Peter James lands a 42-02 heavily scaled Mirror from the Cottage swim

Autumn has finally arrived with a fall in both air and water temperatures. Since last Thursday the water has lost some 5C in temperature and this has slowed the fishing up. With Storm Babet coming it might turn them back on as the Carp no doubt now realise that winter is on its way and now is the time to get on the feed!

We have however had some cracking Carp caught and more than enough for this update. Interestingly all the anglers featured here were first time visitors to Cherry Lakes.

Cherry Lake is blessed with a good number of 30lb+ heavily scaled Mirror's. I am now delighted to confirm that we have our first 40lb+ heavily scaled Mirror. This was caught on Saturday by Chris Skelt from the Cherry Lake Cottage swim. I will admit to being surprised when the phone went to say that Chris had caught a big fish and did I want to pop along. Of course I did! I was surprised because Chris had only started fishing at 08.30!

I am not sure the photo does the Carp full justice. I can tell you that in the flesh this stunning creature looked huge and was good for every bit of its 42-02 measure on the scales.

This is our 14th different Carp over 40lb+ this year. Very nice indeed!

Stephen Carella and his family made the long trek down from Motherwell in Scotland to stay for the first time at Cherry Lakes in the Cottage this week. Stephen was delighted when his first cast (a Cherry Lakes Bio Fruit boilie topped with a matching pink topper, roared off less that 3 hours after casting (to be fair Stephen did cast to a showing fish). The big Common weighed in at 39-02 and sets a new PB for Stephen. See the photo above.

I was just passing around 13.30, earlier today, to see that Stephen had just landed a nice Mirror Carp of 26lb. I obviously got out of my car and was subsequently late for my appointment! The strong southerly winds having apparently turned the Carp on. Whilst we were doing the photos for the 26lber, with Stephen's hands full of fish, his other rod roared off.

In stepped young Harry (age 10!), who beat me to the rod (getting slow in my old age!) and did a good job of playing the Carp into the waiting net.

The lovely Common Carp weighed in at 34-08 and clearly represents a PB for Harry. Harry is on the right in the photo above. Well done young man!

Again Bio-Fruit boilies did the trick for both the 26 and 34-08 Carp.

Angling couple David and Debbie Ellis booked themselves into Kingfisher Lodge on Cherry Springs for their first visit to the complex.

They had a great time, as you can see from the feedback copy below. The 34-08 Mirror caught by David on Friday morning was a real stunner.

''Hi, Mike , I feel we need to say a big thank you for the wonderful experience we had on our recent visit, from the moment we drove through the gates to the last fish caught .

Dave was very helpful when showing us to the lodge and pointing out a few spots to start us off . We also appreciated the advice given by yourself.

We had 17 fish in total. Consisting of

1 single

12 doubles

3 twenties

And last but not least a 34-06 as we were packing up''.

Thanks Debbie and Dave. Well done on a good trip and thanks for all the photos and feedback. See you next time.

Well done to all of our first time guest featured here.