Ben Tipney’s run continues, this time from a lake he had never fished before, on his first night! And what a stunning fish, one which is thought to have been on the missing list for a long time, well done Ben!
‘I was lucky enough to be invited on a guest session on a lovely little syndicate lake on Sunday night. The lake has a stock of cracking old original fish, and having never fished it before it held that bit of mystery for me!
I got down to find my mate set up right on the end of a lovely fresh SW wind, and after a quick look at a couple of other swims that also had the wind pushing in a decision was made. I only had one night so not wanting to thrash the water to a foam I had a few casts with a lead on the spod rod, finding a lovely gravel bar at short range with firm silt/clay at the bottom.
With the pressure below 1000, a mild overcast night forecast and that lovely warm wind pushing in I figured they would be up for a bit of grub so gave them a couple of kilos of a mixture of ‘Blast’ boilies from Pure Pellet (whole and crushed), 4mm/6mm Trout Pellets, a sprinkling of corn and a good glug of hot chilli oil & the ‘Blast’ glug – this stuff is an awesome gloopy mixture of fish protein and various attractors including spirulina and crushed snails. This was left to allow all the goodness to soak into the pellets while I got the rods sorted and out in the pond. A number of fish were showing in the area so confidence was high!
My mate had a stunning 25lb mirror at around 5pm, and with conditions looking spot on we were both expecting more action through the evening, but none materialised. Nevertheless, with fish still showing and the spot topped up, I went to bed feeling confident and this confidence was rewarded when I was woken at 3am by the alarm on the right hand rod going into meltdown!
By the time I’d got the waders on and got to the rod it must have taken a good 30-40 yards of line. The fish felt heavy from the off, making powerful runs and stripping line from a tight clutch.
Luckily though, after a good 10 minute battle it came to the surface close in and we could see it was a good mirror. At this point I was desperate to get it in, and luckily despite almost ploughing through a set of reeds and making a beeline for a marginal snag it went into the net first time!
The fish was like a breeze-block, a proper old english carp – and one that I’m informed had been on the missing list for some years! Always a priviledge to get a special capture like that – for the record the weight was 35lb 10oz – not bad for a first night!
Rigs were a hybrid semi-fixed/running setup that I find works brilliantly for cute pressured fish (credit to Pete Lay for developing that!), with once again ESP end tackle doing the business – ESP Leadcore Leader with a short 20lb strip-teaze hooklink, ESP lead clips and a size 6 Curve hook. Hookbait was a 15mm ‘Blast’ bait slightly chopped down and balanced with half a 15mm Morning Glory pop-up’.