Summerhayes Open, Longs, 21-05-17

I wasn't planning on going anywhere on Sunday, but the weather looked dry and I had a last minute change of heart on Saturday afternoon.

So arriving at the lakes I found there was a few of the regular faces in attendance including Gabe Skarba and Glenn Bailey. The lakes didn't look too fishy to be fair, just the odd one showing themselves and a few looked like they were trying to spawn. A natter with a couple guys and then it was the 10am draw. Gabe's better half drew the golden peg, peg 10, which Gary Coton drew, she drew Gabe peg 4. I did mention I though he'd do well from there as the margins are nice on that peg.
Me, well I drew peg 33 on the road bank, I thought it was a good silvers peg but I wasn't sure that I wanted to fish for them as the weather seemed too bright and there were signs of skimmers still splashing down my left edge.

I had Ray Wickham to my right and to my left was Craig and further round John Barker. The only others I could see were Jamie Cook and Gary Coton over on pegs 12 and 10.
5 rigs made up today, all on 0.18 to 0.14 hooklengths and size 16 hooks.
1st rig was my left edge, bit too deep really and to be fair I never fancied to, it was a DT Big D in 0.3g, feed was meat and meat for the hook......never had a bite!!
2nd rig was using the same float patter etc and I fed maggots and fished bunches of them or meat. That was used down my left edge, again it was deep and I managed to fish it by pulling up the slope a little, the top of the slope was a shallow 6 to 8 inches deep.
Third rig was a rig for maggots over maggots at 2+2 to my left and expander over micro to the right at the same distance. Float was a DT Pencil in 0.4g in around 4.5ft of water.
The last 2 rigs were for across to the far bank in 2 spots, the 1st area was slightly to the right at 14m and the 2nd spot was at the same distance to my left on the corner of the bay, I did fancy 16m into the bay but the wind was an arse and I knew I would have struggled, should have chucked a method I suppose....hindsight!!
Anyways I had a DT Pellet Pinger in 0.1g for up to 18" deep (I started on a Skittle float but it got trashed early on by a foul-hooked carp). The last rig was an RBS Open water float in 0.3g, Both of these rigs were using 6 and 8mm pellets in a band.

Peg 33, Summerhayes Longs Lake

The all-in was called at 11am and I started across after feeding both 2+2 lines, but the following 60 minutes went without much action, a couple lost foul hooked fish on the deep rig across were lost and a couple small rudd came to maggots at 2+2. Nobody seemed to catching much, Ray on 31 had a couple skimmers and some bits but that was it really, I think Craig had one or 2 carp.
The second hour was a bit better, I stayed across to the reeds, it was hard-ish work in the right to left wind, but by swapping between the deep and shallow rigs using 8mm pellets in the band.
I found that by toss potting 6mm pellets on the deep rig and using a catty for the shallow rig, it wasn't manic fishing and I was still losing the odd foul hooked fish but I put a dozen of the lake's smaller carp in the keepnet, my clicker went from zero to 17lb in that hour.

The 3rd hour came and went with my only action coming from the 2+2 lines where I lost a couple skimmers and had a couple roach to 4oz. My far line (the right side one) had fish spawning and a couple of moorhens that were not bothered my pole tip being inches from them. I did lose a couple mad foul hookers that went steaming off to my right into a clump of reeds that looked like they could be a pain as the carp could get around them. I trashed on rig and got what I thought was a rig back in tact....It wasn't in tact as that rig snapped on the next carp I hooked at around 14:30.....ooopps.
Meanwhile Ray had a couple silvers including a lumpy perch but also managed a few carp by accident. I could also see peg 19 catching a few fish, not sure what they were though.
Craig on peg 36 was starting to get the odd one from both of his margins.

