PSV Match, Viaduct Lodge Lake, 25-10-15

I was looking forward all week for todays match on Lodge lake at Viaduct, a lake I have not fished since they first opened in way back in the 90's.
Having not overslept  or got up early due to the clocks falling back an hour, I loaded the car and had brekkie before the 20 minute drive was underway.

I arrived and paid Mike Wilson the entry money and had a chat with a few guys, including Jonny Page who was on the Cary lake open match.
We chatted about the frost overnight was likely to have put a dampener on the sport and that it could be a tricky day. I know I fancied the pegs around the rope of Lodge, on the Cary Bank (pegs 68 to 71) and maybe the opposite pegs, I was hopefully going to fish for the silvers and the middle/far end is the likely spots for these.
Peg 53 and 73 are nice pegs for mostly carp with the big fallen tree an obvious feature to attract the carp and anglers alike. To be fair the only pegs not wanted were 55, 56, 57 all in front of the Shop/Café. These pegs can be hard at the best of times, but you never know how things pan out.

The draw was soon underway and I plucked the 4th from last ticket and was despondent to see peg 55 staring back at me.....well at least the weather looked fair and little wind and dry.
For company I had Steve Sewell down in the corner on p53, Mark Radford on peg 56 and further along was Adam Caswell.
The rope pegs on the Cary bank were taken by Matt 'The Waggler' Taynton and Chris 'I don't draw duff' Szakacs, so they looked good for a few fish.

Viaduct Lodge Lake peg 55

I went about sorting my gear, mixing up some groundbait, prepped some expanders and chopped a tin of meat into 6mm pieces. I also had some casters, micros, dead maggots and some 6mm pellets.
Tackle was then assembled, a small groundbait feeder was put up, but this was fishless all day.
3 pole rigs were knocked up. One for carp at 13m down my left edge, slightly off the grasses, this was 0.18>0.14>16 b911x hook.
2 identical silvers rigs were put together, one with a long line to fish at top kit distance, ideally for some roach. The other on a shorter line for 14.5m in two spots, hoping for a few skimmers. One line would be for groundbait, the other micros. The rigs were 0.2g floats to 0.14>0.10>b911F1 size 18s.

At the all in I cupped 4 balls of groundbait on that line and some micros/expanders on the other line.
Some 6mm pellets and meat along with caster went along my left margin.
I began on the feeder and could see that Steve O'Toole was into a carp right away, he was on peg 68, he had it on the bomb.

After half an hour it was obvious it was going to be tough as nobody had really caught much as all, the odd small roach and skimmer were had and that was it.
I came in on the top kit line where i had been trickling mostly casters and a few a couple minutes I had a 1oz perch....great sign....Not!!
A small roach followed before I was out on the long pole lines, and it was these two lines that I spent the next couple of hours. Although the line fed with micros never gave a bite.
During this spell I had a handful of 3 to 4oz skimmers and odd baby roach. Mark Radford was also struggling, but had picked up a couple better skimmers and foul hooked an eel of perhaps 2lb.
Elsewhere Ryan Radford was fishless, Matty Taynton had landed a decent skimmer but had pulled out of a couple carp, landed a couple too, but was not having a great time.
Steve Sewell also had at least a couple carp in his nets from a line under the big tree. Everyone was finding it hard though.

It was soon 1pm and I took a look down my left edge using the meat, and promptly missed a bite before the next drop saw a nice bit of elastic pulled from the pole and after a spirited scrap a 5 or 6lb carp was landed. No more indications came so i fed a little more and tried my top kit line again.
But it was still hard to get regular bites, I fed a small nugget of groundbait here and hoped this could work. So back out on the long groundbait line and a couple small skimmers were netted, probably putting my silvers to about 2.5lb.
Chris Szakacs had chucked a lead out and was soon into a carp, with number 2 or 3 following a short while later.
I plodded on and on. Oh...I did bank a skimmer from my top kit line, this was maybe 2lb.

It was soon 3pm and another look down my left edge saw me miss a bite as I drank my cuppa, but a few minutes after this missed bite and a line bite, as a lowered my rig in again I had an indication and struck into something lumpy.
A 10 minute battle saw me just about squeeze a lump of a carp into my landing net, this fish looked a good 16 to 18lb......bargain. I hoped for another but it wasn't to be as the last 40 minutes only gave me a small roach.
Ryan Radford landed a couple silvers and a 15lb edge caught carp in the last hour to save him from blanking.

The all out was called and I began packing up, I did reckon to Mark Radford that he could win the silvers, but we were sort of thinking Steve Burgess had caught well all day on his latest efforts in catching some silvers.
Adam had next to nothing, but the top 3 spots looked to be going to one of Steve O'Toole, Chris Szakacs, Matt Taynton and Steve Sewell, all of them having 4 carp each plus odd skimmers.

