Since the beginning of August when I first secured a ticket for Cawcutts lake I've been doing short targeted sessions three or four times a week. Some sessions were spent in just one area and others spent moving around, as much as anything it's a fast way to get to know a lake. Luckily for me I have managed to pick up a few fish along the way which always encourages me. However I had a feeling that if I was to really get amongst them then i'd have to get the bivvy out and do a longer stay to build up the swim. Since Cawcutts is a busy fishery the bivvy was basically to ensure that I kept the swim.
My rota starts at 10:00 AM monday morning and by 11:00 AM I had chosen my swim by the first island and setup. It was drizzling warm rain with a hard southerly blowing right into the swim, perfect! Previous work with the marker rod and Deeper in this area gave me a good idea of where to place my rigs and saved me time so three rods were placed and a little bait introduced in the hope of catching any stragglers from the morning feeding period.
After lunch I introduced a kilo of 18mm Crazy Nut boilies that had been chopped into quarters plus a kilo of 14mm Crazy Nut boilies, all three rigs had 14mm Crazy nut popups on with a size 8 Ultra Sharp Gripper from Specialist Sharpened Hooks.
At 4:30 PM the left hand rod roared off with my first fish, a really fat pot bellied beast that took an age to get in. At 28.8lb I was well chuffed and it signalled a good session ahead. I introduced another half kilo of 14mm Crazy Nut boilies some chops and tossed out a fresh rig. Two hours later and the right hand rod was away with a nice 23lb mirror and another half kilo of Crazy Nut went out. Just after dark I had a tench and then at 11:30 PM a 14lb Mirror. It was midnight when I sat back down, I had been there 13 hours and caught three fish, I had used up 4 of the eight kilos of bait I had bought with me for a 48 hour session.
I didn't think for one moment that all the bait had been eaten in fact I was sure that all that bait had pulled them in, but to get three fish in such a short time was a surprise. The night passed and the morning bought still muggy conditions reminiscent of fog but without the fog. I didn't feel the need to put in anymore bait and let the morning pass into afternoon before I felt the weather turn again and I topped up the swim. By 3:30 PM the wind had once again picked up and the cloud had returned with the promise of rain. At 4:30 the right hand rod once again roared off with a beautifully scalled mirror of 19lb. Out went another load of bait as I settled in for the evening and within an hour Carp were crashing over the swim. As I cooked diner I kept one hand on the gas regulator as I was sure a run was bound to come and I didnt want to burn the homemade curry!
When it came the gas was turned off before I ran for the rod, I picked it up, felt the line run out across the lake, the rod go over and then it popped off! I wasn't much in the mood for curry after that.
The next morning I put out what was left of the 8 kilos I started with and sat back. Nagging me all day was the thought of that lost fish, it didn't feel like a lump of that I was sure but lets face it we all hate losing them and we never count them in at the start of the session only the ones we are going to catch.
At 12:30 PM the middle rod roared off and I knew instantly I made contact that this one was much bigger than the rest. It was one of those fish that has the ability to absolutely stay put like its weeded, such is there power. It made countless worrying runs and I had it on for an age, of course hoping all the time I wouldn't cock it up!
When it slipped into the net I could see it was a beast and it had no trouble pulling the scales to 32:12lb.
Five fish in 48 hours, what a session!