Jack Sowdens Carp Fishing Blog

Over the past two weeks I have managed two very short evening fishing sessions on Barmston Farm. I just popped for 3 hours after work with  just the one rod! On both visits I have managed a few Carp to just over 10lb.

I have been fishing on the surface and moving around to find any feeding fish. Its been nice taking a small amount of gear, as there are no worries when you get back home, cleaning etc. Also its nice not to have to lug it to your peg and spend twenty minutes setting up. The weather has not been great during both session and i am looking forwards to hitting it right and bagging up in the following weeks.

I am hoping to get back out this week, but again it will only be for a couple of hours at the most.

I have just been fishing with Bread Crust on the hook and Chum Mixers for the free offerings. I had bought some imitation bread and was going to give that a go too but have not really had the chance as I have been rushing to get the rod in the water upon arrival at the lake. My mate was using this and he did not seem to be getting as many takes as me, in fact I don’t think he had a proper take at all!

imitation Bread
Over the last few sessions I have not been getting bothered by little nuisence fish such as Roach and Rudd so bread has been ideal and convenient to use. I was wanting to get a bit of confidence using imitation bread, as it is a handy tool to have in your armory when been bothered by small Roach and Rudd on a water like Barmston Farm. I like using bread as you can totally burry the hook inside and there is never a problem hooking the carp.

The is the fake bread I had bought, looks spot on.

Zig Rigs
This is something else I am wanting to have a go with on Barston farm as I have heard a few people have been catching the Carp whilst fishing a foot deep. I am going to try this method out this week and I shall let you know if it does work. For anyone who does not know what a Zig Rig is, you basically fish say a 6ft hooklength in 8ft of water. There are many diffrent versions you can use but the main idea is always the same.

I have posted a few photos from the first short session I did but unfortunately on the second, I forgot the camera.

One of the my Carp from short session at Barmston Farm.

One of the Nicks Carp from short session at Barmston Farm.

One of the my Carp from short session at Barmston Farm.

Jack Sowden

Just found the time to write up yesterday’s hectic carp fishing session. I arrived a little later than I would have liked and found the lake extremely busy. The weather was good for sunbathing but bad for fishing! Extremely hot with no cloud in the sky, must have been over 25C.

I had wanted to get set up in the snaggy area of the lake but these pegs had already been taken. I also wanted to do some surface fishing but due to the breeze this was not possible at first. I tried to get them feeding on top early on in the session but they did not want to know.

I had to opt for the area I had fished in recent visits, peg 29 next to my usual peg 30. I had a little plum around to see what was actually out there and to see how deep the shallow area I had previously found was. After a few casts I found a nice shallow area, which was 3 to 4 feet deep and only 25 yards out, immediately I spodded out a mix of pellets and sweet corn. I knew from recent sessions I needed to put a little more bait out there, the lake is stacked with fish and I thought it would hopefully create a feeding frenzee. By using pellets and sweetcorn I hope to keep the Carp searching around for more food in the swim. Obviously the smaller items are harder for the Carp to find and keeps them interested in feeding in the swim for longer compared to just using large free offerings.

I placed two rods both with PVA bags full of pellets in the area of the spodded mix and sat back and enjoyed the sun. Soon I will document some of the techniques and rigs I use. At the moment I am just using up some of the hundreds of old rigs I have already tied up, as I used to sell them!

For the first four hours I only had two carp but I was getting loads of liners. It was clear the fish had found the bait and was starting to feed heavily. For the next four hours the action was none stop and I landed another 12 Carp. I also lost a few, including a pretty big one right at the net (still trying to forget about that one!). During this period I spodded out some more bait and catapulted pellets out several times.

By 8pm the breeze had stopped blowing and the surface had become calmer. I had been firing in Chum mixers for a while and had noticed a few fish starting to take them. I was more than happy with what I had caught on the bottom so I made the decision to reel these rods in and concentrate on taking one off the top. By the time I got my hook bait out to the area of feeding fish, they where feeding extremely confidently.

My hook bait was gulped up within seconds and I had a good fight for around 7 minutes with a double figure Carp. I was using pretty light gear so I had to be very carefull. At this venue I generally use light gear, I have 2 Greys Prodigy Specimen rods with a 1.5lb TC – which makes playing small Carp pretty fun.

After this, I had two others off the top in the next 20 minutes. I was well chuffed with getting a few off the top as I love this style of fishing. All in all it was a great day and probably one to remember for a while! I felt that I had put a little more thinking into what I was doing and it paid off.

Here are a few photos from the day.

[View with PicLens]

Next week I will definitely be starting my fishing adventure on Newbridge lake.

Till then, Jack Sowden

Well I did manage to get out fishing yesterday for a bit and it turned out to be a pretty good day! I arrived at Barmston Farm fishing lake at around 11am and got set up in a swim which has a shallow area out in front of it (3 to 4 ft).

The Weather
It was an extremely hot day with a nice breeze blowing across the lake and very little cloud in the sky. Even when the sun started to fall the temperature fell very little. I think the weather definitely slowed the fishing down and maybe I should have tried stalking for the Carp in the snaggy areas of the lake. However I had some important stuff to read for work whilst I was waiting for my runs so this was not an option!

The Fishing
I fished using pva bags full of pellets, boilies are not allowed on this water. I cast out to the shallow gravely area out in front of peg 30, you could say it was a Plato I was fishing too. Next time I go I need to inspect this area more and find out exactly what it is. I fired 10mm Halibut pellets around both of the rods I had in the water.

From dinner time to 6pm I had only caught 2 carp but once the sun started to fall, the action was more regular. In the end I landed 6 carp and lost 3 with the biggest been about 8lb. In past visits to the lake I have caught many more fish than this in a similar time period and like previously mentioned, i think the extremely hot and bright conditions slowed them down. I also did not have any hemp & sweetcorn with me as I have found this to be a very successful bait on this lake.

More about the Barmston Farm
If you want any more information about Barmston Farm please see the link for there website below.

Link to Barmston Farms website

Not to sure when I will be fishing next, I will start to add a little more detail to these post in the future. Please take a look at some of the photos from the day below.