Five species in mammoth haul

Groundbait moulded around a lead helped Tony Gibson amass one of his biggest ever stillwater hauls when a run every 25 minutes resulted in a huge catch of tench, carp, roach, rudd and crucians.

The experienced all-rounder was left exhausted after a prolific 48-hour session at Enton Lake in Sussex, which delivered 34 tench, 24 rudd to 1lb 8oz, seven carp to a best of 22lb 5oz, 19 crucians to 3lb 1oz and roach to 1lb 5oz.

He kicked off his fishing with the introduction of a bed of particles via a spod but the key to success, which helped the resident fish find his hookbait quickly, proved to be a method mix squeezed around his flat 2oz lead.

The Dynamite Baits and Nash-backed rod from Northamptonshire kept the bites coming with a variety of hookbaits including boilies and hookable pellets, but the majority fell to artificial Nash Baits Mutant Sweetcorn soaked in pineapple flavouring and hair-rigged to a size 12 and 14 Drennan hooks.

“I fished one rod short and the other at around 30 yards and after putting 10 spods over the top of each rod and then squeezing a generous helping of method mix around my lead the fish really honed in on my hookbaits,” Tony told Angling Times.
“My hooklinks were fished ‘naked chod’ style because there was a lot of silt on the lake bed and this rig helps prevent tangles that can occur when using short hooklinks constructed with flexible braid.

“There were many times when I’d be playing a fish and the other rod would scream off. It was certainly one of the most prolific, non-stop sessions I’ve ever had.”
Tony used 8lb Nash Hardcore mainline in conjunction with a 15lb Nash Missing Link hooklink and he introduced almost 10 kilos of bait to keep his stream of fish coming for the duration of his session.