Cants Mere 'Finding Your Frequency'

There is no death of matter, for throughout the infinite universe, all has to move, to vibrate, that is, to live.

~ Nikola Tesla

A few days ago I decided to pay a visit to a water that I hadn't fished for quite sometime. The temperatures were way up in the low 30's, I knew it was going to be a slow day. However, I managed to get an early bite which resulted in a lovely mirror just shy of 18IB. Nothing else came along but I can honestly say that it was one of the most enjoyable and profound days I'd spent out on the water for quite some time. Looking back through the years and the hundreds, if not thousands of sessions I've been on. There's always a handful that seem to be far more memorable than others, strangely, these aren't always the ones where I catch a fish. I've spoken before about being "in sync"  or "aligning" yourself  with the waters, this isn't something you can't teach someone or really even explain, periodically it just happens. I personally think it has a lot to do with how you translate the world around you. Simply put, it's those moments in time when every single aspect, both inside and outside of your environment, appears completely perfect. I'm not strictly talking about just fishing, it can be at any time and in any location. Being one to regularly tie myself in the knots of my thoughts, I wanted to try to suss out why and when these moments of perfect harmony happen. I believe it has a lot to do with vibration, frequency and resonance, that might sound rather ridiculous but I'll try to explain it the best I can. 

Constant Motion

Every single solitary thing in existence is vibrating at varying levels, and as still as everything may seem, nothing is truly resting. This also includes us as humans, I believe that, just like our DNA which is unique to us, we also have a unique frequency that we operate at. Depending on both your health and some external factors, these frequencies can fluctuate from time to time. When this happens I think that we're much more susceptible to illness, both mental and physical, we all have moments where we just don't feel in tune with ourselves. Lets take a look at color, each individual color vibrates differently to the next. Red has the lowest frequency whilst violet has the highest, why do we all have favorite colors?. Is this because our own personal resonance is very similar to that of the color we are attracted to?. Why do we get on well with certain people, and not so well with others?. Maybe the people we connect to straight away have a very similar vibratory rate to our own. The people we tend to dislike or clash with might be existing at a resonance that may well clash with our own, thus creating a 'discord' in the way we relate to each other. 

 

Sonically discords can be beautiful things, a discord in the right place can make a song sound fantastic. It can change the whole feel of a tune especially when it's followed by more straightforward 'standard' chord changes. However discords you can't necessarily see, in a spiritual sense, can be very damaging, maybe the origins of mental illness and other 'invisible' ailments are simply a discord/dis-ease within our own unique 'vibratory' rate or system. A perfect example of a discord or 'frequency clash' that we can all witness is the opera singer with a glass. Trained opera singers can sing a note so high with so much power that the frequency they reach clashes with that of the glass resulting in it to crack. That's a perfect example of how damaging certain vibrations that are not compatible with one another can be. However, taking the term 'opposites attract' into account, every so often two people or frequencies with opposing resonance can connect in some strange disjointed way resulting in the perfect fit. I can equate this to a standard chord progression in a song where you overdub and mix the corresponding discords in. In theory this shouldn't really work but 'sonically' it sounds and feels great.

When you look at music and musical instruments as a whole, it's all built up on resonance, vibrations and frequency. Music is, and will always be a universal language, it connects people all over the world. It bypasses language, reaches around the globe a million and one times - why is this?. Because it makes people feel something deep inside, something that they can't explain. This makes me realize that there are moments in life where it's far more important how something makes you feel as oppose to what it makes you think. Next time you listen to a certain song that makes your hairs stand up, focus on that feeling, there's a reason why that's happening, it's all got to do with a connection being made that doesn't need to be understood. One example I'd like to use is the song 'Comfortably Numb' by Pink Floyd, here's a tune that has connected, and continues to connect with millions of people everywhere. Not only that but it spans across generations and will continue to do so, now in 2018 it's still one of the most played songs on both the radio and streaming services. When it was written, you can almost guarantee that the band would've had absolutely no idea just how far that song was going to fly. They hit on something at a random moment in time where the stars aligned and something magic happened. Music is simply a variety of vibrations and frequencies that we can actively hear and feel, it must work the other way around, there must be frequencies and vibrations that have an equal effect that we can't actively hear or feel.

So what has all of this got to do with carp fishing? When I'm on the bank, profound things can happen, not only is there the constant possibility of landing a potential monster, you've got the dawn, the sunset and many possible 'poignant' moments that come in so many different forms. But for me, the most important thing of all is the connection, the 'aligning' of oneself to the environment and really feeling it. I believe this happens when your own personal resonance connects perfectly with the world around you. As mentioned earlier, this doesn't happen all the time, it's on the odd occasion and I put this down to the fact that, on the occasions when the frequencies in all the living things fluctuate and become closer to yours, you connect to them in a way you've never felt before. Your connection to the environment around you isn't something you achieve by thinking about it, just like music, it's something that you feel first and then from that feeling your thoughts will follow. Next time you're out on the bank and you hit a peak moment of complete peace and 'oneness' hold onto that moment, something profound is happening. 

