Emerald Pools, Sapphire Lake, PSV Match. 25/01/15

A first ever match for me on the Emerald Pools complex today, notably on the Sapphire Pool.
I haven't fished that lake ever either, but gleaned a bit of info form here and there.

With the weather set fair for the day most of us were expecting a few fish, but Friday saw the lakes in the area begin the day with ice-lids on, but these didn't last and melted away causing an influx of bitterly cold water. This water would likely still be affecting the fish's moods for sure.

We had around 16 booked in a couple of weeks back, but ended up with 10 of us fishing, it was still tight pegging due to the overflow of reeds in certain areas of the lake. These are going to be removed in March we were told. That'll be good as these reeds hold plenty of fish, but they are so dense that they don't venture out too often.

Back to the match, after a bit of a pegging affair we managed to get down to actually drawing our pegs. The golden peg was pulled out, peg 8 (on the day was the 2nd decked swim from the gate on the far road bank).
I waited until 3 pegs were left and plucked the ball labelled p7. I wasn't sure if it was good or bad, obviously most expected pegs 8, 10 (on island opposite bungalows) and 9 (a couple pegs before the bridge to the island). 10 was overall favourite as the water was being coloured up aplenty when it was being pegged!!.

A bit of banter flew towards Lee Waller who'd drawn peg 10 and was under pressure as we all expected him to walk away with an easy win. Peg 9 had Chris Szakacs on it and Alan Healey was on peg 8 (which I fancied to be honest).
I made my way to my peg and found I had Ryan Radford on peg 7 and Steve O'Toole on peg 6, both on my right.

Emerald Sapphire Pool. p7 (I think perma peg 10??)

My swim didn't look too bad, I had some marginal weed, a point of an island at 11m and some deep reeds on the left hand side of the swim, but they were very deep and I was unsure if the carp would venture out too much.

3 rigs were assembled today:
The 1st was for banded pellet towards the point of the island, but could be deepened by 4" as there was a channel between the island and the reeds.
The 2nd rig was for maggot, meat and expander and would do for anywhere else in the swim from topkit all the way to 11m as the depth was the same all over. I chose a topkit line to my left margin and at around 8m to the reeds.  It was hard to see where exactly the reeds were due to reflections and light levels.
Lastly I made a lighter rig that was for the same lines as the 2nd rig but had a 0.10 hooklength and a 18 hook rather than 0.12>16.

I had on my tray some damp micros, 4mm expanders, live maggots, casters and 6mm meat. I also had some 4 and 6mm pellets for in the band or if the carp were feeding well.
The all in was called and I began by the reeds toss-potting some maggots and a couple pieces of meat, I was also feeding the odd pinch of micros down the edge and casters in front as I expected a few roach to show here (they didn't, so no more on that).
After 30 minutes I only had a 1oz roach in the net, Ryan and Steve were biteless. Up on golden peg 8, Alan already had a few decent roach in the net and a carp or two.......I had to endure him catching consistently all day of all species of fish, it was an aquarium up there so fair play to him.

I kept plugging away and was soon attached to my 1st carp, I say soon, but it was around 90 minutes into the contest. the carp done me in the reeds, maybe foul hooked?
My first carp I landed came to meat by the reeds at 12pm, a few rudd followed before my edge swim gave me a small carp of 1lb. Ryan had a roach at this time and Steve O'Toole had a couple roach too.
I began flicking a few pellets and some caster towards the end of the island and went across with the pellet rig only to land a rudd of 6oz.
Another look by the reeds gave me my 3rd and 4th carp in as many drops before they vanished.n Alan was still bagging, Lee Waller and Chris Szakacs had caught a few fish too, the 3 predicted swims were doing the business, everyone else was struggling, Steve Burgess over on peg 4 (our peg 2) was getting a good run of silvers from the end of his island.

By 1:30pm I decided to shallow up my lighter rig and try and catch a few rudd as they'd been occasionally swirling at the casters fed toward the point of the island. After thirty minutes catching these fish I managed to bag a 1lb carp by the reeds on the same shallowed up rig, a false dawn as I couldn't catch any more carp shallow.

With an hour to go I was on 5 carp and a few silvers, I guessed Alan to be around or over the 100lb mark. Ryan and Steve O'Toole only had a few roach each.
I carried on for a few more rudd from various spots in the swim, but they were hard to fix to a certain spot, but the odd 4oz fish was in amongst the 2oz-ers.
I had my last carp with half an hour left, from the reeds on meat, maggots gave me a few baby roach and rudd.

The all out was shouted at around 3:30pm and Ryan, Steve O, Mike Wilson and Matt Challenger all had began to pack up their kit.
I packed my kit away as quick as possible and loaded the trolley before making my way round to watch the weigh in, the results were pretty much predicted before we weighed anyone, Alan was likely to win followed by Lee Waller then Chris S. But the silvers, by all accounts would be won by either Chris S or Steve Burgess as the pay-out was top 2 plus 1x Silvers pot.

