An Interesting Night

It has been quite a long time since I have managed a proper night on Lac Du Coron, before my night a

month ago the last two opportunities I had both ended shortly after they began as the fish embarked on yet another carpy orgy. Last month I was kindly invited for a night with a group of 3 anglers on the lake and Mac and I did the night in The Channel

That night flew by with fish showing all around me and I did manage 3 takes. 1 I dropped and the other two were little wildy commons. Both of those were caught literally under the rod tip on my usual wafter/bottom bait rig.

So, fast forward to this weekend just gone. For the last 5 weeks we have had some serious heat, pushing 40’s day after day, water temperatures were in the high 20’s and oxygen has only been kept stable by 24/7 running of the diffusers and large fountain.

Over the last few days the weather started to break, at last we got a breeze and the temperature went from the high 30’s to the mid to upper 20’s, importantly the night were also much cooler, there was even a good moon phase. With all that in my favour it was well worth getting a night on the bank.

On the Thursday I put a bit of bait all over the lake in several likely looking areas, I only used boilie as to be honest its my preferred way to fish. In total I put about 4 kg’s Northern Baits new Evolution dumbbells out and another 5kg of 15mm Blue Mussel, this was mainly so I didn’t have to create a load of disturbance in whatever swim I decided to fish, I could put little stringers or bags on and put them on the baited spots with little disturbance.

When I arrived on Friday I had a good look around and after a couple of laps I had seen several signs of feeding carp in open water in front of both Lotties and Rolo’s. I had seen carp as usual all over the lake, but there were lots of little patches of fizz coming up in open water, so this is where I would start.

After a few casts with a bare lead I found a spot very close to the fountain, another straight in front in open water and the 3rd down the shelf in front of the outflow pipe. Baits and rigs were simple. 2 were on multi rigs, one with a 13mm Esta Pop Up and the other with the 13mm white Pear Drop Pop Up. The 3rd was on my Haula wafter rig, on this one I had 2 halves of a blue mussel pop up weighted down with a BB shot. They were quickly flicked out to the spots and I sat back with my dad for a chat and some dinner.

Those that know me know that I am quite an active angler. I have always been fairly good at understanding when a bite is due or expected, so when I am sitting there thinking one of these should have gone by now and it hasn’t I have to try and change things. I whipped all three rods in, checked the rigs, hooks and baits and all seemed well there, I didn’t think that was the problem, so I propped the rods up against the brolly and wandered around to the back bank to have a closer look at my areas. Very quickly I saw loads more feeding than I thought, plumes of bubbles and clay coming up all over the area and all in open water. It was clear that they were gill deep in the bottom harvesting naturals. I have had this situation before at waters like Ladywell and I have found two ways that seem to get me that bite. One

is to fish pop ups off the lead over bits like crushed boilie, seeds, groundbait etc. I don’t really mean zigs, just pop ups 5 inches to a foot off the bottom. The other is to ‘force’ them to feed on bait and this is the tactic I felt was right on this occasion. 1st of all I cracked open another 5kg bag of Blue Mussel and combined with the new Evolution I scattered about 3kg with the throwing stick all over the area, the plan was to get them seeing bait all over the place as they moved about, but not enough in one place for them to get nervous. The second part of the plan was to increase the attraction of the hookbait area. For this I shot into the tackle shop and put together one of my favourite mixes. Hot and Spicy stick mix, Daphnia extract liquid and blended fish oil. To that I added a few handful of crumbed boilie, mixed it all thoroughly with a bit of lake water and left it to absorb in and stodge up. The rest is simple, I put a little foam over the hook and dropped it in a large solid bag, i then loaded it up with the groundbait mix, sealed it up and flicked all three back out into open water. Rigs and lead arrangements were all kept the same.

So I sat back down and watched excitedly as the bubbling continued and even intensified. 25 minutes later and the left hander absolutely melted off and I was met with a serious resistance as I connected with the fish, a proper old battle ensued and eventually I slipped the net under a decent common. After a short rest in the net I bit the line , slipped the net into the retainer and brought the fish to the waiting mat for a few snaps and a quick weigh. At over 30lbs it was a great start.

A little later the same rod ripped of again, this time with a little wildy which I unhooked in the net and let

go without too much stress. As the night progressed the fish seemed to spread out more and I could here fish further to my right in The Double and The Channel but I still felt there was another chance. At about 3 o’clock in the morning the middle rod was off and another animal of a battle ensued. This time it was one of the mid 20 stockies, so I didn’t wake dad and just grabbed a quick snap on the mat.

With the new day only an hour or two a way and the dogs up and about I didn't bother going back to bed, instead I sat and watched the water, put a bit more bait out and had a potter about trying to clean up the carnage of the night. At about 6am the fizzers came back and literally minutes later the rod under the fountain charged off out into the main area of the lake kicking up millions of bubbles and clouds of silt as it flanked along the bottom looking for a way to shed that Haula hook. eventually though it went in the net and I could see the little white Pear Drop pop up hanging out of another nice commons mouth. I secured the net and gave dad a nudge, it was an ungodly hour for him but he was happy to see another one and came over to get a couple of snaps for me.

On the mat I could see it was the patch common, a very rare visitor to the bank so I was happy with that. She was a bit lean after all that spawning but still a good 30 and one I was very pleased to catch.

With that my overnighter was done and with only one rod in the water and people due to come over to visit that afternoon dad and scooted about and packed up. The first time dad had spent the night on the bank for probably 20 years, good weather and the plan came together.