MARCH
An amazing smashed time...as recorded by Steve Oakes.............
I arrived on Sunday to join my friend Ian Cox for a 48hr session, I chose peg 30 and set myself up. I had never fished Kingfisher before so I was keen to get myself carefully prepared and spent some time watching the water. This proved invaluable as during my session I smashed my personal best by over 20lbs.
It all started at 3.00pm on Sunday when I had a powerful run and a fight under the rod tip, which lasted 20 minutes… it had to be a Koi I thought, and it was. I had netted a beautiful 26lb Koi, caught on a pop-up hookbait. This was now my PB by 3lbs, my previous PB was a 23lb Common caught on Mallard last year.
I spent Sunday night secure in my bivvy as the weather outside was awful, heavy rain and high winds up to 70mph lashed the Wintons Fishery. In the morning we noticed that the wind had blown the office roof off, my bivvy stood firm but by now I had a small stream running through it.
Monday morning came and the winds eased, an ideal day to catch that big fish!! I had no activity in the morning and my rods were quiet.
I was about to pack up due to the weather and the increasing lake that was forming in my bivvy, when I struck into another fish. After a few minutes I had the biggest fish I have ever see in my landing net. I wet my sling and unhooking mat and prepared to weigh the fish. Amazing, a 43.8lb Common known as Fat lip caught on my pop-up hookbait, what a beautiful fish. Ian helped me take some photos and I then eased the fish carefully back into the lake to fight another day. Wonderful.
Apart from the horrendous weather and strong winds, I had a wonderful fishing experience, thank you Wintons I will be back soon.
The prospect of Spring in the air brought some anglers to the bankside......
Steve Oakes first session on Kingfisher rewarded him with 26lb koi and 43lb 5oz common.
"Dr James" had his five minutes of fame in recording the first catfish of 2008, one of 15lb and 20lb from Mallard.
The carp were feeding for Richard Edmunds on a Kingfisher session with a superb mirror of 38lb 3oz, two kois one of 22lb and a stunning new complex record of 32lb 8oz.
The Easter week-end brought Andy Verrier on his first visit of the year and while braving artic temperatures with a bitting wind he landed his new pb common of 34lb 6oz.
We cant keep that Cliff Sivyer away! He's back on Kingfisher at least once a month, his Easter trip gave him a "lovely jubbly" 37lb 8oz common from his favourite Kingfisher swim. Keeping Cliff company Lee Corder had his pb common (Wood Carving) at 45lb 4oz.
End of March gave Chris Kennard a nice surprise, as monster halibut landed him a 52lb 2oz catfish!
Two pals, Mark Hazzard and Rickie Allen spent a week-end in Kingfisher, but despite bad weather to contend with Mark had his first fish from the lake, a beautiful 32lb common. While Rickie had a new pb with a 44lb common on scopex bait.
APRIL
Mark Smith made his first visit of the year, early April, but he was no fool!!!! For the third year on a row he beat his pb on his first visit to Kingfisher, with a 43lb 10oz common, plus another at 27lb 4oz on a boilie.
Stuart Nesbitt (our Bailiff), decided to do a session on a quiet night in the double swim, only to be rewarded with "Fatlip", in his net at 42lb 3oz.
A couple of days later blizzard conditions took Dave Baker and John Paine by surprise:
"We decided to have a 48hr practice session on Winton’s Mallard Lake before the pairs match for The Disabilities Trust in a couple of weeks time at the same venue.
When we turned up and had a look around there was not much showing and not a lot of fish had been caught in the last 24hrs. We chose pegs 11 and 12 with a north westerly wind blowing in our faces, but we this meant that we would have about a third of the lake to ourselves. We spodded out about 2kg of hemp and 2kg of black magic boilies at about 35 yards in open water. Between us we took 11 carp from 11lb to 36lb 8oz which two of these fell to Dave’s rods in the middle of a snow storm, including a 22lb mirror and a marvellous 36lb 8oz common.
Ben Humphrey had quite an introduction to cats with his catch from Heron............
"I arrived on Heron on Tuesday morning, to find the lake empty. I had a walk around the lake and decided to fish peg 37, which I was told had been producing a few fish. I was told that the gap in the margin to my left was ment to be a good hotspot, so I flicked a halibut boilie fished with a small pva bag of crushed boilie and pellet to the spot.
I decided to fish for cats on my right hand rod, and cast it a rod length left from the corner of the island with a catfish nugget on the end, also with a bag of boilies and pellet.
During the day nothing was happening, until it just got dark when I had a take on my margin rod, as soon as I struck I new it was a cat. After a slow 10 minute battle I had it nearly ready for the net until it wore my braid down and snapped, I was gutted and after that battle I changed that rod over to the cats as well.
