Every year since the first Total-Fishing.com/ACA match in 2003, I have had the pleasure of visiting Roy Marlows Glebe fishery. This is in my humble opinion one of the best fisherys in the country and I wish I lived closer.
This year due to work commitments I was unable to make the TF/ACA festival at the end of May, but not to miss out I was booked in for THE match of the year, the clash of North Vs Midlands Vs South. The Monkeys Vs The Muppetts Vs the Shandies.
The match was arranged to be fished over 2 days the first being running line only, with the second day to be any method allowed on the fishery. This was to be a team event with one man from each of the 3 teams in each section, the winner of the section getting 1 point down to 3 for last. After the 2 days fishing the team with the lowest points gets the bragging rights for the next year.
Both myself and the usual travelling partner Mark set off for the Longshoot Hotel nr Nuneaton(our base for the next couple of days) Thursday afternoon after work after a couple of very shakey moments which included Mark having to get his seatbox frame wielded up at the last minute and then Mark driving off only to see his wallet shoot of the roof of the car. Anyway with those events behind us we arrived safely at the hotel, unloaded the kit and headed to the bar for some drinks and food followed by a few of us trying our hand at a pub quiz and not doing so well and finally to bed late.
The following day dawned and promised to be very hot, so much so that I stopped at the local supermarket to get some sun cream.
We all met at the Glebe fishery where the usual pre draw banter was flowing, with this being a team event our captain Ricky Baxter drew one of 3 envelopes with the teams pegs in then we had to draw our peg from those in the envelopes. I did my usual and drew a crap peg. Peg 104 on pool 7, oddly enough I have had the pleasure of this peg twice before and both times previously I have struggled to catch anything from the peg.
My plan was to be to start on the feeder, while feeding pellet on the waggler line hoping to catch the carp shallow, all the while feeding down the edge looking to catch on the long rod.
At the all in I chucked my loaded feeder across to the far bank, and started to feed pellet on the waggler line. Almost immediately I could see fish milling around feeding on the pellet line, but decided to keep on the feeder and let the fish get a bit more confident. After an hour of fishing all I had managed on the feeder were a handful of skimmers and a perch, so I decided to have a crack on the pellet waggler, first cast and I was straight into a carp. Unfortunately that was all I managed on the pellet waggler and the feeder failed to produce any fish other than the odd skimmer.
All the while the Northern monkey who I was pitted against was catching the odd carp by fishing paste on the waggler just beyond the rod tip, seeing as I was not catching on either of my other lines and no fish were showing down the edge so I decided to follow suit and try to catch some fish on the paste. I quickly set the rig up and and within minutes I was into my second carp with several more following in the next hour before the bites went off and I was struggling again. As we were getting into the final hour I decided to lash some bait in down the edge to try and get a few fish to finish off with, and it worked. 10 mins after throwing in 2 pints of hemp some pellets, corn and caster there were tails and vortex's in the margins. This resulted in me managing to put a couple more fish in the net before the all out.
Unfortunately my efforts were not enough to win my section (of 2) and I ended the day pretty hacked off that I had been limited to fishing a rod and line when I know I could have got more out of the peg with the pole. But what really mattered was the Shandies managed to win day 1 by just 1 point so it would all hinge on the following days result.
Monday, 28 July 2008
Saturday, 10 May 2008
Friday 9th May - Rood Ashton evening match
Summer is finally here!! With temperatures hitting 24deg and light winds for the last few days, prospects of a good days fishing were looking good.
This was to be my first outing with a new club, as well as my first visit to Rood Ashton lake just outside Trowbridge. A venue that I had heard loads about but never got round to visiting.
With the draw set to be done a 5pm with fishing from 5.45 to 8.45 I had to get away from work early and be on the road in time to get to Wests Tackle in Trowbridge to sort my licence and meet up with Mark. I left home at about 3.20thinking that would give me more than enough time, but it was one of those afternoons where every moron was out trundling along at 40mph on a main road, also with the A36 being closed at Bath much of the through traffic was now being re-directed through Westbury and Trowbridge, I only just managed to get there in time.
After meeting with Mark we shot off to get to the venue, arriving with enough time to get our kit out and pay our pools. While waiting for the draw Mark and I went for a walk to look at the pegging, Mark pointed out the pegs that he would and wouldn't like to draw.
At the draw Mark was quite happy with his draw (Peg 9) this put him in the area where a match the evening before had been won from but I had drawn my usual duff peg (peg 1) No-one it appears wanted to draw my peg and I got various comments about not being in with a chance.
The peg itself was the nearest to the carpark, which is great when you have limited time to set up. As I was tackling up I could see plenty of fish moving around so felt quite confident of putting a few fish in the net.
There was one main feature of the peg that appealed to me, and that was the end of a large reed bed that stretched from in front of me right across to the other side of the lake, I decided on a main line at 14m against the reeds, the rig consisted of .20 main line to a 14 barbless carp feeder hook and a korum blob float attached to some tightened 14s elastic to give me half a chance of getting the fish out. I also fed 2 margin lines as a backup to rest my main lines both were long at about 13/14m one either side, these had a little more space to control the fish and were rigged up with a 4x10 dura float size 14 hook again to a purple hydro.
