AAF Gp2 Mt2 Bristol Avon, Chippenham, 16/11/2011

So it was back to my old stomping ground in Chippenham on the Avon, and after the previous round I was looking for a better result so that I might be able to get my mojo back and start to get back up the leader board again. My day started at 4am with an alarm clock going off in my ear as I had to pick Chris up at 0445 so that we could get on the river early and peg it for the day’s festivities. We had a good run and arrived at Riverside drive at around 0620, it was still pitch black so the pegging was done by headlamps and torches, we had 39 pegs to place and a couple of areas to avoid, namely the straight known as the dead stretch and also the peg that I nearly blanked off earlier in the year. That said we ran A section all the way through Riverside drive and a couple down on Westinghouse drain, putting nearly every peg in due to the lack of flow, B section then started at the shallows in the trees and although we missed out a few pegs towards the end of the line of trees ( we could see the weed and bottom all the way to the far side with pants torches) it still finished well before the Sailing club on some half decent pegs. Finally C section was started at the blue bridge and we ran it downstream into the park trying to leave out as many big gaps as possible to keep it as fair as possible. Pegging the match length let me see which numbers that Ian would need to pull out for us later that morning and the perfect draw would have been A1, A7, A11, B4 or B11-13 and anywhere in C section, as I thought that these pegs would give the team the best chance of a top 3 in each section. Eventually Chris and I got to the draw location, had a breakfast and then the work began. Ian came through the draw and the team had the following, Chris A9, Ian B13 and I was on C1, it looked good on paper with Chris being on probably the favoured peg but both mine and Ian’s could produce with chublet in Ian’s from the far bank and the same for me under the tree cover.

I dropped Chris off at Riverside Drive and then found some roadside parking barely 100m from my peg (Result); I pushed my barrow down the path to my peg and was happy with what greeted me. In the half light when we had been pegging it I had not really looked at the peg but now I was happy with marginal shelf weed and far bank cover it looked good for a few pounds and I decided that even with the lack of colour and flow my target weight would be 3Kg.

 

So I started setting up rigs and decided on fishing a single pole line down the middle at 13m with bread, wag and mag across under the trees and also put a worm line in just past the weed downstream for a perch. I set up a 0.75g Carbo on 0.12mm Cenex with a 0.08mm hooklength of the same material and a 20 B511, this was shotted with a bulk of no.8 shot 18 inches from the hook and 3 no.10s spread under the bulk, this was rigged on no.5 Cenex elastic through 3 sections. My second rig for the middle was a 1.25g DS 14 H with the same line, elastic and hook as the other rig but this time the shotting pattern was an ollivette 2 feet from the hook and 5 no.12 droppers. My waggler rig consisted of a 14ft Browning Zitan match rod, Black Magic reel loaded with 3lb Maxima mainline, a 3BB Browning loaded insert waggler attached by a caraluso waggler adapter, a 0.10mm Cenex hooklength and a size 20 Drennan wide gape match hook. I also set up a worm rig and plumbed it up but that’s about it so I won’t go into it.

I called the all in (Even though I was not ready) and then shipped out a ball of bread feed onto my 13m line, the Carbo rig closely followed it and I had a bite first drop in that I missed, and the second that again I missed. Already frustrated I came down a punch size to 4mm and started to hit the odd bite, Roach at around 10 to the pound and a couple a bit bigger started to come in and at the end of the first hour I had 16 roach in the net for around a Kilo. The bites had slowed so I re fed with a small nugget of bread and threw the waggler across for 5 minutes; this gave me 3 small perch so I went back onto the pole line. It was around this time that disaster struck!

The story is as follows: a month ago I went fishing at Nutford on the Dorset Stour, the field was full of cows but I decided to fish anyway. Whilst I was getting a bucket of water to make my groundbait up with I had a very inquisitive cow stamp all over my kit and it managed to hit my rod bag without me noticing. I fished for the day using the pole up to 11.5m and did not notice anything wrong with it; however, the cow had split the 14.5 and 13m sections and also put long hairline fractures into the 10 and 11.5m sections. I replaced the two bottom sections last month but thought the little cracks would be ok!

