Another excellent week’s fishing with 4 x 40s and more big catfish!
This week, we welcomed Chris and Laura to the venue for the 2nd time. They were super happy to be back and had been looking forward to returning ever since they discovered our little slice of paradise last year.
Thanks to you and Ren for another brilliant week! ❤️❤️
Chris was looking forward to a relaxing time and hopefully catching a few fish along the way. Laura on the other hand was raring to get stuck in. She was going to be the first one to catch and she was definitely going to up her PB! Based on the conditions right now, I was pretty confident that they were going to have a few, although the temperature had plummeted from the crazy 27 degrees we had at the end of last week to high teens which might change things a bit.
Click here to view all the captures from this week.
The best way to settle the nerves of course is to set the traps and see what happens… and it didn’t take long before Laura’s right hander pulled up tight and she was into her first of the trip: an upper 30 and a new PB. Chris was also off the mark on the first night with a 20lb catfish and a mid twenty… so all in all, a nice start!
This set the tone for the rest of the session. Once you’ve got the tactics exactly right, it’s very much a case of ‘rinse and repeat’ day after day. Chris was the first into the 40 club with a big ol chunk of an original mirror that was much closer to 50 than 40.
Laura kept on hauling 30 after 30 from a spot that she’d targeted in the shallows. Chris wasn’t going to be outdone though as he then banked a near 40 common that looked like a submarine!
I dropped by on Tuesday for a catch-up and Chris and Laura were starting to flag a bit. They’d hit it hard to begin with but after 48hrs, the adrenaline had run out and they simply had to have a rest. It’s proper hard work this “fishing business” if you do it right! Feeling better after two nights in the gite, Chris was pushing hard for a 3 figure catfish.
This being Beausoleil, it didn’t take long for them to have a go at one of the big cats. Chris has got top end, powerful rods and big pit reels but these creatures are a law unto themselves and don’t care about skill or gear. The catfish made it around the back of the island and they were able to hop in the boat and head off in pursuit. I say pursuit, it’s actually more like being towed by a submarine!
As they quickly found out, rowing against one of these is nigh on impossible! Luckily they went armed with a big catfish net and they were able to bundle the beast in. On the scales this one went 84lb. Chris described it as 84lb of evil muscle! Great teamwork guys 💪
In total Chris had 4 x 40s, and not many anglers have done that in a week, along with multiple 30s and 20s.
Laura also had a field day in point ‘A’ again this week with six carp falling to her far marginal traps. Most of these were also 30s. Interestingly, the spot from point ‘A’ that did all the bites for Sarah last week was not productive at all this week.
That zone is large and feature rich and Laura found the carp at longer range.
On the rig front the solution was very simple. Blow back multi on all rods and change the hooks every fish/reset… that’s it. Simple, but simple works. On the bait front, Chris used a mix of Scopex Squid and CC Moore Live System. Towards the end, Chris’s arm was literally in bits so he went down to fishing a single 18mm Live System bottom bait, topped with a yellow Live System dumbell wafter. And that alone, fished as a single bait, caught him multiple carp, including one of the 40s.
In all the carp action, the guys caught a lot of smaller catfish (10lb to 30lbs). Chris mentioned this on Tuesday and I recommended scaling back on the bait and reducing the amount of liquid. The CC Moore Live System Booster is a very powerful fish attractor!
It’s fair to say that Chris and Laura had an amazingly successful trip. They caught so many fish that they now need a second holiday to recover from this one. It was wonderful to see them again and we very much look forward to seeing them again next year.
Brief details of your catches:
11x Mirrors: 48lb 3 oz (Single Scale), 40lb 12oz (Hyphen), 40lb 2oz (Split Tail), 37lb 5oz (Tormod), 35lb (Tormod), 33lb 4oz (Medal), 33lb 4oz (Apple Pie), 30lb 4oz (Olly), 30lb (Charlie Brown), 26lb (Bubbles), 21lb (Little Finn).3x Commons: 42lb 8oz (Lilly), 39lb 4oz (The Pirate), 33lb 12oz (Scissors).
Catfish: 84lb, 69lb, 25lb, 20lb. Small catfish ×25.
