FLE Fishery (formally Greenridge Farm Fishery) Open

So it was time to start chasing some County Champs points and so it was off to Greenridge farm for an 18peg open. I arrived at the draw on time even after a diversion through the Golden Arches and it was to be peg 21 on Canal 3 that I would be sat in all day.

Looking in front I had a ton of options but decided that with the info I had managed to pick up about the place and the clarity of the water I would fish a far bank line or two with maggot, a track line with corn or maggot and finally a far bank/ margin rig for dobbing bread about the nooks and crannies. All the rigs had 0.15mm main to 0.14 hook lengths and size 18 B911 so I was ready to go with plenty of time to spare, elastics were either Green Vespe E2 Hollow for the mag and bread rig and doubled 8 on the track rig.

At the all in I potted a little hemp, 20 grains of corn and about the same number of maggots out onto my track rig at 9m in the deepest water, and then I shipped a 6mm punch across and under the far bank foliage. It took 20 mins but the float dipped in my 10^th choice spot across on the far bank and a 2lb carp was soon in the keepnet, however, that was when I started to notice problems. Greenridge is full of Topmouth Gudgeon and these love bread, if there were no carp around the float would be constantly moving as they decimated the hookbait. So I tried my maggot line to no avail and then I fed a little on one line and tried another. Nothing was working so I started to explore the margin to my left with the bread rig, pushing it in amongst the snags I was able to extract 13 Carp in total for just over 30lb and I believe 8th Place.

During the day all the guys catching to my left were fishing up the far bank slope in about 2ft of water and barely feeding if at all. Next time I would use more durable floats as I trashed seven rigs on overhangs and other snags and I would think about starting closer to myself and then chasing the fish as they backed off, give it a rest by fishing the track for a period then starting again in a more logical manner. Possible even fishing a deck maggot rig in the same spots as maggot seemed to produce the bigger fish today.

Anyway hopefully points on the Table so job done.

Dorchester Winter League, Match 2, Warmwell

Warmwell was the destination for this match and I had popped down for a practice on Friday that saw me catch 15-20lb of skimmers on the pole from Kingfisher Lake, so that was where I wanted to draw. Fate had other ideas however, and peg 5 on Horseshoe lake stuck in my mitt.

This gave me plenty of options so I decided on a method to the far bank on the left hand side of the swim under a overhanging tree, a skimmer line at 13m just to the left of centre, a 2+2 corn line in front of the platform to my left and just before the all in I plumbed a line at 16m straight out in 2 1/2ft of water (just in case!). The all in was called and out went 7 balls of Sonubaits F1 with caster, chopped worm, pellet and pinkie on my 13m line, then a quarter of a cup of pellet and corn on my margin line before sending a small method feeder under the tree.
After 15 mins the three other anglers on the lake had all had a bonus fish, the guy to my right had taken 2 carp in quick succession by fishing @16m and pinging pellet over the top so I decided to kinder cup in some pellet at 16m. This also saw me sitting there biteless for another 20 mins, I was 45 minutes into the match and had not had so much as a bite, the guy two pegs to my right was catching net roach and bream one a put in on a 2+1 line and the guy to my left was on a whip nailing lots of small roach. Once again the peg to my right had another carp and a few bits so thing were looking desperate, on my skimmer line I had two rigs set up a heavy one for skimmers and a lighter one for the roach. The lighter rig was duly plumbed up on the top 3 and it touched bottom at about 45 degrees to my platform, I threw 10 pinkies in baited with a maggot and shipped it out to 13m over the gbait line. Instantly I had a small roach on so started catching a fish at 13m and feeding my 3m line as I was landing it. This went on until the bites dried up long and I came in short taking alot of roach very quickly again however, they were not of any size so I ended up rotating between the two lines and fishing for better fish from time to time long with big baits. I worked hard until the last 15 mins when I decided that I needed a bonus carp so sent the method back under the tree to no avail.
At the weigh in I had the lowest weight on my lake and in my section (Split with part of Kingfisher and won with 53lb) I was however, only 4lb adrift from the top weight on the lake and a 2lbs away from 2nd with a total weight of 12lb 5oz. All in all I had caught alot of fish apart from one bonus skimmer on the short line but I felt very frustrated with myself for throwing away the first hour.  I should have stuck to my original plan of a line for roach short and then a long bream line but I got distracted by the far bank and looking for carp. I will not make that mistake again. 

