More action for Natasha

Enjoy yourself, cook,eat & drink well, but take it all home after!

Hi all. Well Natasha has certainly had a great end to her summer holidays and the start back to school albeit a tough endurance test when it came to getting out of bed early, was done amicably and all in good manner.

The weekend soon arrived so the few days back at it didn't feel quite so enduring! I have to confess to feeling a little deflated now due to the wife being away for a fortnight.

At this point I will confess that I'm not great at household chores and I hate all that stuff....Fortunately the wife is amazing and cares for all the family! Her cooking is second to none, she works long hours, but still manages to support us all in whatever we do from day to day, even if she doesn't always agree with it.

 Hugely frustrating angling at times!

For that and all else she does for us, I commend her and thank her dearly with all my heart! Despite a few ups and downs we've coped without her and in some circumstances it's probably done everyone bloody good! Especially me! I now appreciate more what she does for us and I'm going to trey and find more time and energy to help her more.....

Low & clear conditions

With regards to my fishing.....I have to be honest and say that I personally haven't really felt much of a pull to go out there. I don't know why but I'm just not feeling it??? Don't get me wrong I have found the 2 sessions I've spent with my daughter Natasha recently, very very rewarding and something I will treasure in the memory banks forever.

But I confess that the weekend I just found it all a bit of a chore. Getting the gear ready, driving to the venue, setting up etc. Just found it hard bloody work. Whether it's down to tiredness or just lack of fish activity at times which has had me lacking enthusiasm I have no idea.

Typical smaller stamp of middle to upper river Barbel

What ever is causing it I hope does one and buggers off soon though as the season is gradually ebbing away into Autumn and the obvious apocalypse of December and winter!

I've found the barbel fishing a little tougher this year, probably down to the tough conditions of high summer. Low water, lack of flow and crappy D.O levels. Albeit I've caught 46 since June 16th which I suppose many would class as pretty darn good. The only down side being that the fish have generally been a lot smaller average than that of last years stamp.

Typically better stamp from the lower club section

There was a double in ever 5 fish I caught last year but this year I've seen 2 out the whole lot??? I can only put this aspect down to the venues I've been fishing and the fact that as a rule of thumb, the Wye in it's middle to upper stretches does generally throw up smaller fish.

My club section however has a great average stamp of fish when they can be found. Last year as I say was a double in every 5 fish caught and sometimes a couple in one evening could be taken. Why this section produces bigger than average fish is a further mystery.

The only good reason I can see for the size variation is possibly down to angling pressure, water flow, feed levels, poaching etc. I think the river there sees a heck of a lot more action than it probably ought to and often gets fished all night by many local lads.

Round 2 commenced and no change! Into them straight away!!

Not that it seems to do the fishing or the fish any real harm. The obvious issues to me are the levels of litter left behind which is not only a shame to see but also tins and such like are potential problem areas for others and animals to hurt themselves on and possibly breeding grounds for bacterial issues like Weils Disease etc.

I had a good mate cut himself on his finger from a left can of luncheon meat a few years back and he ended up with Leptospirosis....believe me it's really not something you want to get! The poor bloke lost copious amounts of weight and was ridiculously ill for months after. The other thing to be aware of in certain areas is Limes Disease cause by ticks....

Fish after fish, the girls on fire at the moment!

Nasty little bastards these things are and something highlighted by top angler and general nice bloke Martin Bowler a few seasons back. So, take care guys and girls, look after yourselves out there and look after each other by taking tins, litter and other general rubbish like discarded mono etc home with you. Not only could you hurt yourself, an animal but you could also end up loosing fishing rights too.

Well, that's enough of me putting the world to rights over boring stuff! I took Tash out Sunday for the day to a local club lake for a few hours with the intention of getting her into a few cyprinids....She told me she wanted to catch a few nice carp as it had been a good 12 months since we'd done any carping together. We turned up to a pretty full pond around 2pm and it was obvious that 99 percent of the fish weren't any where near the bottom layers of the pond! They were all basking in the surface film and looking torpid and miserable!