On the whistle I deposited a pot of Carp Vader 4mm pellets on each margin line before putting some paste on the hook and shipping it out to the reed bed. Almost straight away I had indications on the float but it took a few minutes to hook my first fish which bolted straight into the reed bed before I could react, by keeping the pole above the fishes head I eventually extracted a fish of about 2lb. With that first fish it became apparent some extreme measures were required for me to stop the fish getting into the reeds.
The next cast saw me hitting the bite by quickly dragging the pole to my left, this worked a treat and I soon had the carp going in the keep net rather than the reeds. After about an hour the fish backed off a little and the bites became hard to hit, so I decided to rest the line and try my left hand margin. This produced a couple of very quick fish then it went quiet so I re-fed and went back out against the reeds, this produced a couple of very quick fish before I snagged up on some line that looked thick enough to tow a truck. I pulled for a break, and unfortunately my elastic broke, this really put me off my stride, I set up another rig quickly enough on another top kit but I didn't have any more kits with a strong enough solid elastic and even though I was using tightened red drennan bungee it still had a little more stretch which meant that the fish were making it into reeds and my hooked to landed ratio went down but I kept enough fish going in the net till the last to keep me in contention.
Drawing peg 1 also meant that I had the honour of scales duty as well, seeing as there was another set of scales round the other side of the lake it seemed obvious that I should start with myself and work round, I got the angler on peg 2 weigh me in and was reasonably pleased to put 59lb 9oz which was the best weight out of those I weighed in and as it turned out enough for me to win the match, second place weighed in 53lb and Mark was 3rd with 50lb, as it turned out the lake had fished poorly and that had let me make the most out of a difficult peg.
This was to be my first outing with a new club, as well as my first visit to Rood Ashton lake just outside Trowbridge. A venue that I had heard loads about but never got round to visiting.
With the draw set to be done a 5pm with fishing from 5.45 to 8.45 I had to get away from work early and be on the road in time to get to Wests Tackle in Trowbridge to sort my licence and meet up with Mark. I left home at about 3.20thinking that would give me more than enough time, but it was one of those afternoons where every moron was out trundling along at 40mph on a main road, also with the A36 being closed at Bath much of the through traffic was now being re-directed through Westbury and Trowbridge, I only just managed to get there in time.
After meeting with Mark we shot off to get to the venue, arriving with enough time to get our kit out and pay our pools. While waiting for the draw Mark and I went for a walk to look at the pegging, Mark pointed out the pegs that he would and wouldn't like to draw.
At the draw Mark was quite happy with his draw (Peg 9) this put him in the area where a match the evening before had been won from but I had drawn my usual duff peg (peg 1) No-one it appears wanted to draw my peg and I got various comments about not being in with a chance.
The peg itself was the nearest to the carpark, which is great when you have limited time to set up. As I was tackling up I could see plenty of fish moving around so felt quite confident of putting a few fish in the net.
There was one main feature of the peg that appealed to me, and that was the end of a large reed bed that stretched from in front of me right across to the other side of the lake, I decided on a main line at 14m against the reeds, the rig consisted of .20 main line to a 14 barbless carp feeder hook and a korum blob float attached to some tightened 14s elastic to give me half a chance of getting the fish out. I also fed 2 margin lines as a backup to rest my main lines both were long at about 13/14m one either side, these had a little more space to control the fish and were rigged up with a 4x10 dura float size 14 hook again to a purple hydro.
On the whistle I deposited a pot of Carp Vader 4mm pellets on each margin line before putting some paste on the hook and shipping it out to the reed bed. Almost straight away I had indications on the float but it took a few minutes to hook my first fish which bolted straight into the reed bed before I could react, by keeping the pole above the fishes head I eventually extracted a fish of about 2lb. With that first fish it became apparent some extreme measures were required for me to stop the fish getting into the reeds.
The next cast saw me hitting the bite by quickly dragging the pole to my left, this worked a treat and I soon had the carp going in the keep net rather than the reeds. After about an hour the fish backed off a little and the bites became hard to hit, so I decided to rest the line and try my left hand margin. This produced a couple of very quick fish then it went quiet so I re-fed and went back out against the reeds, this produced a couple of very quick fish before I snagged up on some line that looked thick enough to tow a truck. I pulled for a break, and unfortunately my elastic broke, this really put me off my stride, I set up another rig quickly enough on another top kit but I didn't have any more kits with a strong enough solid elastic and even though I was using tightened red drennan bungee it still had a little more stretch which meant that the fish were making it into reeds and my hooked to landed ratio went down but I kept enough fish going in the net till the last to keep me in contention.
Drawing peg 1 also meant that I had the honour of scales duty as well, seeing as there was another set of scales round the other side of the lake it seemed obvious that I should start with myself and work round, I got the angler on peg 2 weigh me in and was reasonably pleased to put 59lb 9oz which was the best weight out of those I weighed in and as it turned out enough for me to win the match, second place weighed in 53lb and Mark was 3rd with 50lb, as it turned out the lake had fished poorly and that had let me make the most out of a difficult peg.
Sunday, 4 May 2008
Todber Manor Wadmill lake.
Today's plan was to put in some practice on the pellet waggler ready for an upcoming float only league being fished on a variety of venues. But as with everything I seem to do at the moment it all went a little wrong, well a complete waste of time TBH.
