On the grounds that summer doesn’t seem like it’s coming I thought I’d give you all an update, because it will never happen if we wait for the summer! So the farms exciting news is little baby George! Mel and Chris were blessed with a beautiful little boy, so when the weather brightens up I’m sure your all get to meet him as Mel walks around the lakes. I’ve been helping Chris out as bailiff on several of the lakes and in order to take my role seriously, I decided to see what all this fishing lark was about and I’m hooked (excuse the pun). My first real day as an angler rather than a spectator saw me catching 21 fish on Guinea, these ranged from just under 1lb up to 5lbs, I’d caught, Tench, Bream and Crucian Carp. I then spent a couple of hours after work one night and caught a further 10, this time there were a couple of Golden Orfe in the mix. My choice of method is float fishing, white bread worked best for me on guinea, however I know a lot of you are using good ole Sweet corn and Luncheon Meat. This weekend I decided to try Centre Lake, this allowed the other half to fish a method feeder, the typical Carp fishing, whilst I could still do my float fishing. This time I tried sweet corn and I was hooking but still small in comparison to the ones the other half was hooking, he’d had 5 or 6 out on luncheon meat weighing 6-10lbs in just 3 hours, which I believe is a good result for many Carp Anglers.... And then I struck gold!! I’d popped 3 juicy bits of corn onto my hook leaving a little a bit of my hook showing, cast my rod into the lake and boom! An absolute beauty hooked straight on. It took me a good ten to fifteen minutes to land it, with me in absolute fear of losing it, my rod was bent double and my monster was running for the reeds, I had no idea what was on the end because it refused to come to the surface, finally we realised our large net was needed and slowly I landed a beautiful 12.5 Mirror Carp (Photo in our gallery). I have to say all of the lakes are fishing really well at the moment, we watched some lovely fish come out of Centre that day. I was also lucky enough to watch one of our anglers catch his very first Cat on Centre weighing in at 15.5lbs. I hear any size of Cat is a real achievement because they are not a common catch, I hear they give a good fight! Anglers Lee & Mark had a result on Bean in the poring rain, catching a Common Carp around 15lbs and then a 9lb Mirror nice and early on in their day. If you walk Bean you can see them on the surface which will help you chose your spot. Have a look in our gallery to see the latest catches from Bean. So bait wise I think Bread (has to be fresh), sweet corn and luncheon meat seems to be doing the trick! On a slightly negative note I was disappointed to see a barbed hook in the outside of the mouth of one of the fish we landed. We do not tolerate barbed hooks and you will be banned from the lakes if caught, pinched barbs will also be banned in 2013, so the next time you’re in the tackle shops please start to purchase the barbless hooks! Please be aware that we do exercise the right to ask you to reel in for a hook check. I know this annoys many of you, but as a result of people breaching our rules we are forced to keep checking. Finally there will be a price increase for matches held in 2014, 2013 will be honoured at the current rate, but 2014 will have an increase. Anyone booking or booked will be advised of the increase at the time of booking and or confirmation. On that note, Happy Fishing! And roll on the blooming summer!!