DAY-TICKET DIARY
Fishing a venue where the carp are ‘clued-up’ requires a mobile approach, as Matt proves by bagging a fine brace
CUTTLE Mill, a picturesque pool nestled in the West Midlands countryside, has played host to many of carp fishing’s biggest names down the decades.
With angler numbers restricted to just eight per day, and night fishing to just Monday and Thursday nights, you might be forgiven for thinking that the fishing would be easy. However, these fish have been angled for since the 1970s and have seen every trick in the book, so it’s not easy to trip them up. I love the place, and over the last 18 months I’ve caught some truly stunning fish from the venue.
For my latest session I turned up midweek and the lake was quiet. I had 24 hours ahead of me and chose one of my favourite swims, Peg 1.
This gave me a large area of water that couldn’t be encroached upon from other swims, and also a great view of the lake, so that if I spotted fish in another area I could move quickly.
Short and sweet
I decided to opt for short chod rigs on all three rods. It’s an approach I have total confidence in at Cuttle, and has served me well. It’s an old, fairly silty lake, so I tied my chod rigs short – around two inches – to keep the hook away from any twigs and the bait above the silt, but not making it too blatant.
A lot of people struggle to tie their chod rigs as short as this, but the trick is to put fewer turns into the knot at the swivel end. I use 25lb Chod-line, so knot strength isn’t an issue, but slippage is. So, although I only use a two-turn blood knot, I always put a big blob with a lighter on the tag end to prevent the knot from slipping.
Safety zone
To begin with I chose to put out a spread of boilies and to fish all three rods over the top. Each swim at Cuttle has its ‘own water’ but, as at many lakes, in reality most people fish a little short of their ‘boundary’, leaving a ‘safe-zone’ up the centre of the lake. The fish soon realise this and will back off into this
area when the lake is busy. As long as you’re within ‘your water’, then putting the rigs in this zone really can catch the fish out, as they are not used to being fished for there.
However, there’s no point fishing an area where the fish feel safe and then putting tight lines across them, so I let the lines sink after casting out and then fished them nice and slack.
I don’t like crashing big leads over the fish, and with chod rigs you don’t need a massive amount of resistance to cause the hook to turn and catch inside the mouth anyway, as long as it is sticky sharp. The curved line accentuates the turning effect and means that the rig acts like a claw, grabbing some skin and staying put even if the hook hasn’t been driven home. A 1.5oz lead is plenty, especially on silty venues where the lead will plug in slightly as well.
I’ve even been experimenting with going lighter again, down to just 0.5oz, and have been getting positive bites. With such light leads the risk of spooking the fish is massively reduced.
‘Rinsed’ baits
After a couple of casts I was confident that I was fishing effectively and the area I was targeting actually felt harder than in past sessions – a sure sign that the carp have been frequenting it.
With the lines settled, I spread 100 15mm Nash Bait Instant Action Cappuccino boilies over the area. I soaked them the night before my trip in water to soften them and to start to break down the skin. This helps them to leach out attraction, but they still retain enough firmness to be put out with a catapult. As always, I opted for a hookbait that contrasted with the freebies – and white Coconut Creme pop-ups fitted the bill.
Upwardly mobile carp
As the session progressed, the Cuttle Mill carp proved just how mobile they can be… and why a quiet venue can sometimes count against you!
They were putting on a proper display, head-and-shouldering and muddying up the water, the only trouble being that with no-one fishing opposite me they had backed off, indicating just how clued-up they are.
However, as darkness fell they seemed to creep back into ‘my water’, and two bites resulted in a lost fish in the margins which somehow managed to pick up a stick that popped the hook, and a dark common shortly after first light that brightened up the dull morning. It was a typical Cuttle fish, full of character and as old as the hills. As the morning progressed the carp moved out again and
the temptation to move became too much, so for the last couple of hours of my trip I upped sticks and headed to the far side. A quick bite resulted in another double, before the fish inevitably did the off once more… back towards my original swim!
The carp at Cuttle Mill certainly know all the tricks, which is why it’s such a fantastic venue to learn the carp fishing craft. The atmosphere is electric, the carp are stunners, and to know that legends like Rod Hutchinson fished here in the past makes the atmosphere even more special.