So moving onto the session, this blog is going to account for another short trip up to Cant's mere. Due to work I was having to make the most of the time I had available, taking into consideration that on my last two visits, all bites had a habit of coming later on in the day. I didn't feel I was missing out on a great deal not turning up at the crack of dawn. After a quick job in the morning that saw me wrestling my way through the city streets of London. It was around 11:45am when I attempted to make my escape, as expected, it felt like whole world was doing it's best to stop me reaching the water. There was grid lock, road closures, road works, pretty much every obstacle imaginable. I sat tight, gritted my teeth and painfully limped towards the outer reaches of the city. Eventually the signs for the M25 came into view, I was getting closer, it was just a matter of propelling myself onward and up onto the A12. Once on the motorway the knot in stomach started to loosen, the concrete surroundings started to exchange themselves for lush green fields and meadows. I was starting to feel somewhat human again, just.

From The Capital To Countryside

For people out there that don't understand the slightly 'unhinged' mind of a carp angler, this may come across as an awful lot of effort to go through just to catch as fish. They may well be right but I don't have any waters local to me and I'll travel anywhere if I know the conditions are right and there's a chance of a bite.  Today the weather was fresh, nicely overcast with the occasional spot of drizzle, it screamed 'carp' so I had to go and get my fix, whatever obstacles stood in my way, denying myself the chance to cast a line just wasn't an option. By the time I arrived at the water it was early afternoon, I planned to fish until 7pm. I got all my tackle together quickly and made my way around to peg 8. I walked a lap of the lake just to see if I could see any obvious signs of fish. It all appeared quiet, due to the time constraint I decided I'd fish peg 8 again and approach it in the exact same way I had over the previous sessions, at this point "if it ain't broke, then there's no point in trying to fix it".

A few casts with a bare lead on braided line saw me locate both the bars that run from both points of the island. The right hand spot was still nice and clear, the left spot locked up slightly on the retrieve, that told me the weed was still there. If anything it actually felt like it had thickened up a little more since my last visit. I didn't want to fish a pop up so instead of messing around trying to find a slightly clearer patch I though I'd make own. I got my trusty 5oz Fox 'Grappling' lead out and gave it a few casts thinning out a nice little area to place my bait. The lead brought back some hefty clumps of weed, it was fresh and smelt good, no wonder I was getting a lot of bites from that specific spot. I had a very strong feeling, that if I was going to get a bite today it would be from the rig fished within the weed. 

Fox Grappling Lead 5oz

Bait wise, I was sticking with the Tiger-Fish, this has been producing the 'goods' for me lately so it was a 'no-brainer', to add something a little different. Both baits would be topped off with a single white 6mm 'Coconut Cream' pop up. This would add a nice little fleck visually, I like the idea of topping off slightly darker baits with a little bit of color. My rigs we're going to be the usual semi-fixed inlines, this session I'd upped the lead to 3.5oz. Both hook links were combi rigs using the 'Trigga-Link' in 30IB and Sufix 'Magician' in 25IB. These two specific materials blend really well together, I'm finding myself using more of the Sufix range since it all went a bit strange with Kryston. Once my old Kryston stock has been used I think I'll be using Sufix exclusively. I've been more than impressed with what they've got on offer, I'll be writing about some of the other materials they produce in future blogs. As most know, none of my rigs and presentations are complicated, however I find myself getting rather anal in regards to the end tackle that I'm prepared to use.

6mm Pop Ups

I don't want to be using something that isn't tried and tested, I'm not sure if the 'newly packaged' Kryston range is the same as the original. The original range was outstanding and it didn't need changing, it had years of reliability behind it. To be honest I'm becoming more and more disillusioned with what's coming out on the market for carp anglers, prices seem to be going up and quality is definitely going down. We're pummeled with 'gimmicks', 'fashions' and 'buzz items' that don't usually stand up to the job they're supposedly designed for, in my mind a lot of it is just cheaply made shit. That's why I've been finding myself looking at some of the 'lesser known' brands, it's these guys that have something to prove. Unlike the mainstream brands that appear to be resting on their laurels.

The Perfect Combination

  Separation

Both rods were clipped up and ready to deploy, I flicked the left one out first, the rig sailed through the air, kissed the clip and disappeared into the void. I waited, a few seconds later I received the 'DONK' I was looking for. The same procedure was repeated with the right rod, the rig sailed, kissed the clip, disappeared and delivered another perfect 'DONK'. Back leads were slid down both lines, I tightened up, hung the bobbins and proceeded to position myself for the inevitable wait. On all my previous sessions I'd got a little 'trigga-happy' with the throwing stick. Today I was going to adopt some constraint and opted for two heaped handfuls over each rod, I didn't have a great deal of time so I wanted just enough bait out there to pull them in. To be honest when Cants starts to receive a lot of angling pressure, which due to the fish it contains, is inevitable, I can see myself cutting right down on the amount of bait that I use. This has already started to happen on a few of my other waters. So much goes in all the time and I think it's starting to have a reverse effect, I personally think it makes the fishing a lot harder than it needs to be. When the carp have so much bait to chose from and get through, it's logic that the fishing will slow right down. I'm finding that a mouthful in the right location is proving far more productive nowadays, than shoveling it in.

