Blogs

Something for the week end Sir? (more rehydrating)

I have written at length in the past regarding re-hydrating boilies, giving them a drink, softening boilies and so on. In fact it is very rare for me to feed dry boilies on any water that has seen any amount of pressure as I know I can improve their effectiveness with just a little bit of extra effort.

Extra Care When Handling Cold Water Carp

This is a subject I never see covered anywhere despite mentioning it in several of my articles in the past, but it is a vitally important issue which can’t in my mind be repeated often enough.

Carp are cold blooded. This means that the carp is the same temperature as the water it is living in. This affects the carp’s metabolism greatly and is the reason your bait choice is so crucial during the winter months but this is another subject for another place. Humans are warm blooded which  means we are warmer than our winter surroundings.

So you want to catch a carp over the Christmas period?

With the festive holiday looming and many of us with a few days away from work commitments the thought of escaping to the great outdoors with the carp rods to unwind after possibly over indulging on the food and drink is somehow rather appealing.

Sorting the Bait as we Approach Winter

As the cooler weather is now starting to set in it is time for my annual Autumn sort out of my tackle and bait but particularly the bait. From past experience I know that some of the baits that catch me a lot of summer fish will now stop working as effectively with the lowering of the water temperature. Yes, the carp will still eat them but certainly not with the same gusto as they did a month back. There are many reasons for this but on the whole they won’t be seeping out anything like same sort of attraction or stimulation to the fish that they did before the drop in temperature.

Top Winter Carp Tactic

The prolonged cold, dark and often crisp nights of winter, followed by slippery drive ways and frozen window screens, hardly bring on the urge to go carp fishing do they?

Or do they?

They do to me. I must admit to feeling a relative smugness inside me during the winter months and can easily warm to many memories of winter success over the years. It is a fact that most of my personal best carp over the years have actually fallen during the winter period. The majority of times I have slowly upped my best has been during the winter and I truly believe this is the best time of the year to sort the bigger fish out. Undoubtedly the fish slow up and rest up for much longer periods when the water is cold but the larger fish tend to keep that little bit more active. If everything is active then all well and good, as every winter carp I catch seems to feel just that little more important to me than the same fish in the summer. Winter carp certainly give me a buzz!

20 mm Boilies in the Winter.

It isn't just small tiny baits you will catch on during the cold winter months. During a time when many scale their baits down, it can be a lovely little edge going the opposite way.

Winter Bait Choice is Critical

There was a comment on facebook the other day that I responded to and thought I should add it here too.

Someone asked how important I think bait is.