Cherry Lake fishing remains great

We sneaked off for a quick week in Italy, which was lovely, except I missed some fantastic action last week. Bad planning on my part also meant that fishery manager Dave was also away. My good friend Darren Davies stood in and did an excellent job looking after our guests, and coping with a lot of teething problems with the new gate.

Over the full week whilst we were away (I will cover this weekend in my next update) an amazing 16 Carp over 30lb were caught from Cherry Lake including two over 40lb+ and 7 upper thirties. I am grateful to those guests who did send through some photos, but unfortunately not all were good enough to enable accurate individual recognition and or to be used here. So I expect a few Carp who would have 'expected' to appear in this years catalogue, will have to wait until their 'next appearance'.

The most exciting development was the capture of our 6th different Carp over 40lb. Gary Millard on his first visit had a great stay in Heron Lodge. His first fish was this lovely Ghost Carp above, caught at 41-04. This lovely lady sets a new Cherry Lake record for a Ghost Carp, and interestingly she was not the biggest of the Ghost carp in last year's catalogue. She appeared last April when caught by Gary Owen she came in at 35-10. This time she was much heavier with spawn, being some five and half pounds up in weight. Gary also caught a 35lb Common. Both Carp beating Gary's previous personal bests. An outstanding first visit, and you won't be surprised to learn that Gary has already booked to return next May.

The Carp seem to be heavier than normal with spawn this year. I am not sure if this perception is accurate or not, but we are seeing a lot of Carp which are carrying a lot of spawn. This might be because the Carp got themselves 'ready' several weeks ago (when some of the Carp on the other 3 lakes all 'performed') and their eggs took on some water? I hope we get a warm spell of weather and the Carp do their 'business' and we get the Carp back to their more healthy weights and feeding hard. As a fishery owner, this pre and actual spawning period is always a tense time for us, when fish care is even more important.

The shot above of Paul Gould, who had a excellent trip to Osprey Lodge catching 4 thirties, with a 38-08 Mirror clearly demonstrates how heavy this particular Carp is with spawn. The last record I have of this Carp in my catalogue, I think because the angle is not great and I only have one side, is from last year at 34lb.

Chris Pollock returned to Grebe Lodge and had a fantastic week. He also landed 4 Carp over 30lb+ during his stay including fish of 37lb, 36-08 and the 38-06 beauty in the lead photo above. He sent me this phot with the following note.......'This is the other fish I caught at 38-06 and what a great way to end another excellent time at the lake. Thanks again for having us, we loved every minute'. Chris always a pleasure.

Chris's 'smallest thirty' was this lovely fully scaled beauty above at 30-02. Close examination of my catalogues confirmed this lovely fish joins this years catalogue as a new thirty for us. I am particularly grateful to Chris for a great set of photos, which he sent through as his visit developed and kept me nicely involved. The quality of these photos means that I cannot resist using them here, as well as the fact they make fish recognition much easier and reliable.

The last photo of Chris below is with the Mirror I know as Apple Slice at 37lb. A similar weight to when caught by Paul Mitchell at this time of year at 36-02.

I will sign off of apologising to any visitors who I missed in this update. As you can tell there was a lot to write about!