AAF Gp 2 Match 3, K & A, Bishops Cannings

So we were back on the Kennet and Avon canal at All Cannings and until I saw the water I was looking forward to it, even with temperatures on the dashboard dropping to -5^oC on the drive up. I did the draw for the team and managed to get all 3 pegs within 4 of the end, not bad I thought for a team draw however my peg was the 5^th longest walk of the day (Thank god for Barrows).

C10 was my destination for the day and on arriving I discovered it was exactly the same peg that I had fished in our last match there in October, then I finished with a second in section beaten by the end peg, today I had to see if I could go one better. I plumbed up a punch rig, consisting of a 0.6g DS14 float on 0.11 mainline and a 0.08mm hooklength to a 20 B511, at  my 3+2 line straight out in front in about 4 ½ ft of water. I also set up 2 more punch rigs for the far bank consisting of 4X10 and 4X12 KC Karpa F1 floats with the line and hook the same as the track rig and these were set at 24” and 36” respectively. I did not plumb these up as I wanted to rest that area of the swim for as long as possible due to the fact that it was snug pegging in my area, in fact the quote of the day came from the guy whom had pegged the stretch with ‘ The pegging is a bit tight around here.’ (Like I hadn’t noticed).

The all in was called and out went a tangerine sized ball of liquidised bread onto my track line. No sooner as I had fed it that I thought it might be too much, as I had alluded to the water was like Evian in that I could see the bottom in about 3 feet of water. That coupled with the severe frost the night before I suddenly thought I had made a big mistake and I was right, after 30 minutes I had my only bite from what should have been my main catching line so drastic action was called for. I plumbed my track rig an extra section up to my right and then fed a 50p sized ball of licky on that line, within 10 minutes another 3 Roach had joined their friend in the keepnet. This didn’t last long and after around an hour and a half I found myself finding several 3 ft deep spots along the far bank and by feeding, fishing and then starting a new line I managed to sneak a few more fish into the net over the next few hours. The all out could not come quick enough with people packing up all around me well before time, I had the honour of weighing in and started from the last peg on the stretch. He had 880g, and then there was a procession of two or three perch bags then my 660g, another line of lower weights until I had a 40yd walk between two pegs caused by a boat and the guy in the next peg had taken 980g.

So third in section was a good team result and I was happy with that until I found out the other two had not fared so well, we came in 6^th out of 11 teams oh well.

Lessons learnt: Don’t forget a worm line; both the guys who beat me did so with perch ,use a suitable colour float tip, yellow tip against greeny yellow reeds = invisible float.

Dorchester Christmas Match- 16/01/2011

Yes I know it is January but due to the lakes being completely frozen over before Christmas the match had been moved to this date.
 The venue for the day was Revels fishery near Cosmore and with tea, coffee and bacon buttys sorted in the morning it was time for the draw.With the weather as it was, a HOOLIGAN and threatening rain all day I fancied a peg on Old tree Lake as I knew that it is full of small stockies and alot of skimmers and these should feed in the conditions. My next choice would have been the back arm on the Main lake as that is where a few carp can usually be found on the far bank and last out of my top 3 was Main lake behind the Islands in the deeper water where the Skimmers tend to live. I drew peg 6 on Middle Lake, this put me back to back with Dead Tree Lake with an inflow pipe 7m to my left, alot of open water until the right hand side of the swim where it narrowed drastically and became the channel into the 'canal' part of the lake. Here it is about 8m wide and around 3ft deep however with the wind cutting straight across me if I faced that way I decided to take the wind in my face so concentrated on setting up my kit for the left side of the swim.
 I plumbed a swim close to the inflow pipe for a corn line with a 4X14 Drennan Carp 2, 0.17 main to a 0.15 bottom and 16 hook. I had a skimmer rig for 8m out in the open water with worm, this was a 4X16 KC Carpa Chimp to 0.15 mainline and 0.12 bottom to an 18 Tubertini 808 and finally I set up a Preston Pellet feeder on 6lb Mainline and a 0.19mm bottom with a 14 Guru QM1 with a hair rigged bait band.
 My bait list was some Micro pellet for the feeder, Worm, Caster, Hemp, Corn, Red maggot and a few Hookers for the feeder. I also mixed some Sonubaits F1 groundbait that I darkened off with a bit of dye in the clearish water and at the all in I put 8 balls of this with some worm, caster, micros and corn out onto my 8m line, I then put 1/4 of a cup of hemp with 30 grains of corn on that line then chucked the feeder baited with an 8mm punch of meat 18m up the left hand margin just off the drop off. It sat there for 15 mins with a slight liner so a recast saw a strikeable indication followed by another recast and a 4oz skimmer on 8mm meat! I thought that if they were eating that I should empty on the worm line, how wrong was I. To cut a long story short (for once) I swapped between my worm line and a maggot line that I started up in the mouth of the channel to my left for a procession of roach and perch.Most of the time if I hooked a skimmer it would be on for a couple of seconds and then off, I can only think that I was not giving them enough time to eat the worm (too much pellet fishing).
 I also lost a carp/better fish on the feeder when the metal ring that you attach the hooklength to cut through the elastic just after the take, that annoyed me.
 Anyway, I finished with 7lb 14oz of silvers on a frustrating day that gave me top weight on my lake and 8th place out of 28 anglers, so not too bad. the guys behind me on dead tree struggled with the wind across them all day although there were 2 double figure weights and the match was won from the main lake with over 20lb. Oh well always next year.

