Sycamore fishery , Rowans canal

August 31st , peg 22

Rowans canal

Well today was the start of my open match fishing career after leaving Balmoral AC and things didn’t really go to plan as you will find out later , the weather leading up to todays match had been pretty bad with the drop in temperature and heavy rain but it was forecast to be a lot drier today thankfully and we might even get the sun poking its way between the clouds . When we rang in the week we was informed that we would just be on Rowans canal because their was a club match taking place on Silver birch the other match canal and one on Davids pool , this usually results in the match fishing hard especially with every peg being taken like it was today .

When we got to the venue we drove round to the back of the complex to park up as their would be plenty people knocking about , as we hadn’t been here for a couple of months we had a quick walk around the canal we would be fishing today and the first thing that i noticed was the water was up nearly a foot just below the platforms another thing was that there didn’t seem to be many fish topping which was strange for on here maybe all the rain had settled the fish in the deeper water. There had also been a club match on Rowans canal the previous day which was won with just over twenty pound and they had only twelve anglers contesting it , so with all that information i expected a low winning weight of around the mid thirty pound mark which is usually around thirty fish .

After the draw i was on peg 22 which wasn’t the area i would have liked to be in although i did have the benefit of the little breeze blowing towards my direction , per usual i had come with a plan in mind and i decided to fish ;

Far bank at 3ft , 0.3 malmams speedy float with 0.12 garbo line direct to a size 18 lwg guru hook , shotting pattern was a spread bulk of number 10 stotz starting six-inch from the hook .

Bottom near slope at 4ft , 0.4 malmams float with 0.12 garbo line direct to a size 18 lwg guru hook , shotting pattern was a spread bulk of number 9 stotz starting six-inch from the hook .

Margin where it was 2ft , 0.2 scone float with 0.12 garbo line direct to a size 18 lwg guru hook , shotting pattern was a spread bulk of number 10 stotz starting six-inch from the hook .

My bait was going to revolve around pellets because i felt that the weather was turning cold enough to start using this bait and i did bring a few maggots if i had made the wrong decision ;

1/2 pint soaked micros

1/2 pint soaked 4mm pellets

1/2 pint f1 dark ground-bait

1 pint mixed maggots

small tub of expanders

When the all in sounded I started of on my 3ft rig at 12 meters being careful not to overfed i decided to use a small kinder pot and tapped in a few micros with a bit of ground-bait to cap it off , i decided to try a 6mm expander first because it would give me a better idea of the contours of the far shelf and i like my hook pellet to register on my float tip , i do this by allowing the expander to slightly sink the float and i then push my rig up the slope until a few mm show this helps when targeting the shy biting f1s .

On my first drop i had a little dink on the float which resulted in a near 2lb carp making its way to the net before a slightly smaller f1 quickly followed and i was just thinking that if it continued like this i could be on for a winning weight , but as soon as they had turned up they were gone and i can’t believe that my two feeds with a small kinder pot had over fed my peg so i figured i hadn’t put in enough bait to keep them there so i increased the amount and regularity of pellets going in to try to get them back but this didn’t work either . I re-plumbed up a new line two meters to my right and yet again i had two quick f1s then nothing , i tried feeding one swim and fishing the other but still no bites i was certainly doing something wrong but i didn’t know just what ! ! !

I had fed my near slope line for the first ninety minutes of the match with just maggots because they was easier to feed by hand , i was understandably expecting a few fish to have settled here but yet again i failed to get any indications which was really puzzling but most of the anglers i could see were struggling like me . So with half of the match gone i decided to feed my right hand margin with pellets as that was the only hook bait to produce a bite so far , i had another quick look on the 11 meter line while it settled but this time with maggot on the hook for a change this produced in a solitary f1 from my original swim but nothing else followed and my other line still didn’t produce so i decided to put in two big pots there and left it to settle .

