Steve Busby's mint 32-08 Common from the Cottage swim

Steve Busby brought his family to the Cotswolds for their half-term break and chose to stay in Cherry Lake Cottage. As it was a family trip he spent a lot of his time out and about. This meant that he did not fish very much, in fact he told me that throughout the course of his stay he doubted if he had his rods in the water for much more than 20 hours!

He is obviously a follower of the weather forecasts, because cunningly he negotiated Thursday as his fishing 'day in'! This was cunning because it enabled him to trickle boilies in all week, and Thursday was a warm day.

On Thursday it all paid off for him as he had two runs. Unfortunately one Carp came off on an unseen snag. Dave went out in the boat for him and retrieved all his tackle and rig, and we can only think the Carp had found a sunken branch, as there should not have been a snag in the area.

This loss has been quickly forgotten due to the fact that he caught this immaculate 32-08 Common. This beautiful specimen looked so great that even Dave went on about the Carp for the rest of his shift! I think you can see what we mean from the shots above. Wafters fished over a spread of boilies (delivered by a throwing stick) doing the business for Steve.

Steve's lovely Common was the tenth different Carp over thirty pound caught so far this year. A total which also includes two 40's+. Last years total was 84 different Carp including 15 different 40+. My target is for this year is 90. I am of course dependent on anglers catching them as well as the receipt of decent photos of both sides so I can identify and track them properly.

Liam Hunt visited Cherry Lakes for the first time last week and stayed in Kingfisher Lodge on Cherry Springs with his artist partner Zowie Carr. I will confess that I was as interested in the progress of the fantastic painting she was creating as I was by Liam's fishing results!

After a slow start, Liam got among the fish. Indeed Wednesday morning started with a bang with a triple take. This resulted in the capture of a 21lb and 22lb Carp along with a Tench! During his stay he landed 16 Carp and three Tench, which if I can remember correctly included 4 twenties, as he also landed a 24lb Mirror (below)and this 27-10 Mirror above.

Both Steve and Liam left very happy and promising to return.