Well, its that time again, I've completed another lap on my life-o-meter and once again Rachel has agreed to come and join me for the second year in a row for a 24 hours session on the pit at Whitesprings.
Just like last year the sun was shining and I was seriously hoping to set up and fish in the same spots as my birthday session last year, but due to the severe amount of rain we've been having lately I decided to set up the rods and tent on the least boggiest patch of ground which unfortunately, was the complete opposite side of the lake from where we had set up last year.
From my previous visits to the pit I had come to the understanding that even though it wasn't an easy lake to fish the rewards were there when you finally do hook up, and I had yet to catch a fish that I would class as a small one, if I recall correctly the smallest fish that I'd had out of the pit were around the eight pound mark. So, I did have some expectations of seeing some nice doubles out through the session.
It's show time.
I started off with throwing put a few mixer biscuits out before unpacking the rods, before I had even set up the first rod the biscuits were being mopped up, so unwisely I set up the first rod to freeline putting a single mixer biscuit on the hook and dropping it into the margin, then after placing the rod on a bank stick and clicking the bait runner on I set about putting the other rods together, I had everything spread out and had just put the reels on my other rods when I heard a slurping sound come from the margin, I looked up to see the line pull tight to the end of the rod and reel to start clicking away, I scrambled over to the rod, picked it put and tightened up into a fish and it was only a few minutes after arriving, but as I held the rod up and the fish started to pull the drag, then it turned in the water and threw the hook! I knew it seemed a bit too easy.

With fish so eager to take the mixer biscuits I abandoned setting up my other rods for the time being and kept feeding along the margin, I managed to lure one of the fish from under the bank side foliage and after a tough little scrap it went into the landing net, I'd made a start with a Common just under 8lb, I thought that with the fight it had given me that it would have weighed in a bit heavier but I was happy just to get a fish on the bank.
Just under 8lb a nice start.
I kept the mixer biscuits going in and the fish just kept on taking them but actually getting one to take the one on the hook was another story, I must have had about five missed takes as well as fish turning away at the last second, then I watched one fish move almost in a straight line sucking down four biscuits one after the other, making use of this display of greediness I dropped the bait about three foot on front of it and a few seconds later it had nailed it and I was into my second fish.
This time the fish didn't seem to pull me round as much even though it did try and make a bolt for an over hanging tree more than a few times, even so I was expecting it to be more or less the same size as the last one until I got it in the net, you think by now that I'd have learned that you can't judge how big a fish is going to be just by the fight. Once it was on the mat I gave a guesstimate weight of eleven pounds while Rachel opted for a less generous weight of nine and a half to ten pounds, we were both wrong when the scales rattled round to 13lb 2oz, a nice sized double and it was still early in the session.
Keeping the net wet, with a nice 13lb 2oz Mirror.
I finally got round to setting up the other two rods and mixed up a bucket of halibut pellets and sweetcorn to be used on a method feeder during the night then resumed surface fishing without any further until it got too dark to see the biscuit.
As it got dark it started to drizzle, but I wasn't too worried about it as the weather forecast showed clear skies until about midday tomorrow so I thought that it was only going to short lived and the rest of the night was going to be dry, how wrong I was, the reality of it was that it rained all night and the all the next day, you've got to love how reliable the forecasts are.
I fished my usual standard rigs on two of the rods during the night with a good helping of boilies fired over the top of each bait, and my last rod was set up with a method feeder which at first was pretty slow but once I had landed the feeder on on the same spot a few times creating a carpet of bait that action didn't stop all night.
I started off with a surprise Carp of about 2lb which is the smallest Carp I'd ever seen come out of the pit and with the lake being tipped as a step down from the specimen lake I didn't expect to see any more as small as this.
Anyone got a keepnet?As the night progressed the rain got heavier but the fish didn't stop feeding, I was really bagging up on small fish, by about 2am I'd already landed nine fish and they were coming out at almost set sizes, they were almost a 50/50 ratio of 2 pounders and 8 pounders it was like the lake had had a fresh stocking of small fish.
By then I'd given up on photographing every fish caught as the method feeder seemed to be working a little too well plus I didn't want to destroy the camera in the rain.
One of the few fish I photographed in the rain, another one around 8lb.Sometime during the early hours I was crouched down over the bucket of method mix packing it round the feeder when I heard something rustling through the grass, I thought that it may have been a Rat as I'd had them running off with bait at whitesprings in the past, but the rustling came closer then run between my legs my heart jumped into my throat as I looked down at possibly one of the biggest Rats I'd ever seen. I calmed down a bit once I turned on my head torch and could see it was only a Hedgehog, that was more preoccupied with eating the slugs that were covering the bait tubs.
I sat there feeding it boilies for a while and it seemed to prefer the Halibut ones and I even got to take a photos of it before I had another run and the high pitched sound of the bite alarm scared it off.

I was quite happy feeding this Hedgehog after I realized it wasn't a Rat.
As the sun came up, well I should say as the sky got lighter as there was no sight of the actual sun, I'd had virtually no sleep and the few times I did try and get my head down it seemed that I would get a run soon as I got comfy. My catch total must have been pushing twenty if not more, As well the masses of single figure Carp I'd landed I'd also bagged a few nice Bream around the 2lb mark but I had not banked any more doubles.
The Last Bream of the session.
And the final Carp of the session, another 2 pounder.To be honest, by mid morning I was happy to pack up and go home most to the gear was soaked through and the tent had leaked during the night so the sleeping bags were soaking and I really needed some sleep. I doubt I'll be fishing the pit for a while as it does seem like they've had a stocking of Carp around the 2lb and 8lb mark which isn't really a good thing when you pay extra money to fish for the bigger ones then spend all night catching fish that you can catch on the match lake, but I suppose if it hadn't rained all night I might have a different perspective.
I've got to thank my wife Rachel for coming with me and for being my camerawoman for the session, I wonder where we will fish on my next birthday :)