.Our first anglers of the year Tony, Mike and Barry, from Cheshire, arrived for a 4 day break on Thursday 25th March. The weather was a bit unkind for their visit, heavy rain and fairly cold. Nevertheless, the guys managed to put some very impressive fish on the bank. The highlight being a brace of 40's to Mike, both Personal Bests. A huge framed Mirror of 45lb 4oz took a liking to Mike's Loirbaits TC1 boilie and a chunky Mirror of 42lb was skilfully tamed on the float rod, with sweetcorn as bait.

Meanwhile Barry also put 2 new PB's on the mat. Mirrors of 33lb and 30lb, to the TC1's. Tony's best fish, also a Mirror, went 30lb 8oz and fell for a yellow pop-up boilie. The trio also spent a fair bit of the daytime float fishing with maggot and put together some nice bags of Roach and Perch, up to 1lb.

A bizarre occurrence that took place during their visit was that every night at about 2am Mike was awoken by very heavy splashing in the far margin, he said it sounded like someone hitting a paddle in the water. We have found out since that this is almost certainly our Catfish feeding on frogs, toads and their spawn in the margins and whacking their long tails on the top of the water as they do so. I would love to see this spectacle, now where did I put those night sights?

Tony penned the following just before their departure…………

'Excellent facilities and made to feel very welcome'
'Val's cooking was excellent serving fresh food with excellent choice'
'Nothing was too much trouble'

We only have photos of Mike's 40's. If you read this Tony and Barry and you want to see your fish on the website, please send them in and we will include them at the bottom of the page.

angling at sweet chestnut lake carp fishing lake in france