Steve Sewell weighed first putting 33lb 10oz on the sheet (4 carp, 2 skimmers), I was next and 5lb was my silvers reward while my 2 carp together weighed 24lb 1oz giving me a shade over 29lb.
Mark Radford had 8lb of silvers and Adam amassed a paltry 2lb.
I finished packing up and loaded the car before I managed to see the weigh sheet, Chris had 37lb but there were 3 guys with 33lb+ and then my 29lb.
Mark won the silvers with Lionel Legge 2nd in this category,

Results:
1st, Chris Szakacs, peg 69. 37lb 4oz
2nd, Matt Taynton, peg 70. 33lb 11oz
3rd, Steve Sewell, peg 53, 33lb 10oz
4th, Steve O'Toole, peg 68, 33lb 7oz
5th, Lee Williams, peg 55, 29lb 1oz

Silvers:
1st, Mark Radford, peg 56, 8lb 11oz
2nd, Lionel Legge, peg 62, 7lb 7oz

So a tricky day and not one to remember really, but I am glad I had those 2 carp. 1 more and you could have framed, but always if's and but's.......I don't think I would have 9lb of silvers from my peg.

Next weekend sees me fishing the 1st round of Avalon's Teams of Three, with Steve and Eric Fouracres being my partners.

Until then, tight lines.
Lee

Weigh Sheet

Pawlett match. Avalon fishery. 18-10-15

32 of us gathered at Avalon fishery yesterday hoping for some decent fishing  and a nice match.
Having arrived in plenty of time and dipped my nets I had a chat, as usual,  with a few of the guys. Some of it was about the upcoming Teams of 3 that Vic holds at the venue each year. If you are interested then contact him through Facebook or the fishery website.

Back to the day. The usual rabble around the draw was happening and I pushed in around halfway down the 'line'. Hoping for a peg in the 30's or 40's.
I pulled 21. Not a great peg for either carp or silvers. My intention was to target the skimmers rather than the puddle pigs. With 20 and 23 being the obvious better pegs (for carp)  and 19 always capable of having a few fish of either carp or silvers, my confidence wasn't great.

Anyway the lake is pretty fair and the winners can come from anywhere.  So onwards and upwards.

I got to my home for the day and found I had Colin Haggett on my left and Chris Higgs on my right.

And with the vegetation having been trimmed on the islands it looked fishy, though I never saw a bubble or a sign of fish in my peg before the all-in.......actually that is a lie, there were plenty of smaller carp in behind the rushes to my right, they rarely venture out from here.

Avalon peg 21

With silvers being my target for the day, in theory, I set up 2 rigs for them, a light float (0.2g) for topkit with caster down to my right next to the reeds and a slightly heavier 0.4g float for 2 areas at 14m.
Now having done reasonable with silvers using groundbait with caster and dead maggots, I based these 2 lines on those baits, one fed with more loose feed and the other more groundbait,
My other baits on my tray was a small helping of meat and some 8mm pellets, purely for the chances the carp were playing ball and the silvers were not.
I did set up a pellet waggler to fish tight over and a margin rig for down to my left in the cut back area.

On the whistle I potted just 3 balls of well laced groundbait at 14m in the 1o'clock direction and less groundbait but more maggot/caster in the 10 o'clock direction.
Some meat went down to my left, but i never had a bit here all day, I fed some caster by hand to my right, but I never had a bite here all day, which came as a surprise as usually the rudd will be present.
It was just after the all-in that I had to go back to the car as the alarm was going off every 2 minutes, which seemed to annoy everyone except me, haha.

I began on the waggler and never had anything more than a slight bob on the float in the first 30 minutes. In this time Kev Crouch on peg 23 had around 4 carp and Higgsy on peg 20 was on 3. The pegs on the other bank were in the same boat as me and Colin, we were struggling.
After an hour I was on the long pole lines and 1st drop I had the number 6 laccy pulled from the pole and a spirited battle saw a 2lb carp netted.......that was the action over for 20 minutes, then I had a couple roach and a small perch. Things looked hard up this end of the lake, only Higgsy and Crouchy getting a few carp.

Another look on the waggler gave me a 2lb carp but this was a false dawn as another bite never came on that all day.
Back over the groundbait swim and I managed a 1.5lb skimmer before something more substantial took my double maggot hookbait. A 10 minute fight on the light elastic saw a near 6lb common netted.
By now we were midway through the match, I was on 3 carp (10lb-ish) and a couple pounds of silvers. Kev on peg 23 was on 7 or 8 carp and Chris Higgs on peg 20 was on 5 or 6 small carp. Nobody else had much more that a couple carp each up at this end of the lake, plus the silvers were not really upto much either. But from the grapevine it was fishing hard.