I got down to the lake early to try and get a couple of decent pegs for Mark and myself, I chose a couple of swims in the middle of the lake and while waiting for Mark decided to set my kit up in a swim looking out over open water, the intention was to start fishing the waggler on the deck and come up in the water. Just as I was getting set up Mark arrived and settled into the next peg to my right looking at the point of an island, his plan was the same as mine but he would fish over to the point of the island again starting on the deck but aiming to get them on the pellet waggler a bit later on.
We started fishing and as expected Mark was getting indications straight away and 5 Min's in hooked and lost his first fish, a further 5 min after that he hooked and this time landed a big F1 about 2lb. All the while I was playing around with depths etc.. trying to get presentation right, surprisingly the weather forecast was wrong again and we had quite strong winds and later in the sessions thunder, lightning and heavy rain, which made presentation particularly difficult.
An hour went by and apart for a couple of quick knocks I had yet to have a bite, Mark mean while had managed to put a couple more fish in the net but was missing bite indicating that the fish had come up in the water. A switch to a dumpy waggler saw him catch another couple of fish fairly quickly
2 hours in and I had yet to get a bite Mark had about 6 fish and things were not looking good. I decided to switch to the pole and see if I could catch some on the paste. It took me about half an hour before I got my first indication which provided me with my first fish, a bream of about 5lb , next drop in I hooked another one, but the hook pulled, then another drop in and I hooked what felt like a carp but again the hook pulled. That went up the bank for a while and out went the waggler again, for the next couple of hours I switched between the pole and the waggler and put in a stunning display of catching nothing. Finally the float on the paste rig shot away and I was again rewarded with a bream, that I suspected was the same fish as they were both missing most of their tail.
Well, that was it for me. I had successfully managed to visit a lake solid with carp and avoid every one of them, Mark finished up with 11 fish up to about 8lb and we both set off for home soaking wet and totally fed up.
I got down to the lake early to try and get a couple of decent pegs for Mark and myself, I chose a couple of swims in the middle of the lake and while waiting for Mark decided to set my kit up in a swim looking out over open water, the intention was to start fishing the waggler on the deck and come up in the water. Just as I was getting set up Mark arrived and settled into the next peg to my right looking at the point of an island, his plan was the same as mine but he would fish over to the point of the island again starting on the deck but aiming to get them on the pellet waggler a bit later on.
We started fishing and as expected Mark was getting indications straight away and 5 Min's in hooked and lost his first fish, a further 5 min after that he hooked and this time landed a big F1 about 2lb. All the while I was playing around with depths etc.. trying to get presentation right, surprisingly the weather forecast was wrong again and we had quite strong winds and later in the sessions thunder, lightning and heavy rain, which made presentation particularly difficult.
An hour went by and apart for a couple of quick knocks I had yet to have a bite, Mark mean while had managed to put a couple more fish in the net but was missing bite indicating that the fish had come up in the water. A switch to a dumpy waggler saw him catch another couple of fish fairly quickly
2 hours in and I had yet to get a bite Mark had about 6 fish and things were not looking good. I decided to switch to the pole and see if I could catch some on the paste. It took me about half an hour before I got my first indication which provided me with my first fish, a bream of about 5lb , next drop in I hooked another one, but the hook pulled, then another drop in and I hooked what felt like a carp but again the hook pulled. That went up the bank for a while and out went the waggler again, for the next couple of hours I switched between the pole and the waggler and put in a stunning display of catching nothing. Finally the float on the paste rig shot away and I was again rewarded with a bream, that I suspected was the same fish as they were both missing most of their tail.
Well, that was it for me. I had successfully managed to visit a lake solid with carp and avoid every one of them, Mark finished up with 11 fish up to about 8lb and we both set off for home soaking wet and totally fed up.
Sunday, 27 April 2008
Todber manor park lake 27th April
Will this summer ever get started? Well yesterday (saturday) wasn't bad but I was busy doing some gardening, which left me with today. The forecast was breezy and wet and the only reason I was looking forward to it was because it was on the Park Lake at Todber Manor. I venue I enjoy fishing and usually do quite well on.
Well the day started with me cooking breakfast for Mark and myself, its always better to go fishing on a full stomach, while I cooked Mark loaded my kit ready to get down to the lake. With breakie eaten we make the 5 min trip from my house down to todber and arrived to find quite a few already there keen to get going. Very quickly we were mugged for our pools money before taking a walk with Tim Suttle who was running the match to work out the pegging, although when the draw was made, there was obviously a mistake because several people including myself ended up on pegs that weren't going to be put in.
I found myself for a change on a reasonable draw, Peg 30. As everyone started to get settled I discovered that I had 2 spare pegs to my left and the pleasure of Ian Hornby (Herbie for those who know him from TF fame.) on my right.
Looking at my peg I was pleased to see a couple of nice holes in the far bank grasses which on this venue is usually a bonus. My plan of attack was initially based on 3 lines, 1 against the far bank, 1 at 11m down the middle and a 3rd line in my left hand margin. And for me on this venue the chief bait is paste for all three lines. I had 2 pastes with me that I make at home, the first is my trusty basic paste made with ground pellets and the second was a paste I had made with some carp vader predator+ pellets ground up with water added. This produced a really nice vivid red paste with an interesting odour.... And as it turned out very effective texture.
