Wold Farm Fisheries, Northants, 17th July 2011
Well after my day with Bob Nudd, Mark and I decided to try out our new tips at Wold Farm Fisheries, near Santa Pod in Northants. To fish Wold Farm, you need to have an appointment, so call Dax on 0797 4000 230 to make one before you just turn up.
Finding the place proved a challenge beyond getting to Santa Pod, google maps doesn't really help. So to help with directions, as you drive down Airfield Road you will basically come to the end of the road and have a choice of turning right down a road that has a lot of junk cars scattered around or to open a gate onto a private gate. Follow the road with the junk cars on. This will take you down behind the private road and around the back of Airfield Farm. The entrance to Wold Farm is a small gate that is in amongst a fir lined set of trees that says, "no public right of way". I've indicated on the google imagery the road that is not shown and also the entrance.
We met Ron, Dax's dad, as we had decided to fish Island Lake Ron told us that a bag of micro pellets and one bag of expanders would do the job. The bags of pellets are £2 each. You can fish with Keepnets for an extra £2. Wold Farm provide both the keepnets and landing nets, so our combined bill for the days fishings between us was £26.
As I was now loosing the Mark vs Mark battle I could select my peg, I chose a peg that had a good set of lilly pads on the left and an island reachable at 14m straight ahead and too my right. Mark fished the peg to the left of me, had the same lilly pads and a number of smaller islands to his left to fish to.
The Session
I chose two lines of attack. Firstly the lilly pads to my left at full depth, approximately 5 foot deep and also a shallow line to the island. Both were to be productive.
After the advice on feeding from Bob Nudd I started with a cautious approach by pinging in some 4mm and micro pellets to the swim next to the lillys. The fish started to respond and the first fish to the net was a small common carp. Once the fish has arrived I potted in a small pole pot of micro's, 4mm hard pellets and casters. This started to produce fish on a regular basis and then I hooked into a lovely bream of around 2lb which was followed by another 4 of equal size.
While fishing the lilly swim I was loose feeding pellets to the island and there was some signs from Golden Orfe and some very white ghost carp. I gave the lilly swim a rest and tried to go shallow to the island with no luck. So I kept on loose feeding maggots and casters to the island while fishing the lillies. Gradually more and more golden orfe where visible just below the surface. The sun came up and the number of increased and their feeding became more confident.
So, back on the shallow rig I hooked double caster, fed twice and shipped out and hooked straight into a golden orfe. The fight was pitiful, one quick run and then it just came to the net, almost as bad as a bream!Meanwhile, Mark wasn't managing to put together a run of fish on the pole line to the lillies. Mark then set up a method feeder and went out to the islands. Mark's casting is spot on and he pulled in about 6 carp from that tactic.
After a hectic hour I had managed to capture about 25 Golden Orfe from the island swim including a few bonus carp. By this time the fish were becoming a little cautious, so back on the Lilly line.
The Result
We packed up for the day around 5pm, I'd managed to beat Mark and claimed my point. So the score to date is Lewy 10, Mark 8.
Conclusion
Wold Farm Fisheries is a lovely fishery, there is plenty for the specimen and pleasure angler. The fishery is clean and tidy, gravel paths, well laid out pegs with plenty of room. Ron is a very pleasant and funny man. You hear a little noise from Santa Pod but not enough to spoil your day.
Feeding is the key and understanding the fishes behaviour and feeding appropriately, Bob Nudd mentions this in July's Improve Your Coarse Fishing.
The fishing shallow certainly improved my catch rate on the day, it was a very busy method but certainly the results speak for themselves.
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| Some lovely fish |
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| The winning catch ;-) |
