Myself and a couple of mates recently went Clattercote Reservoir in search of some winter action, Chris being a match angler starting with the method feeder whilst me and Kev went with short 7ft zigs. I hadn't been out on the carp rods for some time so saying I wasn't organised would have been an understatement.... however with the aim of catching a few fish and getting Kev his first zig caught carp I got some spod mix straight out and kept topping it up every ten minutes whilst I continuing to get the gear together, sorting zig rigs, changing to lead clips, wrapping rods etc.
I finally cast out the first rod out, landing smack bang in the centre of my cloudy spod mix "Nutz Sludge Mixed with Supreme Cream Slime" and it took less than five minutes for the first bit of activity, a quick drop back and Kev lifted up into his first carp, after a short fight, edging it closer and closer we soon saw our prize, a lovely mid/upper double mirror but as she was just inches of the net cord the hook pulled...gutted! However a quick recast soon resulted in continued action, by this time both rods were now on the money and the Sludge was flowing, one bite soon turned into ten with a few hours passing. During this time Chris changed over to the pellet waggler, having had nothing on the bottom and with a few shows up in the water and us catching it made sense really, after around 20 minutes of feeding 8.5mm Carp Pellets he was soon bent round into action and this continued throughout the day.
The action slowed for me and Kev so we went higher up in the water "around 12ft" ensuring to keep dipping those foam pieces in the Tutti Betalin, we soon started catching again! By the end of the day we had around 25 bites landing most and Chris had 15 carp with one of the biggest at around 17/18lb - not bad on a light pellet waggler rod!!!
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