Natasha really did get to grips with her fishing skills this last week of the holidays.

I set up a couple of short 9ft rods with 10lb line on for her and got her out towards the main feature of the island shallows, where a few carp could be seen milling around. We sat for a good hour with almost nothing to show for our efforts. I broke the silence with the suggestion that maybe a dabble on the surface with a small quantity of chum mixer freelined close in might just do the trick!

Starting to shine with the fish posing!

Natasha flicked out about 50 or so small dog biscuits and sat back and waited for a response. It didn't take long before a few small commons came mooching around at about 3 rod lengths out. We rigged up one of the rods with just a small section of 8lb surface fishing line and a single size 12 hook and banded chum mixer hook bait.

This was then dropped right in on top of one of the cruisers at about 8 feet from the bank. Tash watched intently as the carps lips rose up and engulfed the whole thing in one slurp!!!! Bang, she was in! The reel screamed and the rod slammed over quickly! Poor girl didn't expect quite such a violent take and I think it shook her up a little!

After a few minutes of tussling around with the fish in the margins, she finally netted her prize. A stunning common of around 11lbs. A great start to proceedings. Things carried on from there really. We fed a good steady influx of chum mixers and the carp kept coming back one after another much to Natashas delight.

The rod sung in the gentle summer breeze and the reel buzzed away with the clutch
 set softly. 7 more beautiful carp graced the net before we called a halt to proceedings around 6.30pm.

With tired out arms and a hungry tummy we retired to the car for the short trip home. Successful yet again and looking forward to our next eventful days fishing together as father and daughter.

Tight lines guys
Keith x

Natashas red letter session!

Natasha leaning into a double figure Barbel! Go girl!!!!!

Hi guys and girls. What a busy few days it's been here at Nuts about Carp. Lots of lovely bait orders and some new field testers taken on to help with the testing of our new prototype fishmeal boilie. Not much feed back as yet but I'm hoping a few of the lads will get back with some results soon.

My fishing has been put back a little due to my wife being away working for 10 days in Hampshire and of course I'm on household duties and full time parental works! House work, cooking, cleaning, feeding our 300+ animals! Bla bla bla! lol It's been good fun so far but I'm only 3 days in yet! God help us!

With it being the final few days of the children's summer holidays I wanted to do something a bit special for Natasha my daughter as it's also her 8th birthday on Friday too. As some of you will be aware from previous blog entries by myself, she came out barbel fishing for a brief evening a few weeks back and with very little help from myself, landed a stunning Wye barbel of 8lb 4oz.

A life changing moment for both of us. Only her third ever barbel and a new PB of 10lb 4oz!

Well, for the last 4 weeks she's been continually asking me when we could go out again next? I really wanted to take her to my club stretch as I know the average size of the fish far exceeds the rest of the Wye by a country mile. The only trouble being that so far it had done only 4 barbel for me in the best part of 8 trips! Not only that but in reality the whole river had been fishing pretty poor for the time of year. It's a splendid and highly prolific water but the fish have had to endure months of low water and clear conditions that have pushed them into spots that are either unfishable, too weedy to attack or they have just avoided feeding at the usual times.Whatever the case maybe? It's been tough and taking her to my club stretch was always going to be a gamble. Any one who has kids of this age knows that trying to keep an 8 year old interested for more than 10 minutes is almost bloody impossible, so 5 hours of fruitless fishing didn't hold me with much hope for a relaxing evening with her!

Another beauty!

How wrong can anyone be? Well I was! I offered her the chance to river fish or go carping at our local pond and she said she'd much rather have a crack at another barbel. That's my girl!!!! We set off at around 4pm and hit traffic on the M4 from the word go. As you all may know, Newport is hosting the delegates of NATO for a couple of days and the whole area is locked down tighter than a chastity belt on valentines day! There were police officers everywhere! I have honestly never seen such a presence. God only knows what it has cost the tax payer to host this event but I can only image the costs and planning involved. It took a little while to cover the journey but it kept flowing and by 6pm we were making our first casts into the coloured up and slightly more flowing river Wye.

7lb 14oz! Smashing it up!

