Terrific general fishing with anglers baggin on all lakes! - 12 05 2010




The arrival of May see’s some terrific general sport on all lakes

Despite one of the coldest springs for 30 years, the general fishing over the past few weeks has been brilliant with anglers experiencing some terrific sport on all three lakes. To show just how good the fishing currently is, we enlisted the help of four anglers of mixed ability who each fished for just a few hours on a different lake and who all experienced non-stop action. 

Bury Hill’s tackle shop manager Russ Evans started the ball rolling by grabbing a short four-hour session on the Old Lake targeting the Old Lakes massive bream shoals fishing a waggler up in the water. Slotting into peg 21, simply because it was nearest to the boathouse, Russ had a fantastic session bagging a fish a chuck for most of his session.



Casting three to four rod lengths out into just five feet of water and fishing between 6-12 inches over-depth, Russ caught 65 bream up to 7lbs plus 8 tench with the biggest going just over 6lbs. All the fish were caught on 6mm Ringer soft expanders and a combination of either 2 or 3 red maggots on a size 16 or 14 hook. Using a 3AAA waggler float with a bulk shot pattern above the hook length and a single dropper shot placed 6-8 inches from the hook, Russ's fish averaged just over 3lbs for a weight well over the 200lbs mark. "Russ’s key to the big catch was the regular feeding pattern of halibut pellets" said Russ. When the wind dropped I was catapulting out 3mm halibut pellets but when the wind picked up I switched to larger 6mm halibuts so I could reach the catching area with ease. Having his float dotted right down also made it easy to spot lift bites and of course the positive straight under takes as Russ the fish went on a feeding frenzy during his very busy session.

Russ quote "Whilst Milton Lake is probably my favorite lake on the fishery, the Old Lake on day's like this runs a very close second, with catches like this confirming the Old Lake as one of the countries truly great waggler/bream waters, fantastic sport".



Also fishing a short four-hour session, Bury Hill regular Hayden Woods from Leatherhead, Surrey opted to fish Milton Lake choosing to set up on peg 3 next to the reeds. Fishing a pole at 9 meters, Haydon’s set up was a ½ gramme float shotted down the line and fine wire 14 hook with 4lbs mainline and 3lbs hook length. Fishing dead depth (it is always important to plumb the depth accurately) Hayden fished small thumbnail sized pieces of Green Swim Stim paste alternating 6mm soft pellet on the hook loose feeding little and often with Dynamite 4mm Swim Stim carp pellets to catch a good 50lbs mixed bag of tench, crucian, roach and rudd with a cracking 4lb 6oz tench taking top honours.



With Russ and Hayden reporting bumper catches on both the Old Lake and Milton Lake, the pressure was certainly on for another couple of Bury Hill regulars, Jude Agate and Matt Fuller from Reigate in Surrey who chose to fish Bonds Lake. Fishing pegs 5 and 6, the pair opted to fish a feeder tight to the island margins. Using a small Drennan cage feeder loaded with fishmeal groundbait and a 4mm carp pellet mix, they both caught on 8mm hard carp pellets which they fished on a size 12 hook hair rig set up. Catapulting three or four 8mm pellets regularly over the top of the feeding area, both anglers were soon into fish ending their 5 hour session with 23 carp between them, which included a new PB for each angler, a 12lbs 1oz Common for Jude and a 9lbs 11oz common for Matt and total weight close to 150lbs.



“Catch More” Fact Sheets for the Old Lake and Milton and Bonds Lakes are available in the shop and on the website to download, these explain in very simple terms the best way to fish each lake and how to increase your catches.