It was around this time that I set up a small groundbait feeder to fish across with maggots on the hook, hoping for a decent skimmer or 3.
1st chuck on this and a small tapping on the tip saw me connect with a fish, not a skimmer but a carp, probably 7lb, but a nice common none-the-less, though not the 3lb bream I hoped for.
A perch and small blade skimmer followed before that rod was chucked up the bank.

The last 2.5hrs of the match were mostly spent swapping between the 2 long pole lines and picking up odd roach and blade skimmer, but it was hard work.
I did manage 3 nice skimmers of perhaps 1lb each and bumped a couple better ones off the hook also.
This period of the match was quiet for most, but peg 19 had a couple decent carp from his margin and Mark Sweeting had a couple carp on his waggler before the wind picked up.
Higgsy ended up on around 10 carp, but were the smaller stamp. Kev Crouch had 11 or 12 and that was it, everyone else I could see had between 1 and 4 carp and a couple pound of silvers.
I did hear that Mike West, Steve Fouracre and Keith Clapp had decent nets of fish, as had Jamie Cook. Tom Mangnall had some decent skimmers by accident, but I suspected that Mike Bendell would have had some decent skimmers in his catch, but to be fair he does fish for silvers (I did tell him that I'd write that he fishes for carp and he'd have accidental silvers).

The  all out sounded and I finished on 4 carp for perhaps 16 or 17lb and maybe 5lb of silvers, it was bloddy hard work all day.
I packed up and loaded the car. Made my way to the scales and watched Mike West put 74lb or so on the scales, Jamie had around 65lb and Steve Fouracre had 50lb-ish. But Tom M. weighed 11lb of silvers and looked likely to that envelope. The rest weighed between 19 and 36lb, plus a couple DNW's.
Down to peg 19 and Kev Locke's couple of late lumps gave him 28lb, Higgsy had 25lb and just pipped me as my silvers (7lb 4oz) and carp (17lb 10oz) gave me 24lb 14oz.Colin had 14lb and then Crouchy plopped 38lb  on the scales.
The far bank weighed in, but I never watched until we got down to Keith Clapp, up until him there wasnt much caught with lots of DNW's. Keuth weighed 53lb+. Moving along the bank we came to Mike Bendell and his nets, With Tom Mangnall looking on someone called 11lb something as the weight, just to wind him up, Tom waddled off and Mike's net of silvers went 10lb 8oz. So he was 2nd in the silvers (we pay 1 only silvers).

Back to the hut and Jamie dished out the envelopes, Mike West won on the day, Tom won the silvers and I came nowhere, but had the 3rd best silvers net.

Results:
1st, peg 5. Mike West. 74lb 10oz
2nd. peg 9. Jamie Cook. 65lb 11oz
3rd. peg 39. Keith Clapp. 53lb 10oz

Silvers:
Tom Mangnall, peg 13. 11lb 5oz
Mike Bendell. peg 43. 10lb 8oz

Sections went to Steve Fouracre, Kev Crouch and Mike Bendell.

Weigh sheet 1

Weigh sheet 2

So all in all a very tricky day and it seems like the fish are starting to move to their winter haunts.
Mike caught mostly on meat down his margin in the last couple hours.
But I am looking forward to the Teams of 3 this winter,

Next week, I think, is Viaduct Lodge lake with the PSV crew........Silvers again?....maybe.

Stay Warm
Lee

PSV Match, Sedges Tile Lake, 04-10-15

Back to Sedges today, with the PSV guys. They had 3 days down at Stafford Moor last week and had a great time, even if the fishing was patchy.
You can read about it Here...

I got to the lakes, had a cuppa and had a chat with Jamie and paid my monies to Will. 19 fishing today (although Will had to put me on the list, but I am sure I booked in at the last meeting!?) we had to leave 1 peg out, that was peg 34 as it doesn't have any island/end bank chuck.
The lads were in jovial mood even if the weather wasn't, being foggy and dour, but apparently it was die to fizzle away as the day progressed.
I fancied any peg from 21 to 26 and 36 to 40. I didn't want 30..!!
The draw was made and with only 2 balls left in the bucket, I was left with 32 (Will had 29, opposite me). I wasn't best impressed, but at the same token I hoped that the lack of wind all week had helped the fish spread a bit.