I opted to put her into a swim that I know is the most likely area to bag one from at present and the only real spot I've had action from this season on that stretch. It's a little tricky to get to as you need to negotiate hideous quantities of stingers and brambles, a high bank with sloping and slippery declines. Not the best or most practical place to take a youngster but I was adamant i'd do my best to put her onto at least 1 fish!

She's not learned to cast yet so I had to do that task for her, but she was quite good at filling the feeder, placing the hook baits on with a needle and of course tying a PVA bag full of pellets. I put the upstream rod about 3-4 rod lengths out for her with a feeder of 2oz on and a River Monster Boilie on the hook. The other went some 20 yards down stream with a plain lead on and a small pva bag of pellets and a boilie hook bait.

It looked as if she was in for a bonanza!

We sat back to await results and after about quarter of an hour the left hand rod was away! In true Wye Barbel style! The spool screamed as the fish ripped yards of line and before I knew it Tash was on the rod and holding it herself! I asked her if she wanted help but she was clear that she wanted to do it herself. I watched from just behind her with my grip tightly attached to her belt as the fish made its merry way around the 6 yard wide stretch of river! I thought she was going water skiing at one point as the fish just kept taking line!

Eventually after some 10 minutes of fight, I netted the fish for her. I looked down and instantly knew she had a new PB in the net. I looked at her face and she was white! She looked gob smacked at the size of the fish, a particularly long one at that too! I set up the scales , mat and camera before lifting it clear of the water. It was a double for sure and she knew it was big! We weighed her at 10lb 4oz and of course it was her first ever double and only her 3rd of the species! We were both ecstatic!

Yet more incredible Wye Gold for Natasha!

After putting the fish back I told her that that fish may well be the only one of the evening as that was how it had been fishing of recent. She was so happy with the one she'd caught that it really didn't seem to matter in all honesty. Within minutes of us putting the fish back and before the left hand rod had been recast. She was into no 2 on the other rod. Another epic battle ensued and after a few minutes of fighting for authority, she won the battle and landed a 7lb 2oz barbel.

The scene was now set and the fish were clearly in the swim in a big way! The rod tip of the right hand rod hardly sat still on the next cast and it was just minutes before the next fish was banked at 8lb 5oz. This was followed by another of 8lb 1oz and yet another of 8lb 10oz! I just couldn't believe the change in the river and her luck that evening!

No 6 for Tash and at 7lb 14oz she couldn't have been happier!

More was to follow and just as darkness set in we were thinking of packing up. I had put the majority of the kit away and I had to get the scales and camera back out for her one last time with a 7lb 14oz beauty! She then informed me she wanted to stop another quarter of an hour and to see if I could catch one as she wanted to do the photographs! lol

I made one last cast on both rods and within minutes I was into a stunning hard fighter. The bank was now pretty treacherous and I kept Tash as far up the bank as possible away from the rivers edge. I slipped a few times so I wasn't keen for her to be near the water. She managed to net the fish for me from above the higher bank area and at 9lb 10oz I was well pleased with my second biggest fish of this season from the Wye.

Even the old man got two nice ones as well!

Whilst packing the rod away and folding the chairs etc away, Natasha shouted out that the rod butt was now in the air on the remaining rod and that the clutch was on over drive! Yet another Barbel was hooked and this one felt pretty tasty by all accounts. A good old tussle ensued and after what seemed like ages I banked my second for the evening at 9lb 14oz. A great result. I would have liked Natasha to have caught them all but she was adamant she wanted me to catch a couple as well. Bless her. I have to say now that despite all other sessions I've ever had, anywhere, with anyone....This tops the lot! What a truly memorable event that I will take with me to my grave!

Go on then, just one last cast! 9lb 10oz beauty!

Natasha is now firmly hooked on fishing and can't wait to get back out there. She wants to catch all sorts of fish too which in my opinion is magic! Can't understand anyone who's never caught all of our British Coarse species wanting to just fish for Carp for example....Very sad in my opinion as there is such a variety of fish to be caught that it's a shame for them to not be experienced due to fashion!