I spent the next night and day with nothing until it was just starting to get dark, when my right island rod screamed off and as soon as I connected to it, I new it was going to be big. It led me all around the lake and I couldn’t do anything to stop it! Twenty minutes into the battle I was playing it in the margins and it was starting to give up.
At this time I was on my own as my friend I was with, called Ben O’Flaherty was on the other side of the lake asleep. Luckily when it was nearly ready for the net his mum phoned him which woke him up, so I called him to give me a hand with the net. When the head popped up out of the water we both never thought it was going to be that big, After 30 minuites I had the fish sulking in the net. I was so shocked that my first catfish would be that big. I kept the fish in the net and got Ben to stay with it and I ran around to kingfisher to get Martin McMahon to help me with the pictures and weighing the fish. We put it on the scales and the needle pinged around to 42lb exactly, not bad for my first catfish. I was struggling to hold the fish but I eventually got some good photos with the fish, and slipped it back in the lake.
I was so happy but very smelly and wet, Martin was kind enough to lend me some clothes, towel and shower token. The shower was lovely. The rest of the stay was biteless, until I was reeling in my rods to pack up when there was a 6lb pike on the end of one, which was quite a surprise so I carfully unhooked it and slipped it back.
Thanks to Martin and all at Wintons for great stay and a great fishery."
First timer to the Fishery, Kristian Newton spent two days on Mallard's peg 11 and landed his first ever cat, at a respectable 26lb 8oz, along with three mirrors, best being 28lb.
A session for Michel Woolsey on Mallard gave him 13 fish, which included 11 catfish, best being 45lb 9oz and his new pb common at 24lb 3oz, all fish fell to halibut pellets.
A "hard going session" for Gary Furminger on Kingfisher produced a common 32lb 2oz and five tench to 9lb 10oz.
A 72 hour session of Ross Welfare concluded with him commenting "best trip of my life". Ross recorded 15 fish, his best common at 28lb 10oz, his best mirror at 20lb 10oz and his best cat at 30lb!
"Hardest fighting fish I have ever caught, but back soon", were John Clark's thoughts after his session on Mallard saw him capture his pb cat of 53lb.
Bill Brown's day sesion on Kingfisher saw him record a scale perfect mirror of 39lb.
A three day session on Mallard for Bob Wilkinson saw him record his new pb cat of 53lb 8oz, along with 19 other fish.
Neil Roger's 48 hours on Kingfisher saw him bag a beautiful mirror weighing in at 467lb 8oz.
A first visit to the Fishery saw Ian Rice record a 14 all carp catch, from 10lb to 24lb, "great visit".
A four day session saw Mark Rich capture his new pb cat weighing in at 46lb 14oz, he also landed a cat of 43lb 11oz along with 13 other fish.
MAY
"My best 24 hours in a long, long time", were the comments left by Dave Longhurst, with seven catfish, best being 41lb 8oz, togther with three commons.
A stunning common of 42lb 2oz was the reward for Steve Oakes on an early session on May.
Brian Tickners own report on a session in early May...............................
My second visit to Mallard saw me catch my first ever cat at 18lb 15oz, I was thrilled!
I returned for a 72 hour session over the May Bank Holiday weekend once again on Mallard which was busy when I arrived resulting in me ducking into peg 18. Sport was slow although peg 20 was alive and the lucky occupant notched up 10 fish including a 36lb cat in just 24 hours! He suggested I dropped in behind him and so I moved round to 19 for the latter part of the afternoon. Good move as within 30 mins I was into a fish, a 21 lb cat came into the net a new PB!
I moved into 20 around 7pm and was soon into another fish, a hard fighting koi of 17lb. The session remained hectic and I improved my PB with another cat of 24lb and a good fish lost at 7am on the monday. I was just talking to she who must be obeyed around 9am ,saying the temperature was rising and I would be home for lunch, when I had a few bleeps and the bobbin rose to the alarm. Bream I said, it happened again, this time taking a few inches of line. Hang on I said , best hit this. As I thought there was little resistance, although the line is slicing across the lake at quite a rate! GONE SOLID? Got to go dear! The next 15 minutes resulted in me trying to stop a "dragcar"from escaping and worrying about a size 8 hook! But after an epic battle she slid into the net just as Stuart walked past after a night session. Good job he did as I was exhausted and elated, he said thats a forty as I lifted the net from the lake and instructed me on how best to deal with such a fish. Once in the sling Stuart lifted the scales, 48lb 2oz! no wonder my arms felt like jelly and not just a PB but a fish of a life time.
Photography is also by Stuart and I would like to thank him for his help and expertise.
Thank you Wintons this session yielded 11 fish including a 21lb common, great stuff.
