So it was back down the crosses for a bit of pole action, i even brought my vassaline with me just incase
With all the rain the main pool is up again another 2 or 3 inches and has plenty of colour. There were a few folk down there today so before i picked a peg and got setup i went and had a quick walk. Apparently "You shoulda been here yesterday mate we emptied it!" Why is it always the day previous it fishes its head off?
Anyway, with what seemed to be a light north, northeasteraly i decided on peg 8. A feature packed peg with brilliant margin lines either side. To my left a reed line that ran out back towards to middle of the pool for 5 meters and to my right a undercut bank with overhanging tree. Both excellent fish holding areas. But alas! Today was not to be a day of margin tomfoolery, instead today was about trying out some floats i had made specificly for these two venues i fish. 3 patterns in total, rugby ball 4x10 and 4x12s, and 4x10 pencil floats with 1.5mm hollow bristles to 1mm glass stems. I decided to be brave with these floats and leave the twisted spring eyes off, instead rubbering up the little fellas. If this cunning plan didnt work i could always glue some on later....would of been much harder to take them off! The floats in question. Not perfect but i did tidy them alittle after this pic was taken;
So anyway, ignoring the inside lines (i wouldnt do this normally) i decided to fish 13m out straight infront of me into open water. I popped on a 4x10 to 0.10 mainline and a 0.9 bottom. This connected one end to a double number 6 slip and the other end a pr24 18. I plumbed up at 13m's to find a whopping 2.5foot of drink! I was pleased, i am so used to fishing in a foot of water
I did have some concerns about the little float i was using though if the wind picked up but i would just have to suck it and see....for now it would do.Lets hope it goes under!
Now ive not mentioned bait....mainly because i dropped a bit of a booboo with it. I had planned more maggots and pellet attack. But when i got the mags out of the fridge this morning they were....well.....bad
Sweaty, smelly and rock hard. They were terrible...hell if i was a fish i wouldnt want to eat them. It was to late to go to Ians at this point so out came the Robin Red! A good sprinkle and a shake....and well they were....as good as new....even more smelly! Luckly i had a few different pellets to try and was confident one or more would catch me a few if the fish turned their noses up at the mags.Bait for the day....rank mags and a selection of hard soaked pellets plus a few expanders and IM5 GB;
I got the float down to a pimple and slipped on a few of those rank maggots, filled the converted pop bottle cap tosspot type thing with a thumb nail of GB, 6 small pellets and 4 maggs. Shipped out to 13m's....dumped the feed and lowered the bait. The trap was set.....the float sat quite nicely and was visable which is really what i was looking for. All i needed now was it to go under and thankfully i didnt have to wait long as Simon the skimbo hung himself on my nasty maggots!
I repeated the above 5 or 6 times with mags on the hook catching skimmers and carp each time. Sport wasnt frantic but it was enough to keep the mind ticking over. A drop in action prompted a switch to expanders which in turn caught a few more skimmers and carp. Then another drop in action....i slipped on two of the small soaked feed pellets on the hook....god it looked terrible.....there was just no way on earth it was going to get any indication. Well it just so happens i was wrong and this was infact just what the fish ordered. For the first two hours i managed to keep them coming by switching baits but mainly using 3 different types of pellet. They were all great fun to play on the light elastic with even the skimmers giving a good account of themselfs. The 3rd hour things tailed off and it was hard to connect with them. I had proper bites but couldnt hit them which left me puzzled.After pinching a few more skimmers and a roach that must of been 8oz's taking a likeing to the pellets, i decided to scale down the hook length and push out to 14m's for the last hour. On went a 808 sz20 to 0.7mm hooklength and in went a little bit of feed. 2 minutes passed before Colin the carp decided to do me a favour, hooking himself and going off and 100mph
I feared for the hooklength but it stayed strong and i was back in touch with the fish. The next hour passed with another good run of carp and some nice bream being netted. At the 4h mark i called it a day...i was hungry and the misses was no doubt going to be on the phoned asking where the hell i was 
The catch;
I have no idea how many craps and skimmers i ended up with in the end but it felt like knocking 30lb of fish. Not a bad day!
