Firstly, I am sorry that it has been a while but I have been very busy so these blog pieces will be kept a lot shorter than in the past. The story for this match goes that a while ago I was chatting to Greg and decided to start fishing some of the group matches again, probably concentrating on the natural venues but with an eye on the R.Sigs champs next year as they will be on a local venue to me.
This first group match was being
held on the prolific Colber stretch of the Dorset Stour so it would have been rude
to miss it. I booked in a week before and was soon being tapped up by Tree to
join his team, if only for the natural venues, well why not. The draw was
conducted the night before via Zoom as there was no suitable venue to hold a
draw for 18 people and I was given C2 as a swim, now this meant absolutely nothing
as I had never been to the stretch so it would be a surprise come the morning.
The swim was on the outside of a
bend and I was sat on the top of a high bank with about 14m to the far side, as
you can see from the photo there was a tree on my bank downstream and a bunch
of reeds opposite it so they were earmarked for lines.
So my plan was to feed a few
balls of feed rich groundbait on a pole line at about 11m, then feed worm down
by the tree and loose feed maggot for a waggler line towards the reeds. My
groundbait was ½ Bag River, ½ Bag canal and lake and ½ a bag of roach black all
from the dynamite baits stable, simply because I had them spare in the garage.
I set up a rig for the pole, a
heavy rig for down by the tree, a waggler, a light feeder and a 6m whip in case
the pole line was good. I was ready in plenty of time so went and annoyed a few
people and had a cup of tea.
At the all in I cupped in 6 balls
of groundbait with 250ml of hemp, caster and deadened pinkie followed up with a
palmful of caster and about 20 chopped worms on the perch line. I shipped out the pole rig and started to
catch small fish straight away, the first run lasted about 25 minutes before
they petered off and a look down the worm line saw the fist of a few small
perch come in. The day was pretty
simple, try to coax a few bites on the pole, then refeed a small ball and try
something else for 10 minutes, the stamp of fish was small and I never really
had them lined up, although I did give the whip a go for 10 minutes or so, but
it was still nice getting a few bites, especially when I hooked a fish that
pulled elastic out on the worm line, ok as I was swinging the 6oz perch
granted.
The 5 hours ended and had
actually enjoyed working hard to get the bites, I was on boards so we got the
carbon put away and then started from the bottom of the stretch, it turned out
that Glynne had charmed a 4lb tench out on his light maggot rig and that saw
him weigh 3.375Kg, there were a couple of 2Kilo weights and then I weighed 3Kg
dead for second in section.
I just needed a bonus fish as the
match had been won from 2 pegs to my left by Greg with 3.55Kg and that included
2 small tench! I was forth overall so in
all a good day, on the team front I was top scorer, we will leave it at that.
What would I do different:
I think a second groundbait line further over or a worm line further
down the river in the main channel may have been worth a few more bites in the
quiet spells, and I would have fed my waggler line more accurately rather that
trying to fish as far down the river as possible.
Rigs used:
Whip: Cadence 9.5m
Line: 0.13mm Powerline to 0.10mm Stream
Hook: 18 Colmic B957
Float: 1.5g DH 23
Pole light long:
Elastic: 1.2mm Drennan Power Pull
Line: 0.13mm Powerline to 0.10mm Stream
Hook: 18 Colmic B957
Float: 2g DH 23
Pole Worm:
Elastic: Preston 13H through 1 section
Line: 0.19mm Powerline to 0.15mm Colmic Stream
Hook: 33 B711
Float: 1.5g Drennan AS6
Feeder:
Rod: 3.3m Matrix horizon xs with 1 oz tip
Reel: TDM 3012 loaded with 8lb sensor
Rig: Helicopter 0.11mm hook length to 16 B560
Feeder: 20g Guru commercial open end (The smaller one)
Waggler:
Rod: Cadence CS10 13ft number 1
Reel: Daiwa TDR 2508 loaded with 3lb maxima
Float: Dave Harrell 2AA sensitip wag
Hook length: 0.10mm to a size 18 B560
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