On to the match then, on the all it I potted my usual mixture of hemp and pellets onto the margin and track lines, then popped some paste on the hook and shipped out to far bank. Fairly quickly I had a couple of fish but it was obvious that the fish were mooching around off the deck rather than getting their heads down due to lots of missed bites. I spent the next hour switching between rigs trying to put a few fish together but struggled with lots of missed bites and foul hooked fish and with a tricky wind I also kept hooking up in the far bank grass.
By now I had hoped that my track paste line would be solid with fish, first drop in and I was getting indications many of which I was missing, eventually I managed to hit one of these iffy bites which turned out to be a small F1 not the proper carp that I usually manage on the 11m line. It soon became apparent that the lake wasn't fishing as well as normal and some changes needed to be made.
I felt that I had overfed the paste line, so the only thing I could do was to decide on a different line and start again. This turned out to be an inspired move as after feeding a small amount of pellets and letting it settle for 30min I went over it and started to pick up the odd fish, by letting the paste feed the swim it started to get stronger and stronger and this time I was catching proper carp averaging 3lb. By resting the swim occasionally and going down the edge I managed to get into a steady rhythm, that was until I trashed my main paste rig after snagging up. Even though I put an identical rig on it just didn't sit right and I couldn't get back fully into my catching rhythm for the last hour.
On the final whistle I felt I'd done a reasonable weight but not enough to win anything, those drawn further down the section to my right had appeared to be sacking all day and looked set to weigh in some big weights. First to weigh in was eventual match winner Kev Abigail on end peg 37 one of the ones that appeared to be sacking from beginning to end. Kev put 112lb on the scales, then the weights dropped to 70lb followed by 66lb until they got to me, I was quite surprised to put 90lb 08oz on the scales which was second until Guy Manton on peg 25 put 92lb exactly to push me back to 3rd.
Ultimately an interesting match in which I had to really work to get the best out of the peg.
Well the day started with me cooking breakfast for Mark and myself, its always better to go fishing on a full stomach, while I cooked Mark loaded my kit ready to get down to the lake. With breakie eaten we make the 5 min trip from my house down to todber and arrived to find quite a few already there keen to get going. Very quickly we were mugged for our pools money before taking a walk with Tim Suttle who was running the match to work out the pegging, although when the draw was made, there was obviously a mistake because several people including myself ended up on pegs that weren't going to be put in.
I found myself for a change on a reasonable draw, Peg 30. As everyone started to get settled I discovered that I had 2 spare pegs to my left and the pleasure of Ian Hornby (Herbie for those who know him from TF fame.) on my right.
Looking at my peg I was pleased to see a couple of nice holes in the far bank grasses which on this venue is usually a bonus. My plan of attack was initially based on 3 lines, 1 against the far bank, 1 at 11m down the middle and a 3rd line in my left hand margin. And for me on this venue the chief bait is paste for all three lines. I had 2 pastes with me that I make at home, the first is my trusty basic paste made with ground pellets and the second was a paste I had made with some carp vader predator+ pellets ground up with water added. This produced a really nice vivid red paste with an interesting odour.... And as it turned out very effective texture.
On to the match then, on the all it I potted my usual mixture of hemp and pellets onto the margin and track lines, then popped some paste on the hook and shipped out to far bank. Fairly quickly I had a couple of fish but it was obvious that the fish were mooching around off the deck rather than getting their heads down due to lots of missed bites. I spent the next hour switching between rigs trying to put a few fish together but struggled with lots of missed bites and foul hooked fish and with a tricky wind I also kept hooking up in the far bank grass.
By now I had hoped that my track paste line would be solid with fish, first drop in and I was getting indications many of which I was missing, eventually I managed to hit one of these iffy bites which turned out to be a small F1 not the proper carp that I usually manage on the 11m line. It soon became apparent that the lake wasn't fishing as well as normal and some changes needed to be made.
I felt that I had overfed the paste line, so the only thing I could do was to decide on a different line and start again. This turned out to be an inspired move as after feeding a small amount of pellets and letting it settle for 30min I went over it and started to pick up the odd fish, by letting the paste feed the swim it started to get stronger and stronger and this time I was catching proper carp averaging 3lb. By resting the swim occasionally and going down the edge I managed to get into a steady rhythm, that was until I trashed my main paste rig after snagging up. Even though I put an identical rig on it just didn't sit right and I couldn't get back fully into my catching rhythm for the last hour.
On the final whistle I felt I'd done a reasonable weight but not enough to win anything, those drawn further down the section to my right had appeared to be sacking all day and looked set to weigh in some big weights. First to weigh in was eventual match winner Kev Abigail on end peg 37 one of the ones that appeared to be sacking from beginning to end. Kev put 112lb on the scales, then the weights dropped to 70lb followed by 66lb until they got to me, I was quite surprised to put 90lb 08oz on the scales which was second until Guy Manton on peg 25 put 92lb exactly to push me back to 3rd.
Ultimately an interesting match in which I had to really work to get the best out of the peg.