Dorchester Winter League, Round 1, Hanford Farm.

This match was due to be held on the Dorset Stour on the Hanford Farm stretch, however, due to heavy rain through the week before it was moved to Coking Farm Fishery, Rush Lake. We all met up in the car park next to meadow lake with most people deciding not to risk the drive along the grass to save themselves a 5 minute walk with their kit. I decided otherwise and drove my van to the side of the lake,(I later came very close to regretting this).
 All the usual suspects were in attendance and it was decided that it would be an out and out silvers match with carp not counting. I was second in the draw queue and peg 7 was my destination for the day, oh and I had the scales for company, Joy!!
 I got to my peg a whole thirty yards from the back of my van and found a big hole on the bank exactly where I would have set my platform up for the day. Much huffing, puffing and cursing saw me eventually find a comfortable place to sit my box without the threat of a swim however, it placed me about a meter back from the bank. Not good in winter when the fish tend to back off so I started plumbing my pole up and out to 16m.
 I decided that my plan would revolve around two lines, 5m loose feeding maggot for Roach with a 4X12 Drennan Roach float, a spread shotting pattern, 0.10 main, 0.08 bottom and a 20 Drennan silverfish match hook. Elastic was no.5 through three sections, strong enough to swing most Roach in and soft enough not to bump them off. The second line turned out to be at 14.5m and was going to be fed with groundbait, caster, hemp, pinkie and a few grains of corn. My groundbait mix was 50/50 Marine halibut and Sensas lake and was mixed quite stiff as it turned out to be about 10 feet deep and towing, my rig for this line consisted of a 4X20 KC Carpa Chimp on 0.15mm Main to 0.12mm bottom and an 18 808 for a start, elastic was blue hydro through a big bore power kit.
So the all in sounded, I cupped in 6 balls of groundbait containing 50ml (small drennan pole pot) each of hemp and caster, a pinch of pinkies and about 40 grains of corn, these were spread over an area about a meter square as I was looking for Bream or Skimmers on that line and I like to give them a bit of room to feed over. All the time I was pinging in 10-12 maggots over my 5m line and this is where I started, once again after 20mins without so much of a sniff on my maggot alarm bells were ringing so I had already reduced the amount of feed going in to 4 maggots regularly, I now started using a light catty to try and group them even closer. 40 mins in and no indications I thought it was time to go on the skimmer line as by all accounts no one on the lake had caught a silver fish yet. I hooked on 2 red maggot and shipped out resting my pole between my legs and on a front support to keep the float dead still, after another 20 minutes without an indication I decided it was time for lunch and with the long pole out I started my sandwich. Just as I was finishing I thought I saw a slight indication, then it dipped under, I dropped my sandwich and struck like Zorro! I missed it! My first indication in nearly 2 hours and  I had missed it, I made up a couple of new swear words under my breath, swapped hookbait to a chunk of worm and hoping for a tiny perch, if nothing else, shipped back out. After 10 minutes my float slipped under and my well timed (ish) strike met with about 4 feet of Blue Hydro coming out and the unmistakable nod nod of a decent skimmer, however, a few minutes later I slipped my net under 5lb of very cold foul hooked carp. Back it went and the news came across the lake that my mate Craig had just had two skimmers in two casts on the feeder, with nothing to loose I got off my box and set up a pellet cone rig on my 11ft light feeder rod, a foot of 0.15mm powerline and a 16 QM1 finished the set up however although I received a few liners I didn't get any real bites. Most of the fish were shoaled up on the other side of the lake and most of the fish around us were up in the water. This was proved with the weigh in, Craig won the match with a little over 5lb, second had a Roach for 3oz, the remaining 11 of us failed to bother the scales with a silver fish, nobody in my section weighed in, but the guy pegged on the other side of the lake to me had 22 Carp and a fantastic days fishing on the maggot feeder chucked to the island. A few fish came from down our end on wagglers chucked at the island set to about 3ft.
Can't wait for Round 2 at Warmwell fishery.
As a final note I decided to fish on for an hour to try and catch a carp on the tip, I still failed and then Craig came round and told me that everyone whom had driven up to the lake had struggled to get away from the bottom corner, yep you guessed it THANK YOU Craig for pushing me out the mud.

