BIG FISH COLUMN: Graham nets 25lb carp

My weather-forecasting skills proved to be a little off-target last week and we did actually see much-needed rainfall although, of course, it was much too little to make any great impact on the local rivers .

With overnight temperatures beginning to threaten the first frosts and the first signs of the dreaded leaf fall beginning to come through, it is not the easiest of times on the rivers and catches locally remain rather subdued with just the odd decent fish.

One fish which really did brighten up the week was an excellent Thames carp which fell to the rod of Marlow angler Steve Graham during the course of a night session.

The one difficulty with Thames carping is the sheer amount of bream the river holds and at times it can be painful wading through dozens of slabs as you wait for a carp.

Avoidance strategies involve ensuring you don’t feed trout or halibut pellets which bream can seemingly detect from miles away and using oversized hookbaits with boilies or double boilies over 20mm in diameter the usual fare – but at times even these only postpone the inevitable rather than actually preventing the problem!

For Steve, the big double bait was not really an option as he was hoping for barbel or carp and he reasoned a typical 26mm Thames carp boilie might deter the barbel from picking the bait up.

So he presented a single 20mm Richworth KG1 boilie with a PVA bag of boilies on one rod and a soaked 20mm pellet and PVA bag containing a couple of pellet offerings on the second rod. They were  presented on semi-fixed lead clip rigs with 3oz leads tight to a run of snags on the far side of the river; the boilie at the upstream end and the pellet below it.

Unsurprisingly, Steve picked up a couple of bream on the downstream rod as the light faded but the activity tailed off after dark allowing him to fish effectively and he was pleased not to have to keep continually re-casting to a tight area in darkness and it was not until dawn when he was woken by another bite with a fast take to the boilie rod.

Steve knew the fish wasn’t a bream by the speed of the take and after a minute it was also readily apparent by the sheer weight of the fish that it was a carp rather than a barbel and once the fish was clear of the far bank snags he was able to take his time and play the fish out in open water.

It took the best part of 10 minutes to get the fish to the net and on the bank where the early morning light illuminated the flanks of a pristine common carp of 25lb 12oz.

To report catches call me on 07780 755138. I may be e-mailed on ian@bigfishtrail.com