A weekend of rain had cooled everything down, but a strong wind was blowing by 3 pm, when I arrived at Braybrooke Park to fish Jeane’s Pond this week.

Reports of tench and crucian carp coming out, saw me liquidising some frozen sweetcorn to add to my feed, while I also boiled up half a cup of hemp seed to go in the mix.  On the bank, half a pint of liquidised bread, was the base for my feed, sprinkling over some grains of sweet corn, mixing in the liquidised sweet corn and hemp to make four firm balls, that I put in over the shelf 4 metres out, two in front and two in a line toward the lily bed, watching the balls sink quickly to the bottom. For bait I had bread punch slices, sweet corn and some ready prepared tares, which I had bought online, being disappointed that they were no bigger than the hemp seed. I prefer tares that are at least twice as large as the hemp feed. I also had a tub of soft hooker pellets. Used to only bread as bait, it would be interesting to find out what was best on the day, if any?

Within minutes of the feed going in, the surface was a mass of bubbles bursting on the surface and I tackled up a 4 x 16 float, with the shot grouped a foot from the size 14 barbless hook in an attempt to get through “the small stuff” near the surface. A double punched 7 mm pellet of bread was dropped in off the end of my pole and I watched the bait fall through, only to see the float rise and skate off. Expecting a tiny roach, the elastic shot out as I lifted into a quality rudd.

Next drop in the float settled and sat for a minute, then sank away, again firm resistance, this time a roach swinging in to my hand, the size 14 holding firm in the top lip.

More roach and rudd followed, many chasing the bread down. I gave the tares a try, their size more suited to a size 16 hook, but the big hook did not bother the small roach that grabbed the tare. I loose fed a few grains of sweet corn and the rudd came swooping back in, the corn on the hook being attacked immediately, the float zooming off. Surprisingly I missed most of these bites, despite the big hook, the occasional good rudd being landed. Several times a small pike chased my fish to the surface in panic, but I lifted them all clear of its teeth.

I went back on the bread, more roach, then the float bobbed and stayed down as a small, but strong fish fought back. It was a tench, probably one of the 300 stocked last year.

Note the wasp on my hand, the liquidised sweet corn had them crawling all over the bait box, waiting to be crushed by a well positioned plummet. The surface was still a mas of bubbles, the occasional eruption a clear sign of a carp, or larger tench on the feed, but they could not be tempted by bread, corn, or pellet, the float rocking on the surface with the disturbance. The float kept going under, anticipating an epic battle, but even these quality rudd and roach were an anti climax.

The corn, pellet and tare all gave missed bites, the only consistent hook bait being the bread.

I still rang the changes and a big piece of corn attracted a bite that brought out the elastic, that convinced me that a better tench had taken at last, but no, a golden round shape flashing deep, proving to be a nice crucian carp.

I have had a crucian on my last three visits to Jeane’s, it’s a shame there are not a few more, as they fight well in the deeper water. It was now close to 6 pm and I had set my self a three hour time limit to get home for tea and bang on time I connected with my last fish, another quality roach.

Had I learned anything from these bait changes? The bread seemed to hook every time, but even the tiniest of roach and rudd would take the 7 mm punch. I have punches to 12 mm, maybe a much bigger punch on a heavier pole float will get the bait down better. The sweet corn got bites all the time on the bottom, but what looked like definite big fish sinkaways were missed. The tares worked, but only brought fish of a few ounces at best. The pellets were often ignored, but this may have been a different story if I had been feeding them.

It had been a busy three hours of fishing, throwing back many smaller fish, a quick weigh up putting just under 8 lbs on the scales. All the fish were returned in the landing net with no casualties.