Back to Chippenham I was missing a few bite so I decided to work really hard at hitting them, but I got a little carried away on one and the 11.5m section broke in 2 right on the crack that the cow had put into it. I was not a happy bunny. I telescoped the sections through and carried on but I needed a break so walked my section taking a few photos for the newsletter. On my walk I saw people struggling to catch bleak, or anything and it transpired that the whole river was fishing desperately hard so I was doing alright, Pete Coleman however, was catching the odd better perch and I saw him landing one of about a pound as I walked past. I needed to get back to my peg and get my head down so I did, it was still hard but the fish turned on a little in the last hour and I caught 3 chublet for 12oz and also a few Roach on the pole line saw me add around a pound in the last 30 minutes.

The scales came round quick and it really had been hard, my 33 fish weighed in at 2.230kg so a good day had been had however, Pete had emptied his swim of perch and his 8 fish came in at 3.240kg so he had done me by a clear 2lb!! At the results this proved to be enough for 1^st and 2^nd in the match for the pair of us as well, so the stretch had fished really hard, at the end people were moaning about the pegging but I was fine with that as it certainly was interesting. Congratulations again to Pete and the next round is on the Kennet and Avon Canal at Bishops Cannings so more bread fishing for me.

Pete Coleman and his match winning bag.

Jefferies Cup, River Nene

This was my first visit to the Nene and I had been looking forward to it for a couple of weeks, rigs and hooklengths were tied ready and the rest of my kit was well prepped. I drew a peg about 3 pegs upstream of a small footbridge, an area that I was told would normally be run to by the guys fishing, ‘Normally?’ I replied, and soon found out why.

It was 13m wide and around 4 feet deep so perfect for a bit of bread fishing, especially since the river was so clear, I set up a 0.75g Drennan carbo on 0.12mm Cenex mainline and a 0.08mm bottom of the same material, with a 20 B511, all set on a top 4 rig with no.5 Cenex elastic through 3 sections. I also set up a strung styl hemp rig and a worm rig but enough about them as neither produced a bite. At the all in I fed a small ball of licky bread at 5m in front of me and 4 balls of groundbait at 11m downstream at 2 o’clock, before shipping out a 4mm punch onto my 5m line.
Basically nothing happened, I re-fed with ting nuggets of bread to try and attract the roach onto that line but it did not work, started a worm line but nothing on that and I had no indications on my groundbait line. The RAF angler to my right had caught about a dozen roach in the first 2 hours so I needed to catch something to save face and I got off my box and ‘adapted’ a hemp rig into a light bread rig. 0.10mm mainline, 0.07mm Cenex bottom with a 20 B511 all set on no.3 Cenex elastic. The float was a slim 0.2g pattern with a hollow bristle and I plumbed this up on a line under the tree in front of me at about 10m fed a tiny pinch of loose licky (as there was next to no flow) then went over the top with a 4mm punch. I had an almost instant response but missed my first couple of bites but a change to a 3mm punch sorted that out and I was soon putting skimmers into the net. Not bad I thought but the skimmers were around 20-25 to the pound with the odd slighty better roach thrown in for good measure, I found that you could not take too many fish from the line on the bounce as they would back off. I nurtured the swim as much as possible and at the end of the match I had done a good job of trying to catch up and thought I had possibly 2kg in the net, the scales however, told a different tale and the fish were alot smaller than I had thought (plus I did not count them) and I ended up with 2lb 6oz. This was enough for 5th in a 15peg section but I was not impressed with my first visit to the river, the section was won with a joint weight of 3lb 1.5oz so all I needed was another line perhaps that I could have caught on and it would have been enough.


Lessons learnt were to stick to my guns! I saw that the river was tap water clear and thought hat bread would be the way but still fed a groundbait line!! And, never give in as the last hour was the best as the light started to fade.

Withy To4, 5 Nov 2011

For this match it had been decided that I would be fishing Selwood lake, this meant that I was in for a tough day and that I needed to be drawn a decent peg, I wanted an island chuck as I felt that this would give me the best chance of catching my target weight. Keith returned from the draw with peg 11, this was not really what I wanted as I had no island chuck and was basically forced into fishing towards the corner. To make my life easier I set by box up facing down towards the corner to the right and plumbed up a number of swims along the bank. The starter rig for here consisted of a 0.18mm mainline to 0.16mm bottom and a size 2 Tubertini 175 hook. This was set on medium hollow elastic and had a short robust float attached to try and survive the far margins in which there were overhanging reeds and a platform to contend with. I also set up a dobbing rig for down and around the corner, this was 0.18mm mainline to 0.14mm bottom with a 16 B911 hook on yellow Reflex hollow elastic. The float was a 4X12 Big H border and the bait was 8mm punched bread. Finally I plumbed up a Drennan Carp 7 on 0.16 to 0.14mm line with an 18 B911 again on yellow Reflex elastic, at 2+2 straight in front of my platform where the depth was only 2 feet deep. The theory was that if fish were on that line I should be able to see them, and I was going to fish meat on this line for the resident skimmers and big carp.