Into the last 90 minutes and my clicker showed 22lb and I was on 14 carp but was doing ok comparing myself to the 6 peeps I could see from my peg. But my carp were rather small and averaging less than 2lb each, they normally run on average nearer 3lb or so.
I started to feed the micros line with meat by hand as I had a few bubbles and the maggots and expanders were not producing.
A look to my right hand edge gave me a fish of 3lb right away but it was a false dawn as I never had another bite from there.
A look on my 2+2 micros, now meat, line again gave me hope as I had a 2.5lber on my first drop, again my only bite from there.
So the last spell of the match was spent up and down across to the reeds, I managed a few more on each rig, but the spawning fish were not helping matters, neither the wind. At the all out I had 22 carp and my clicker showed 36lb, so a small average as 22 fish should be nearer 60lb or maybe 70lb. Oh well.

Gear packed away and in the car and the weigh-in was underway, I saw Gabe put 25 carp and 7lb of silvers on the scales to have a likely winning weight of 91lb and a few ounces, he caught across on maggot over micro and a few edge fish on the same late on. A few lower weights and non-weighing anglers came and went before we had a 47lb net from Glenn Bailey down on peg 15, again that looked a framing place, I certainly never had that but thought Craig may be close to it, but he insisted he had about 35lb. A few silvers nets came and went before my 22 carp and 14oz of silvers gave me a total of 37lb 12oz with only Craig to register on the sheet. He had 3 weighs....2 of which were single carp still in the keepnet, but he totted up 35lb 2oz which saw me pick up 3rd overall.

It had fished really tricky for everyone and again a poxy windy match didn't help at all, but still it was sunny and warm.

Results:
1st, Gabe Skarba, peg 4, 91-04
2nd, Glenn Bailey, peg 15, 47-02
3rd, Lee Williams, peg 33, 37-12

Silvers:
1st, Roy Hughes, p19, 7-15
2nd, Gabe Skarba, p4, 7-05
3rd, John Barker, p38, 4-12

Weights

Acorn for me next Saturday in the 2nd round of the Series, not sure if I am anywhere on Sunday as we may head to White Acres or elsewhere for half-term. Hopefully the carpies will have spawned and even more hopefully they are settled and munching.

Until then, have fun.
Lee

Tony's Short Pole Series, Trinity Woodlands, 14-5-17

Covering for Emma Drysdale for this one, so I hoped I would get her a decent start, but you can never be sure on that venue on how it will be as a few areas tend to struggle during matches.

So on to the draw, I wanted to get on either of the end banks or somewhere along the far side, preferably 6, 7 or 13, 15 and 17, these pegs are a good starting point for a few bites.
Anyways, pools paid and into the tub and out comes 24, towards the far end of the nearest bank, not usually the most productive of areas and I was not too confident at all. Still I had a task in hand.

Peg 24 Trinity Woodlands

Arriving at my peg, I did fancy it for silvers, but as I was covering I couldn't really go down that line as if I was struggling for silvers then I would never pick up good points, but should you get 15lb or so of non-carp species and 4 carp then that could be ok, I didn't fancy risking it. If it was for me, then maybe I would have.
I had Mike West on my left and Jamie Cook (not Sedges' one) on my right, he had Rich Heatly to his right.
The wind was pushing over to pegs 15 to 17 and with Joe McMahon on 17 I fancied him to do well.
Our area had a little ripple but looked less than fishy.

A margin rig for both sides at topkit+1 (max allowed is topkit +3) for mostly meat
A meat line in front at topkit+1, feeding wet micros.
A pellet line at max distance in front, both shallow and on the deck. (6mm and 8mm plus a few expanders)
I also had some groundbait and a few maggots, mostly with the margins in mind.

At the all in I cupped a pot of 6mms long and 1/2 a cup of meat and micro on the short line.
I started shallow, then tried deep, then tried short etc.....90 minutes in and 4 of us in a row were blanking.....yet Joe was probably on 50lb including an 18lb lump, he was fishing shallow.
It was 12pm that I had my 1st carp (I did manage a roach on meat short), that was around 4lb, not the size hoped for, my 2nd followed at 12:45 and it was around 13lb. Nice, lets hope these keep coming.
Nope. Never happened.

