Hordle Lakes 24/06/2012

It was off to a new venue for this one and Hordle lakes were programmed into the sat nav and off I went Via Chris’s house and Maccy D’s. We had enough time to say hi to the guys and have a look around the ponds when we got there and after looking at both of the lakes that were in I fancied a draw anywhere on Willow lake as there seemed to be more water to go at rather than Spring lake that was a snake lake. Chris and I both drew on Willow fortunately with me on 6 and he was on 4, we soon discovered that these were not the permenant peg numbers as I ended up with 4 blank pegs between me and peg 5 to my right, and peg 7 was not drawn out giving me another blank peg to my left... ACRES....

Just to make it the perfect peg there was an island around 25m out in front of me which had carp written all over it, due to the amount of room I decided to keep things simple and spread 3 lines out and around myself. Firstly was the Island, I set up a 30g small Kobra inline method feeder with a size 14 QM1 on 0.20mm Cenex and a bait band o my Force 10ft Bomb rod with an ultimatch reel and 8lb reel line. I also set up a 2 swan Drennan crystal pellet waggler on 4lb line to a 0.18mm bottom and a 16 PR36 hook for fishing a foot deep to the island, the rod for this was an 11ft Force pellet wag 2 and a 030 Xitan front drag reel,  I use this reel as it retrieves over a meter of line a turn which is quite useful for on the pellet wag when the quicker you can get in and out can sometimes make a difference.

After extensive plumbing up I decided to fish a meat line o a 2+2 line at 2 O’Clock to my right, it was about 4 feet deep there and I set the float to fish about an inch over depth just up from the bottom of the shelf. I started with a Preston Inter 1 float on the line with 0.18mm  main line to a 0.14 bottom and on the business end was a size 2 Tubertini 175 as I had heard that there were some bonus fish in this pond. I had this rigged on yellow Browning Reflex elastic through a tension puller kit  so that I could land anything that I hooked on it. My final rig was for paste to fish in front of the platform to my left, I found 4 feet again tight to the pilings and had a quick grope around under the water to see if there were any undercuts to worry about. The answer was no so it was a 4X10 Big H paste float on 0.20 Hybrid power mono to a 0.18mm Cenex bottom and again a tubertinin 175 but this time a size 5. This was rigged on a 17H elastic through a heavy tension puller kit and a paste pot was put on the very end of the kit next to the bush.

My plan was simple, I would feed the meat line at the all in then fish the island for 2 hours, then hopefully the carp would be on the meat line and in the last 2 hours I would plunder the margins. So the all in sounded and out went ½ a pot of hemp and 6mm meat onto the chosen spot then I cast the method to within inches of the island, I was watching Chris still cupping in bait on his spots when my rod wrapped round and Carp number 1 was soon in the net, not that I told anyone!!(MUCH!!)

It was steady for the first couple of hours with the odd carp and skimmer falling to pellet or mini boilie on the hair, the problem I had was the overhanging bushes and a determination to get the feeder really tight to the island. From the start I was also pinging a few 8mm pellets towards the island and after a while I had a look, I would love to say that it was solid but I can’t, I managed a couple of chub but it was soon time to go onto the meat line. By this time the guy opposite had started getting a few carp shallow, he was not setting the world on fire but he was definitely ahead of anybody else, even Chris was getting a few on the pole behind the island. I shipped down to the right with a medium cad pot on the end of my top kit full of hemp and meat, dropped the lot in held onto the rig and after 30 seconds was playing a skimmer, 2 minutes later though it was a carp and at about 3lb it was the start of a good run of fish. I managed around 15 over the next couple of hours interspersed with a few skimmers and proper roach but it was fading fast on me and it was about time to prep my margin. I potted 5 full pots of groundbait, meat and hemp in down on the edge line then I cast the method back to the island, that didn’t work but the waggler gave me a couple of quick fish before they backed off again.

It was time so I shipped my paste rig off and down the edge, the float settled perfectly on the slope and after a count of 85 the float disappeared, followed after the strike by around 10 of proper elastic, there was an over flow pipe in the middle of my swim and it was interesting to play the fish around it but I soon had an absolute HORSE in the landing net. Next put in and the same result but with a slightly smaller fish and then the same on the third put in, I had managed over 30lb of carp in 3 put ins near enough so I knew what was going to be my main line for the last period of the match.

I topped up after every 3 proper indications and this kept the fish in my swim until the all out, I managed to land about 8 carp for around 60lb over that period but they were alot harder to come by at the end as I ran out of groundbait.

