Charman’s Challenge – River Farm
Fishery.
It’s exactly what it says on the
sign!
Date – Tuesday 1st
– Wednesday 2nd April 2014
Venue fact file –
River Farm Fishery – Frontley Road,
Titchfield, Hants PO15 6QZ
Tickets Adult daylight £8 (2
rods 7am – 7pm), Night £9 (2 rods 7pm – 7am).
Stock – The owner reckons
there are around 70 carp over 20lb with the best being a mid thirty
plus more than 150 doubles.
Conditions – Clear with cloud
increasing during the night along with the odd shower, A/P dropping
slightly too1004mb, wind increasing from the east to south east yet
the temperature is holding up, starting at 17 degrees and falling to
a low of 11 during the night.
This was one of
anglings best kept secrets for a number of years, well to those in
the know, and I remember constantly seeing 2lb plus roach featuring
within the Anglers Mail. This was back in 2009, yet with specialist
anglers on the lookout it was obvious this secret wouldn’t last
forever.
My first visit to
this small two acre lake was in 2009 and as it happened this was
without a doubt my best ever session, not for size of fish but for
numbers of quality roach that all came to simple float tactics. I was
fishing the swim to the right of the small inlet stream, which is
still the best float swim, and fed red maggots on a little and often
basis to catch more than twenty roach over the pound. I’m not sure
if a two pounder came on that occasion, yet many were around that
weight, yet sadly after this session I was unable to repeat that day.
Don’t get me wrong the fishing was still brilliant, yet due to the
pressure (and I include myself here) catching on the float was
getting tougher and soon more specialist tactics had to be employed.
Whilst the float fishing close in was good, numerous carp came to
net; the most notable was the only grass carp in the lake that was
unfortunately hooked in the tail by my good friend Steve Ansell. It
weighed around 30lb, yet due to the nature of the catch he simply
slipped it back without recording a weight or taking a photograph as
to him, unlike match fishing today, it didn’t count! One of the
lakes most sort after fish is a common which is grey in colour,
around 25lb and has a distinctive dip in its back, one that graced my
net after an epic fight on float gear. When the float fishing
declined the helicopter rigs reined supreme and for a number of
years, it was a tactic that saw me land my best from the water, a
roach of 2lb 6oz, however although a two pounder was almost a
guarantee throughout this period, many were just scrapper two’s!
It such a shame
that an ongoing fishery management project that worked so well, of
removing any fish under a pound every other year, was interrupted.
Bad handling of the bigger roach during one such netting saw Paul the
owner missing this routine, however by doing this he didn’t
envisage the off spring from these big roach having an even bigger
impact on his specimens. Unfortunately these ‘shitters’ as I call
them are so abundant that catching anything else on maggot is nigh on
impossible.
Fast forward a few
years and all I can say is this is the last throw of the dice for
this fishery. A hunch that I need to fish for the roach in a more
specialist way has been niggling away in my brain for a while and the
question now had to be answered, do any big roach still exist?
The journey down
to Titchfield from Aldershot has never been an easy one and takes at
least an hour, yet with the main route blocked due to flooding in
Faringdon today’s journey was going to take even longer. Finally
arriving at 6.30pm Paul, knowing that roach would be my target,
bought some bad news that the roach fishing had been bad for a number
of weeks at that targeting these, in his mind would be a waste of
time. As we spoke numerous carp moved and it was these that stopped
me heading back home as I knew the tactics I had bought would catch
these as well as roach.
This tactic was
simple, helicopter rigs, yet instead of maggot on the hook I would be
placing a 6mm pellet on a short hair that I had tied of the hook.
Rods were barbel rods with the 1.25lb tips added and my reels held
plenty of Gardner 8lb HydroFlo. The hooklink, just three inches of it
was constructed using a 5.94lb Grand Match Fluorocarbon, sadly no
longer available. On one end a small size 20 swivel was attached with
a micro sleeve pushed over the top to create a boom and on the other
end a size 16 Super Specialist hook tied knotless knot style. The
standard maggot feeder was replaced with a 1oz cage feeder which
would carry a few loose 6mm Nash Squidgee Pellets (another product
that’s sadly not available anymore) pressed into 2mm Nash Sticky
Pellets and on the hair a 6mm Squidgee. To get the swim going I
decided to cast six pellet loaded feeders accurately out. This was
simply done by casting out, placing the line in the reels line clip
and tying on an elastic stop-knot just of the rod tip. The reason for
elastic and not the new Nash Spot-On is that during the night I can
feel this stop knot hit the top eye instead of tying to locate a
coloured mark on the line which I prefer to do during daylight hours.
After priming the swim it was time to cast out, one rod to the left
around 30yards, the other just an underarm cast to the right. The
reason for fishing two areas is that when using such fine balanced
rigs the last thing I need is getting these tangled whilst playing a
fish. I also had the rare luxury that I was the only angler on the
lake.
My game plan was
to cast every two hours however come 9am I found myself playing a
carp which came to the left hand rod. Fortunately it didn’t give
that brilliant account of itself and soon a common of around 13lb lay
in the net. After a quick photo rods were repositioned and it was
then that I realised that the roach were nowhere to be seen. I did
get a few bleeps as well as the odd big liner as a carp swam into the
line but any sign of a rolling roach was noticeable in its absence.
An hour past before the next screamer came, again to the left hand
rod however after getting the carp under the rod tip the hook pulled.