View From The Swim

The afternoon crept along, the skies above were changing fast from gloomy heavy clouds with drizzle, separated by the occasional sunbeam piercing down on the surface of the water. It was one of those days where everything felt fresh and clean, it's hard to believe that only a few hours ago I was clawing my way through the rather unforgiving streets of London, this was literally a world away and it's a world that I feel very thankful for. It's impossible to feel grounded living in the city, everything around you creates friction, there's endless souls clashing into one another. Every where you turn people are racing around within an inch of their life chasing after 'the wage', 'the promotion', that one leg up that might just get them out the rut of it all, many though are working all the hours under the sun and still don't have another money to forge some kind of meaningful existence. When I witness this going on around me, very little of it makes sense and I find myself questioning exactly why we are put here. I'm positive it certainly isn't to work yourself into an early grave. Just as I started to sink into an abyss of contemplation, my right rod was away. 

The bite alarm was screaming, the clutch, equally as loud, the rod was bending round so tight, I could literally hear it moaning, all the bites from Cants go the same way, from nothing to chaos in three seconds flat. As I lifted the rod up I had no other choice than to just let the fish take line. It whizzed off to the left kiting tight towards the nearside margin, it was gunning for all the marginal snags. I sunk the rod to keep the line low and started to apply as much pressure as I thought I could get away with. I was slowly gaining a bit of ground but it wasn't really having any of it. Bolting out to the open water, it was darting all over the place, every time I thought I was starting to win, it would tear off, striping line as it went. Closer it came, I lowered the net into 'scooping' position and teased the carp towards me. This was a bad move, the second it spotted it, it fired off back out into the open. I was starting to get a little impatience but, from experience, the worst thing you can do is try to rush the situation. I held on, applied some more steady pressure and eventually eased a bloody lovely looking mirror over my net.

My First Cants Mirror

I was totally blown away with this fish, its lovely chocolate color complimented its majestic scale pattern perfectly, not only that, it put up one hell of a fight, one of the hardest I'd experienced from any previous Cants fish. A few pictures were taken, a 'thank you' was exchanged, and back she went. It was a really good call to clear a bit of the weed away to create a clearer spot to put my rig. I clipped up and pinged the bait back out, followed by another couple of handfuls of freebies. An hour or so past and with that came multiple shows very close to both my rods. It was clear that a few fish had made their way down, I sat quietly watching, poised on the edge of my seat. These situations can be both magical and tense all at the same time, you can't make those fish take your bait. You can only hope you've done enough right to help produce the desired end result. As the minutes continued to tick by the fish action increased, the wind picked up and the skies started to darken. Two things were going to happen, I was going to get another bite and leave victorious, or this magic moment would pass and I was going to get a drenching of a life time. Peering behind me, the clouds creeping ever closer in the distance were looking rather threatening.

Possible Armageddon

As I was sitting there visualizing the possibility of a Tsunami washing me down the proverbial drain, my left rod fired away .. result!. I was on it like lightening and another immense battle commenced, this fish pretty much mimicked the one that came before. The initial take was nuts, you couldn't really do anything, then it shot tight down to the left towards the snags. Just like before, I lowered the rod down into the water and applied side strain, holding my breath as I went. This fish was so close to getting under the branches, if I allowed that to happen I may as well kiss it goodbye. It was so tense, I felt a bit of grating on my line, I prayed that everything would stay intact. Gently it was coming closer, now out of the danger zone I lowered the net down and as the fish surfaced just out in front of me, I performed the penultimate 'scoop', in she went. The relief I felt was marginally indescribable, with the heavy weather moving ever closer I peaked down into the net to lay my eyes on the prize. It was an immaculate common carp, a fair sized one at that.

Minutes Before The Downpour

This carp was long, lean and as clean as you could get, a few pictures were taken and she was gently slipped back home. It was now my turn to slip back home, I had a sense that if I wasn't quick I'd be sailing. I got all my gear together and packed away in a very undignified fashion. I was half way between the lake and the van when the sky fractured and the heavens started dumping all its unwanted sins on my head. I slipped and slid back to the car park, threw everything in the back of the wagon and leapt into the driving seat. The rain drops were like bullets on the windscreen, I got another good soaking opening and closing the gate. The drive back to London was pretty treacherous, I had the fan going full blast to keep my windscreen clear, I was literally surfing along the surface of the A12. It had been a busy day, there I was in the teeth of the city, I escaped deep into the country, caught two pristine pieces of the wild and I'd literally sailed home. If anyone ever tells you that fishing is boring ....... don't listen to them.