It is a venue I have not fished for a long time, but I wont leave it so long before I have another day there. I never consider it if I fancy a day out or the kids want to go fishing, I shall do next time.
Anyways, a 9am draw, fish 10:30 - 16:30. There was 17 or 18 fishing and several of us were not on Adie's list, much to his amusement.
A quick chat to a few of the regulars here informed me of some 'hotter' pegs, but to be honest the only pegs which I didn't want were 10 and 2, as the few times I have fished the lake, peg 10 has never done me well, and 2 looked cold.
So the 9:10 draw came along and out I pull...........peg 10. Ho Hum. For company I had a nice chap called Allan Oram on peg 11, Lance Tucker on peg 13 and Kev Perry (I think) on 8.
View from my swim.
It is a relatively deep lake, with up to 10ft in places and in some swims the margins can be 3ft+, mine was pushing 8ft on the pole lines at 6 and 12m, my right hand margin was a decent 3ft.
I initially set up a pellet wag for 20m out, a lead/banded 8mm rod and 3 pole rigs. The pole lines were 6m (0.5g float) out to an area to my right which was 6" shallower than everywhere else, a 12m line in front (0.7g float) and a margin rig (0.3g). All were on 0.16 to 0.14 matchteam with B911 hooks.
Baits were 6mm and 8mm pellets, 8mm cubed meat and incase of a struggle some dead reds and casters. I also knocked up a 50/50 mix of micros and groundbait. Oh and some 6mm expanders.
On the all in I was straight on the pellet wag with a banded 8mm, as I have found that 1 or 2 early casts while everyone is potting bait in can catch a bonus fish or 2, this was initially set to 2.5ft deep. I gave this 20 minutes or so. altering the depths but I only had a liner. I kept the feed going in though as they can turn up at any point, they were moving near the surface as there were lots of rolls/swirls/jumping fish.
At this point I fed my long line with 3 balls of groundbait mix with a few deads and casters in, on the 6m line I cupped 3 big pots of 6mm pellet, but I only gave it a couple looks with no response, so no more of that. I also potted a heaped cup of mixed pellet and meat in my margin swim.
By now Andy Hembrow on p23 had landed a few carp and Allan and Lance had also landed a few skimmers and the odd carp.
Out to the 12m line, I missed a bite after 15 minutes, then promptly foul hooked a lump, which I played for a while before it shed the hook, leaving me a scale of around 2" in diameter.
By now we'd been fishing around 1hr or so and had kept feeding the pellet wag line, so a quick look with that and no fish were coming, so I chucked the bomb over that line and had a few liners before the tip whacked round and a fish was on.......................for 5 minutes until I was left with scale number 2. Luckily I had a bite soon after and carp number 1 was in the net, possibly 4lb.
I stuck with this tactic for a while as nobody except Andy Hembrow and Jonny Page on p26 were catching carp, Lance had a few skimmers as had Allan, the guys on the far side's end pegs hadn't had a bite, or at least a fish. Rod Wotton opposite me had a few fish, but wasn't hauling.
By now 3hrs had passed and I was properly struggling, I had tried all my lines without any luck, when I noticed peg 8 catching on the pole shallow, so off my box and another topkit out of the holdall and a shallow rig was put together, banded 6mm or 8mm was to be hookbait. The next 40 minutes bought me 4 more bites on the shallow rig, constantly catapulting 6mm pellets around the float resulted in 2 landed carp of 4lb each, a baby roach which fell off and a lost foul hooked carp. The swim again died. I tried on the deck again, but not so much as a liner, but the wind had got up and had changed from being towards me in a left to right direction, to a right to left direction towards me. It had also picked up in strength with odd attempts at rain thrown in for good measure.
For the last couple of hours I decided to switch between the shallow rig and my margins.
Allan on the next peg had had a few carp and skimmers, but it was Andy who looked to be running away with the match, Jonny Page had a few too.
To cut a long story short, Allan spent the last 90 minutes fishing his margin and was getting a bite a chuck and looked to be catching Andy, whose catch rate had dropped somewhat. Rod Wotton was now bagging some lumps, shallow by the looks of it.
I wasn't catching consistently, but was getting a few bites, even if most resulted in nothing, small roach methinks. I did land another 4 or 5 carp from the margin, couldn't get a bite shallow or on the deck at 12m, I also had a tench of 1lb 8oz and a couple skimmers of an ounce (which I chucked back).
The all out signalled and other than 2 guys on the last two pegs on the lodge bank who'd packed up and dnw. I figured I would be somewhere near last. Allan had, I suggested, 20/25 carp and his silvers, Andy had a load, Jonny Page and Rod Wotton had also done well in the last hour, Kev next door on 8 had also landed a few too.
The scales had arrived at me and 50lb or so was the best weight, I guessed on maybe 40lb. Infact I weighed 43lb of carp and my tench of a pound and a half. Not too bad.
Allan weighed in with 123lb or so and looked good for a top 4 placing.
I scooted my kit back to the car and caught up with the scales and it turns out my 44lb 8oz was doing just fine, but the lodge bank still was to be weighed. Andy's catch went 128lb 14oz, which is less than everyone thought it would. Jonny Page had 93lb 8oz and there were a couple weights around 40lb before Rod Wotton put 5 carp plus his silvers on the scales for 62lb 2oz.
So all in all a day of inconsistency for me, no sort of pattern in the fish's behaviour, perhaps yesterday's warm and sunny day, followed by a cloudy, cooler and more breezy day may have confused the fish, though the far end pegs had calm water the last couple days so maybe was a touch warmer up there. The fish definitely were not feeding in the bottom layers, I only had a couple bites off my deep rigs including the 1 fouled lump. But I am back on here next month, so I have learned a fair bit too.
Results/Payouts
1st - Peg 23 - Andy Hembrow - 128lb 14oz
2nd - Peg 11 - Allan Oram - 123lb
3rd - Peg 26 - Jonny Page - 93lb 8oz
4th - Peg 29 - Rod Wotton - 62lb 2oz
1st Silvers - Peg 19 - Adie Baker - 20lb 8oz
2nd Silvers - Peg 3 - Brian Slipper - 17lb 10oz
So my 44lb wasn't too bad in the scheme of things. Allan's weight was a great result after seeing the results from that bank.
Next up for me is a Pawlett Match, at Trinity again, with Wildmarsh lake being the selected one.
Take Care and stay safe.
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