BRITISH record carp The Parrot has come out at 62 lb 10 oz... just weeks after carp legend Terry Hearn caught her at 63 lb.
The British record carp’s capture, albeit at a weight over 5 lb less than its all-time high, saw Dave Mattock end a ten-year search.
He’d been keenly aiming for the magnificent fish at Cranwells Lake on Berkshire’s Wasing Estate.
And Dave’s eventual success came after a change to Total Baits Cream Seed boilies this season.
The 39-year-old systems analyst from Crawley, West Sussex, explained: “I planned a four night session after the bank holiday.
“And with a high pressure that had been over a lot of the UK for about three weeks, I wasn’t feeling too confident with only one fish having come out all weekend.
“I did two nights in a swim pretty near to where I saw some fish moving but the swims were taken.
“But then fish started showing in front of a swim I knew was going to become free so I packed up and moved in there,” he said.
Carp fishing legend Terry Hearn was the last captor of Parrot, when it weighed in at 63 lb.
Clear spot on gravel bar
Dave continued: “I found myself a nice clear spot on a known bar, about 80 yards out that runs between the two islands on the lake.
“Just baiting up little and often, using a throwing stick to get the baits out, I went to bed feeling a lot more confident than when I had turned up.
“The fish screamed off at about 3am and plodded around for about 20 minutes.
“It felt like a good weight and really livened up as it came in close but it wasn’t until I peered over into the net that I saw the size of it that I knew I’d finally caught the Parrot.”
Ten-year effort rewarded
“I’ve been fishing Cranwells for ten years and this was the one fish that had eluded me for the whole time,” revealed Dave.
“In a way, I was kind of happy that I hadn’t caught it sooner, as it left me a target whilst I continued to catch all the other cracking fish that swim in Cranwells,” Dave concluded.
The whopper fell to a hinged stiff rig, with a 14 mm glugged Total Baits Cream Seed pop-up around matching freebies.
British record carp The Parrot holds current official crown at its peak weight of 68 lb 1 oz when caught by Dean Fletcher in January 2016.
Dean is pictured above with the much admired fish, which only occasionally slips up.
Last autumn another mirror carp, called Big Rig, was caught twice at Shropshire’s The Avenue at 69 lb 3 oz and 71 lb 4 oz…. well clear of Parrot’s all-time high.
But amid much controversy, the British Record Fish Committee announced it couldn’t be accepted as a record as it has been artificially been grown to that weight before being stocked.
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