Another group of new Boys on the lake this week for their first visit to France let alone Le Moulin and what a session they have had:
47 (49) Big Carp to 64lb 12oz
We have a figure in brackets because Matt has claimed 13 fish but I can only find 11 recorded, and I have searched the catch sheets and photographs. As soon as we get to the bottom of this I will amend the total accordingly, but either way all you need to know for now is that that headline reflects the biggest catch so far this season.
Well done Boys !!
From left to right meet Luke, Gary and Matt:
The weather has, once again, been totally weird, following on from all of the heat we have moved straight in to Autumn and had a relatively cold and overcast week, in fact Tuesday was the coldest ever day ever recorded in any month of August across the whole of France, the national average temperature was 17.3 degrees Celsius. We don’t normally get down to those temperatures until November!!
The afternoons have been quite pleasant but the mornings have been quite chilly.
I took The Boys for the standard guided tour on Saturday and they were hungry for information, they had certainly done their homework and had studied every catch report I have ever written so they were well prepared for most eventualities.
They had never had the pleasure of an exclusive venue before and they were keen to find the fish and get on their rods.
During the tour it was obvious that there was a shed-load of fish in swims 2 and 3 so Luke and Matt quickly settled in to swim 2 and 3 but Gary was conscious of the fact that if they put all the pressure on one end of the lake the fish would probably move to the other.
He took another look at swims 5 and 6 and despite there being very little fish activity he pre-empted the move of the fish and he elected to fish swim 5.
The Saturday evening-Sunday morning session passed without incident but when they reviewed the situation on Sunday morning it was obvious that the fish were reacting to their presence and they had already departed from swim 2. Say no more, Luke was out of there and set himself up in swim 4.
Gary and Matt both got the ball rolling around mid-day on Sunday so all looked like it was going well but during the course of the day Gary found another 3 and Matt and Luke were left with nothing. The fish had continued their move to the deep end and swim 6 was alive with them.
Monday produced more of the same with Matt having no action at all on swim 3, Luke had found his first fish on swim 4, but Gary found another 7, and swim 6 was still alive with big carp.
He was very conscious that if he moved up to swim 6 it was going to impact on everyone else but he couldn’t sit in an empty swim all week so Tuesday morning saw Matt take the plunge in swim 6.
The result was instant but things were going to change very quickly.
Tuesday saw Matt pick up 2, it saw Gary’s run slow down to only 4 fish and Luke was left with nothing, but everyone could see the fish reacting to the change in pressure as they started their move back down toward the now quiet shallow swims.
Wednesday produced a final mad flurry for Matt on swim 6 with 6 big carp, Gary’s catch reduced to 2, and suddenly Luke was in to fish and produced his next 2.
Gary was the first to make the decision and he quickly anticipated the movement of the fish and he was off to swim 2 at a rapid rate.
Matt remained in swim 6 for the remainder of the session where he picked up another 2, or possibly 4, either way he caught some stonking fish, smashing his PBs to pieces and his best went to 54lb 8oz :
Luke ended his session with a run of big carp to die for, he found 2 on the Wednesday, a whopping 9 stunners on Thursday, and one last one on Friday. That gave him a total of 11, almost everyone of which shattered his previous PB.
He went on to take the Big Fish Award with his best going to 64lb 12oz:
And just to show that they are in there somewhere he found a stonking Grassie at 52lb 10oz :
Gary’s move to swim 2 proved to be spot on, he found his first fish on Thursday evening and went on to land a further 5 on Friday.
He was a touch peeved about Luke’s 60 as he was running with a new PB of 59lb 04oz, but at least he went on to secure the Top Rod Award with a very impressive tally of 23 big carp:
The Boys worked hard at keeping their eye on the fish and trying to pre-empt their moves rather than following them and their final tally was:
Zero Babies, zero Doubles, 1 @ 20lb, 1 @ 21lb, 1 @ 28lb, 2 @ 30lb, 3 @ 31lb, 2 @ 32lb, 4 @ 33lb, 2 @ 35lb, 5 @ 36lb, 4 @ 37lb, 1 @ 38lb, 1 @ 39lb, 4 @ 40lb, 1 @ 41lb, 2 @ 42lb, 2 @ 44lb, 1 @ 46lb, 1 @ 50lb, 2 @ 52lb, 1 @ 54lb, 1 @ 56lb, 1 @ 57lb, 1 @ 58lb, 1 @ 59lb, and 1 at 64lb 12oz.
Needless to say The Boys had a great session and they are keen to get back on to the lake for another go so they are now on my waiting lists for 2024 and 2025, if not before Helen and I look forward to hosting them again in 2026.
I have another group of 3 on the lake this week for their first visit to Le Moulin although they have fished France several times before, watch this space and I will let you know how they got on next weekend.
Till then take care.
Le Moulin de Graffeuil 