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Carp Fishing Diary… Rob Shanks
Carp Fishing Diary... Rob Shanks - A Lambs Tale!
This spring has surpassed even my wildest expectations and since April lady luck has been extremely kind to me. After catching one of the lakes biggest mirrors early on in my campaign the bites just kept on coming thick and fast. I continued to target the same section of water close to the out of bounds, alternating between two swims that covered the area, keeping a plentiful supply of Sticky baits Vortex going in, sometimes in excess of 10kg a week. The carp just couldn’t eat it quick enough and the area was just spot on being shallow with lots of new weed growth. I don’t think the fish had seen the heavy baiting approach before or at least for a long while with the majority of members opting to fish small bags or a dozen or so baits per rod.
I kept things simple, small Sticky baits White Krill pop-ups fished over enough Vortex boilies to feed a small continent. Rig wise I stuck too tried and tested components from the awesome new Edges range from Fox, my usual helicopter set-up with the business end being a Hinge Stiff rig or 360 rig so I could present a low lying pop-up.
Over a six to eight week period fishing 13 overnighters, I managed to bank a total of 41 carp, 24 over 20lb including another 5 over the magically 30lb barrier. A lovely mix of broad backed, chestnut mirrors and beautiful, golden, scale perfect commons with my particular favourite being an ancient, dark, scaly mirror known as the half linear.
It became the norm to catch four or five on an overnighter right up until the hot weather took it’s grip on the country in June and the carp eventually turned there attentions from feeding to their annual leg over rituals. The carp blew kisses and flirted with each other and this brought a very abrupt end to the action over the middle and later parts of June and with it, much to my frustration, I suffered a succession of blanks which brings me up-to-date in early July.
I’ve decided rather than to write a succession of captures and ego inflating accounts of “I caught this” and” I caught that” to recap on some of the lighter sides of our wonderful pursuit. We’ve all been there, those things that have you rolling around in laughter, sharing the moment with friends whilst out on the banks in wild, in the pursuit of carp, stories shared for years to come.
One particular session in April was to stick in the mind for a couple of reasons, none of them fishing related. Everything went to plan as usual arriving in the afternoon heat of a lazy Sunday. I’d booked the Monday off work to do the night with my fishing buddy and very good friend Chris. We set about our usual task, like trained hunters, trying to track down some fish and hatch all sort of wonderful plans to outwit them, only as usual to become despondent and lethargic in the afternoon heat of what was turning out to be a very hot day.
In the end I decided to fish the swim from which I’d caught the 34lb mirror on my previous trip and Chris decided on a swim known as “the point” on the bearing that the wind was pushing into the area and his highly trained blood hound like sense of smell had picked up “oudor de carp” on the breeze. Before long chirpy but fully laden we were barrowing our gear to our chosen swims full of renewed enthusiasm and it was at this point it all started to fall apart before my eyes. I got to the swim, parked the barrow and walked to the waters edge to view the water like a proud captain on the bow of a ship. All of a sudden my finely tuned approached was interrupted by a thud and the next few moments descended in a blur of slow motion.
My wheel barrow hit the floor, my gear scattered itself across the small path that separated the lake from the back channel and as my heart sank into my stomach and my buttocks clenched every item of cloth in the vicinity, my carryall, which indecently on this occasion contained every conceivable electrical or battery powered item I take fishing (camera, bite alarms, radio) rolled into the small back channel landing the correct way up with a splash and slowly started to drift titanic like on the breeze. My mind raced with all sorts of rescue plan’s, none of which included diving in and as I stood frozen, heron like, waiting the inevitable and it to slowly sink out of sight, lost for ever, I decided the obvious choice was to scream Chhhhrrriiiiisssss at the top of my voice like a girl.
He appeared in a flash, well as quick as a mid forties male dragging a dodgy knee could run and I was greeted by a startled and out of breath face which didn’t know whether to join me in panic or roll on the floor laughing. Before long it was clear that the breeze was pushing the bag into the bank and hanging precariously from a branch Chris (he’s got longer arms than me) managed to hook the handles with my landing net pole and drag it safety in the margins, between us we managed to drag out the enormous weight of a water drenched bag and much to my amazement very little water hand actually penetrated the material to the items inside. I just couldn’t believe it hadn’t sunk and for a few minutes we both rolled around on the floor laughing recapping on events. Before long we were back into fishing mode and on with the job in hand, me with a huge sense of relief, Chris with probably a little bit of wee in his pants from laughing.
Now this is probably where you think the story ends, oh no, at midnight Chris woke me to photograph a mid twenty common which on the unhooking mat and scales grew into a mid double common that weighed 15lb and after an exchange of tongue in cheek expletives about waking me up we both retired to bed for what was an uneventful night except from a rather noisy sheep that kept me awake bleating at intervals in the early hours.
Before long it was mid morning and it was time to pack up. The gear was packed away on the barrow, with just the rods left out and in the dying seconds of the session I got a take and managed to bank a 14lb common, which was met with lots of abuse from Chris as I managed to catch one smaller than his the previous night. He made me have a photo and as he walked back to his swim he suddenly called for my attention looking more than a bit concerned. I ran to see what the problem was and all of a sudden the source of the rather noisy sheep in the night became apparent.
There at the waters edge at the bottom of steep sided grassy bank lay a sheep. It was breathing but clearly in some kind of trouble, Chris kindly instructed me to go and see what was wrong with it explaining that he wasn’t willing to touch it so I would have to go. I quickly scaled down the steep bank and straight away it was clear the sheep had fallen down the slope in the night and got tangled in some brambles and was unable to free itself. At this point Chris appeared behind with a large piece of wood explaining that I needed to put it out of it’s misery and I needed to knock it on the head. He explained that I was to administer the fatal blow apposed to him self on the basis that he was a hair dresser. Feeling he was being a little bit premature in his medical assessment a quick investigation proved that the sheep was in fact in fine health and with a wave of inspiration I think it is probably the first time in my life I was thankful to be in the company of a male hairdresser.
A plan was hatched and with the use of Chris’s finest hairdresser scissors I made quick work of giving Nobby (Named by Chris) a short back and sides to free him from the brambles as Chris, the hairdresser, watched and laughed whilst insinuating all sorts of things that I was allegedly trying to do to the sheep in distress. Before long he was free but had managed to injure one of his back legs in the fall. We were now faced with the problem of getting an injured sheep back up a very steep slope.
Chris, the hairdresser came up with another pearl of wisdom and asked whether I had any rope and I obviously sarcastically explained that I carry rope in my back pocket all the time in case of situations such as this and as we both rolled around at the stupidity of his suggestion, Nobby calming eat some more grass. There was only one solution and the next few moments saw a vertically challenged Male and a camp hairdresser pushing an injured sheep up a hill to safety. Needless to say the story had a happy ending with him managing to hobble off to join the rest of the heard in the morning sun, albeit with a limp for his efforts. Me and Chris pushed our barrows back to the car park hero’s that morning recapping on the night’s events and relaying the story of sheep rescuing heroic’s.Over the last few weeks I’ve suffered a string of blanks which is a complete contrast to only a few weeks previous when I seemingly couldn’t put a foot wrong, but this little story highlights that there is so much more to fishing than catching. It’s the adventure, the highs and the lows, the stories and the relationships built along the way. Some of my best friendships have been forged through carp fishing and long may that continue and hopefully I’ll catch a carp or two along the way, I’m certain there will be plenty more laughs.