Tuesday, 22 April 2008
Wednesday 2nd April - Viaduct
Well, I have got a bit behind lately with this blog due to work and home commitments. Anyway I have now started to catch up and I begin with the wednesday open I fished at Viaduct in Somerton to try and get up to speed before the Fish-o-mania qualifier that I had managed a ticket for.
This time rather than my usual travelling partner Mark Poppleton, I was being picked up by a good friend from work Mark Brennan who fishes for Thatchers. He collected me nice and early to give us plenty of time to get there and get the kit out the van before the draw, I prefer it that way because I can get straight off to my peg and give myself as much time as I can to set up.
At the draw I was first in the Que and hoping for peg 85 or 86 on Cary, but as per usual I managed to NOT draw either of those pegs and pulled out Peg 102 on Cary. Having never fished the peg, I spoke to Matt Parsons (Son of one of the lakes owners.) about the peg I had drawn, and he confirmed my fears that it wasn't too good a draw. But after my last session at Willinghurst I left for my peg hoping that the fish had decided to move about a bit.
As it turned out I was pleased to find that I had an end peg with no-one any closer to the carpark that was off to my left, and a spare peg between me and the next angler so felt that I had a reasonable chance to catch a few fish with the space I had.
After plumbing around I decided on 3 pole lines the first was to be long at 14.5m fishing pellet for the carp, the second was at 6m for the skimmers if the carp were not playing ball. (Viaduct usually pays top 2 silvers weights as well as top 3 overall.) and the 3rd was long down the margins to my left in front of the next pallet. With the wind blowing in against the bank I really fancied it for a few fish. The finally I set up my trusty lead rod to fish out towards the middle of the lake, this was to be my opening line while the pole lines settled.
I spent the first hour fishing the lead trying to snare a few carp on the lead with double Carp Vader halibut crab pellets on the hair. Feeding hard pellets over the top via the catapult, to say it was rather slow would be exaggerating. It took me 40min to get my first bite which resulted in a tench, then a further 20min before I put my first carp in the net. This was about the time the wheels really fell off.
My plan had been to spend the first hour or so fishing for the carp, and unless I was catching well switch to the skimmers for the following 4 hours before switching back to the carp. While setting up the wind was stiff but manageable, but as the match started the wind began to get stronger to the point that I couldn't fish my 14.5m pole line, which was OK because I'd fed at 6m for the skimmers or so I thought.
First put in on my skimmer line and it was obvious that it was solid, as the float just settled then disappeared. Most of the fish I was catching were about 4 to 6oz but I felt confident that if I kept the bait going in the bigger fish would move in. But the problem of the wind was getting worse and had started to cause me to loose fish, as I was hooking the fish and the wind would catch the pole and tear the hook out of their mouths. I gave it about half an hour before giving up as to do a weight you need to be putting fish steadily in the net and I was losing fish after fish due to the wind.
This left me with 1 choice, and that was to go back out on the tip for the carp, the thing is it can be boring fishing when your not getting many bites, and bites were hard to come by and there appeared to be no pattern to it except that I'd get a couple of carp then nothing for ages and no matter what I did I just couldn't keep the coming.
After a while the wind calmed down enough for me to try my margin line, and although I was convinced that I'd catch a few down the edge, I didn't even have a bite. It was one of those matches where I was glad to hear the final whistle and wasn't surprised when I weighed in 46lb and I would guess last in the section the match was won by Martin Preston off of peg 85 with 207lb. I was apperent at the end of the match that the fish were still shoaled quite tight as Dave Britten 2 pegs away on peg 87 had struggled for just a handfull of fish.
This time rather than my usual travelling partner Mark Poppleton, I was being picked up by a good friend from work Mark Brennan who fishes for Thatchers. He collected me nice and early to give us plenty of time to get there and get the kit out the van before the draw, I prefer it that way because I can get straight off to my peg and give myself as much time as I can to set up.
At the draw I was first in the Que and hoping for peg 85 or 86 on Cary, but as per usual I managed to NOT draw either of those pegs and pulled out Peg 102 on Cary. Having never fished the peg, I spoke to Matt Parsons (Son of one of the lakes owners.) about the peg I had drawn, and he confirmed my fears that it wasn't too good a draw. But after my last session at Willinghurst I left for my peg hoping that the fish had decided to move about a bit.
As it turned out I was pleased to find that I had an end peg with no-one any closer to the carpark that was off to my left, and a spare peg between me and the next angler so felt that I had a reasonable chance to catch a few fish with the space I had.
After plumbing around I decided on 3 pole lines the first was to be long at 14.5m fishing pellet for the carp, the second was at 6m for the skimmers if the carp were not playing ball. (Viaduct usually pays top 2 silvers weights as well as top 3 overall.) and the 3rd was long down the margins to my left in front of the next pallet. With the wind blowing in against the bank I really fancied it for a few fish. The finally I set up my trusty lead rod to fish out towards the middle of the lake, this was to be my opening line while the pole lines settled.
I spent the first hour fishing the lead trying to snare a few carp on the lead with double Carp Vader halibut crab pellets on the hair. Feeding hard pellets over the top via the catapult, to say it was rather slow would be exaggerating. It took me 40min to get my first bite which resulted in a tench, then a further 20min before I put my first carp in the net. This was about the time the wheels really fell off.
