Bailiff Comments

Week Commencing: Sat 17/01/2026

Musical Swims

Midway through the winter season now, and with just five anglers booked on to fish the Road Lake this week the guys would have plenty of space and options to try their luck this week.

Let’s read on to see how they fared………….

Returning customer, who has fished both lakes on site here, was Alex Paterson who found himself back in familiar territory fishing from Turtles Corner.

Alex got off to a great start during the first night and morning in Turtles, when he managed to land three fish by the time I came around on the first morning’s breakfast run.

The pick of the bunch being ‘Mr P’ weighing 30lb, this was also backed up by one of our 2021 stockies that he got to name and is now known as ‘Bubbles’ and the third fish of the bunch was ‘Double Row’ weighing 22lb 2oz.

A fantastic way to start the week, was this run of fish going to continue?  Well, the answer was no.  A couple more fish did come Alex’s way and two great looking fish with that.

The first of his final two carp was ‘Gubbins’ weighing 23lb 12oz and finally ‘Gilder Special’ putting the scales around to 27lb 12oz.

No real monsters this week for Alex, but it certainly was the pick of the bunch in regards of how the carp looked.

21 wraps out towards the tall tree to the right of the dot island as he looked out produced the fish for Alex.  He baited up with a very traditional winter mix of bait, which would work anywhere at this time of year.  Corn, hemp, and small boilies.  This was applied by either the use of a Spomb or by going along the left-hand margin and spraying small boilies with the use of a catapult.  Alex used around 20kg of bait total for the week, and over this he fished spinner rigs made from Amnesia and Wide Gape hooks with D Rig Kickers and a match the hatch bottom bait with either a yellow corn topper or a match the hatch pop-up on top.

Moving on to first time visitor here, Nick Woof.  Nick spent the first night at the opposite end of the lake and after just one night made the difficult decision of moving but went to the furthest point from where he started in to Bacheliers.

The move paid off during the Tuesday night when he managed his first fish, the newly christened ‘Fidget’ at 14lb 12oz and ‘Squadron Leader’, which Nick also got to name, weighing 16lb.

The following night also produced another bite and fish in the net for Nick, when he landed ‘Jupiter’ weighing 21lb.

That was all the action for Nick, but during the winter it is always nice to get a bend in the rod during the week.  Nick’s fish all came from the extremes of his swim boundary out at 25 wraps, with the bites coming from towards the lefthand of the two marker poles set out in front of the swim.

Here he baited with again a similar mix to Alex in Turtles.  Hemp, maize and a mixture of Cell and Essential Cell boilie that was chopped and crumbed then with Cell \Smart Liquid added to the mix.  Similar amount was applied, around 25kg of bait during the week.

Spinner rigs were also used by Nick to land his fish.  This time Boom 25lb and Wide Gape hooks connected to lead clips, and the bites came to pink Cell pop ups balanced out nicely with the use of Dark Matter Balancing Weights.

Another Nick joined us for the first time this week, Nick Ward.  Nick did a tour of the lake and swims this week.  Starting in Beach then moved to The Goo then on to Decoy before finally settling in Double Boards for the last two nights.

It was worth the moving around in the end when he managed to slip a great looking common into his awaiting net.  This was identified as ‘Flo’ and weighed in just shy of the 30lb mark at 29lb 12oz.

His prize was caught from 15 wraps at Bacheliers swim as he looked out and was taken on a white Cell pop-up presented on a spinner rig made from Boom and Wide Gape hooks again on a lead clip with a heli lead.  Nick didn’t introduce any bait in this swim and chose to fish just single hook baits.

Well done to the guys this week, they all certainly put in the effort around the lake.

Until next time

Gareth “Gino”.