Catch Reports
Stunning - just stunning!
Posted in Catch Reports on 29th April 2009Martin Finan’s incredible list of big fish captures just seems to get better and better! Fishing a difficult Southern gravel pit, it was only 13-months ago that he smashed the lake record with a huge 54lb mirror, followed by a hat-trick of forties, but he’s now been at it again!! Read it and weep!
During the past year Martin has concentrated his efforts on to a certain area of the lake in pursuit of an extremely elusive ‘leathery’ type mirror that has only ever been caught on a handful of times during the past 20-years. Having seen the great fish frustratingly cleaning up his free offerings on a number of occasions, and with the season running out of time, the big fish maestro finally managed to nail the monster at a staggering weight of 52lb 10oz!! A new fifty for the venue and of course for Martin himself.
As if all that wasn’t enough, during the same session he also managed to bank a 33lb 8oz mirror followed by one of the most stunning looking carp you will ever see, a 37lb 2oz perfect linear which visits the bank even less than the big mirror! All the fish fell to the legendary B5, which just keeps on nailing the big fish time and time again.
Mike sent Martin the following message on the evening before the capture:
“Encouraging to see he's on the 'money'. Not long now but still time. One
moment's mistake for a lifetime of memories! Don't forget to call me”
The call came the following morning!! Stunning – just stunning!
Fluoro pop-ups
Whilst carp are not generally recognised as sight feeders, there are undoubtedly times when they are visually drawn to a food source and bright pop-ups are a classic example of this. It's not surprising therefore, that fluoro pop-ups have proved very effective, particularly if just using a single bait with no free offerings. The winter and spring months are a classic example of this and a single fluoro pop-up cast to a 'showing' fish has resulted in the downfall of many a carp.
But it would be a mistake to think fluoro pop-ups should be just restricted to single bait presentation. Quite often, a fluoro pop-up fished over a bed of bait can fool the wariest of carp and a little 10mm fluoro pop-up mounted above a standard bottom bait can act as a very good visual sight and lead to a bite or two when other methods fail to produce.