A common of 36lb 10oz was the highlight of Daniel Roberts 72 hour session on Mallaard.
A 13 fish haul for Barry Blackman culminated in his new pb cat of 34lb 6oz.
Keith Speed's day session on Malllard gave him his new pb common at the impressive weight of 30lb exactly.
A five day session saw Bill Brown land 16 fish with his heaviest of session being a new pb catfish for Bill of 47lb 2oz.
Phil Alexander thought he would send us his catch report and some photos from his session in mid May ............
Finally managed to get down to Wintons and fished Mallard in peg 3 for five days, the only time I managed to fish last year was on the charity competition so I was chomping at the bit to get down there, when I arrived it was blazing sunshine and had been for about a week.
Going on past experiences I knew it would probably be hard going, so I was hoping for the weather to change at least for it to cloud over a bit. As I suspected I struggled for the first couple of days only managing to bank a couple of fish, but Wednesday afternoon the weather was starting to change, we had a bit of cloud cover at times and there was a breeze picking up. I was now more positive that the fishing would now improve, it did and from then I started to bank most of the fish in my catch report below. One thing I noted when I turned up was the carp had been spawning the previous week, so I thought the cats/carp would probably be a bit pre-occupied with eating the eggs, instead of fishing where I normally would in that peg I fished extremely tight to the island as on previous years I had seen the fish spawning there, as you can see from the list it payed off..........
Fish Weight Bait
mirror----------14lb 8oz----------nugget
common-------19lb---------------nugget
common-------21lb---------------nugget
common-------21lb 8oz----------nugget
cat--------------23lb 8oz----------nugget
cat--------------26lb 4oz-----------nugget
cat--------------28lb 8oz-----------nugget
cat--------------44lb 8oz-----------nugget
cat--------------44lb 12oz---------nugget
cat--------------46lb----------------nugget
cat--------------47lb----------------nugget
cat--------------57lb----------------nugget NEW PB
Two fish in a day, but what a catch? Simon Ward's first visit this year saw him take two commons from Kingfisher, one at 41lb 8oz and the other a stunning fish of 44lb 8oz.
Andy How recently had a session on Mallard from Monday 19th to Thursday 22nd of May. and this is what he had to say.......
After a slow start I managed to land a magnificent cat fish of 57lb, as well as seven carp to 27lb.
I would just like to say that for the four years I have been fishing at Wintons it never ceases to amaze me at what can be caught. They say Horseshoe Lake is the 'Theatre of Dreams' maybe they should come and fish Wintons!!
Thanks again for a fantastic venue. Hope to see you all soon.
First time on Heron for Ben Watson, "good session, well happy with the result", after his three days Ben upted his pb cat to 21lb 12oz, along with 14 other fish to 2llb 10oz.
Gary and Angela Roberts spent a three day session on pegs 2 and 3, both enjoying a successful time, Gary took three cats to 17lb 10oz, two commons, one mirror and pb leather at 24lb 5oz. Not to be out done Angela had two pb's, a common of 18lb 15oz and fully scaled mirrors of 17lb 12oz.
Just round the corner at the same time on peg 20 Nigel Ryder was bagging a eight fish haul of carp and catfish, best being two commons of 20lb and 20lb 6oz, that "fought like Tyson!"
Despite his own catches Paul Smith was delighted to witness his mates' face when he landed two new pb's during their session on Mallard, Craig took a cat of 22lb 11oz and an "awesome" common of 30lb 14oz. Guess they'll be back for some more?!
Surprise, surprise when J. Vassila successfully landed a 63lb 2oz cat from Kingfisher!
Paul Humphrey had to take second place to his son after a session on Mallard! Ben (14) had a fantastic time........
"Thanks to wintons for a great week, all together we had about 15 carp and 6 catfish with 4 bein over 40lb, hope you enjoy the pictures.... see you soon !"
Chris Bright was fishing along side Ben during the same session and he was equally successful with a haul of cats and carp ............
"I arrived on the 25th for a weeks session on Mallard lake, when I arrived I had a walk around the lake and it was packed so we decided to fish on Heron for one night.
The next day several people left and we decided to move over to Mallard and we fished on peg 19 and 20. I didn't get any cat fish at the beginning of the week but on the last two days I managed to get some. I caught my 47lb on squid and my 41lb on three large halibut pellets. I caught both of them 30 yards out on peg 19 with several spods of pellet over the top. I lost one big cat in the snags to the left of me but about 10 minutes later I had another run and landed my 47lb. The next day 20 minutes before I left I had another run and landed my 41lb.
My first session at Wintons and a great one , cant wait to go back and give it another go."
The end of May saw a "cracking session" for Vince Whyborne on peg 29 with a common of 43lb and mirror of 38lb 8oz.
