Catch Reports

Pete Springate smashes Somerset record with a 60-pounder!

Posted in Catch Reports on 08th July 2013

Well the above heading rocked the carp world for several hours recently when Mike Willmott posted it on his facebook page, but despite frantic calls from the weeklies begging for the exclusive story and the rumour mill going into overdrive, it was indeed a massive tongue in cheek wind up!! 

However, it was actually a true story because Mike never even mentioned it was a fish, and left this to the imagination of the media and general public to draw their own conclusions. The truth of the matter is that Pete put a trail of B5 out to tempt 'Victor' (one of Mike's giant tortoises) out of his home and to the waters edge before having his picture taken!! The pair then giggled furiously as the phone lines went into meltdown!

The following day Mike and Pete visited Ashmead as guests and Pete used the B5 to very good effect yet again, but this time on a fish! The result being a lovely 29lb 8oz common. The pair then returned to Mike's Springwood fishery and caught several fish between them up to 28lb 8oz. What a wonderful week of wind ups and whackers!

Long may we all continue to smile in this often too serious carp bubble we live in at times... 



Corker Pop-Ups

Cork dust pop-ups have a number of advantages over other pop-ups.

1) Made with identical ingredients/attractors to free offerings and send out the same food signals.

2) More durable and less prone to ‘theft’ from nuisance fish, crayfish and birdlife!

3) They can be pierced with a baiting needle without losing buoyancy.

4) Brilliant for ‘snowman’ presentations where you can trim down the corker pop up with scissor blades to achieve the perfect level of buoyancy required.

5) Ease of use.

 

Top tip for long term buoyancy

When fishing pop-up rigs in deep water for long periods of time or on waters where bird life can be a problem, drill out a cavity in the corker pop up with an 8mm drill bit then plug it with Gardner Tackle’s cylindrical high density rig foam (yellow). Then pierce the corker pop up on to your hook/rig, making sure the baiting needle goes up through the yellow foam first, then secure with boilie stop. I guarantee you that you can leave your pop up out there for 3-days if needed with no loss of buoyancy! Further to this, in the unlikely event that a diving coot or tufty unknowingly pinches your pop up, you are still fishing a nice visual yellow ‘fake’ bait.