My plan had been to spend the first hour or so fishing for the carp, and unless I was catching well switch to the skimmers for the following 4 hours before switching back to the carp. While setting up the wind was stiff but manageable, but as the match started the wind began to get stronger to the point that I couldn't fish my 14.5m pole line, which was OK because I'd fed at 6m for the skimmers or so I thought.
First put in on my skimmer line and it was obvious that it was solid, as the float just settled then disappeared. Most of the fish I was catching were about 4 to 6oz but I felt confident that if I kept the bait going in the bigger fish would move in. But the problem of the wind was getting worse and had started to cause me to loose fish, as I was hooking the fish and the wind would catch the pole and tear the hook out of their mouths. I gave it about half an hour before giving up as to do a weight you need to be putting fish steadily in the net and I was losing fish after fish due to the wind.
This left me with 1 choice, and that was to go back out on the tip for the carp, the thing is it can be boring fishing when your not getting many bites, and bites were hard to come by and there appeared to be no pattern to it except that I'd get a couple of carp then nothing for ages and no matter what I did I just couldn't keep the coming.
After a while the wind calmed down enough for me to try my margin line, and although I was convinced that I'd catch a few down the edge, I didn't even have a bite. It was one of those matches where I was glad to hear the final whistle and wasn't surprised when I weighed in 46lb and I would guess last in the section the match was won by Martin Preston off of peg 85 with 207lb. I was apperent at the end of the match that the fish were still shoaled quite tight as Dave Britten 2 pegs away on peg 87 had struggled for just a handfull of fish.
Monday, 24 March 2008
Willinghurst Top Lake
Have you ever had one of those days where you've arrived at the fishery looked at the weather conditions and decided that you must be a complete lunatic and should have stayed in bed? Well this was one of those days.
Due to taking my daughter to stay with her grandparents in Crawley over Easter, I found myself at a loose end so decided to make the most of the journey and take in a match at a different venue for a change. Through the winter I tend to stay fairly local sticking mainly to venues that I know will produce a few fish no matter what the conditions, but come the spring I like to spread my wings a bit and try places further afield.
Anyway, I arrived at the cabin where I discovered the 6 other blokes who were fishing the match sheltering from the howling wind. A discussion was going on about which pegs would be used on top lake, the aim being to put people on the fish but also where they would have the wind off their backs to make life a little comfortable. With peg decided upon the draw was made, the favored pegs were 7 or 8 either side of the aerator but my drawing arm failed again as is usual and pulled out peg 10, I was almost immediately told that I was the wrong end of the lake and that the fish had been showing around the aerator.
I decided to feed and fish 3 lines, my main line and the one I expected to catch the most fish on was the lead cast toward the centre of the lake, the second line was the long pole at 13m and finally a line in the margin toward my right, tight in against a nice fishy looking bed of reeds.
On the all in I fed a small amount of micro pellet and corn on the pole lines then cast the lead out. Within minutes I could see that the chap to my right on peg 9 was playing a fish, as was Ian Summers on peg 7 this set the tone for the first half of the match and it soon became obvious that I was fishing for second.
After about 15Min's I had my first indication of fish with a quick liner, then a few moments later the tip wrapped round and I had my first fish a common that I estimated went about 5lb. 10 Min's later the same thing happened and I put a second fish in the net. That was it for the next 2 hours, I came off the lead for a while and tried the pole to no avail, what didn't help was the lake was towing hard in the opposite direction to the wind and made it impossible to present a bait on the pole. 2 1/2 hours into the match and the tip finally went round again out of the blue and a smaller mirror of about 2lb went into the net. Why is it that those little fish go off like rockets and cause more problems when you try and net them than fish 4 times their size?
At this stage the cold wind and the shock of catching a fish forced me off my box down to the cabin to get a cup of tea and a hot pie, that is one of the best bits of fishing commercials in the winter. I returned to my peg and chucked out the lead again with double hair rigged corn and proceeded to eat my pie which warmed me up considerably, the fish were kind enough to let me finish the pie but didn't wait for me to finish drinking my cuppa. A pattern started to emerge in the second half of the match, by catapulting a few pellets over the lead I found I was getting a fish on average every 10 Min's this continued right through to the end of the match.
I was the first to be weighed in, before pulling my net out I estimated I had maybe 40lb and for those that don't know Willinghurst they have a 65lb per net rule. As I pulled my net out I realised that I had too much in the 1 net, it took 2 weighs to find that my actual weight was 74lb but due to the rules at Willinghurst this was capped at 65lb. To say I wasn't impressed by myself is an understatement and being first to weigh in wasn't sure what it could cost me. I was pretty sure that Ian Summers on peg 7 had won the match as every time I looked up he was playing a fish. Following the scales along I discovered that I had beaten everyone up to Ian,and waited to see what he weighed. A couple of weighs later and I discovered it was close with Ian putting 79lb on the scales to take top spot, I breathed a sigh of relief that my error in estimating the fish in my net hadn't cost me the match and I still managed to hang on to 2nd spot and a brown envelope. Not a bad days work really on a lake I have never fished before and from a peg that I was told was the wrong end of the lake, goes to show you never know.