The all in saw me a very happy boy as I knew that I had done alright and reckoned that I had around 140lb of fish, Chris thought that he had 50lb and a wager was set on top weight, top silvers and closest guess (well I had to give him a chance), the guy to his right weighed first with 96lb, Chris had 85lb!! Then it was around to me and 5 weighs saw 135lb 11oz on the scales helped alot by this little beauty at 15lb 10oz.

Many thanks to Rich for running it and I hope to go back soon.

AAF Group 2 Match 8, Witherington Farm

This league has been growing more and more frustrating for me this year as I am the match secretary, this basically means that I get to go to the fishery an hour early to place the pegs out and then have people ignore me when I give the pre match brief. Anyway this time I had help on the pegging as I do not fish the snake often preferring the lakes at withy due to the style of fishing, John and Stu turned up bright and early to help me place he 36 or so anglers around the lakes. We still missed a couple of things with 3 sets of eyes (but more of that in a minute), we finished the pegging and organised ourselves at the cafe. Big breakfast, prematch brief done and then the draw and I was off to A8, this was halfway in the section but just off a bend with a cut through to the inner snake.

I know the picture isn’t the greatest but you can make out the gap through to the inner snake, now this is a decent are but I fancied the end pegs to do alright as we had tried to put a bit of room in for them, Bri on A2 had bags of room to his right and he was fancied for the section. We also discovered that Stu had drawn the only 3 peg line that we had put in by accident, talk about irony!! However, knowing what I do about the snake though I decided on a varied attack and I set up a paste rig to fish on the 2+2 line and the same depth at 13m towards the gap, I set up a margin rig for my left hand edge towards a blank platform, I set up a top 2 whip rig for silvers and finally I set up a dobbing rig for the far bank.

My plan was simple and at the all in I shipped out with a big lump of paste to 5m with the paste pot full of hemp and pellet and I waited, it did not take long and on my second put in the float trembled before disappearing down a hole and fish no.1 was hooked. The Blue Browning Reflex elastic made short work of the fish and I soon had a 5lb F1 in the net, I shipped out again and had another bite on the next put in that saw another smaller F1 into the keep net and then the swim fell silent, I got a couple of indications off very small fish and put the paste rig up the bank for the time being.

I shipped across with my dobbing rig baited with three dead reds hoping to find a carp under the far bank foliage but after a fruitless 30 minutes with only a couple of small roach to show for it I decided to put that up the bank, feed my paste line long and then look on the top 2 rig for some roach. I was not disappointed and I managed a good run of roach and perch before they backed off, I was using pink Reflex elastic so it was easy to swing most of the fish and this line kept me occupied for the best part of an hour and a half but then I noticed a few carp coming in further down to my left. This forced my hand a little and I shipped across with paste onto my long line, I got alot of indications and a foul hooked skimmer so at this point I set up a pellet rig to fish over this line. This gave me a couple of small skimmers but I was still not setting the world on fire, Gary 3 pegs to my right had been concentrating on the entrance to the inner lake and he had a number of decent sized carp that were reluctant to come too far into the open water, but when I saw them start to move my way it took me no time to drop the dobbing rig on their head. It was not right and they spooked off, by this time there was only half hour left and I had only caught 3 carp, and a handful of silvers for about 6kg.

Suddenly the carp moved out of their safe zone and I was able to mug 2 carp in 2 dobbs, then I dropped in on my paste line and had another 2 fish in 3 put ins, it was too little too late in my mind and I was left regretting not trying around the corner earlier in the day as I called the all out.

Bri from the end peg was following the scales around, he had managed 19.570Kg from the end, I thought it might be close but I turned out to be a decent carp short with 16.980Kg, this was still enough for 2^nd in section and it helped the team to another 2^nd on the day. Congratulations must go to John Dewberry who drew the middle of a section and managed to win the match with 19.770KG, helped alot by around 10Kg of silvers that he took on the short pole line.

K&A Sping league, 27/06/2012

This was the final round of the spring league and it once again saw us meeting at the Marlborogh town football club, I did the draw and it seemed to be half decent, I even managed to bag myself a fancied end peg that turned out to be the a peg away from where I was the week before.

I could only hope that I had learnt my lessons from last week so I again decided to concentrate on 2 areas, 1 was at 11.5 meters in front in 3feet of water, for this line I set up 2 rigs on no.2 elastic with 0.09-0.06mm line and size 22 B590 hooks, these both had Drennan pinkie floats on, one of 4X12 with strung no.13 shot an inch apart starting at the hooklength knot and the other was a 4 X 10 that had 2 inch gaps. I also set up a skimmer fig that consisted of a strong 4X12 float on 0.1mm mainline and a 0.08mm bottom to a 20 Polemaster wide gape hook, the shotting pattern was a bulk and 3 droppers and this was rigged on no.3 elastic. I also set up a positive worm rig to fish under the tree but this hardly saw any action.

