish darting around in the margins in groups which made me think that with all the hot weather that they were about to start spawning. Also fishing a couple of pegs down from me was Jan Porter and he also said that the fish are about to spawn. May I say as well that Jan Porter is a really nice down to earth guy. About 11:00am the following day my right hand rod screamed off and when I pulled into the fish it felt big, after a few minutes the fish had weeded me up, so kept steady pressure on it to try and get it through the weed. After a minute or so the fish pulled through the weed and it was on the move again. It then weeded me up again after a few minutes of being stuck in the weed I decided on try to walk down the bank a little to try and get a different angle on it when suddenly the line went slack and it had broke my 18lb mainline, I was Gutted!! Later that day the fish were spawning. By that evening the whole lake was alive in the margins with fish being pushed up out of the water, after a long sleepless night of fish in the margins and liners it was time to bring in the rods a let the fish get it over with. At around 19:00 that evening the lake had gone a lot quieter with only a few fish still crashing about so I decided to put my rods back out. Then at 21:10 my right hand rod with the SBS Bio Premium Phaze1 boilies on roared off. Pulling into the fish it felt like a very angry fish. After a short while it was in the net and it felt really good to have landed a fish even though some fish were still spawning, it was a nice looking 14lb 7oz mirror carp.

Things were looking good for more fish through the night but by lunchtime the next day nothing else had happened and it was time to start packing away to go home. The dramatic change in weather from the weeks before being cold and wet to suddenly hitting almost 30 degrees Celsius made fishing conditions very hard.

By: Steven Manktelow