Due to taking my daughter to stay with her grandparents in Crawley over Easter, I found myself at a loose end so decided to make the most of the journey and take in a match at a different venue for a change. Through the winter I tend to stay fairly local sticking mainly to venues that I know will produce a few fish no matter what the conditions, but come the spring I like to spread my wings a bit and try places further afield.
Anyway, I arrived at the cabin where I discovered the 6 other blokes who were fishing the match sheltering from the howling wind. A discussion was going on about which pegs would be used on top lake, the aim being to put people on the fish but also where they would have the wind off their backs to make life a little comfortable. With peg decided upon the draw was made, the favored pegs were 7 or 8 either side of the aerator but my drawing arm failed again as is usual and pulled out peg 10, I was almost immediately told that I was the wrong end of the lake and that the fish had been showing around the aerator.
I decided to feed and fish 3 lines, my main line and the one I expected to catch the most fish on was the lead cast toward the centre of the lake, the second line was the long pole at 13m and finally a line in the margin toward my right, tight in against a nice fishy looking bed of reeds.
On the all in I fed a small amount of micro pellet and corn on the pole lines then cast the lead out. Within minutes I could see that the chap to my right on peg 9 was playing a fish, as was Ian Summers on peg 7 this set the tone for the first half of the match and it soon became obvious that I was fishing for second.
After about 15Min's I had my first indication of fish with a quick liner, then a few moments later the tip wrapped round and I had my first fish a common that I estimated went about 5lb. 10 Min's later the same thing happened and I put a second fish in the net. That was it for the next 2 hours, I came off the lead for a while and tried the pole to no avail, what didn't help was the lake was towing hard in the opposite direction to the wind and made it impossible to present a bait on the pole. 2 1/2 hours into the match and the tip finally went round again out of the blue and a smaller mirror of about 2lb went into the net. Why is it that those little fish go off like rockets and cause more problems when you try and net them than fish 4 times their size?
At this stage the cold wind and the shock of catching a fish forced me off my box down to the cabin to get a cup of tea and a hot pie, that is one of the best bits of fishing commercials in the winter. I returned to my peg and chucked out the lead again with double hair rigged corn and proceeded to eat my pie which warmed me up considerably, the fish were kind enough to let me finish the pie but didn't wait for me to finish drinking my cuppa. A pattern started to emerge in the second half of the match, by catapulting a few pellets over the lead I found I was getting a fish on average every 10 Min's this continued right through to the end of the match.
I was the first to be weighed in, before pulling my net out I estimated I had maybe 40lb and for those that don't know Willinghurst they have a 65lb per net rule. As I pulled my net out I realised that I had too much in the 1 net, it took 2 weighs to find that my actual weight was 74lb but due to the rules at Willinghurst this was capped at 65lb. To say I wasn't impressed by myself is an understatement and being first to weigh in wasn't sure what it could cost me. I was pretty sure that Ian Summers on peg 7 had won the match as every time I looked up he was playing a fish. Following the scales along I discovered that I had beaten everyone up to Ian,and waited to see what he weighed. A couple of weighs later and I discovered it was close with Ian putting 79lb on the scales to take top spot, I breathed a sigh of relief that my error in estimating the fish in my net hadn't cost me the match and I still managed to hang on to 2nd spot and a brown envelope. Not a bad days work really on a lake I have never fished before and from a peg that I was told was the wrong end of the lake, goes to show you never know.
Sunday, 23 March 2008
Kennet and Avon canal, Devizes
This was another session that didn't go quite as planned or hoped. Mark and myself had arranged to meet Ken Rayner and Tim Suttle at the canal for a little friendly knock up and a chance to see if the big fish had woken up from their winter slumber yet.
We had hoped to fish a pound at the top of the Cain hill locks called Curries but during the week preceding we discovered that the pound had been virtually drained out, probably for maintenance. The decision was made to head to the bottom of Cain hill and fish one of the last pounds called fox hangers.
On arrival at the canal it actually looked in quite good shape with a nice bit of colour that left us all feeling confident of a few fish. A hastily arranged draw saw Ken sit himself down on the end peg nearest the upper lock gate, next in line was Tim with a jungle opposite then there was me and finally Mark had the downstream end peg, with a huge sum of £1 each thrown into the pot things could get interesting.
The pounds at the bottom of Cain hill are noted for the number of carp that reside in them, particularly the pound above where we were fishing so we were all aiming to target the carp in our approaches.
For me this meant fish the bomb and pellet or corn against the far bank for the Carp. On the pole I decided to fish 2 lines, the first at 9m where I was feeding groundbait and pinkie for the small silvers, and a longer line at 14.5m feeding pellet and corn mainly for the skimmers but hoping the odd carp may venture away from the far bank .
I started by cupping in a couple of balls of groundbait with pinkie and a pinch of caster at 9m, then a ball of fishmeal groundbait with some pellet in at 14.5m then left these to settle and cast the lead over to the far bank and sat back in anticipation.
The first sign that something wasn't quite right came from Tim who is an accomplished canal angler. He had started on a bread line at 3m, and after 5Min's hadn't had the slightest indication of any fish let alone a bite. As Tim put it, you know things are going to be rock hard when you can't get an immediate response on the bread.