I personally can't wait for our next session together and I know she has ideas on beating my barbel PB of 11lb 4oz and she also wants a 20lb plus pike from the river this year! I know just the place to take her and I can't wait to see how she gets on holding a monster Wye Croc!!!!!!

Tight lines all
Keith x

New beginings.....

In house quality control measures

Hi guys...

I thought I'd piece together a little blog entry about what's currently going on with the business and it's former partnership. As many of you will know Ian and myself decided to go our separate ways around 2-3 weeks ago now. Things had been getting complicated with us being so far apart from each other. One living in Wales and the other in West London. This meant that at times it was difficult to speak to each other regarding products and orders etc as Ian works long hours as a painter and decorator.

As it stood Ian was dealing with the majority of tackle orders and I of course did all the bait rolling. I wanted to continue with the bait rolling aspect as it's my forte and I really wanted to concentrate on new baits, flavours and ingredients. With the added pressures of splicing lead core, making cog leads and other general duties, it was leading me to have less time to concentrate on the bait.

Hand rolled quality ensured!

It was at this point we both agreed it may be better to split and do our own thing. I now have much more time to put into the bait aspect, webs work and of course FB and customer relations. Ian and I met amicably half way down the M4 to exchange stock and he has taken over the tackle that CBS held and myself all the baits.

As many of you will be aware, I roll all the bait by hand on tables and pride myself on making some of the finest base mixes available.

More time to spend in development

I hate using filler ingredients and I strive to insure the bait is fresh, palatable, stimulating and of course a reasonable price. That being said I cannot roll bait of the highest quality for pittance, so if it's cheap quality bait your after, then have a hunt around for others who out-source their rolling to other companies maybe as they can roll cheap ingredients in bulk on machines.

The only down side to these companies being that due to an outsider rolling for them, they cannot check the ingredients being put into the baits.....Something I personally keep track of due to obviously rolling it myself.  I will be updating all the product range over the coming weeks, adding new products, updated quality photographs, FB and web page updates, graphics etc etc. It all takes time so please bare with me.

New company and great things to come!

I have reverted to an old name I used to use with my blog for the business's future as I felt that using CBS only caused confusion about who was running what? Some customers have fled the roost and gone elsewhere since the change over has occurred and in all honesty I totally understand and wish you all luck with your angling. To those who have stayed loyal to me and the company I will endeavor to cater for your requirements and look after you as best I possibly can.

Thanks for your continued support through 2013/14 everyone!

Sometimes things go wrong like a few weeks ago when our courier network let us down with 2 orders but this was all sorted out amicably and fairly swiftly. Hopefully not something that will happen again soon. If you notice a problem with an order or you need a special requirement then please call or email me and I'll try to sort the issue asap for you.

As of 20th of August 2014 CBS Carp Bait Specialists is no longer trading and I am in the process of developing the new business in the name of Nuts about Carp. It will take a little while to divert webs traffic and do the paper work involved with name changes etc etc, so please stick with me and I look forward to continuing to serve you guys with top notch fish catching bait! I hope that the above has done something to clear up any misconceptions some may have and that you understand why whats happened has.....

Kindest regards and best wishes
Keith Supple
Director

At last a break!

First of the 2014 season for Joel! Well done mate!

Sunday came around quickly and another river session beckoned me to the River Wye in Herefordshire. I met up with Joel Biddle and his friend Rhys who made the drive down from Shrewsbury to fish for the day and have a good social.

The beat we fished was a new section for all of us and having never seen the place before we were all unsure what to expect on arrival. After a little mess up with the directions and getting a little lost, we finally met up for a wander along the mile long beat.

It was fairly overgrown and there were only a handful of swims in which to pitch up and fish from. Joel and Rhys decided to fish together as it had been a good 12 months since they had last fished together.....they set up on the top of the beat and I opted to fish at the other end in the slightly deeper, slower water.

Joel text me around 9.30am to say he had caught the first of the day at around 7lbs. I had just landed the first chub of the day at 4lbs....things were looking much better for the day! The river had a good few inches extra water and was fining down nicely with some colour in it. My next cast resulted in another chub around 4lb 3oz. This was looking great!

