PSV Match, Trinity Wildmarsh, 09-11-14

A generally dry day was the forecast for today's match on the tricky Wildmarsh lake at the popular Trinity Waters complex in Bridgwater.
I made the very short trip and arrived in loads of time, so took a wander around the lake and dipped my nets while I waited for everyone to arrive.

Everyone soon arrived and the usual banter was made, but things seemed to stem around how difficult the lake can be.
11 of us were to fish and Misha had put, I think, pegs 6-12 and 23-30 to one side for us. However a couple carp anglers in 2 pegs between 7 and 9 put paid to that.
So after a walk along the main road bank (pegs 58-67) where there was loads of fish blowing and odd one topping, we decided to had 7 pegs along that bank and 4 on the spit pegs 26-30. All 12 pegs went into the tub, thus leaving one empty peg. I fancied a draw around pegs 60 to 62 or maybe peg 30 which is the point of the spit.

The draw was made and the golden peg was plucked, peg 26, a good peg, would be the winners bonus should they win from there. I picked my peg out towards the back end of the queue and pulled out peg 28 which is on the spit, not a bad area. For company I had John 'The Gimp' Bradford on peg 29 and Derrick Lucas on golden peg 26. Opposite me were Alan Healey and Ron Hardiman.



Trinity Wildmarsh Peg 28

I decided to set up 2 rigs for silvers and 2 for carp, plus a method feeder(initially a pellet feeder).
The silvers were both on 0.14>0.10>B611 size 18 and middy solid 8-10 set soft.
One of these rigs was a NG Caner in 0.6g  and was for topkit length as I found that this spot can do well, unfortunately it didn't today, only giving me a single bite from a 2oz roach. I fed maggot and caster over odd balls of groundbait on this spot.
The 2nd silvers rig was an NG Gimp in 0.8g and covered two spots. The 1st at 9m slightly left for maggot/caster over groundbait. The second line was for maggot/caster on the hook over micro pellet, this would be fished in the 11 o'clock direction at around 14m,
The 2 carp rigs assembled covered my right hand margin at 7m on the near shelf, the second rig was for 14m in the 1 o'clock direction, these would be fished over 4mm pellets and corn, with corn hookbait. I never had a bite of these 2 rigs so no more on them.
The method would be fished at around 20m in front.

The all in was called around 10:10 and we'd be fishing to 3:30pm.
I potted a couple small balls of groundbait at 9m and half a pot of micros with a few maggots at 14m.
Some pellets went in on the spots I hoped for the odd carp (or tench, bream or similar).
I began on the feeder, but after 40 minutes I was biteless. John on peg 29 had netted a couple skimmers by this point, but it was pretty quiet all round.
A switch to my topkit gave me a roach right away, but that was the end of that line for the day as far as bites was concerned.
Out to 9m and a bite was soon coming as a 3oz skimmer took my bait, a few roach of 2oz each soon followed before it tailed off. I potted in another small ball of groundbait and went out to 14m.
I stuck here for 15 minutes and never had a bite, so fed some more micros

We were soon well into the 2nd hour and some guys hadn't had a bite, John had landed a nice tench and Darren North on peg 30 was getting a few silvers, it was tough going.
A look on the method feeder, with some groundbait around the pellets was what I decided to do next, hoping for my bonus fish, and if by magic the tip shot round, it wasn't the carp I expected but a welcome 12oz skimmer, that was the last of the action on this!!

The remainder of the match was mostly spent switching between my 2 lines at 9m and 14m (I had fed some groundbait here by now as micros were not doing anything), I kept picking up the odd small 3oz skimmer in amongst the roach, topping up with odd balls of groundbait when bites tailed off. A pretty simple last couple of hours or so, with just the odd 5 minutes here or there looking on the 'big fish' lines without success.

As we approached the end of the match Ron Hardiman had his 1st fish, but soon after packed up, Alan Healey bumped a decent skimmer. Steve Burgess and Adam Caswell both picked up odd skimmers too. John's bites had slowed but I reckoned he had maybe 13 or 14lb. Also Brian Shanks on the far end peg of the road bank had landed a couple small carp and was getting some decent silvers too, but I couldn't see what exactly.

The all out was called and I began to pack away, Adam shouted that he thought that Brian Shanks would win, John Bradford 2nd and either me or Darren would be 3rd.
After I had put everything into the car I made my way back to my swim where I asked Darren what he had, he said maybe 5 or 6lb, about the same as me I guessed. John said he'd not got 10lb, but I reckoned on him having 14lb or so.
The scales soon arrived at us and the board showed Ron had 31lb+ then Adam Caswell had 5lb-odd and was in 2nd spot.
I was first to weigh as Derrick tipped his pound of fish back, which he caught on maggots I let him have, lol. My net of fish pushed the dial round to 11lb 11oz.
The Gimp's net pushed him into 2nd spot with 15lb+.
Lastly Darren tipped his fish, which had a bream of around 3lb in there, onto the scales. It was going to be close, the needle spun round a bit and was soon bouncing around the mid 11lb area.
His weight was called at 1 ounce more that me at 11lb 12oz.....bummer, the few bumped fish may have cost me, but then no doubt Darren and John lost a few.

Results:
1. Brian Shanks (58) ... 31lb 9oz (inc 7lb of carp...only ones caught today)
2. John Bradford (29) .... 15lb 10oz (inc a bonus tench)
3. Darren North (30) ... 11-12 (inc a bonus bream)
4. Lee Williams (28) ... 11-11
5. Adam Caswell (61) ... 5-8


Overall I was pleased with how the match went and picked up some money for my efforts, but maybe I could have done with a proper bonus fish like John's tench or Darren's Bream. Brian's weight was very good and unless a couple decent carp appeared for anyone else, it was unlikely to be bettered on the day.
I really enjoyed the day, I like it when it is challenging and makes a change from carp catches.  I may even head over there for a pleasure season soon.