By 2pm it was still quiet up my end of the lake, Jamie and Rich both had 1 carp each and Mr West was on a perch and a skimmer. But by 3pm he was on 4 carp, proper 8lbers and bigger, he'd had a quick flurry on his beloved paste.
Jamie and Rich were both on 2 carp when we got to 3pm. It was very slow.
A look on my meat line gave me a bite right away and after a spirited scrap an 8lber was netted, a small skimmer followed, then nothing.
Back out long, just after an awful deluge of rain I had my 4th carp, on the long, deep rig. It was 4lb or so, another next drop gave me hope and my clicker showed 33lb.....

4pm came and went, Westy had a couple more, I had him on around 40lb, he also had a few accidental skimmers and a decent perch. He lost a couple carp, as had I, foul hooked.
The far bank, well it had fished ok very early in the match but there were little flurries for people.
Mike Nicholls on 19 had been having small silvers and coupled it with 3 or 4 decent carp.
Joe on 17 possibly had 100lb, 60% came in the first 2hrs, but had a few late.
Clayton Hudson on peg 15 maybe had 60lb, but I wasn't sure as they were not in my section.

The all out was called and we were unsure of how our section was pegged. It turned out it was from 23 to 29 I think. I knew I had beat Jamie and I was sure I had pipped Paul Faires who was on the left of Mike, but I was not sure how Tony and Bela had done. Tony had 8 carp and Bela a couple less I believe.
I packed up and loaded the car, waited for the scales, had a chat with a few guys....
When the scales got to me, the section boundaries were made and I weighed in a little over 35lb as my silvers were a whole 14oz. That put me, after the weigh-in, 4th in section, not a mega disaster, but that last hour and first 90 minutes killed it for me.

Sorry to Emma for not doing better, but that's fishing, could have done with the section moving one place anti-clockwise and I would have had a 3rd. But there was a blank, a few weights under 20lb and it was tough for most on the whole.

Results:
1st, Joe McMahon, p17.  119lb.
2nd, Chris Fox, p6. 89lb 3oz.
3rd, Dave Evans, p33. 88lb 7oz.
4th, Martin Rayet, p8. 78lb 11oz.

Silvers:
1st, Martin McMahon, p13. 17lb
2nd, Mike Nicholls, p19. 16lb

For the weigh sheet, Tony Rixon, Mike Nicholls and Chris Fox all have a photo on their blogs.

Not too sure where, or if I am fishing this weekend. Depends on how I am feeling.
If not, then it is the 2nd round of the Acorn Series next weekend (27th) so I will report back after that if not before.

Until then, stay safe.
Lee

Acorn Saturday Series, Round 1, 13th May 2017

First blog for a little while after 3 weeks or so away from my fishing kit.
My last match was back in April with Pawlett, at Apex, it fished hard as predicted, I dnw'd chucking back a few pound of hard earned silvers.

Anyway, today at Acorn. I had booked-out of this but re-joined the list yesterday.
Arriving early enough (12pm draw, fish 13:15-18:15 ish....). Pleased to see a few guys I hadn't for a while, some decent anglers in attendance including a fair few regulars at the venue. 21 fishing so 3 sections of 7 split across the venue rather than in a line.
I looked at the lake, plenty of semi-spawning fish, mixture of silvers and carp, but not in great numbers, pegs 40, 6 and off the point of the island from pegs 9 to 13 had loads of fish moving.
The pegs that I didn't want were 3, 24 and 26 as I don't like 24 or 26 and although 3 can occasionally be ok, pegs 1 and 5 often slow the fish in moving through to peg 3.

Acorn Peg 3....

The draw came, I plucked my ball around halfway along the queue and had peg 3.... fer-cough I thought, still you never know how things will go. Discussions said 200lb would win and 100lb needed to be top in each of the other 2 sections. We hoped it would be a good day.
At my peg I saw it was a real area of PSV guys, Steve Sewell on peg 1, Matt Williams on peg 3, Paul Preston and Ade Crawley on 34 and 33 and Keith Ray on peg 36. But you can see a good amount of the lake from my vantage point so I could see how I seemed to be doing.