The lads struggled upstream but I was having a good few chub from the 'Rope Swim'. By mid afternoon I was on 8 chub and had lost 2 nice barbel to underwater hazards. I think they were large sharp boulders because the fish seemed to know exactly where to go! Every one I hooked headed straight towards the dreaded snag!

Joel's account for the 2014 season was finally open!!!

I opted to move up 3 swims and try on the back edge of a wide corner swim. which was on the below side of some rapids which afforded some extra oxygen to the river. I plumbed around and found 6ft 6inches at around 3 rod lengths. This was liberally baited by dropper and pellets and left to develop for 45 minutes. I went round to see the lads who had moved a few times and were just an eel up from the earlier barbel Joel had managed.

At last a barbel to break the monotony! 8lb 9oz of pure gold....lush

I went back after a short while to try my newly baited spot. The lads moved into the rope swim I'd been in earlier and were instantly into a small barbel of 6lbs.

A few minutes later I was just starting to nod off in the chair with my finger hooked over the line to feel for nibbles, when all of a sudden the line ripped from my finger and a good fish plowed off down stream. A couple of dicey minutes ensued and after a game of wits I sunk the net under a stunning long beast!

Rhys got in on the action too!

I called Joel up and he came up to do the pics. On the scales she went 8lb 9oz. Well chuffed as it seems like my barbel fishing had taken a turn for the worst!

Joel then had his third of the day and almost straight after Rhys finally nabbed a nice 6 pounder to end the days fishing. Tough conditions yet again but at least we managed a couple of Barbel!

Nothing's in the diary now fishing wise for a bit so I'm not 100% sure what I'll be doing next or where??? Who knows.....

Tough times

Gorgeous but devoid of fish???

The last few weeks of river fishing has been rather quiet by all accounts for me personally, with just a handful of fish finding the bank.

I've put this down to a couple of factors which include low water conditions and bright sunlit days and low oxygen levels. All this or I've just completely lost the ability to catch fish?? Another possibility!

This week has done little to bolster my ailing confidence and a trip out to a day ticket stretch of the Wye with friends Liam and Bob left me feeling worse than ever come Thursday evening....We met up at early doors Thursday and with it being Liam's first ever trip up the Wye, we were hoping like crazy that he'd bag his first barbel!

The swims looked pristine and the 3 of us set up in close proximity in an attempt to focus the feeding area in a localized area we could all grab one or two out of.

Well at least Liam caught something!!! lol

This proved to be a bit of a waste of time as nothing happened for the first few hours at all. In fact this was the way most of the day turned out! We moved swims to a spot further upstream around 1pm and the faster water there provided Liam with the first bit of action of the day. A nice little chub finding the net. Bob also managed 1 quickly after too. I on the other hand sat and sat and sat! I just couldn't grab a fish at all.

After 2 lost barbel due to hooks pulling out which baffled us??? we chose to move back to the first peg again for the evening and the slower but deeper water. Again we sat for a few hours and the rain kept falling out of the sky! The river rose a good 4-5 inches in the day and I think this probably didn't help matters very much.

Just as I was starting to feel like it was going to be a blow out blank for me, I finally got a strike-able bite that resulted in a chub of around 4lbs....At least I hadn't blanked. The day was great fun and thank god we had lots of giggles and banter as the fishing was truly awful!  

Holiday fun!

Awesome prawns!

With the kids away for a few days at their grandparents, it left Marianne and I some quality time together for the first time in the best part of 15 years! Having no family members living within 150 miles makes baby sitting a chore at the best of times! We had a few odd days of being lazy and around work and other stuff we thought that we'd grab a few hours float fishing our local club lake.

Now, Marianne hasn't actually properly fished for at least 12 years and I must admit that I thought she may struggle a little at getting back into the swing of things....How wrong could I have been? I set her up with her 13ft float rod, .17 main line and a size 12 hook to 0.15 hook link. She chose the bait and went for a prawn!

well done Marianne!

