Bashing Bishops.........
Sadly I was having a fishing trip without my fishing partner in crime Steve due to a prior engagement but as I was itching for a fish and the weather near perfect it had to be done.

I spent a while deciding where to go, the choices were between Marsh Farm in Godalming or Bishops Green near Newbury.

An old school friend of mine asked for a day out on the bank and as his style of fishing steered towards Carp it was decided we would target the Carp at Bishops Green.

With Bishops now quite a popular place to fish even with a day ticket increase I felt we needed to be there early so I picked James up at 5:45am and we headed for Bishops. And as I hoped for we had arrived first, paid in the dog house, and made our way down to the lake.

After a lap we decided the far end of the lake looked favorable as there was a few bubblers in the edge, which was where I planned on fishing.

I have fished Bishops Green a lot in the past, it's a great place to take the kids, as I have done many times, there's a lot of Roach and Gudgeon present so the kids love float fishing for them which is a great way to start, whilst I have a couple of cheeky Carp rods out on alarms, perfect.

Over the years I have chopped and changed a few different methods but have found two that I use and have never failed, and on this occasion they really done me proud.

The first and normally the most prolific starts the moment I get in the swim, where I will put two handfuls of Halibut Pellet either side of my swim right next to the bank and in this case next to some rushes either side. Method wise I use solid Pva bags, small bags stuffed with 4mm Halibut Pellet nice and tight with a 12mm halibut pellet on the hair topped with plastic corn of any colour soaked in Betalin, strong size 10 hook as I have seen the Carp in here snap hooks with their brutal fights, a short 3-4inch hook link of a supple Braid to an inline lead of 2-3oz all on a leadcore leader of a couple of foot.

The second method is simple floater fishing tactics with either a controller float held by rubbers and a size 10/12 surface style hook or straight to the hook for close in work, a couple of simple methods which really do the business.

Whilst setting up base camp with mat etc and a shelter with a possibility of rain and every few minutes I put a bit more Pellet on the spots.

With alarms in place, rods put together and one of the 20 ready made pva bag/leader setups on either rod and dropped right in the edge a few feet from the alarms.

It took all of about 20 seconds for the first run which resulted in a little Common of a around 2lb, but off the mark, before a new bag was put on the other rod was away with a similar sized common.

The bites where so frantic for the first couple of hours that it was hard to have both rods in at the same time.

There was a few anglers on but not many fish out, it seemed all the fish were in the edge with me, well all the small ones so far.

James had had a couple using similar tactics but without pva and I wasn't even putting a bag on every time anymore as they were so frantic it wasn't needed.

Whilst fishing I had my camera out doing a bit of filming for an upcoming YouTube video so decided after over 15 Carp to nearly 13lb and being about midday I would have a rest, and try to get some shots also I had caught that many fish I was getting fatigue in my right forearm causing my muscle to pop out, not something that has ever happened to me and not something I wish to ever happen again.

After a long lunch break and some really strong wind resulting in my camera on its pod to go flying and my mat to disappear into the hedge, I got back to job in hand, there was fish to be caught so I carried on, pegging the mat and pod down.

Although the wind was being a pain there was fish coming up for the odd floating dog biscuit so I set up my Barbel rod on a simple setup of just 6lb mainline straight to a 12 hook and stalking around the edges near our swims as there was no one fishing up near us.

After a few tense minutes I had a nice Ghostie on the bank of around 11lb, followed by another similar size Common.

With my arm still giving me gip we decided to call it a day and with over 20 Carp and half being doubles to my name I was happy and having comments whilst walking back to the car asking what on earth I was doing felt like I must have been doing something right, for once.