Anyways, we had 16 fishing today on a lake which 12 of us or so hadn't seen up close or fished. The venue was chosen by Dave Nash, he likes the place.
It is set in the ground of a converted barn set-up which is used to host weddings, in fact I went to have a look yesterday but turned around at the entrance as I didn't want to gate crash someone's special day.
I arrived at the sensible hour of 8:15 for a 9am draw. A few guys were there already and had a look around, there seemed to be a good few carp at each end of the lake, these fish wouldn't count as its a silvers match. The owner told us that there was bream, skimmers, roach of a decent size and some rudd and perch. He said there were no eels or tench!!
We did the draw at just before 9am and I pulled my ticket halfway down the queue and out popped peg 9, last peg on the side bank up the far end of the lake. For company I had Jamie Cook on peg 11 (end bank peg) and on peg 8 I had Dick Hurford. I could also see Jason King and Mike Davis opposite.
I arrived at my peg to see that there were a few carp in the upper layers, but not much in the way of silver fish activity.
I decided to set up a small waggler for just past my 13m pole range, 2 top kits were assembled (both NG Silverfish Caners on 0.14>0.10>B911f1 size 20 to 6/8 middy elastic. One was 0.6g and the other 0.3g) and a 3.5m whip was rigged up too.
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| P9, Quantock Lakes. Nether Stowey. |
I plumbed up a line for 13m and found 4.5ft, this was the same depth right the way in until we got to the top kit +1 line where I found the bottom of a shelf where it was 6" shallower. The waggler line was the same depth as the long pole.
The whip was set to fish shallow, but in hindsight I used a float which was too heavy, but we had a brisk wind which increased during the day.
I was ready in plenty of time, so I was ready at the all-in. When the 10:30 was called I cupped in 4 small balls of groundbait at 13m along with a few casters, maggots and expenders in. I was to fish the heavier float on this line. Alas I wont mention this line again as I never had a bite on it before the wind got too much, it also became too awkward for the waggler so that wasn't used other than a couple chucks (did give 1oz rudd each time).
I then cupped in some caster and maggot at the top kit +1 line before throwing some maggots at the whip line.
I began long and remained biteless for half an hour, with the guys I could see also not catching, though further down I could hear that a few carp had been hooked plus some silvers.
I came short to the +1 line and managed a couple 1oz rudd, but it was quiet. All the while I had been feeding the whip line.
After the 1st hour I had a handful of 1oz plips and that was it, Mike over on peg 12 had a nice silverfish of some sorts.
Into the 2nd hour and I had a look on the whip line, this gave me plenty of bites, but the fish didn't seem to get any larger than a couple ounces. This hour was pretty productive compared to the 1st, I put about 25 fish in the net for probably a pound or so. I also noted that Eric Fouracre had landed one of the non-existant eels and Jamie Cook had began his carp-quest.
The start of the 3rd hour saw me look on the pole lines, without success, so I decided to stick with the whip line, however I did have the occasional look on the short pole line plus I tried the pole rig over my whip line in case any better fish were present on the feed that would have gotten to the lake bed.
I found that on the whip I would get a couple bites and then the fish would move up or down in the water. A switch to feeding nuggets of my groundbait every 3rd fish definitely helped bring bites.
So the last 4 hours were pretty much spent on the whip picking off fish averaging maybe an ounce, with the odd bonus 2oz fish!! Jamie meanwhile was bagging loads of carp, I think he hooked around 25 during the day, landing a good percentage. Rumour had it that Vic Bush had landed a couple decent skimmers and a few other guys had some nice roach, rudd and odd skimmer too. So I wasn't doing great.....
The all out was called at 16:30 and I thought that I had 5lb of bits, a mix of roach and rudd, but no better fish, casters didn't make a difference to the size, plus I tried towards some reeds in my margin, but that area gave me even smaller fish, I had 150+ fish by the end of the match, but with a lot of them weighed 1/2oz each or less.
I packed my kit away and soon found the scales at my peg, with Dave Nash, Vic Bush and Pete Manning all put double figures on the scales. I also knew Eric Fouracre had around 10lb from what I could see.
I tipped my 5lb of bits onto the scales and it swelled to 8lb 12oz. which at that point gave me 4th spot.
I continued to pack away as the scales made the way along the far bank, and from what I could tell, I had more than those anglers with the exception of Eric.
Back at the car park I loaded the car and waited for the results. There was lots and moans though, but it was a fair venue, if not ideal or liked by many. Dave Nash likes it though as it suits his fishing.
The results were called:
1st Dave Nash - 12lb 9oz - peg 1
2nd Vic Bush - 11lb exactly - peg 5
3rd Pete Manning - 10lb 10oz - peg 7
4th Eric Fourace - 10lb 7oz - peg 19
5th Lee Williams - 8lb 12oz
Section winners were:
Chris 'Giffy' Ware (pegs 1-8) with 4lb 11oz off peg 6
Eric Fouracre (pegs 9-22) with 10lb 7oz off peg 19
My weight was good enough for 5th on the day, but if Eric had landed 4oz more then I would have won the section, lol.
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| Weigh Sheet. |
Next up for me is a match on Sedges with PSV, it is on Brick Lake.
Take Care.
Lee
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