I set up next to her on the feeder and had a few chucks out to the island with a CBS Micro tutti boilie on a size 12. Things started very well for both of us and Marianne was instantly catching some nice roach and bream. I started to find a few carp straight off.....Most were around 6 to 8lbs in weight and put up a cracking scrap on the light feeder kit.

Mariannes float swim was alive with fish. Every chuck in resulted in shoals of rudd and roach clustering on the surface and smashing anything she threw at them! It was a delight to watch. Eventually the light started to fail and we put on a night light each on our float rods. I had one last cast on the feeder which resulted in the biggest fish of the day at around 14 or 15lbs.

The float gear was set up on my side of the swim and the pair of us started to fish with corn and prawn alternately. Marianne was almost straight away into her first decent carp of the day and ended up with a nce common around 6 pounds for her efforts.

Even the old git managed one!

Continued regular feeding kept the fish in the swim and it wasn't very long before she was into yet another fine common! This kept going on for about the next hour and a half with Marianne totally out fishing me with her float tactics! She had 6 lovely carp to around 8lbs on her tactics and I have to say that despite the lack of strength she had in her arm for playing the fish, she managed very well to catch so many lovely fish on her first outing in a millennia!

I'm off out on Thursday this week for a day on the very slow Wye with Bob and Liam. Looking forward to trying a new venue and hoping the river has a little bit more water in it at last! Then Sunday is another day session with Joel and Reese at yet another new section! All go for me this week!

Smashing stuff! x

Some of you will notice that the tackle has been removed from the CBS web page and FB page. This is due to myself and Ian deciding to do thinks separately from each other. Before you all ask....no, we have not fallen out what so ever. We're good pals and will always remain that way. But the business needed a slight change and both of us were feeling very tired out from all the ordering etc. Ian has taken on the tackle side of things and will be doing this off his own back under the CBS Tackle banner. I will be continuing with CBS Carp Bait Specialists LTD on my own for the moment as Director and I will be concentrating solely on the bait side of things. This is more my cup of tea and in all honesty this gives us both the time to now concentrate more on our aspects of the game.

I have a new bait that we are going to be field testing over the coming months which I am very excited about! I'm currently still looking for more testers to help with this. If you think your up to the job then give me a shout on our face book page or send me an email at cbs-sales@mail.com.

Tight lines all and see you soon x

Mathews PB!

Mathews first of the day!

Sunday loomed and the kit was loaded in the car ready for another early start on the wonderful Wye. This session was to be on the Wye and Usk Foundation section at Sugwas Court. I've fished Sugwas before in October of 2013 and its a pretty little stretch of the river.

My partner in crime for the day and having his first session out on the Wye and first barbel session for over 20 years was to be Mathew O'neill. Mathew is an accomplished angler but has never targeted large river fish before.

He's caught barbel and chub to about 4lbs in the past by fishing for them on the River Trent many years ago with stick float techniques. The methods we were to be employing this time round would be different to any thing he had done before.

Just call me Mr Chub!

Things started well...I put Mat in the going swim and within minutes he had a nice chub on the bank of about 3lbs. This turned out to be a bad omen as the rest of the day until 6pm passed by without either of us having a bite worth striking at! The water was clear, low and weed rafts continually drifted into the swims, making fishing out further than 15 yards impossible.

At around 6.15pm Mathew had his first proper take of the day and landed a stunning barbel of just over 5lbs. He was ecstatic to say the least!

Within a few minutes I eventually caught my first fish of the day....a chub around 2lbs. This was followed up over a two hour period by a further 9 chub for my rod in 4 different swims! I just couldn't get the barbel into my swims. They were all sat under the tree roots in Mathews swim.

8lb 10oz PB for Mathew!

Mat's next fish was a real warrior and almost took his arm off on the take! 8lb 10oz of Wye warrior gold found the net and I can't remember the last time I had seen someone so excited by a fish! It was truly great to see his pleasure at catching the stunning gold bar.

Mat caught 2 more chub and finally another lovely barbel of 7lb 5oz! After such a torrid day of very little action, Mathew managed to make it into a very memorable one! Well done mate!