After a year spent chasing monsters, and at times virtually living on the bank in my successful pursuit of the Drennan cup, it’s been great to get back to my roots over the last few weeks and enjoy some social fishing with some good friends. Angler’s paradise has been the main destination, as despite being less than an hour from home I’ve only just started to realise the potential of the 30 lake complex, with everything from 60lb cats and 35lb carp, through to record breaking bright orange orfe, there is certainly plenty of exploring to be done.
I have to admit I had some preconceived ideas about the venue expecting ultra busy lakes, but the opposite has in fact been true with anglers spread around the complex and we have been lucky enough to have had lakes to ourselves at times, it’s also been great to meet so many keen holidaying anglers some there for a family holiday, some for a specimen fish, and many just for Zyg’s wine, but all having a great time.
Before the pleasure sessions began I had a score to settle, after losing a couple of good cats on Nirvana Catfish Lake over the last few years, I popped over for an opportunist overnight session. I was joined by my regular photographer Dominic Garnett, as I was hoping to complete the latest edition my regular feature ‘The Quest’ that follows my pursuit of specimen fish from open access waters for Improve your coarse fishing magazine . Following my simple ground bait, pellet and boilie set up mentioned in my last blog, I was awoken by an early morning run, by a beast that appeared intent on dragging me around the lake, after somehow getting the lump into a somewhat inadequate 42inch net, I was soon photographing a cracking 43lb moggy, just a 1lb short of my p.b.
The larger mixed lake at Anglers Eldorado has been the next port of call, taking several good friends who all had one thing in common; they had never caught a catfish, all succeeded in their own quests landing several hard fighting cats, the power of even the double figure specimens is spectacular, and all the fish were taken in daylight, something I have previously overlooked. If anyone fancies an adventure in search of your first catfish, I offer a guiding service at this venue, so feel free to drop me an email at inspiredanglingservices@googlemail.com and I will arrange a session to meet your needs with all tackle and bait supplied if required.
Whilst walking around the main complex a few days later I stumbled across the specimen carp lake, 2.5 acres of clear water, fringed with gorgeous lily beds and containing 25 of the most stunning carp I have ever seen, it was obvious where my next few sessions would be spent. From my observations it appeared that due to the fact most visiting anglers were doing relatively short sessions, many were adopting identical tactics, usually based around a pva bag cast close to the lilies, this approach was catching the odd fish but I felt that an alternative approach would catch those scaly residents off guard. A few casts with the marker found a lovely hard clay spot in 8ft of open water, so popping the float to the surface I put the Korum boilie catapult to good use, spraying a 25m square area with a generous bed of mixed size boilies, as one holidaying angler commented ‘your catty isn’t up to much mate, your baits going all over the place’ think he might have missed the point.
As I hoped, getting the carp moving around and grazing over a bed of mixed bait paid off with 6 of the lakes residents paying a visit to my landing net in the next two sessions, including several absolute stunners, and proving that if many anglers are doing the same things on a water, being brave and trying a totally new tactic can often pay off.