During this time Mark had like me been fishing the lead near to the far bank and had been getting plenty of liners to show that there were fish in his peg but had failed to get and proper bites. After half an hour of this he decided to drop in on his long pole line to see if the liners were coming from fish over his pellet. And immediate response from a small skimmer made us think that the fish had moved over the pellet but alas it was just a solitary fish.
A couple of hours into the session it was evident that something wasn't right, the canal looked OK but we had caught about 10 fish between the 4 of us. I think we all knew that for some reason the fish didn't want to feed at all and that we had probably killed our swims dead with our initial feed. Meanwhile Mark latched into what appeared to be a carp on the pole and carefully played it for about 5 Min's before the fish made a last ditch bid for freedom going under his keepnet at his feet and breaking him. On such a hard day, I did find myself feeling slightly sorry for him but that only lasted a couple of seconds because the main task on any day's fishing is to batter Mark and it would have made that impossible if he'd landed that fish.
Another hour or so passed in which we all managed to put a couple of small fish in the net but then the next calamity struck.
Tim was only able to stay until about 1pm because he wanted to get back to watch the footie, so he packed up and left way before us. Shortly after he left Mark phone rang, it was Tim apparently our cars had been locked in by the landowner. As we understood it we were OK to park where we had met, but it turned out that it wasn't OK and the landowner had got the hump and decided to lock the gates and was threatening to get the cars towed away.
Luckily Mark is both a big chap and a very good diplomat, he trotted on down the towpath to have a chat with the landowner and after half an hour of discussions the chap relented and unlocked the gate giving us a reasonable amount of time to pack up our stuff and get going.
This was an unfortunate end to the day but it did save us the embarrassment of weighing in, Ken did weigh his net and had just over 3lb of bits. I would estimate that my net wasn't any better and Mark tipped back about 4 skimmers and a couple of small perch. Much to Kens disappointment we called the result void as we didn't get to finish fishing properly.
We had hoped to fish a pound at the top of the Cain hill locks called Curries but during the week preceding we discovered that the pound had been virtually drained out, probably for maintenance. The decision was made to head to the bottom of Cain hill and fish one of the last pounds called fox hangers.
On arrival at the canal it actually looked in quite good shape with a nice bit of colour that left us all feeling confident of a few fish. A hastily arranged draw saw Ken sit himself down on the end peg nearest the upper lock gate, next in line was Tim with a jungle opposite then there was me and finally Mark had the downstream end peg, with a huge sum of £1 each thrown into the pot things could get interesting.
The pounds at the bottom of Cain hill are noted for the number of carp that reside in them, particularly the pound above where we were fishing so we were all aiming to target the carp in our approaches.
For me this meant fish the bomb and pellet or corn against the far bank for the Carp. On the pole I decided to fish 2 lines, the first at 9m where I was feeding groundbait and pinkie for the small silvers, and a longer line at 14.5m feeding pellet and corn mainly for the skimmers but hoping the odd carp may venture away from the far bank .
I started by cupping in a couple of balls of groundbait with pinkie and a pinch of caster at 9m, then a ball of fishmeal groundbait with some pellet in at 14.5m then left these to settle and cast the lead over to the far bank and sat back in anticipation.
The first sign that something wasn't quite right came from Tim who is an accomplished canal angler. He had started on a bread line at 3m, and after 5Min's hadn't had the slightest indication of any fish let alone a bite. As Tim put it, you know things are going to be rock hard when you can't get an immediate response on the bread.
During this time Mark had like me been fishing the lead near to the far bank and had been getting plenty of liners to show that there were fish in his peg but had failed to get and proper bites. After half an hour of this he decided to drop in on his long pole line to see if the liners were coming from fish over his pellet. And immediate response from a small skimmer made us think that the fish had moved over the pellet but alas it was just a solitary fish.
A couple of hours into the session it was evident that something wasn't right, the canal looked OK but we had caught about 10 fish between the 4 of us. I think we all knew that for some reason the fish didn't want to feed at all and that we had probably killed our swims dead with our initial feed. Meanwhile Mark latched into what appeared to be a carp on the pole and carefully played it for about 5 Min's before the fish made a last ditch bid for freedom going under his keepnet at his feet and breaking him. On such a hard day, I did find myself feeling slightly sorry for him but that only lasted a couple of seconds because the main task on any day's fishing is to batter Mark and it would have made that impossible if he'd landed that fish.
Another hour or so passed in which we all managed to put a couple of small fish in the net but then the next calamity struck.
Tim was only able to stay until about 1pm because he wanted to get back to watch the footie, so he packed up and left way before us. Shortly after he left Mark phone rang, it was Tim apparently our cars had been locked in by the landowner. As we understood it we were OK to park where we had met, but it turned out that it wasn't OK and the landowner had got the hump and decided to lock the gates and was threatening to get the cars towed away.
Luckily Mark is both a big chap and a very good diplomat, he trotted on down the towpath to have a chat with the landowner and after half an hour of discussions the chap relented and unlocked the gate giving us a reasonable amount of time to pack up our stuff and get going.
This was an unfortunate end to the day but it did save us the embarrassment of weighing in, Ken did weigh his net and had just over 3lb of bits. I would estimate that my net wasn't any better and Mark tipped back about 4 skimmers and a couple of small perch. Much to Kens disappointment we called the result void as we didn't get to finish fishing properly.
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