I was set up with plenty of time to spare and watched the water before the all in, also chatting with the other anglers, it turned out that last time the lake had been won with 20 odd pounds! The average size of carp in the lake is around 7-8 lb so I only needed 3 or 4 for good points and now my target weight was halved to 20lb, shouldn’t be too hard.

The all in was called and I shipped my dobbing rig into various spots along the right margin for the first 30 minutes, I did not even get an indication until I had worked my way all the way to in front of the next platform, at 16m the float dipped and I was attached to fish no.1. At 3oz I was not really after roach, but had a couple more looks in that area for a couple more as I was now off the mark. I decided at this point to feed 2 of the spots that I had earmarked when plumbing up and put a small helping of hemp and corn on the left and pellet and meat on the right. The rest of the day was really a case of chopping and changing over the 2 lines to try and maximise my chance of catching a carp, this also saw me changing the way I fed the right swim a couple of times but all I had from there was a couple of roach. In fact there was not even a sign of a carp on the right hand swim but when a fish moved into the left swim they gave themselves away by bubbling freely.

I managed to land 2 carp from the left swim, one of 6lb and a baby at 3-4lb, I also lost two fish into the reeds and under the platform due to my elastic being too soft and stretchy, something that I will be looking to change in the future. The 5m line also showed fish moving across it all afternoon, I caught a couple of skimmers before the big carp moved in, I landed one at 9-10lb and spooked another couple from under my pole tip. It was either the pole or rig spooking them so I have bought a couple of smaller stumpier floats to try and prevent the fish spooking. The all out was called too soon as I had two carp feeding on my 5m line at the time but I had ended up with 3 carp and a few bits for a total weight of just over 19lb, this was enough for a section win with 2^nd catching 4 carp for 18lb but the weights were very tight and if I had not caught the roach and skimmers I would have been 3^rd or 4^th in section.

I learnt a few lessons, basically about how to feed on the day and to try and keep my loosefed meat tighter as when it was closely grouped the bites came quicker.

AT WL Round 3, K&A, 30/10/11

This round got moved from the river as Staverton had not fished well, so we were off to a stretch of canal that only a few people had practiced. Not a good start. A bacon butty and coffee despatched before the draw, and Barry drew me out a peg along the Beeches stretch of the canal. I got quite excited as I walked along the towpath looking at all the swims with far bank features and the word on the bank being that mine was a section full of bonus fish. I got to my peg and suddenly realised that I was about to have a bad day out of the 7 pegs in the section mine 2 had no real far bank features to speak of and mine was the worst of the two. Kevin Rowles on his walk to the end peg of my section (not where you want to see him) stopped to tell me that I would do well to beat the end pegs from my peg and then Barry tipped up and told me that I would be lucky to beat anybody from my peg.

This made my mind up and my plan for the day was to catch as many roach as possible and to look on a bonus line but not to concentrate on it like I thought that a few others would do. I set up a 5m bread rig, 0.6g float on 0.12mm main and a 0.08mm bottom to a 20 B511 and no.5 elastic through 3 sections. I also set up an on the drop rig for 11m and a deck rig for the same line, both on 0.1-0.07mm with 22 B590 hooks and no.2 and 3 elastic respectively. I set up a skimmer rig for the 11m line, a track worm rig and a far bank bread rig just in case it was harder than I would like but due to the ship back I would prefer to fish shorter.

