perch hunt that turned upto a bagging session

Well as a few people know I’m mainly a predator angler so when the chance to fish the cob house fishery with Gary hickton of gazza’s fishing tackle for their big perch I  just couldn’t turn the offer down, so we set off at about 8am and stopped off at the local tackle shop to pick up some bait, I picked up 3pints of  red maggots which are a perfect big perch attractor and big tub of dendrabeona worms, when we got to the fishery we decided to fish listers lake as that’s where the big perch roam free we had a quick look around the lake and both settled on a swim which was near the end of the lake and had features galore which screamed big perch i.e. tree roots, bushes and over hanging trees. Once settled in the swim I went about setting up my Drennan series 13ft power carp waggler rod with a smalls shimano exage 2500rc  reel with 6lb maxima line to which I slid on a Drennan clear crystal insert waggler float locked in place with  shot and a couple of number 8 shot down the line to a 2lb hooklink to a Kamasan barbless size 14hook which was perfect for worms, maggots ,once the rod was rigged up I poured a good glug of  blood’n’worm glug onto the maggots and mixed them around to give them all a good flavour to draw in the prey fish which would hopefully attract the big stripeys. For the 1’s hour I just cast n the rig with the float shotted right down and catapulted in 5 or ten maggots every few minutes to create a bed of maggots and get the fish feeding when all of a sudden the float buried and a plump roach came to the net on the next cast a plump perch come to the net but it was a start, then for the next 45mins it was dead with not a bite then it was as if someone had rang the dinner bell as it was a roach or a rudd a chuck, gary at this point was into what looked like a small carp but once it rose to the surface it was infact a decent perch which went 2lb5oz on the scales

 which he took on double red maggot, I took a few quick snaps for him then recast myself but with a worm on the hook this time and continued to spray red maggots over the top when this time the float buried and the rod took on an all together different curve the fish felt heavy and kept running at 1^st I thought it was a very big perch but infact as the fish kept running I soon realised the carp had crashed my swim and brought a nice plump little common around 7lb to the net which was in perfect condition not a mark on it. Next cast I hit back into a small roach about 10ounce’s which was the average stamp of fish for the day with the odd bigger one,

 I continued spraying red maggots over the top of the float while feeding another area of the swim with corn as I thought if the carp were now moving in the perch would be long gone, then sure enough my float buried again to which a nice 1lb3oz rudd come to the surface and in the net, at this point I could see the roach and rudd just under the surface taking maggots on the drop so I knew at this point this was going to be it for the day and I was possibly just going to hit into rudd and roach for the rest of the session which I didn’t now mind as this was a whole new experience for me as I’m used to just sitting and watching the rod tip waiting for one fish so I was just going to enjoy catching fish till the end of the session, I decided to try a  worm over the corn line and within 10 minutes the float buried and I was into a nice little mirror carp 

of about 6lb but it was as if the fish was on steroid’s as it just didn’t want to come to the net it just kept running and taking line off the clutch after about 7 or 8 minutes I finally got it to the net and unhooked it and slipped it back into the lake, and that was the end of the action for me, we packed up at around 4pm and went home.
It was a totally different experience for me and enjoyable as a few people have said to me “you only know how to fish rivers and couldn’t go to a lake and catch” well I think ive proved them doubters wrong.
As what else would I do in close season? I’m open to ideas as what to do but I won’t be fishing for carp as it just isn’t my thing.
Follow me on facebook at the diary of a river Severn predator hunter!
Follow Gary on gazza’s fishing tackle for quality tackle at good prices!
I couldn’t do an end catch shot as the cobhouse don’t allow the use of keepnets but I would recommend the place to anyone looking for a good session as all the fish were in perfect condition and it’s a really enjoyable day’s fishing.

Thanks for reading my 5^th article on a totally different way of fishing to me
Jay