LATEST ADDITIONS

MPs' warning to water companies over sex-changing chemicals in rivers. The Angling Trust is urging water companies to remove gender-bending chemicals from waste water before they enter our rivers, backing a hard-hitting report put forward by MPs. Angling Trust chief executive Mark Lloyd said: “I am delighted that this all-party select committee backs what the Trust has been calling for over the past few years. “There is mounting evidence that these endocrine-disruptor chemicals make fish change sex, can poison aquatic organisms and damage ecosystems.

Karl Jenkinson reflects on a very rewarding weekend. The elusive carp of a local farm pond are all I have been able think about lately. Over a two-week period I visited the lake five or six times after work to apply some bait and build up knowledge of the fish behaviour. Having only had seven carp over 50 nights’ fishing, it was imperative that I did my homework.

Although I have had limited use of these baits I am taken by the make-up of the boilies, even the shelf-life versions, which absolutely stink of shrimp, salmon, fishmeal and all manner of goodies packed inside. The inclusion of Robin Red increases the all-round profile. There are matching pop-ups to complement the baits and I particularly like the washed-out pink hook baits, (although the label calls them Fluro, they’re not) which could work brilliantly fishing over the top of a bed of boilies. I’ve started introducing them to one of the waters that I fish and, so far, the carp have readily accepted them.

Nano Technology is very much the buzz word in carp-rod design right now, and Greys has spent three years perfecting its own to create what looks like an extremely decent range of wands. Its Toreno composite technology claims to create a rod with a stronger and lighter blank but with no compromise in terms of action and performance. We don’t really need to delve any deeper into the science of it all, but in layman’s terms you could say that the result should be a terrific carp rod with all-round performance. Just about every rod on the market claims to offer casting performance with sustained playability, but the reality is that only a handful probably actually deliver on this promise.