I plumbed up a new swim along the base of the far shelf at 4ft deep because i felt that the fish might have dropped down into the deeper water i put in a kinder pot of micro-4mm pellets – ground-bait and left it to settle for a try later in the match and went on to my right hand margin , there was definitely fish present in this swim but i couldn’t connect with any of the little dinks on the float and a couple of times i came back with half a 6mm pellet which would lead me to believe that they were the small crucians not the f1s i wanted to catch .

With the last ninety minutes looming large i had a ten minute spell on each far-bank swim without success and as a last resort i began dripping in maggots on to my left hand margin where it was 2 ft deep , out of the blue my float buried and another nice stamp stockie came to the net it was so long since my earlier bite that i almost forgot to strike . Another carp followed of similar size and a couple of the bigger f1s too and i even managed a small carp from my right hand margin where i had feed pellets , i don’t know if it was the time of day or the fact that they had switched onto maggots but it was too little too late .

I think that i had learned a great deal in todays match which will put me in good stead for my next visit on their , the open was won with nearly 40lb and a couple of low 30lb back up weights so it fished as well as i expected it too with it being a close if a bit difficult contest with the top 8 weights only being split by less than 8lb but i think you can get carried away catching big weights of fish , my ten carp went a surprising 17lb which shows a good average stamp of fish for me but yet again i struggled to get among the smaller f1s which some thing i can not get my head around but it needs sorting before i can begin to compete in these more challenging matches .

Lathom pond one

24th August , peg 11

Well it has soon come round to the last club match of the season and my final one with Balmoral AC , i have enjoyed my four years there and had a little bit of success along the way with me winning ;

Division three winner in 2011

Overall club winner in 2013

Runner up in 2014

But there has also been a few disagreements to sort out over the years and its been quite stressful running the club on your own ,so i would recommend to who ever decides to take over that they nominate a couple of people to help with everything to make it a bit easier. Back to todays match i had wanted everything to go well but the harder you try the more it usually goes wrong , but it never really happened like that today and without going into too much detail , it wasn’t how i would have liked to finish my time at the club .

Today we only had a dozen anglers fishing because a few members of the club was on a fishing holiday and with us having most of the lake i was able to peg one miss one which will make the fishing better hopefully , i had been up for a practise the previous week and done extremely well so i was expecting some big weights and one lad who had been on a few times in the week decided he would try to break the long-standing club record which stood at 99lb and to be fair he did just that so well done to him .

After the draw i ended up on peg eleven which was in the middle of the bay which also had the benefit of the bit of breeze blowing in to it , but the last few matches we have fished on here this area never usually throws up decent weights and we also had a couple of good anglers on the better pegs plus my section was the hardest of the three so i could be up against it today .

When i got to my peg i had already decided on how i would like to target it and i was really happy with my margin swim too , the areas i wanted to fish where ;

Shallow 1ft+2ft , i used a matrix series three float with 0.12 garbo line direct to a guru LWG hook which had a micro band attached , elastic was size 12 preston durro

Pellet deck 6 meter ,i used a 4×14 malmams speedy float with 0.12 garbo main line with a 0.10 hook length which had a size 18 gamma pellet hook attached and my elastic was matrix 12s red .

Paste  meter , i used a 0.3 scone float with 0.14 garbo line direct to a turbertini 808 hook and my elastic was matrix 12s red ,

Margin ,  i used a 0.2 scone float with 0.14 garbo direct to a guru size 16 LWG hook and my elastic was matrix 14s yellow

I had found it best to feed quite heavy on here to keep the fish in the peg so i brought with me ;

1 pint paste

3 pint of 4mm pellets

2 tins of corn

1 tin of hemp

1 tub of hard hook pellets

1 tub of mixed expanders

When the all in sounded i went on to my four meter line and cupped in a full pot of 4mm pellets before proceeding to drop a pea sized piece of paste over the top i decided to use a piece this size because i had expected to be mainly targeting f1s and i would also cut out the pellet feed if it brought the fish up in the water which was a problem on my last visit here .It took a few attempts to get my float set right but it all went towards feeding the peg and i was soon getting indications but not from the f1s though but from proper carp averaging over 2lb a piece so i increased the paste to the size of a conker which helped attract the better stamp of fish .

