Also before I leave I will pester my mates, if there is anyone I know that has been down recently, even if they were just having a stroll, did they see anything, was it busy, had any fish been out, if so where? All these things although minor are a major help to me and allow me again to have a real good starting point. Already I have a good picture piecing itself together; even if I hadn’t been down for a while I have used the tools available to me to keep me in touch.

The next step is obviously to get up, stick some warm clothes on and head off to the water, if I can I will always get there as early as possible, my water is days only so the earliest I can arrive is 6, but waters where you are a member and can be on anytime you like do your best to get there before the sun comes up. I always make a flask of Coffee; position myself in a swim that allows me to watch plenty of water and chillax for an hour while the sun comes up. This time of the day is without doubt the best time to spot fish, seeing them crash and roll is obviously the best way to pick a spot, if fish are active, and you can get on them then you are in with a shout, I don’t care if every fish has come from one swim in the last few weeks, if they are visible somewhere else, then that is where I will head. It amazes me how many people just turn up and head for the swim near the island, or closest to the Car Park or simply the ‘hot’ swim without even doing a lap of the Lake. The amount of people that have the opportunity to get on fish and don’t even bother looking amazes me! Don’t get me wrong you may well still catch in these swims, but are all the biggens chilling in a bay or is the water a chocolate brown in the shallows, the amount of people that never even notice!

So what do I look for when I have my walk; if I haven’t seen anything whilst supping on my coffee then there are a few things I will start looking for as I start a lap of the Lake. The first is to have a proper look into every snag that I can, I don’t mean peer through a little hole for a second, I mean put your hood up and slowly and as quietly as possible get right in them and stay there for a while, look down as deep as possible, even better and if it is allowed on your water then get above the water by climbing a tree, that will take away any glare and allow you to see down far deeper and far clearer, the way the water transforms when you get high up is ridiculous, weed beds, bars, shallow humps can all become apparent, trust me your eyes will be opened!

Coloured Water - Another thing I am keen to find is coloured water, this is often only caused by a couple of things. One is fish grubbing about on the bottom, rooting around in silt or weed looking for their next meal, this is obviously a great sign, they are already up for it, and you are in with a shout as soon as that hook bait is in the water. The other will be the fish flanking on the bottom, another really positive sign. The best way I can sum this up is Carp do this when they are happy, either because they are hungry, sexually excited or simply frolicking, either way they are expelling energy which they need to replace, and often means they are going to have a munch! Another cause could be a big wind kicking into the margins disturbing the bottom and causing it to cloud up, although the fish may not already be there, this is also a very good feature, the cloud indicates suspended matter kicked up off the bottom, much of this will be Carp grub and will often bring those fish in!

Weed beds: What ever time of year are a great pull for fish, they give loads of people the geebees, presentation problems and landing fish can often freak people out, but it really doesn’t need to. Weed is a larder for the Carp, it is 9 times out of 10 packed with Carp grub, snails, mussels, shrimps and a myriad of other bits and bobs. Why would they go searching about the Lake for a meal when they could just plough there heads into a weed bed and suck up a gourmet meal! They often don’t move much when in a weed bed so observation is the keep, get as high as you can, get the Polaroid’s on and just fix your eyes toward the weed, you are looking for a fin poking out, a tail lobe, bridge of the head or maybe even just a gentle rocking of the water. All these things are tell tale signs that there is at least one fish held up in the weed. Another major thing to look for is their patrol routes in and out of the weed, often they will not pick up a bait amongst the weed, but a strategically placed traps set up on their route may just be the winning ticket, so take your time, sit there and watch.

Bird Life:
Another little edge I use to try and locate those Wiley old Carp is to use the Lakes Bird Life to my advantage. Often we despise the little blighters, diving on our baits, catching my hook bait on the drop or simply having a swan plough through your rods, but often they can be used to your advantage! On my club water I have had 3 of the handful of 30’s whilst the Swans were actually sitting in the weed in 4 ft of water above my baits!
A lot of the time birds such as coots, swans and ducks will feed on the same fodder as our scaly friends, fresh weed, bloodworm, snails and other water born insects, so if you can locate areas that the birds are ripping to shreds for no apparent reason then often the fish wont be far behind. Don’t believe the hype that fish are scared by bird life and always bolt, it just isn’t the case, more often than not they will even compete with each other to get at the grub.

Islands: Similar to weed beds islands can hold a lot of natural food, either amongst the islands marginal cover or on the shelf that leads off the island, so again look for the same sorts of signs as you would amongst a weed bed. Remember as well, often you don’t want to be mega tight to the island, so often I see people blindly casting as close as possible to the island. Often at the bottom of the shelf leading off from the island will be a larder, lots of food congregates against the shelf, on top of that it is very likely to be a patrol route for the fish around the bottom of the shelf, so bare that in mind before you bust a nut trying to get a lead stuck up a tree on the island!

Although I have covered a bit there is obviously still many more things to look for, but these are the main features I look for. In the next article I will look at how I would actually approach fishing these different features, because chucking and hoping is often not the way to go. I will look at different rigs for situations, baits and even changing mainlines.

Until next time be lucky,  Nic Brown..