Next up for me, hopefully, is a match on the River Parrett with Pawlett, I don't get to fish running water too often so I am looking forward to it.

Until then, take care.
Lee.

PSV Match, Landsend Match Lake, 02-11-14

A match at Landsend today with another 13 of PSV's finest, though Adam Caswell wasn't amongst them, nor Mark and Ryan Radford. Saturday's match weights were ok with plenty of 60lb+ bags and the silvers won with around 20lb.

I arrived in plenty of time for the draw, but there were a good few present. So after a little chat and banter the draw was made, I fancied pretty much any peg from 13 down to 20, 15 or 16 preferred, though I didn't really fancy a corner peg as they tend to be shit or bust when I am on them!!
The golden peg was picked, peg 18, but after last week the pot was barely into double figures.
I waited to towards the end of the draw before picking my peg for the day, this turned out to be peg 1......not an ideal peg, well I didn't fancy it. Yes it has the long end bank on the left hand side of the swim, at trimmed down tree to my right and the point of the island at around 14.5m. But I'd rather have had a mid-way up peg where 'silvers' are usually present in better numbers.



Landsend Match Lake, peg 1.

The water levels are well down with at most 3.5ft anywhere in front of me. I spent too long getting ready for the 10am all-in, in fact it was 10:25 before I put any bait in and was ready to fish!! By this point we'd also had a massive rain shower and everything was rather wet!! My enthusiasm again waned, perhaps I shouldn't watch Thinking Tackle....makes me want to get my carp rods out, ho hum.
Also By this time a good few carp had been caught by all the pegs to my right, I had Lionel Legge for company on peg 3, opposite me I had Si Belcham in the other corner, he had Lee Waller next to him.

Rigs were a pellet shallow rig for along the end bank which would double up for open water stalking if needed. A rig for silvers at 2+2, but this never gave me a fish, neither did the rig under the tree to my right and I didn't have any fish come from off the island. I did have a rig for banded pellet at depth just off the shelf at 14.5m along the end bank, I think I had 4 foul hooked fish lost off this, possibly as fish headed up the shelf without any feeding intent (my excuses).
In fact my match was rather quiet, not helped by the fact I could see Lionel and Brian Shanks (p5) catching well enough for most of the day.

My 1st carp came from the area at the bottom of the ledge along the end bank, I caught this around 2hrs into the match and was my only mouth hooked fish from there,  I had already tried for silvers but couldn't get a bite.
I was still suffering from line bites, foul hooked carp, leaves, poor sunlight and a few more leaves plus the odd tangle or 10, I really was fishing like a tw*t!!
So by now we were at the halfway stage of the match and I was on 1 skimmer and 1 carp!!

The second half of my match was a little more productive, suffering less foulers and generally putting a few fish in the net, all bar one came from the end bank. 1 fish I stalked at top-kit distance when I spied a 6lber sucking on a bunch of leaves!! Meanwhile, Brian, Lionel and I think, Ron Hardiman, were doing well and all looked like having at least 80lb, Brian possibly nearer 100lb.
I could see the fish mooching along the bank and resorted to fishing 2+2 distance along the bank where the odd fish would drop down to feed, but it was too shallow to get a run of carp going.
The odd look on the deeper rigs didn't produce anything.

By the all out I was on about 8 carp and 1 skimmer, so possibly around 35lb.
I began packing away as I had the scales duty and waited an age for Mr Burgess, who incidentally drew peg 19, the peg he said he wanted on Saturday night on Facebook!!

I weighed first, my skimmer weighed 2lb and my carp boosted my weight to 46lb 6oz.
Lionel said he had 70lb, I reckoned on 80lb, he had 84lb on the button.
Brian Shanks on peg 5 totted up a decent 105lb 15oz.
Next up was Ron Hardiman, he put 83lb 15oz on the board.
We were soon at John Bradford, silver fish extraordinaire, was on peg 13 and gave the silvers weight of 17lb 7oz, he also put back no less that 14 carp during the day.
Peg 15, Darren North, on the peg I wanted, moved into third with 91lb+.
However, next to Darren was the in form Chris Gay, he gave the board 130lb+ using his normal groundbait and dead maggots, fishing worms over the top, down the margins. A good weight, well done.
Alan Healey on peg 18, golden peg, put a great net of silvers on the board, moving The Gimp into 2nd silvers place.....22lb 14oz was Alan's silvers weight.

The scales continued down the bank and there wasn't much to report regarding the overall positions, though Lee Waller on peg 22 did have 12lb+ of silvers.

Result:
1. Chris Gay (16) .... 130-6
2. Brian Shanks (5) ... 105-15
3. Darren North (15) ... 91-9
4. Lionel Legge (3) ... 84-0
5. Ron Hardiman (7) ... 83-15

Silvers:
1. Alan Healey (18) ... 22-14
2. John Bradford (13) ... 17-7
3. Lee Waller (22) ... 12-4

I am not too sure how well I did, but we had a couple DNW's and a few fished for silvers.
I couldn't seem to get the fish feeding in any sense of the meaning, just picking up the odd one in the 2nd half of the 6hrs, me starting late and it seemed like one of the days which I would rather of not had. The silvers were not present in any numbers for me, which I had initially wanted to fish for.
Maybe I should have tried meat, but I didn't take any for the 1st time in over a year!!

Anyways, at the moment, next week,  we are on Trinity Wildmarsh, though I believe Mr Match Secretary is trying to move it to Woodlands.

Until then, have fun.

Lee