At the all in I fed a Satsuma of licky at 5m and then 3balls of No.1 groundbait with a few squats and pinkies at 11m before dropping my bread rig in close. It took a couple of minutes but I soon had fish no.1 in the net but the problem was that the guys either side had both caught bonus fish in the first 10 minutes. I decided to try and ignore them and get my head down but after 40mins I had caught 25 roach for 2lb and the guy to my left had taken a hybrid and a big perch already and the guy to my right had caught a skimmer of about a pound. I was about to go over my 11m line when I looked up and witnessed a pike strike right on top of my feed so I fed a small ball of groundbait and also my worm lines and had another look inside. After 5 minutes I shipped out a half a dendrabena and looked on my 1^st worm line, nothing happened so I looked on my second, after about 80 secs the float slid away, I struck and bumped off what felt like a small perch. Next put in I had a small tommy ruffe so that was chucked up the bank in disgust and I looked on the 11m line. I was able to catch roach at about 80 to the pound quite quick but I started to have pike problems with them striking on my feed area. To overcome this I started a bread line at 14.5m and could catch quite quickly but I saw the guy 2 pegs to my left catch a small carp and a perch in quick succession so decided to start a worm line right over in about 14 inches of water. This backfired with only a small perch to show for my efforts and a destroyed bread line so for the last 45 minutes I got my head down on the 11m line. I found that every time there was a strike on that line then a small ball of groundbait brought them back within 10 minutes, still not quick enough. The all out could not come soon enough as the end pegs had smashed the section and the guy to my left had caught a few as well, I was on scales and Kev Rowles had nearly 30lb of carp and skimmers from the left end peg. The right end peg had caught 18lb+ for second and finally the guy to my right had 14lb ish. My 4lb 1.5oz was only enough for 6^th but I had been 1.5ozs away from 4^th!! I had taken the right plan for the peg but felt let down at the end to have been so close when competing against the pegs I was. Still at least I know what to do next time.

Lessons learnt were again don’t try to chase big fish if there are none there. Hare and the tortoise springs to mind!!

AT WL Prac, Bristol Avon

This was my first ever trip to this stretch apart from the odd walk along its banks with the dog a few years ago, I had always fancied a trip there and was pleasantly surprised when B15 stuck in my mitt at the draw. When I got to my peg I had around 20m of width with most of the flow across, there was a tree overhanging just downstream of my peg and I fancied it for a few perch. I set up my platform and soon noticed that there may be a problem in the form of the local rowing club as they were obviously training and boats were up and down like a fiddlers elbow. Unperturbed I carried on and after mixing my ground bait I started to set up my top kits, my plan was to fish a long pole line for Roach, a short line with chopped worm and also I set up a waggler to fish across and downstream of where I was sat. My first rig was a 1.5g float on 0.12 to a 0.08mm bottom and size 20 on no.5 elastic and the other 2 Roach rigs were all the same apart from the floats, with a 1g pencil and a 0.6g nevis also getting set up. The inside rig was a 0.7g FP500 float on 0.14mm main to a 0.12mm bottom and a 16 wide gape match, due to the amount of weed I had this set on 10 solid elastic and I also chucked a weed rake out to 13m in front and to 10m under the tree as the plummet would not settle properly. My long pole line was at 14.5m to avoid the weed and find some flow so at the all in I cupped 10 balls of groundbait containing pinkie, caster and hemp out to the spot. I went straight over the top with my heavy rig double bulked and was rewarded with 4 fish in 4 puts before it got a little harder, then it was a case of catching a couple of fish and then changing something. After about 2 hours I had 30 fish for around 4lb when the rowers stopped, the wind picked up and my swim turned into an unfishable layer of pond weed.

The only way that I could get to fish was with the waggler, so that I did for small roach, chublet and bleak for the rest of the match. Over the last 3 hours I caught about a pound of fish due to being unable to present bait and I caught best when I dragged my float under the pond weed.

My match finished with a credible 5lb 1oz unfortunately only good enough for 3^rd in section with a big 6 and a big 7lb weight both coming from further upstream to my right. I did however; beat the pegs to either side so that made me feel better considering the duckweed ruining my day. Always next week, the team had a reasonable day with a section win and a few other pickups.

AAF Gp2 Mt 1 K&A canal, Bishops Canning

My alarm went off at 4am for this match so that I had enough time to get to the venue and peg the match length. However, I still had enough time for a breakfast and also a quick dash with a couple more pegs that I needed to add to the end of the match length when a couple of extra people tipped up without booking in. I had peg B7 pulled out of the bag with my name on and I knew straight away that I would be up against it, I briefed Pez and Dave the best I could remember on their pegs and then travelled down to my peg.

