The Blank Saver – A Tale of Two Halves!

My latest foray bankside was to meet up with a group of fellow members from the ever growing Team Pallatrax, which is now in excess of 2,000 members literally from across the globe. The formation and the social side of it means we frequently meet up knowing we will be with like-minded anglers, fish together and share our passion for the sport we all love so much.

Not that I can do a lot about it, but checking the weather prior to the trip saw the start of our recent heatwave and showed clear skies with temperatures in the mid to upper 20s and zero wind. Certainly not what I would call good fishing weather, but you have to be in it to win it. Weather has a massive effect on the species we fish for and in the Summer months we are also ‘frustrated’ with an abundance of natural food sources for the fish to feed on. Whatever we offer as baits can never be as the same nutritional value of the 1000s of Naturals that live within our waters.

For example, just look at species like Daphnia, the water flea, a tiny crustacean that is prevalent within our water ways. These microscopic creatures number into their billions and are rich in protein and fish literally swim through water laden with them. In essence it is like us walking around and every time we breathe in we take in nutritional food with no need to hunt it out!

Driving into the car park it was great to see both old and new faces, but for once the weather people had got things right and the temperatures were soaring and this is where it really does become a tale of two halves! I love the warmer months alongside the longer days, I really am no fan of our darker and colder months. To me most of my childhood angling memories revolve around fishing into dusk on warm evenings sitting within nature and far from the madding crowds. This was to be the case over the next 40 odd hours I was to spend in my swim. The weather was absolutely glorious, if I was into sun bathing, and I sat out well into the night watching the resident owl fly across the skyline, a majestic bird I would never have seen if I’d stayed indoors!

So the first ‘half’ of my tale was accomplished, a lovely fishery, lovely weather, great company and a brilliant over-all atmosphere – but that’s where the wheel started to wobble i.e. the fishing! I am one who hates to blank, I really do and hence one of the main reasons to start my own bait and tackle company so I can innovate and design products and tactics that give us all those important edges. I will ‘fight’ a blank trying all the legitimate tricks in the book to winkle one fish out and this was very much going to be the case here.

How was I going to catch in a swim that was far from a fish-holding swim in this weather? It was going to be a real challenge, but ultimately I would prevail and it could not have got any more basic a tactic to catch the single fish of my trip. I love surface fishing for carp, the sight of the fish moving in on the floating bait, the seeing of the take and the resulting fight is very difficult to beat. In such conditions the free-lined cork ball comes into play, no controller just line, hook and bait and a fish within the zone that I could try to tempt against the odds.

As in all areas of fishing the last few feet are the really important elements and this case it was around six foot of 13lb Gamma Fluorocarbon, which I had bonded into my main line using a blood knot. Hook wise has to be a Wide Gape Gripz in size 8, this versatile pattern with an in turned beak is unbeatable within such tactics. I also use some Mucilin, a line floatant which I cover my Fluorocarbon in. This has the benefit of keeping the line on the surface which is another ‘must do’ when surface fishing.  Last, but not least, was the bait. Bait, by definition can be of any substance and my go to surface bait is a 10mm highly flavoured cork ball which in this case had been doused in my Jungle flavour, a blend of tigernut, peanut and clove.

How basic, but on its day such a deadly tactic and so under-appreciated by many. The next question is how do you get any distance on a set up which weighs little and, to be honest, it just took a little bit of thinking in the early days of using this set up. I found I could get a piece of method mix, around the size of a 50 pence piece, and mould it till it becomes firm and then wrap it around the hook and cork ball. This gave me plenty of weight to gain the distances needed for this style of fishing and as soon as the method hit the water, a quick flick of the wrist will see the method drop off and the cork ball floating within the target zone.

It is then a bit of a waiting game but, as luck would have it, through the ripples I saw three carp mooching around within my bit of water. Cast one the method fell off and therefore I never got the distance needed, cast two the cork ball went through the zone but no interest from the fish, cast three and wallop! One of the carp, with a flick of its tail, surfaced and engulfed the cork ball and I was into some fierce action on a light set up. Heart thudding knowing this could be my only chance, and it was, I carefully played the carp out and before too long a stunning mirror was drawn over the string on my net. It really is satisfying in such conditions to hoodwink a fish and the trusty cork ball had again put the cherry on the cake for this session!