New Year Open, Bristol Avon, Chippenham

After the hour and a half drive from Blandford to Chippenham I walked into the Wetherspoons and suddenly faces started to come back to me. It had been nearly 2 years since my last match along this stretch of the Bristol Avon and was hoping that not too much had changed in my absence.
 After the customary fried breakfast it was time to draw, I was about halfway down the draw queue and peg 42 stuck in my grubby little mit. A quick confer with a couple of the Chippenham club boys confirmed that I was in fact on a peg that I knew as the lifebuoy along Riverside Drive.
Upon arriving at the peg and having lumped my kit down to the waterside I decided to fish with my platform in the water. This gave me a new perspective on the swim which saw me sitting on the outside of a sweeping bend with a small overhang opposite and a stretch of slacker water on the inside of the bend with an obvious crease, there was also a long line of trees on my bank that extended downstream for about 50 yards. After looking at the swim for a few minutes I felt that it looked right for bread on a stick line just behind a boil about a rod length out and slightly downstream and then a waggler across on the edge of the faster water.
 Both were set up on 14ft float rods with a 3AA straight waggler on 2.5lb mainline to a 0.10mm hooklength and a size 20 hook set just tripping bottom with 4 no. 8 shot spread down the line and a micro swivel connecting my mainline to my hooklength on one and a 4 no. 4 stick on 2lb main line to a 0.09mm bottom and a size 20 hook again with spread no.8's down the line on the stick. I had a little time left before the all in, so, pulled my Bolo rod out of the bag as it is always set up with no shot on and decided to have a good plumb around the swim.
 Suddenly I found a problem as the floods obviously had not removed all of the summers weed and there were strands of the stuff all over the swim. Bearing in mind the fact that one of the best ways to approach the swim in the summer is to find a hole in the weed and then either ball in groundbait or dropper in chopped worm and caster for the Bream and Tench that live in the area I was starting to spot a problem. Even depth all down the swim however persuaded me to try and see if my tactics would work so I waited for the whistle.
 On the whistle I underarmed out a ball of 50/50 liquidised bread and punch crumb about the size of a Satsuma then fed 8 half pouches of hemp on my waggler line followed by 15-20 maggots every run through. On went a 5mm bread punch and I started trotting the stick down the inside, it travelled a yard before it dragged under on a bit of weed, next run missed the first bit of weed found another. This continued for about 30 minutes and the only way to get a trot anywhere down the swim was to shallow up by a foot, however, then the float didn't go under at all and alarm bells started ringing.
 Starting to fear the worst as all I could see was the guy on peg 44 catching Chublet at the rate of one a put in I tried the waggler early, it took three trots before it popped under halfway down the swim before Chub no1 was on its way to the net, at about 6-8oz it was a good start and I hoped it would continue for the rest of the match and I would complete an awesome turnaround. It was not to be at the end of 5 hours I had 6 Chub to 8oz , a Roach and a small Dace one of the Chub and the roach came on the stick when I tried trotting that down the far bank run in order to slow the bait down and one of the chub came at nearly half depth.
 I ended up weighing in 3lb 12oz ish for around about the lowest weight of the day and had watched (Robin Guy i believe) winning the match from peg 44 with 16lb of Chub and Roach on bread on the pole and stick/topper.
 Next time I think I would have set up a pole and groundbait to start the match on and I would have fed my waggler swim further downstream to take full advantage of the tree line that held fish, I know this as they were topping about 30 yards downstream in the later stages of the match.
 Ah well always next year.