Mike’s Diary
Meanwhile back at Essential HQ...
Posted in Mike’s Diary on 05th July 2010Meanwhile back at Essential HQ Lee was finally starting to get the urge to visit our Glos syndicate water. Poor old (young!) Lee doesn’t get that much time to fish after rolling hundreds of kilo’s of bait for us each week, but in all honesty, there’s very few anglers’ I’ve met better than Lee once the enthusiasm really kicks in, and it did two weeks ago.
Like many venues around the country the lake had been fishing very slow with only nine fish out all season but Lee managed to winkle out three carp over the 48-hour session. These being commons of 23lb 4oz and 29lb together with a 25lb 2oz mirror. Top B5 bombing!
Armed with his new found enthusiasm he returned to the lake the following week fishing over large beds of whole and chopped B5 boilies mixed together with a combination of B5 pellets and crushed maize to bank yet another hat-trick of stunners. This time a 27lb 8oz common followed by two gorgeous mirrors of 26lb 12oz and would you believe it a new personal best UK carp by just 4oz at 41lb 4oz. What a truly magnificent result!
Congratulations Lee, who incidentally has asked me to thank Dave Jones, Head, Ninja, Davey-G and Clarky for their assistance with the above.
Boilie Paste
Mark Stubbles with yet another fine cold water carp. Mark is an extremely succesful and consistent angler and instinctively knows the rewards little edges can bring.
Many anglers tend to overlook the advantages that paste’s can give. Throughout the colder months I nearly always wrap a thin layer of paste around my hook bait. This not only gives the bait a better ‘leak off’ in terms of attraction as the paste slowly dissipates, but also gives the hook bait a completely different texture.
Paste is also an essential requirement if you prefer to make your own cork ball pop-ups or balanced baits. A 10mm cork ball with approx 3mm of paste wrapped around it will give you a nice balanced 16mm hook bait. To make pop-ups however, you will need to wrap a thinner layer of paste around the cork. I find that a 12mm cork ball with approx 1.5mm of paste wrapped around the outside creates pop-ups buoyant enough for most presentations.
Top Tip
We make the paste soft enough for most applications, but if you find the paste starting to dry out a little, just dampen it down with a ‘Bait Glug’ or a ‘Liquid Food’ and re-mould together. (Rinse hands in warm water first)
If you need to leave the paste standing for any length of time, make sure you wrap it up in cling film otherwise it can quickly dry up. It will be fine to wrap up in cling film and leave in the fridge for 24 hours if needed.
