After a gruelling three months of concentrating most of my efforts on a river campaign, I have managed to fit in three short overnighters on my syndicate water. These have been short twelve hour sessions, which have led to some good results using a range of Gardner terminal tackle, CC Moore baits, good old trusty instinct and watercraft.
For my first session I arrived at the lake just after work around 6:30pm, it was a warm evening and the water was very calm. After a quick walk around it wasn’t long before I found a small group of fish and decided I would fish for them as there were a couple of good 20lb fish in amongst them. I soon had the rods baited and out on the spots. One rod was placed at about 70 yards range, quite tight against a bed of reeds. I was using my normal combi-rig arrangement, which consisted of the Gardner Subterfuge in 15lb and the braid section made from Gardner Trickster Heavy in 15lb. The rig was paired with a size 8 Gardner Covert Mugga hook and baited with an ever faithful CC Moore Meteor Cork Dust Wafter and a golf ball sized PVA bag filled with Crushed Meteor boilies, CC Moore shrimp pellet and a little CC Moore Antartic Krill Meal. I catapulted about twenty five 15mm Meteor boilies around the rig.
This time of the year I find it best to match your hookbaits with what you are feeding, also I tend too always use glugged hookbaits in the matching liquid. I love the way the Meteor glug congeals on the baits in hot weather, when it begins too dry giving a thick and sticky texture. It just gives the hookbait that little edge and I have watched fish home in on these very quickly amongst the freebies. I apply this too all of my matching range being the Hardbait Hookers, cork ball pop ups, wafters or just standard Meteor boilies.
My other two rods were fished on chod rigs with Gardner components and all rods fished on Gardner Heavy Plummet Leadcore in 45lb brown and on the Gardner Mirage Fluorocarbon mainline. The Chod rigs were baited with the super buoyant CC Moore Meteor cork ball pop ups. One of the chods was fished off an island, not too tight as I felt most people would cast a hookbait tight. I baited with about a kilo and a half of 15mm CC Moore Meteor Freezer baits, which were widely spread over a big area with a throwing stick. The other chod was fished in open water about fifty yards out in front of me again baited with around a kilo of Meteor freebies.
Gardner components.” alt=”My other two rods were fished on chod rigs incorporating As soon as the rods were out, I put the kettle and sat watching the water for a while. The fish seemed to have settled and not much was going on, but just before dark a fish stuck it head out just off one of my spots. An hour or so passed with no other occurrences, so it was time to get some sleep.
Just after midnight my middle rod absolutely screamed off, and I was away on the chod on the heavier baited area. I could feel it was a good fish as it was a powerful fight leading me into various weedbeds. After about 5-10 minutes the fish came over the net cord and a lovely 24lb mirror was the reward. A fresh corkball pop up was tied to the chod and recast to the spot.
My alarm was set for 4:30am and as soon as it sounded I was up and looking at the spots. I was debating a recast on the cork dust wafter rod. I put the kettle on and told myself give it fifteen more minutes while I made a cup of tea. As soon as the tea was made the rod burst into action and I was in again. After a spirited fight I landed a mid-double common and I soon had the od back out in position. I received one further take off this rod about an hour later, again resulting in another mid-double common. I packed up that morning feeling content and I couldn’t wait to get back…
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