Carp Fishing Premier 2008

The capture of ”Brorsan”

Härlanda Tjärn 18th – 20th April 2008

www.screamingdelkims.com

After a warm Swedish winter it was time to dust off the rods and head to the local lake in search of the ‘big fat ones’.

Harlanda Tjärn was our first choice for the simple fact that we live 10 minutes away and there are some big carp (as far as Swedish carp go) that reside there in a pretty small expanse of water.

We had prebaited the swim for nearly 1 month with Banana and Pineapple boilies so there was a good chance we may catch a carp or 2.

My telephone rang on Tuesday morning and a good friend of mine, Anders Reutermo, asked if we were going fishing this weekend.

I said “yes” and we were planning a trip to “Härlanda”. He asked if he could join us and of course I obliged!

It was unknown to me at the time, but another good friend of mine (Fredrik Palm) had also been prebaiting the same swim and he had planned to fish the swim the weekend after (25th – 27 th April) so I believe that this may have contributed to this glorious weekend.

We arrived at the ‘old jetty swim’ “Gamla Bryggan” at about 19.15hrs on Friday evening and proceeded to ‘rig up’. I opted for leadcore inline leads and my favourite anti eject rigs tied with 15lbs Carp ‘r’ Us combi link and a rig ring & bait band set up. Jeanette had the same but with a standard hair rigs and all were tied to FOX series 2 hooks size 6.

Anders had the 360 degree rigs on with the standard semi fixed bolt rig set up and of course “Excalibur Leads”.

The baits we used were varied and of our own preference.

I had Energy baits on all 3 rods, Pineapple, Magic Fruit and Banana Tutti.

Jeanette had Energy Pineapple, Caribbean Dream and Sweet Orange.

Anders had Mainline baits, Sweet Plum and Pineapple.

On each rig was a mixture of PVA bag/stick mix with either pellets, boilies or a powder stick mix.

 

We were set for the night and the alarms were “ON”.

When Saturday morning came the first run came on one of Ander’s rods and the fish was lost.

This was due to line breakage (30lbs braid).

After making fun of him for losing the fish we all jumped back in our sleeping bags for some more sleep.

Then while trying for some more beauty sleep we were woken by a few bleeps on a Delkim. I thought at the time that this was a “Duck Problem” as they were splashing around in the baited area.

When we finally arose and I checked my rods I noticed that my right hand rod not only had the swinger tight to the rod but that the reel spool was missing a lot of line!!!

I tightened up and felt a fish………… my delkim had failed me, dead battery!!!!

By this time the carp must have swam at least 150 meters and snagged itself in something!!!

I had no choice but to break the line and re-rig! There was no way that that fish was coming free.

So the score was “Carp 2 – Fishermen 0”

Saturday went by without another bleep but a few beers and a bar-b-cue was most welcome!

Sunday morning came and we were all woken by the sound of a screaming run!!! Unfortunately it was the droning screech of a ‘FOX Micron M’ and Anders leapt out of his Bivvy like shit off a Teflon shovel and I was not far behind.

Time check was 08.30hrs and Anders was into a fish. The fight lasted about 10 minutes and the fish showed its head just as it was bullied into the landing net.

As its back surfaced I realised it was a big carp and my ‘guestamation’ was 12 – 13kg as we took her to the mat.

We put her in the sling and weighed her……………………… 17.52kg!!!! I thought that the scales were wrong and we needed to re-weigh her. The scales were not wrong; it was me that was wrong as I could not believe my eyes!!

The weigh sling was 1.2kg which gave the fish a total weight of 16.32kg. I assumed the fish was “Brorsan” which is the lake record fish in Härlanda and was caught last year (2007) by “Mille” (Emil Hjertberg) at a weight of 16.46kg.

The first carp from Härlanda this year was last year’s lake record but has dropped 140g in weight during the winter.

So my congratulations go out to Anders Reutermo for this magnificent catch and if anyone says the 360 degree rig doesn’t work…………… well, he proved you wrong.

WELL NAILED!!!!

By Chris Thornhill