The 2 main flyers, well the 2 pegs everyone would be happy with, went to Ryan Radford (in the pools this week) on peg 21. Peg 40 went to decent all round guy, Keith Ray. Both of these would surely catch a good few fish.
I waddled up to my peg to find I had Matt Taynton on peg 31, we agreed we didn't fancy this end of the lake, but there were a few fish moving in front of him, plus maybe that silvers would be a good target. On my left was Matt Williams on peg 33.

Sedges Tile Lake, peg 32

I went about sorting my kit out, this comprised of a method feeder, a full depth waggler (20m in front fed heavy) and 3 pole rigs. The 1st rig was for down my left edge (remained fishless), the 2nd rig was for under the tree to my right (fishless again) and the last rig was for 13m in front and gave me a solitary skimmer....so thats the last of my pole rigs for this blog..!!!
Baits were 6 and 8mm pellets, micros for the feeder and some meat for the short pole lines.

I began on the feeder and it took a while for me to catch a fish, in fact the 1st hour was fishless for me, though Matt on peg 31 was getting a good few small skimmers and was also getting an odd carp chucked in, mostly on the pole using soft pellets.
The 2nd hour saw me try the pole rigs, I had a skimmer out long on banded 6mm over wetted 4's but that was the last of the action here. I did manage my 1st carp, a 6lb fish landed on the method feeder.
Into the 3rd hour and Matt on peg 33 was blanking, but soon had a resident goldfish on his feeder.
Elsewhere it seemed Matt was doing the best, but could see a few fish getting caught further along my bank and my end (except Matt on p31, now on the pellet wag...he had calm waters) were struggling.
Into the 4th hour and I had my most productive spell, landing 3 more carp and losing 2 to hook pulls, again all on the feeder despite my efforts on the other lines.

The penultimate hour was soon upon us and I stuck with the feeder, it was hard work with bites not coming in any sort of regularity or to any pattern, but a couple more carp found the confines of my keepnet, one was a couple pounds the other around 8lb. I also pulled out of a squeaker carp under my rod tip. Matt was still catching on the pellet waggler, mostly in spurts of 3 or 4 fish, but that was more than anyone I could see,
The last hour proved better for most as it seem the fish began to feed, Keith Ray down on peg 40 was getting regular action, and that peg can throw up a good few better sized fish. Rich Jones on peg 35 was now getting regular carp action on meat short, this is after he'd had plenty of skimmers.
I did only manage 2 carp in this last hour, but Will Dearlove had a couple and Steve Sewell on peg 30 had a very productive spell, away from the eels, on peg 30....he had some lumpy carp which had probably pushed him up the field.

The all out sounded and I finished on 1 skimmer coupled with 8 or 9 carp. So about 30 to 35lb perhaps? As you may well know, my fish sizing on smaller 3 to 6lb carp is dire to say the least.
I packed my kit up and chatted with Matt, he said he had 70lb, I thought he had more as I'd heard splashing pretty much all day.

The scales were soon at Matt and it turned out that his 70lb, well judged, guess was spot on as he weighed a touch over that. But prior to him, the board showed Ryan was top weight from peg 21, he had 51lb+, then came a few 40lb+ nets to Will and Steve, their fish were of a decent stamp.
My turn to weigh, I had stopped using my clicker at 22lb but had 3 fish after this point. My weights including the 7oz skimmer pushed my to 54lb 5oz.
Matt Williams didnt weigh, but Rich Jones had done well with 16lb+ of skimmers, coupled with 41lb of late carp pushed him to 2nd spot, but I also knew Keith Ray's late run was going to be closed.
I went and loaded the car while the others weighed and I returned just as they were to weigh Keith. When he lifted his nets it looked very close to getting that second spot. His 2 weighs (+10oz silvers) gave him a total of 52lb 3oz and 4th spot.

Results:
1st, Matt Taynton, peg 31. 70lb 9oz
2nd, Rich Jones, peg 35. 57lb 13oz
3rd, Lee Williams, peg 32. 54lb 5oz
4th, Keith Ray, peg 40. 52lb 3oz

Rich Jones had 16lb of silvers in his net to take the best silvers net on the day but the payout was defaulted down to Pete Uzzell who had 8lb 15oz from peg 39.

Weigh Sheet.

So a spasmodic sort of day where bites were hard to come by, maybe i should have set up a soft pellet rig for the pole in the hope of a few extra silvers, but then I also pulled out of 4 carp (I think) during the match, but this often happens on the method feeder.

I have a few days off work this week, so maybe I will give Wednesday's open at Sedges a go, Tile Lake again I think. Not sure on the other days though.
Next Sunday, as it stands is a PSV match at Trinity Woodlands.

Until then, take care.
Lee