Two more carp came up to midnight, both on the right hand rod, both
double figured commons but I had to wait till around 1.30am to land
my forth and biggest carp of the session, one that weighed 18lb 15oz.
Up until this time the lake had been alive with activity yet after
this the lake fell quiet as did my rods, yet after working each rod
throughout the night no more bites came.
7am arrived as did
the rain and as I made a hasty retreat to the van I knew deep down
that this venue is no longer a roach water, in fact I have a feeling
that it hasn’t got any big roach left in it. As they say as one
door opens another closes and for me River Farm Fishery is exactly
what is says on the sign, a carp fishery.
Farnham Angling Societies Junior
Helicopter Rig Teach-In
I get together
with Mark a few times a year and he always wants to learn new tactics
and with a Christmas present from his parents of two days fishing
with myself. Having fished Frensham in the past and tried to perfect
the art of using ‘The Helicopter Rig’ with mixed results, Mark
wanted to get to grips with it, perfect the art of casting clipped up
and hitting the same spot constantly well before the venue reopens in
the summer. Knowing that I was catching loads of fish from FAS
Badshot Lea we headed here on the first day and in far from ideal
conditions landed more than 30 bream for a total weight well in
excess of 200lb. I even fished alongside with pellet on the hair and
caught as many as he did on the maggot so he managed to learn two
tactics in just one day. Yesterday we headed to GAS Harris Lake as
Mark had never caught a crucian carp. Instead of using my standard
tactics we decided to fish the flat-bed feeder and whilst others
around struggled for just the occasional fish, Mark landed more than
fifteen tench to 6lb 2oz along with three crucians to 2lb 1oz.
It was also good
to see another customer of mine putting what he had learnt with me a
few weeks before into practice and was constantly catching on the
opposite bank. Unfortunately for us all on the day it was just bream
and the occasional small roach that showed and not the carp that
Martin had taken on his first cast during our guided trip.
Stop Press - Mill Farm Fishery opens to the public on Friday 18th March.
Teaming up with my
fishing mate and fellow Nash Ambassador, Chris Petter we had planned
to travel down on the Monday night but due to the constant rain that
finally stopped late that evening decided to travel down early
Tuesday morning so we would be on the venue at first light.
Arriving almost
together at 5.45am the plan seemed to have worked as the clouds had
dispersed and the ground somewhat drier. Heading for the specimen
lake our minds were firmly fixed on catching silver bream, hopefully
one close or bigger than the present British Record of 3lb 4oz, yet
realistically a two pounder would be classified as a result. The most
popular swim on the lake is the big double that gives access to both
islands and this was were we settled, Chris on the right hand side,
myself to the left. Having rods already set up it was simply a case
of casting out so that our rigs fell close to the islands then
quickly marking the line using Nash Spot-On before clipping the line
in the reels line clip. Rigs were as explained and used last week at
River Farm Fishery, Helicopter rigs using cage feeders and short
hooklinks which incorporated a hair. The fishery has a groundbait ban
so it was once again the brilliant 3mm Sticky Pellets that were
pressed into the feeder and either a yellow or orange 6mm Squidgee
pellet placed on the hair, ones that has been soaked in Nash
Sweetcorn Magic Mix Attractor. Components that made up each rig were
almost identical to last week; however constant splitting of the once
brilliant Korum micro sleeves meant that these had to be replaced.
I’m not sure the manufacturer of the new sleeves, I think they are
ESP and will let you know soon, but Chris had found a packet of
longer sleeves in his tackle box and by simply cutting these down
gave the perfect anti tangle boom effect. Hooklink also had to be
rethought as we felt a stiffer material was required along with a
hooklink that knotted up better than the 5.14lb Reflo that had been
previously used. I had bought some Wychwood 6lb Truefly in the hope
that it would replace the Preston Grand Match I use for rudd fishing,
yet it seemed to stiff for this, but complimented this type of
fishing perfectly and coupled with a Drennan Super Specialist size 16
hook we soon had rigs in position.
The minutes
started to tick away without incident and with very few fish moving
we started to think that we might just be too early but eventually my
alarm sounded, yet it wasn’t what I wanted but the first of what
was to be numerous carp. For an hour the action was steady and we
both took a couple of tench, carp and silvers too 1lb 15oz as well as
numerous roach but then the swim died. For two hours we sat without
much happening before Chris tweaked his setup slightly, a change that
transformed the session. I can’t say what this change was at the
moment as we need to take it elsewhere but from that moment we
struggled to keep all four rods in the water. Every species, well
except eels, constantly graced our nets and come the end of the day
we had landed more than fifteen carp, the best 14lb 15oz, plus
numerous tench to 5lb, roach to 1lb 10z, perch to 1lb 15oz plus
around a dozen silver bream over 1lb 12oz which included three two
pounders, the best weighing 2lb 3oz. I should have learnt after
letting Chris take a bite on my rods at Broadwater back in the winter
that ended up with him placing the net under a 19lb mirror, however
whilst playing a carp a bite developed on my other rods which he took
and you guessed it, this was from the 2lb 3oz silver, hence the self
take of us both holding fish.
Come 6pm we were
both knackered having landed so many fish, but the rewarding point of
this session was that we had thought about our approach, tweaked
certain areas and pretty much landed everything that was hooked,
however the icing on the cake was when a Osprey flew just feet above
our heads, the fist that I have ever seen.