We began with Lee, he put 54lb on the scales from the island peg. Chris Szakacs amassed almost 39lb (inc 7-11 of silvers) from opposite the aerator. Mark Radford didn't do too well from his little bay before Steve Burgess put a 9lb 7oz silvers winning catch on the board, he added a couple carp to that to giving 13lb+.
Matt Challenger had 13lb 1oz and Mike Wilson 5lb+. Steve O, and Ryan both tipped back between 1 and 2lb each. Next was me, my 6 carp gave me 12lb or so and my 5lb+ of mostly rudd topped up my weight to a shade over 18lb.
Alan was last to weigh and had obviously won, but he had less than I guessed, but 11lb of silvers was accompanied by 89lb of carp for a comfortable win and a nice days fishing by anyone's standards.

Results:
1st, Alan Healey, 99lb 9oz
2nd, Lee Waller, 54lb 3oz
3rd, Chris Szakacs, 38lb 15oz
4th Lee Willams, 18lb 2oz

1st Silvers (default), Steve Burgess 9lb 7oz.

Weigh Sheet.

So for 7 of us it was a tough day with the majority of carp up towards the far end, bungalows end, of the lake and also well into the reeds where they wouldn't come out from.
I couldn't get any rhythm going either for the silvers or carp and only caught out of the blue rather than by design. In hindsight, maybe targeting the rudd should have been my only option seeing Lee and Alan would have the top 2 overall pay-outs.
But I enjoyed it and will look forward to the next match on there, hopefully the reeds will be managed to sensible levels by then.

Next up is Harescombe next Sunday, a nice little jaunt, but plenty of bites (famous last words).

Until then. Take Care.

Lee

Pawlett Match, Landsend Fishery, Match + Speci. 18/01/15

After very little sleep and a near error on my part with the draw time, I arrived at the venue not too long before the draw. I wasn't in the best of mind. But I had to press on.
With 29 of us fishing the turn out was ok, several new members were present which is good, so was the banter.
The 2 golden pegs were draw, peg 15 (very nice, good chance) and peg 39 (no chance barring a miracle). I fancied the ever consistent pegs 31 to 34 on the speci lake and any odd number + p24 on the match lake.
I managed to get my self to the rear end of the queue and with only a couple of pegs present I plucked out peg 39. Bugger. Not the best peg at the best of times.

I made my way to the peg, where I had Brian Gattis  on corner peg 40 and Eric Fouracre on peg 38. Opposite was Steve Fouracre (p26) and Lewis Hembery (p25). But with nearly every peg on my side in, peg 35 was empty I think, the writing on the wall was already written.

View of P39, Landsend Speci Lake.

I went about sorting the kit out and assembled 4 rigs, 1 for silvers anywhere from 4m out to 14.5m where the shelf up to the far bank began.
A shallow rig for banded pellet up against the end of the island and near the end of the island.
The heavier rig for over the silver's spots in open water should I need to swap(yeah right!!).
I would fish the silvers by utilising 2 lines at 2+2 in the 10 o'clock and 2 o'clock directions, plus a line just a touch onto the shelf at 14.5m. I would fish micros/expanders on one short line, groundbait and maggot on the other. While micros would be fed at 14.5 with mostly maggot on the hook.
Last rig for 16m and would do for topkit down my margins, was a slightly heavier rig with caster and prawn on the menu.

The match was pretty dire for most though, the light was not great and most of my bank struggled to see their floats for most of the match. Other than the usual 4 pegs, I think only 2 or 3 carp were netted by the rest of  the lake. Perch were the bonus fish, maybe skimmers if they were to show.

So how did the match go? I mostly spent the day rotating lines hoping to pick up a few fish rather than aim to catch carp,  which were obviously not present in numbers.
It seemed all I could get was roach, some nice ones to 8oz, odd palm sized skimmer. I even managed a chublet and a couple hybrids.
Eric on p38 managed a few nice perch mid-way through, but his line died when he tangled and lost a rig in the bush opposite him. But he had a late flurry of silvers to boost his weight to a silvers winning net of around 10lb.
Brian on p40 had 1 carp on corn while having a cuppa, that carp went on a merry dance through his and my peg, killing the fishing for a while, but he did catch plenty of nice roach to 12oz in his 6lb silvers net.
Young Lewis on p25 only had a couple fish, 1 rudd and a nice perch. Steve Fouracre had an accidental carp and a few silvers. That was it really on the lake, except 31-34.
At least the banter between the 5 of us was great, it had to be....we'd all of fell asleep through lack of action.

I did foul hook a decent fish on a topkit line I had started, but it was quiet. I did bump off a perch and a nice skimmer came adrift halfway through the match.

So the 3:30pm all out came not quick enough, in fact a few had packed up and gone home.
I loaded the car and had a bit of a natter with a few before I tipped my 4lb 1oz on the scales, which was, again, more than I was admitting to. Eric had weighed 10lb and Brian had the 1 carp and 6lb of silvers.

Results:
1st p31 Kev Lock, 53lb-ish
2nd p24 Keith Clapp, 45lb-ish
3rd was 35lb or so

Top silvers was 10lb-ish by Eric on peg 38 (a few decent perch and some roach/skimmers)

So not a day to remember and my eyes are a little frazzled from the light.
Next up is a PSV match at Emerald Sapphire pool, I haven't ever fished that lake!!

Take care
Lee