The trials and tribulations of a beginner carp angler

[jonjo]

The first outing of the year so I popped down to my local lake, got there for about 8am in the morning just as the sun started to rise. I headed for my favourite swim to find some one already there enjoying a nice cup of char! Had a bit of a chin wag with the nice fellow, to find that the carp are not playing ball. He'd been there for 2 nights already without putting anything on the bank. With that I headed to the other side of the lake, hopefully where all the carp were. I decided on my pitch but could'nt see any sign of carp anywhere so it was going to be pot luck if there where any fish in the lake.

There's not much in the way of features on the lake since it is a man made boating lake around 3-4 ft deep all over so i decided to cast my first rod in between 2 islands. I casted out, started to wait for a splash as my rig and pva stick hit the water. There was no splash, looked at the rod tip it was bent upwards, did'nt realise i was so close to the tree! I looked upwards to find my double maize dangling down from a branch. With a bit of gigery pokery I managed to set it free. The perfect started i thought to myself. The other rod went out without any fuss.

Nothing really happened for a couple of hours until I heard the bleep of another anglers bite alarm going off. Good sign i thought at least they were feeding (10lb mirror).
Around 2pm I noticed my bobin was twitching, I went over to investigate good job i did i had'nt turned my bite alarm on! lol. It all went quiet again until about 2.30 when something started to take line and my alarms started to beep at me. After a vigerous fight of about 30 seconds I pulled in a slab of a bream. Oh well better than nothing i thought. That was the end of the action as well. The bailiff came round later on and informed me that only 2 fish came out all weekend and one of them was my bream. No carp this time but there's always next time

[Gemo]

Nice article JonJo better luck next time mate
Regards

IanG

[bradz32]

The lake itslef looks nice and the bream wasnt bad. Also good article.

[Gemo]

A quick observation if thats the landing net you are using for landing carp ?, its not big enough and where is the unhooking mat that lovley bream should be laid on !!!!.
Regards

Ian G

[Scotty]

good article, but a good investment would be as gemo says a unhooking mat around £10 for a half decent one and a bigger net... nice bream, have a few like that at bishops bowl. keep up the good work xx

[jonjo]

been away for a while but acquired my self a landing 40inch and unhooking mat. sorry if upset any one with pic but i live and learn

[Gemo]

Jonjo well done mate I think I speak for most people on here you did not upset anyone mate we are all keen to see you fishing in the right way and doing well thats all mate. Tight Lines

[jonjo]

ive done a few 24 hrs stints the past couple of months and all i could catch was bream, buckets loads of them. I was starting to get a bit down because of this. I decided to do another 24hr stint yesterday. Not really expecting to catch anything. The first afternoon carried on as all my previous trips had gone.then a s daark drew in i got a screaming run i was fish and it wasnt a bream, the old adrenalin kicked in and i ended up loosing it, tried to bully it to the bank.(lesson learned !!).
Feeling like my luck wasnt in again i got my head down for the night. Nothing much happended untill i heared a massive explosion. The fella in the next swim had left his car in the car park and some undisirables had taken upon them selves to set it a light. Any ways back to the fishing woke up min the morning determined to catch me a fish. I went and rebaited mys rods and baited up, sat down to make my self some breakfast. half way through breakfast the right had rod started to bleep on a rage run just a steady plod, Great i thought another bream, struck into it and it felt heavy, very heavy and the carp exploded in to life giving me me the hardest fight of my very short carping carer. 10 min later i had a lovley 12ilb 2oz common on the bank. A new pb. I would of takena picture biu the carp was still very lively so i thought it best to put it back before any harm came to it.
So all in all a very good session for me !!

[MarkeR]

well done on the pb mate, its a great feeling catching your biggest ever

[Tom]

It's finally paid off then mate, see, we told you if you stick at it you'll get there in the end