At the all in I fed 3 balls of Browning Etang and Canal mixed 50/50 with a few squats mixed in, then I went straight over the top with my 4X12 pinkie rig. I had a quick response from net roach and a couple of small skimmers so I was soon on my bagging rig but I believe that this is where my day fell over, my swim got stronger for about an hour but then died off suddenly. I tried re feeding quite aggressively but all that this seemed to attract was loads of Crayfish this led to me getting loads of indications but very few fish, the peg that I had been sat on last week at this point went into overdrive fishing small bits of worm under the branches of the tree. I however did not have an answer, at the end of the match I had had a very frustrating day of chasing squatt roach whilst watching the next peg empty the canal of skimmers, but again I learnt alot.

AQs you canm see I managed 5^th, and we had 3 of the top 5 in my section, I really need to learn how to catch skimmers!!

We as a team ended up on a high though with a forth on the day pushing us back up into the top ten and we were left wondering what could have been.

Many thanks to Nigel Franks for a brilliant league.

Withy Teams of 4 , 26/5/12

This was the final round of the teams of 4 so we were hoping to at least get another decent result on the day, John drew me peg 4 on Selwood again and I was pretty confident of doing alright even though I had heard rumours that the carp had been spawning in the week.  I had a plan and it was going to revolve around catching skimmers for as long as I could and then to try and target a couple of carp in the last couple of hours. I set up a paste rig to fish in front of the platform on peg 3, a meat rig at 5 m and a small groundbait feeder that I clipped up at ¾ of the way towards the islalnd.

My bait was also simple 600g dry skimmer mix, a pint of dead reds, a pint of caster, ¾ of a kilo of worm some pellet 6mm meat and hemp. I also had the remainder of my 1kg dry allowance of groundbait for paste. At the all in I fed a half a pot of hemp with pellet and corn on my left hand paste line, a lesser amount of hemp and some meat on my 5m meat line and then cast out a large open ended feeder 3 times with no hooklength before starting to fish on the tip. This was a small cage feeder on 0.20mm Cenex feeder line with a 0.12mm hooklength and a size 18 Kamasan B911 hook, I was using quite light line and small hooks confident that if a big carp did pick up the bait then my Commercial bomb and Ultimatch reel combo would be smooth enough to deal with it. For the first couple of hours sport was steady with me leaving the feeder in for about 2 minutes a cast if I had not had a bite and I had caught skimmers up to a pound. It was looking as though I would need a carp in order to do very well in the section so after a couple of hours I rotated around my carp lines with no indications, and after around 10 minutes of searching, I was back to looking for skimmers on the tip. During the ten minutes that I had been off the line I had not fed it and when I returned sport had slowed considerably with just the odd fish to show for my efforts, I tried bigger and smaller feeders and also leaving the bait longer but I had lost them, and with people around me catching a few carp I made the decision to concentrate on trying to catch one for the last couple of hours. I started by plumbing up a new swim in the edge to my right in around 18 inches of water and I fed all of my remaining feeder groundbait on this line in an attempt to pull a fish in.

It worked very quickly and within 15 minutes I had a couple of carp to upper double figures cruising around and colouring up the water in the edge. This is when I dropped a major clanger and I tried to catch them on paste, I had not had a proper indication on my banker paste line and it was not looking good, in hindsight a couple of worms would have been a better choice of hookbait, but out went the paste. I had an indication after 5 minutes that saw me strike and hit a brick wall, this wall then nodded and came off as I believe that I had foul hooked it, the explosion that happened in the edge was spectacular as around 20lb of annoyed carp bolted off my bait, spattering it everywhere. 10 minutes later and I had a definite foul hooked fish come off again very quickly but that was the end of my sport, although I had a few fish cruising in open water I was unable to mug any, although I missed 1 bite, and I only saw indications of fish over my lines again after the all out.

I managed to weigh 20lb 12oz of skimmers and this was enough for 5^th on the lake, I had only needed another couple of pounds for 4^th, 10 for 3^rd and 30 for 1^st, in hindsight (and this is a tough one to swallow) I should have stayed on the skimmers until I had used up all my bait for them or the last 30-60minutes as I may have doubled my weight as they seemed to be coming in waves that increased in strength. When I stopped feeding them they moved infront of peg 2 and he caught a few and a couple of carp for 25lb odd. That was it for this competition and we as a team finished alright on the day but not enough to claw our way into the top 3. I will be back given half a chance next year.