Scott Mann MP for North Cornwall is a keen angler and paid a visit to Stafford Moor Fishery with his family enjoying success landing five carp to 16lb 9oz. Scott tells me that the family are hooked and looking forward to a return visit.
Ben Butler age 17 with his new personal best from big fish corner on Beattie’s lake a 27lb 8oz beauty caught with mainline essential IB Wafters.
(Above)Connor Nettleton who had 5 fish on CC Moore live system boilies on the inlet swim on Beattie’s lake.
(Above) Seb Winter, 35 from York, joined us for a week’s holiday with his Wife and 2 Daughters for a spot of fishing and Family time but wanted to try the Kracking Carp Lake before the end of his stay in the hope of beating his current Personal Best Carp of 31lbs. Well, he absolutely smashed that by catching the previously nick named Mirror known as ‘Parrot’ at a whopping 46lbs!!! The Mirror hasn’t ‘officially been named’ but because of its distinctive characteristics people call it ‘Parrot’. Seb caught the Mirror using a single pop up 11mm Sticky bait Manilla Boilie.
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(Above)Tommy Flower, 27 from Kent caught 3 stunning Carp, a Mid double Fully Scaled Mirror and a 22lb Mirror from the Specimen Carp Lake and a 22lb 8oz Leather from the Main Carp Lake – all lovely looking Fish! Tommy’s Write Up – “After a frustrating morning chasing the inhabitants of the Specimen Carp Lake around eventually a pair of lips engulfed a carefully placed trimmed down Xcel baits KSC pop up resulting in a cracking mid double fully scaled mirror. The commotion of playing a fish in one of the small bays soon saw the rest of the carp running for cover. With the fish now hiding it was time to head off for some lunch and restock on my skretting expander pellets. With my belly and bait bucket now full I was off in search of some scaley creatures and soon had a number of fish taking once again. A trimmed down banoffee pop up was soon nestled amongst rising mouths and almost instantly my hookbait disappeared as another carp headed off into the distance. After a great fight I slipped a cracking apple slice scale mirror into my waiting net.
After my scaley Carp from the Speci I found myself down on the Main Carp Lake in search for more but was rewarded with a carp from the opposite end of the spectrum. After depositing a healthy 4kg of KSC boilies and constant blips and bleeps from little spawned on carp eventually something better had a proper battle curve in the rod but unfortunately once it found some sanctuary amongst the lilly pads it soon came adrift and left me with a very bitter taste in my mouth. With the rods back on the money and bait topped up I was soon called into action again and this one was staying on resulting in a cracking and rare Leather carp of 22lb+ was being held aloft from some pictures before being sent back home.”
(Above)Adam May has been after one of the Scaley Mirrors from the Main Carp Lake for many years and after a lot of persistence and determination, this year he finally caught one – and what a beauty of a 20lb Mirror to catch!! Adam’s Story – “4 years running the Main Lake’s well known scaley Gems at Anglers Paradise have eluded the bottom of my landing net after repeatedly being pestered by the smaller residents in the lake and the headache of hook pulls on previous sessions. This year ‘luck’ decided to pay me a visit! Due to persistent baiting throughout the week to a big set of lilly pads that is known to produce big hits. On my first session fishing, not baiting, my xcel baits vnf wafters were cast out to compliment, the deadly mix of the xcel baits ksc boilies and skretting pellet that the fish had clearly been visiting as the bite alarms couldn’t remain silent as I landed 4 stunning carp in which the final one being one of the many eye catching carp in the lake graced my landing net at 20lbs on the nose!”
(Above)Gavin Love, 36 from Eastbourne East Sussex joined us to fish our day ticket Lake Xanadu for an 8 hour day trip in the hope of catching a 20lb and caught a 24lb 4oz Mirror.
Gavin used a snowman rig using Paradise Baits The Twist Boilies tipped with ABS Spicy Lobster pop-ups. These were fished onto size 6 hooks with blowback rings. Baits were lowered into the margins onto the tops of the shelves that I found while having a lead around. I also covered my rigs, tubing and leads in the clay from the lake bed that I scraped out to give me an extra edge and make the rigs less obvious.
(Above)Joseff Rosser, 14 from Cardiff enjoyed a week’s holiday with his Mum, Brother and Sister last week and caught a variety of Species including a New Personal Best 25lb 14oz Linear from the Specimen Carp Lake to name just one!
Joseff’s Story – “I just finished my week at Anglers Paradise and I ended the week with plenty of fish of all different sizes and shapes including a 20lb 4oz Cat from the Easy Access on our first day caught on a 12 mm key cray wafted over a scattering of 12 and 15 mm matching bottom baits.
I then went on to fish the Specimen Carp lake where I landed 3 stunning Specimens along with many small but hard fighting stickies, I started off landing a 25lb 14oz Linear also caught on the same tactics above, which is a New PB for me!
The next day I spent around 3 hours watching the fish swim in and out of an unfished area of the Lake. I watched which way the fish would enter and where they would leave and that’s when I slowly introduced some dog biscuits and within minutes I had a few slurping in the mixers, I waited for my opportunity to come and I dropped in 2 mixers banded on to a size 8 hook and around 2 feet from the bank I landed another stunning Mirror which came in at 22lb 4oz, later that day I got the fish feeding confidently again In the same spot and I waited for my opportunity and I picked out an absolute stunner of a 18lb 11oz fully scaled Mirror which also fell to double mixer.