The swim was a standard straight bit of canal, I had the bend to my right that usually contained a few better skimmers so I was hoping that perhaps one or two of them might stray as far as me, however, due to the recent frosts the colour had dropped out of the water drastically and I was in two minds as to even try for them. I set up a bread rig, 4ft deep at 4m, 0.12mm mainline to a 0.08mm bottom and a 20 B511 with a 0.6g pencil float and no.5 elastic through 3 sections. I also set up a deck squatt rig of a 0.1mm mainline, 0.07mm bottom and a 22 B590 with a 0.3g Classic 6 on no.3 elastic and an on the drop rig that consisted of the same line and hook but a slim browning float and no.2 elastic. I had a small overhanging bush at 14 m to my right so I set up a worm rig for that line on Pink Reflex elastic, 0.14mm mainline, 0.12mm bottom and a 16 wide gape match under a 0.5g FP500 float; this was also the same depth as under my keepnet so a second worm line was planned for there. I had a bit of time left after mixing my groundbait and prepping my caster, so I set up a skimmer rig and a bread rig for in the reeds on the far bank, the skimmer rig was 0.12mm mainline to a 0.1mm bottom and an 18 wide gape match under a 4X16 Chimp on No.5 elastic. The bread rig was the same as the close in rig but under a 4X12 float and no.3 elastic.

Before I knew it the all in was upon me and I potted in a Satsuma of licky with a bit of loose bread in on my 4m line, and then I shipped across to my 11.5m line with 4 balls of groundbait laced with squatt, dead pinkie and a few caster. I then dropped my bread rig in at 4m and awaited results, after 40 mins I had had 25 fish all on bread but had over fed the swim (again) so decided to try the squatt line, before I started on this line though I fed 10 worms and a pinch of caster under the tree. Back on the squatt line and I was straight into fish, however, at 25 to the pound I was going nowhere fast and decided to concentrate on catching a skimmer after the guys to either side of me had one. This proved to be the worst thing I could have done and over the last couple of hours I managed a couple of small perch on the worm lines and some small roach that hung themselves on big maggot.

The match was over before I knew it but not before the heavens opened and soaked us all, I had managed to catch 1.560Kg but this was only enough for 6^th out of my 11 man section. I had not been far off with only a pound needed for 3^rd in section but targeting the skimmers was not the way to go, as a team Dave and I had blown out but Pez continued his run with a 3^rd in section from a tricky area so not all was lost. Still next month it is the Bristol Avon at Chippenham!!!

AT Upper Thames WL, Rd 2 K&A Canal, 16/10/2011

As you can see from the picture I was the first recipient of the ‘infamous’ Pink Flamingo, this was for an indiscretion earlier in the year but I digress, back to the fishing. At the draw Barry came out with G4, this put me around the area that I had been on last week and the speculation around the team was that it was the peg that won it last match. On walking along the section I finally found my peg, 2 along from where I wanted and in front of next to no cover and the same problems with the lack of depth over to look forward to. As I thought that I would be off the fish so to speak it made my mind up for me that I would be concentrating on small fish for the day, I plumbed the same bread rig as last week at 4ft deep and then set up a deck squatt and an on the drop squatt rig both plumbed up at 13m in around 2ft of water. My reason for this was simple, hopefully the boats would not go that far over to get around the corner, sound in theory but only time would tell.

My squatt rigs were 0.1mm Cenex to 0.07mm Cenex and 22 B590 hooks on no.2 or 3 elastic, the deck rig was a 0.3g Classic 6 and the OTD was a 0.1g Browning slim. I also set up a worm rig and a shallow bread rig but I hoped that I would not need to use either. On the all in I cupped in a small ball of licky at 5m and 2 balls of groundbait with some loose squatt at 13m and I started on a 5mm punch on the short bread line. Same as last week it did not take long for my first fish and I soon had around 20 in the net, but then the first boat of the day came through and coloured the water up stopping the action almost immediately. I fed my worm line and then started to work the long line but it was hard work in the shallow water and we were not helped by the number of boats that were taking full advantage of the Indian summer. The 2 pegs to my left were easily running away with the section as they both had skimmers in the bag by the half way stage but I was steadily catching fish at around 20 to the pound so the weight was steadily growing. I had a couple of looks on my worm line and also across at 14.5m in the shallow water with bread but my best line was the 13m groundbait line. I finished with over 75 fish for 3lb 15oz and a 4^th in section so it was as expected. The team managed a 4^th on the day with some good results and some not so good ones but the best news for me was that the Flamingo found a new home.