I missed a couple of match reports just by being very busy at work and also not catching much :-(
But, on Sat June 3rd I set off on my annual trip to the mighty St Lawrence river which marks the border between the USA and Canada.
It's really the dream setup. My friend Nick lives in Indianapolis but also owns a house that is 200m from the river in a little town called Massena in NY state. He has 5 full sets of kit which comprises of:
2 x Fox Warrior Elite 3lb test curve carbon rods
2 x Shimano Baitrunners with PowerPro Braid
2 x Delkim EV Plus bite alarms
42' landing net, unhooking mat and weigh sling
60lb x 2oz Ruben Heaton scales, a comfy folding chair, 50" Brolly, a few bank sticks and a catapult.
A tackle box with 2/3/4oz leads, beads, swivels, hooks (3/4/5/6), forceps and blade type scissors. Plus a fox 3 rod holdall and a big carryall for all the stuff.
He's even got rods for spodding and and a marker float equipped rod.
So no need to take anything, although I do take take my own 6000 GTE baitrunners and Delkims as these are the bits that take the biggest load. I also take my own hooks as I prefer barbless.
The trip started badly with the 9am flight from Glasgow being delayed by 3 hours, meaning that there was no way we (Mrs DJ was our 'official' photographer) were going to make our connection from Newark to Montreal - We should have arrived in Montreal at around 15:00 - we got through immigration/customs at 23:00! Grant, who lives near Los Angeles, had arrived at 16:00, so Nick, his son Ben, and Grant had waited for 8 hours for us! And we still had a 2 hour drive back in to the USA…..
Still, at least we were there and had a week of carp fishing to look forward too.
Sunday: It was cold, windy and wet - not like up state NY in June - more like Glasgow. I decided to fish the Boathouse swim which is around 3'-4' deep all round.
The others were going to try the Golf Course which was very prolific last year.
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| 28.5lb |
I had my first bite after 4 hours which produced a nice 28.5lb common, which was followed by a 15.25lb common 2.5 hours later. Quite disappointing. Ben had 2 and Grant had 1, which was 29.5lb.
Monday: The weather was at least dry, but still overcast and not much warmer.
Having fished the shallow areas, we decided to try the deeper areas, with Grant opting for Brandy Brook, where 20' of water is reachable, and the rest of us heading for just downstream of the Iroquai dam, where there is a deep channel (30' +) with a shallower area of around 8' - the plan was to fish on the edge of the drop off. Ben and Nick had the easier swims with, from the left, distances of 15, 25 40 and 60m to the drop off. Mine were 80m and as far as I could chuck it at over 100m. After 4 hours of nothing, and Ben and Nick having 5 fish to 24lb, I wasn't hopeful but I continued feeding as best I could at those distances and from 15:00 on I had 3 between 20lb and 22.5lb and one of 15lb.
So not a great start to the week……
Tuesday: At last, a clear blue sky and a forecast of 73 degrees. So, Grant and I opted for the shallow again with me in the Golf Course and Grant at Boathouse. Ben and Nick had been studying the results from September's World Carp Championship, and went for a swim along the deeper water of the boat channel where 4 of the 5 top weights had come from.
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| 30.25lb |
My first fish was a nice 30.25lb and I then picked up a 17lb fish close in. But compared to last year it was another slow day with 20.5lb and 25lb carp completing the day for me. Grant drew a blank at the Boathouse, but Ben and Nick had 17 fish with two biggies of 32lb and 30lb from the Osprey Point swim.
Wednesday: Well, it was fairly obvious that Nick and I would now try the Osprey Point swim. The sky was clear and the forecast was for another hot day of 72.
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| 27.5lb Male! |
The first hour was quiet but then the fish found our baits and it got pretty busy. Nick quickly had 3 to 24lb where I only had 1 of 25lb. But I kept at it and I was rewarded with a great run of fish. Firstly a male of 27.5lb (right) - the biggest male carp any of us has ever seen, quickly follow by a PB equaling fish of 36.25lb , and then another of 35lb.
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| 36lb 4oz |
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| 35lb |
All the fish, for me, were caught at around 75m on double plastic corn over a feed base of maize/cracked maize. We put put around 10 spods each to start and topped up with 5 each every couple of hours.
Casting a spod that distance is tough, but the new Korda ones are much better in flight than the older ones.
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| 29lb |
This 29lb fish looks as big as the 36.25lb one - but it was much easier to hold!
This was more like the std St Lawrence day!
Thursday: The wind had shifted to the south, so it would be even warmer, with no sign of the forecasted thunder storms.
We returned to the same place, but after 3 hours, still had nothing - Nick and Ben after having a day off on Wednesday, were now in the World Champs winning peg, but for them it was similar - they had a 16lb fish after 15 mins and then nothing. I tried various baits and distances but only got one fish all day, as did Grant and the other guys only had the one early on.
The only thing we could figure was the wind direction change, but that was ruled out when I got a text on Sunday at home saying Ben and Nick had had 17 fish to 28lbs in a southerly wind at Osprey Point. Maybe it was the coming storm.........
Friday: The last day for Grant and I. We were all a bit lost as to why Thursday had been so hard, so we opted to return to the Iroquai dam swims with Grant taking the short left hand side swims and me on the medium length ones. Ben and Nick went upstream to an area know as Strawberry Fields, where Nick and I had fished a couple of years ago on a September trip.
And Grant and I struggled again with 2 to 19.5 for me and a solitary 19lb for Grant - Meanwhile, Ben and Nick had 7! I fished through a massive thunder storm with biblical rain and forked lightning which came very close - around 0.5 seconds from flash to bang. But we all agreed that as weeks go, this was the worst we could recall.
Which in isolation, seems nuts! For me, 26 carp from a low of around 10lbs to 36.25lbs, with 12 fish over 20lbs - but compared to a 'normal' week, way off on the total number side - in 2010 I had 68 in a week! But I had some big fish, and a very relaxing week, so no complaints here.