4 rigs assembled, 1 for my margins (mostly left, downwind). 1 for 2+2 off to my left in line with the point of the island, this rig also suited topkit distance in from.
A banded pellet rig for across in 12 inches of water. Lastly, but unused, was a rig for around 2m off the far bank in 3ft of water.
Bait was a few pints of maggots, some 4 and 6mm hard pellets, expanders and groundbait. I did have some alternative 8mm pellets for the band, just in case I fancied a change.

At the all-in I began across hoping for a few early mug fish, but that never happened, actually this spell was the calmest of the day and after an hour spent, mostly across, I had 2 small carp, 2 skimmers and couple roach and a baby carp. Elsewhere it was peg 40 and 36 who set the early pace, but Mark Bromsgrove who on p38 and in my section was doing ok, nobody else looked to be doing much.
The second hour saw the wind increase in strength and was going directly right to left and holding a pole at 8m was hard enough at times let alone fishing across, but there was signs of fish in the area across. I spent this hour fishing maggots both off to my left  at 2+2 and on the topkit in front, this gave me a few nice stamp roach, some perch and a couple 3oz carp, but it was bites at a time when most were not getting much action.

As the day progressed the fishing got tougher for pretty much everyone except Keith Ray whom had caught consistently all day, peg 40 got off to a flyer but he slowed in the second half of the match.
I had to keep switching between the left edge and the 2 maggot lines (2+2 left and topset in front) to pick up fish of various species, when the wind dropped enough to venture across I would get a bite, but this was only an option on and off throughout the second half of the 5hr match.
One of my blond moments came when I had an 7 or 8lber just sat on the surface waiting to be netted, but my mind switched off and I just sat looking at it not even touching the landing net handle, when I went to grab it the hook pulled.....numpty. I also dropped a perch late on, maybe 12oz, it ended back in the lake.

My 3rd and 4th hour saw me put 4 or 5 carp in the net and some silvers including a couple nice skimmers and a few perch. Steve and Matt on pegs 1 and 5 were struggling. There is not really too much to talk about, trying to snare a few extra fish was hard going. With just a little over an hour left Matt Williams began to catch a few lumpier carp down his left edge and put maybe 7 or 8 decent fish in the net which boosted his net, but he wasn't in my section.
The final 60 minutes was a little better, well that is retrospective of the day when using the word better, I put 4 more carp in the net, 3 from the left edge and 1 across. My clicker showed 41lb at the all out, plus I reckoned on 8lb of silvers.

I packed up and waited for the weigh in, pretty much everyone had struggled and there was a dnw in Rich Lovering.
The scalesmen arrived and weighed Steve on peg 1, he managed 20lb. Then my silvers weight 8lb and a few ounces, my carp boosted me to 50lb 1oz. Matt then had 67lb 8oz, 40lb of which came late on.
I left the scales to do their job and caught up with them when they got to Gabe, the venue expert managed 40lb before Ade and Paul Preston had 47lb+ and 25lb+ from each side of the bridge.
Then came Keith, he almost did 100lb but alas he totalled 95lb 12.5oz for what looked to be top weight on the day. He was in my section. Next was Mark Bromsgrove, he was also in my section, he was admitting to 40-something pounds, I reckoned he had more but he said he had silvers. He managed 49lb 9oz.
Last to weigh was peg 40, he had flown out of the blocks at the start and slowed down late on but still managed a nice net of 90lb and a few ounces.

So an okay day, the wind being the main preventative in me catching a few more, in hindsight I could have got a little method feeder rod set up to chuck across, but that isn't my idea of fun. 2nd in section and £60 in the pocket means I have got a decent start and my entry fee returned.
Back in 2 weeks for round 2.

Next up is Sunday's match, covering for Emma Drysdale, at Trinity Woodlands for a short pole match (topkit plus 3 sections)

Until then, have fun and take care.
Lee