Huge 12lb 5oz Tench for Carl!

Carl catches huge 12lb 5oz tench

Just a few weeks ago, On 24th May, Carl Street caught a 3lb 11oz roach and 500lb of bream from his syndicate water in Bassingbourn, Cambridgeshire. Now he’s been amongst the tench and landed an absolute whopper of 12lb 5oz! Let Carl tell his own story:

“As I had the weekend free I thought it was time to target the tench on my syndicate carp water at Bassingbourn in Cambridgeshire.

Carl and his 12lb 5oz tench

“I arrived on the Friday afternoon (13th June) armed with two 1.25lb test curve rods fitted with Shimano 5000s loaded with 12lb line (in case of a rogue carp!). The hook was a size 10 barbless Raptor with a cocktail bait of hair-rigged corn and half lobworm.

“That first night went by with 6 bream.

“On Saturday I had more bream and one tench of 7lb 9oz and two carp of 18lb and 26lb 3oz.

“More bream again on Sunday morning to 9lb 10oz and two more mid-double carp and two tench 8lb 11oz and 9lb 2oz.

“On Monday morning, 16th June I was being picked up at the lake to go home at 8.30am so got up at 5am to start packing up. After seeing a couple of tench roll over the baited area I left the rods in and at around 7am the left hand rod alarm beeped once and then went off on a one-toner’.

“After playing what I thought was a carp for a while it became apparent, due to several surges to the bottom, that this was a big tench. Three minutes later though the fish came to the net and I knew straight away that this was easily a double-figure fish.

A slightly different view of Carl and his 12lb 5oz tench

“So in the weigh sling she went and the scales registered 12lb 5oz!

“An amazing looking specimen tench with a paddle tail that when opened must have been 5” plus in size. No wonder it gave a terrific fight!

“I slipped her in a keepnet until my mate turned up to give me a lift home. We then took some photos and returned the fish and she powered off into the lake.

“Hopefully we will see that incredible fish again one day.”