As my week progressed I landed a few other carp from the main lake including a lovely 15lb 5oz grassy and other backup fish around the 10lb mark. I then fished Fat Boys Lake part of the Nirvana Day Ticket Lakes which I landed around 30 carp in a day to 15lb 1oz which gave me a hell of a scrap, all these fish fell to a 15mm key cray bottom bait over a bed of sweet corn, luncheon meat and matching boilies.
All in all I enjoyed the week catching all manner of sizes of fish and will definitely return in the near future!”
(Above)5C’s Member Scott Cooper was smiling like the Cat that got the cream after he caught this 29lb 8oz Mirror from the Main Carp Lake using Essential B5. Scott came down for the weekend with his friend Malcolm (who caught the PB 73lb Cat) and had a great session, he ended up with 4 low 20lb Carp up to this 29lb 8oz Mirror. They also had 8 mid to upper doubles between them, so went home very happy! No pictures of the other fish as he caught them at night and struggled with self takes.
SMASHING UPPER TAMAR……….Upper Tamar regular Aaron Bunning has been in great form landing 27 fish in just 4 nights!! Aaron has landed 8 mirrors and 19 commons with the largest fish being a 23lb mirror which was stocked only a few days before he caught it! The fish has been named ‘Single scale’. The biggest common was 16lbs but only five fish were under 10lbs. Aaron also caught a 19.09 mirror which he has had three times in two weeks and amazingly the same fish he caught 8 years ago at low double figures!! All the fish have been caught on premier baits matrix bottom baits with matching freebies. Awesome stuff Aaron!
19lb 9oz
15lb 2oz
Stafford Moor regular Steve Pinn ( The BIvvy Tramp) sent me this awesome image of a mid double from Lodge Lake.
Above a couple more doubles for Steve Pinn.
Andy David Honey and friend Rob fished on the beach swim on Beattie’s and landed many carp out up to 29lb (Robs new pb) using C C Moore live system boilie.
(Below)John and Adam Atkins caught several carp from the back bays in Beattie’s Lake using Sticky Baits Krill boilies.
There is a winter ticket now available to buy for Stafford Moors specimen lakes Beattie’s and Lodge lakes. The ticket runs from 4th December until 2nd March (am Monday- am Friday). The ticket is £150 If you are interested in a ticket you can register with Jo now in which you then have 4 weeks to pay for your ticket. Call Jo in the shop on 01805804360
Jack Scott fished Lodge Lake with brother Ben. They fished on the double swim in the spit and landed 8 fish out up to 18lb using Sticky Manilla & Krill boilies.
Conner Nettleton fished on the inlet swim on Beattie’s using CC Moore live system boilies, he had 5 fish out in 24 hours.
Matt Ling did a quick session at Jennetts for 4 hours on the point and after losing a fish and blanking in the previous two sessions he decided to give it another go before his holiday finished and was rewarded with 2 fish in the short session. The largest was a 22lb 6oz common the other being a 11lb 4oz common both caught on multi rigs cast to the reeds on 12mm pop ups with a small scattering of freebies.
As always there have been some bumper catches at the ever prolific Stafford Moor Fishery near Dolton where Joanne Combes and her family have invested to make this one of the countries top commercial carp waters.
Jack Griffiths and Dan Head who had 13 fish out using Sticky Baits Manilla and Krill boilies and also mainline cell. They fished up on lodge lake for 48 hours.
Carl Spear fished on the back bays on Beattie’s where he 7 fish up to 21lb 5oz using CC Moore live system and fake corn and Mainline diamond whites.
Darren Palmer landed 18 fish in a 48 hour session up on lodge lake on the dam wall using Sticky Baits Krill boilies. Darren normally always fishes on Beattie’s but fancied a change and had a fabulous session.
Mark daughter Chloe and wife Emma Downing fished on the back bays of Beattie’s lake for 48 hours. They had 34 carp out in total (they had many out of Tanners too 😜) fishing Sticky Baits Manilla boilies. ( Below) Chloe Downing
(Below)Lee Galley (dad) with sons Nick and Brandon Galley. All fished up on lodge lake had over 20 fish between them using home made baits.
Carl Hutchison and Nikki Parker fished up on lodge lake on the first double swim on the dam wall . They had 28 fish out between them and Nikki had a new personal best of 21lb using home made fruity boilies.
Adrian Morgan has been having plenty of fish from Darracott reservoir, Torrington, recently with fish to just under 17lbs all caught on floater tactics.
Mark Garrett, 46 and Son Kieran Evans Garrett 22, from Wales had one hell of a session on the Kracking Carp Lake, Mark smashed his Personal Best with a 39lb Mirror and Kieran caught a 26lb 5oz Common topped off with a 31lb Mirror!
They both used fake pop up sweetcorn popped up about an inch from the bottom and a few scattered sweetcorn around it. They used their own rigs, made from Korda N-trap coated braid hooklink, stripped about an inch past the eye and the rest left stiff, fake corn was attached via a hair rig and size 6 Korda wide gape. The lead was attached via a led clip on to 15lb mainline.
Mark caught his 39lb Mirror on Peg 1 by the Lilly Pads to the right, Kieran caught both his 26lb 5oz Common and his 31lb Mirror to the extreme right of peg 2 by the side of the weed.
