The day started well, not, with me going to Sainsbury's to check the car's tyre pressures, 3 were ok and duly topped up to 'full load levels', but the 4th was down to 10psi....puncture. So that was topped up as well. I popped home to get my 12v pump, just in case I needed it later. Also informed the wifey to call a couple places to make sure they have tyres if that one is needed to be changed.
Anyways, back to today, it was a Memorial match on Trinity Waters' Wildmarsh lake, the largest on site and a good variety of tactics for many species can work. We had 29 fishing and were using pegs 1-15, 20, 22 and 50-67. The island and main spit pegs were not 'in'. Also, un-be known to me there was a gathering/presentation/grub do at Pawlett Legion after the match, which sadly I can't/couldn't make as I never knew and have stuff to sort.
To the draw, I hoped for a peg in the high 50's, 20, 22 or maybe peg 67(next to the car park). I didn't fancy any of the pegs 1-15 as I never see any consistency in the results I read from that area. But saying that the wind was pushing into that bank at a decent rate, which also meant the rain would be face on for those along that area.
Into the bag goes my right hand, out comes peg 8.......ball cocks. Not at all what I wanted and knew that any framing chance was unlikely. But I was here and so I trundled off. Eric Fouracre drew well (67) as did soon to be daddy- Vince Brown (59). Mike Davis was on 22, a peg that should be ok.
I arrived at my peg, the water was chocolate brown with a decent ripple and the rain blowing in.
I had Kev Crouch on my right in peg 7, he too was despondent about his peg, to his right was Brian Gattiss, who too admitted he wouldn't choose this bank.
My peg - Peg 8 on Wildmarsh
I duly mixed up some groundbait, 1.5kg in total, a 50/50 sensas Lake and sensas Noir mix as I hoped for some of the bream, tench and decent roach that live in the lake, I figured that the majority of carp would be up the other end, or at least along the road bank. I also had some worm, caster, corn, meat and paste with me.Rig wise I had a standard running feeder rig on my S7 competition feeder rod, this would be cast 2/3rds of the way across towards the spit (in line with the 3rd tree from the right). 4lb maxima to a 0.14 hooklength and a 16 B911-f1 hook.
For the pole I set up a chopped worm and caster rig for almost 13m in the direction of the corner of the spit opposite, this was on middy solid 8/10 laccy. A 0.6g NG Caner float, bulked 18" from the hook with1 dropper. Lines/hook were 0.14>0.10>18 B911-f1. Depth was around 6ft.
My 2nd pole rig was for my margins and was 0.20>0.18> a size 14 B911x hook. This was under a 0.2g NG Margin float and middy solid 18/20 elastic. This was around 2.5ft deep close to marginal cover. Baits for this were meat and corn.
Lastly I set up a paste rig for 6m, slightly to my right on a shallower spot. Lines and hooks were the same as the margin, but elastic was a 14/16, hook was a 12 carp feeder hook and float was an NG Power Pencil(0.3g).
On the whistle I cupped two balls of groundbait/cw&c at 13m then balled 8 decent sized balls over the same spot. Some meat/corn went into each margin swim and a half cup of paste pieces went on that line.
I started on the feeder, with worm on the hook and was into a fish after 20 mins, a small carp of 1.5lb was netted, 10 minutes later a skimmer of 12oz landed, then it died. I also managed to tangle my feeder set-up so re-rigged.
Not much had been caught along my bank after an hour and people were already walking the banks.
Eric F. on p67 had a few carp though, but I couldn't see what everyone else was doing, except Mike on 22 and those right at the far end.
The 2nd hour saw me on the pole and it was hard work in the wind, so much so that I tangled my 13m rig and re-tied a new one through boredom. I did manage a couple skimmers and a few roach on worm. Kev on peg 7 landed a carp on the feeder. It was difficult for most.
The 3rd hour started with a quick look down my margins, and 1st drop on the r/h side I missed a bite, 2nd drop I was into a carp, it was netted after a spirited fight and the 4lb fish was a welcome bonus.
I never had another bite from either margin swim.
Alas, a quick look on the paste line never saw the float move, something that happened a couple of times, so that rig was forgotten.
The last 2.5hrs were un-eventful, I had maybe 5 or 6 roach upto 6oz, but no carp, tench, bream or other lumpier fish. A lot of people started packing up with an hour left, news had filtered round that Eric, Vince and P. Furlong were likely candidates for the top 3 spots.
The all out sounded and most were pleased that the match was over. There was to be a lot of DNW's today as I could see swims vacant before the all out.
I loaded my car and made my way to the scales, when I arrived Vince was leading the way with 55lb but said Eric on 67 was likely to have more. But given the wide range of carp in the lake (1lb - mid 20's resident) means that it can be hard to gauge other anglers catches. ChrisWare had 21lb 3oz split almost equally carp and silvers.
I watched a few anglers weigh in and when it came to peg 63, P.Furlong put 43lb on the scales to move into 2nd spot. Next up to weigh was Eric on p67, he popped his catch onto the scales, registering 49lb 9oz putting him into 2nd.
Next up to bother the scalesman was me, my carp went 6lb 7oz and the silvers 9lb 1oz, so 15lb 8oz was not too bad given most people had DNW'd with less.
The scales moved along to weigh the last few and there were more low weights.
The weigh sheet (less p22 who weighed 6lb-ish)
So all in all it was a tough day and the highlight for most was seeing Chris Pike on peg 65 breaking his pole on a rampant carp, he duly lost the fish but retrieved the carbon about 30 minutes later. He also lost a lump 1st cast of the match, that snapped his mainline when the fish was near netting.
Results:
1st - Vince Brown - 55lb 4oz from peg 59
2nd - Eric Fouracre - 49lb 9oz from peg 67
3rd - P. Furlong - 43lb 5oz from peg 63
The best silvers weight went to Eric and Chris Ware with 10lb 5oz each, with my 9lb 1oz next best,
I am pretty sure I should have won the silvers, but lost track of time, I am sure if I started a shorter caster line I would have had a few pounds of roach. In fact I avoided caster over my 13m line as I was getting too many small roach taking caster or small bits of worm. I really should have adopted the fish for anything approach rather than hope for the bigger skimmers.
That'll do for now as need to get sorting my holiday stuff (I have to get a puncture/new tyre sorted in the morning as well).
Next up match wise is Thursday evening on Sedges, then I am fishing Durleigh with Clevedon. Pawlett have a match on Avalon, but I enjoyed the ressie a couple weeks back.
Tight Lines and Take Care
Lee.
No comments:
Post a Comment