I arrived in plenty of time for the draw and unloaded my kit, there was a few guys there already present. Looking at the water, the colour looked spot on for some punch fishing, a lot clearer than Saturday afternoon when I took a ride along the canal with my kids, it looked a lot more coloured up then.
Alas, this meant that I didn't bother to take bread with me today, it could prove a bad decision as the canal is usually a good bread punch water.
So after a little chat with some of the guys, it was left to me to pick the 4 golden pegs. I obviously used all my expert ability in drawing good pegs as the golden pegs were 6, 12, 1 and 20. 1 and 20 were end pegs and 12 was the next to end peg. We had 2 sections, one above and one below the little road/swing bridge. A draw from pegs 1 to 10 would be my choice as 11-20 have the road as the far bank, saying that any end peg (or end 2 pegs) on any canal is always a nice draw to have.
The actual draw saw me pick 3rd last with peg 15 my plot for the day. I wasn't best pleased and didn't expect much from the swim.
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| My peg for the day |
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| Looking downstream |
The pegging didn't go as planned however as pegs 11 (Vic Bush) and 12 (Eric Fouracre) were pegged under a massive willow tree and were not fishable, so we all shuffled down a couple pegs....poor old fester, who pegged the match, cant have looked up when putting the peg numbers down.
Rigs were assembled, 2 whip rigs using Carpa Chimps in 4x12 size, 0.12 mainline to 0.08 hooklength and barbless size 20 middy 6313 hook, the difference being one was on a 3m whip, the other on a 3.5m whip.
A pole rig using an NG 0.2 silverfish float to run over the whip lines was set up on the same line/hook, middy 4-6 elastic was set soft on this rig.
Another pole rig was made up using an old maver pole float on slightly heavier kit, 8/10 elastic and 0.14>0.12>18 B611 hook. This was for 9m in the 11 o'clock direction over chopped worm and caster. I never had a bit on this, so no more on that.
Lastly a small dibber type NG float was set up for tight over to the folded reeds, I had a 18 inch round area that I would feed worm/caster. Middy 14/16 elastic was my choice for this spot, lines were 0.16>0.14 and a B611x size 16 was my choice of hook.
Baits were 1/2pt of pinkie, 1/2pt of maggot, some worms, 1pt of caster and 1.5kg of sensas roach/matchblend mix. I was un-prepared for the clearer water as I would have had bread and liquidised bread instead of the groundbait.
As I was sorting my kit out there was a few fish topping, especially further back toward Vic and Eric, I managed 3 small rudd on a bare hook while checking my shotting before the match.......not a great sign usually.
The all in whistle went at 9:30 and the 6hrs began.
I cupped some worm and caster tight across and a couple small balls of groundbait on my 9m line.
While I was doing this the anglers to my right all got off to decent starts with some fish immediately, including a few 'netters'.
I began on the 3m whip and had a few small rudd and a couple blade silver bream, nothing over 2 ounces though. I also was bitten off by a pike on my 2nd cast, which annoyed me!!
I spent the first couple hours switching between both whip rigs, but it was hard going and other than a 4oz rudd most of my fish were 3 to the ounce rudd....!!! I was feeding nuggets of groundbait when bites slowed or stopped, this would bring a few fish back, but no quality.
Elsewhere Vic and Eric were doing well as was Steve Fouracre who was a couple pegs up from me, he was getting less fish but a better stamp. Everyone else was struggling.
At around 11:45 I took a look on my other lines, the 9m never gave a knock, nor did my line on the far bank. A switch to my pole rig over the whip lines didn't change my fortunes, so after a few fish on this I switched back to the whips, especially as I only had 2 sections space behind me to ship the pole back. It didn't make sense to stay using the pole over the whip lines, so it was chucked on the roost for the rest of the day, I made this choice based on a effort to reward basis.
I did figure that when things went quiet I could find a few small fish by dropping the whip rig alongside the near dead reeds.
Just before 1pm I took another look on my far worm/caster spot and immediately the float buried and some pink elastic stretched from the pole, only to retract a touch and a perch of 6oz was my prize, that was my only real bite from that line for the rest of the match.
The second half of the match was soon upon us and I reckoned I had 2lb, also the water was rapidly clearing with the fishing getting harder and I could now see the bottom the canal by my keepnets. Next door on peg 14, Chris wasn't catching many, however when he did hook a decent fish, well a fish worth netting, he did it in full view of about 50 ramblers, nothing like playing to the audience, lol.
Also Mark on peg 16 landed a cracking rudd at around 1:45pm which in turn put an end to his catch rate!! Steve Fouracre landed a very decent perch on one of his forays to the far bank reeds. Vic and Eric were still picking a few fish of various sizes and were plenty ahead of everyone I could see.
I continued to feed balls of groundbait and some pinkies, being rewarded with 3 to the ounce rudd!!
That's pretty much how I spent the remainder of the match doing this with only odd 2 or 3oz fish as my 'bonus'.
The all out sounded at 3:30pm and I had well over 100 fish, but 95% of them were these baby rudd. I thought that I only had 1lb or so of 'proper' sized fish for perhaps 3lb in total.
I packed my kit up and put it by the car before catching up with the scales which had done pegs 1 to 10, leading at this point was Jamie Cook off golden peg 1, he'd amassed 7lb 9oz. Kev Crouch had netted a couple tench for his 4lb 8oz from peg 7, there was only 2 other anglers weigh in from that section.
Vic's turn at the scales saw the scales showed 8lb 2oz to put him in the lead, Eric's 6lb 10z catch off golden peg 12, put him to 3rd. The scales continued their way to my peg.
My net of mostly baby rudd weighed a grand total of 4lb 2oz.
Mark weight just under 2lb before Steve Fouracres perch boosted net of 5lb 5oz moved him into 4th and looked to have taken the section money by default.
I didn't watch the last few weigh as I wanted to load the car.
Back at the car park the results were called:
1st - Vic Bush, peg 11, 8lb 2oz
2nd - Jamie Cook, peg 1, 7lb 9oz
3rd - Eric Fouracre, peg 12, 6lb 10oz
Section winners(by default) were Kev Crouch and Steve Fouracre.
So all in all a tricky match for most, with everyone hoping for a bonus fish or 2, but other than a couple small tench to Kev Crouch, the bonus fish were perch or decent net roach.
I enjoyed it though and although we'd have liked a few more fish, me especially wanting some 2oz+ fish would have been nice, it was fair and the weather wasn't too bad either, haha. I did feed a fair bit though, as did others, keeping some bait going in was the way to at least keep a few fish interested.
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| Weigh Sheet. |
Until next time, take care.
Lee
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