In the first couple of hours i had thirty fish in the net and seemed to be doing better than all but one other angler , my swim was starting to struggle though and i needed another part of my peg to produce to keep on catching . I had been loose feeding pellets on to my six meter line since the match started but strangely i had only seen the odd one top where when i practised the week before it was black with fish shallow , maybe the recent cold weather had pushed them lower in the water so i decided to start on my deeper shallow rig first to see what response i got but it wasn’t great with only a few line bites so i tried increasing the feed to try to force the fish up in the water but this didn’t work either .

I figured with the amount of pellets going in that their must be some fish in the area so i tried my deck rig with an expander on the hook but this did not produce a bite either and maybe the water was a bit too deep at six meters but i do know that i had just wasted forty minutes without putting a fish in the net not what i wanted .

With two hours remaining of the match i decided to start feeding the left hand margin with four big pots of hemp plus corn , i also made the bold or stupid decision to put my second net in and while i left my margin to settle so went back on to my paste swim which took a while to get going again after being neglected for an hour , i was relieved to finally start getting indications again but the fish i began catching now were f1s instead of carp so i reduced the paste size again which increased the amount of bites that i hit .

I noticed a swirl from a big carp at the side of the reeds where i had potted in the bait so i took the opportunity to give my margin rig a go with double corn on the hook , i had purposely left all the float bristle showing so i wouldn’t be tempted to strike at any little dinks which would have only resulted in foul hooked fish . My first proper bite resulted in yards of yellow 14s matrix elastic streaming from the pole tip , after struggling to get it under control for about five minutes i had a near double figured carp in the net which was a bonus and another smaller one followed before i started getting bites from silvers so a couple more pots of feed went in before i returned to my paste rig .

A few more f1s came to my four meter line before after about twenty minutes the fish were back in the margin , so a quick change of rig resulted in a couple more carp before i hooked something heavy which just plodded about then headed off into open water before the hook pulled and i felt that it must have been foul hooked , a few more cups went in and by rotating between the two swims i kept fish coming for the rest of the match apart from in the last ten minutes when i had run out of corn+hemp so i decided to feed pellets which strangely killed my margin .

When the all out sounded i was unsure if i had done enough to end my time at Balmoral AC with a win but i had certainly caught a few fish , as it turned out it was probably the best club match that i had been involved in with lots of weights around the 50lb mark . It was between me and one other lad for the match win , he had caught constantly all day where i had a bigger stamp but the quiet hour would most certainly cost me and it did with my 53 fish going 94lb but he put 106lb on the scales for the match win and new club record , So well done you fished a great match . 

It was a closer result than a few people in the club had thought and it was a fitting result to end my time at the club because i have lost count on the amount of matches that i had just fell short of winning in my four years with them ,it was just a real shame that it ended up the way it did  but to be honest i didn’t expect any less from some members in the club .

I hope you have all enjoyed reading about my club fishing exploits and i have booked some good matches for Balmoral AC next year i just hope that they find someone good enough to take over from me . I think that you will like my open match blogs that i will be doing from now on and i know it is going to be a real step up for me , i have no doubt it will be a steep learning curve but i am looking forward to it .

Gorses farm fishery , formerly Nicks farm

August 12th , peg five

This was my last chance to get back on to the bank before my wife goes away for a fortnight with work , i had planned on going to Sycamore fishery but after speaking to my mate he informed me that Nicks farm in Aspull was fishing really well at the moment and as i hadn’t been there for nearly four years so i decided a return was in order .

The weather during the day while i was at work wasn’t the best with strong winds and the occasional heavy shower but it was forecast to be hopefully a bit better in the afternoon , i arrived at the venue around three and it is your basic style of water with it being square in shape it also has twenty pegs with a very small island in the middle , from what i remembered on my last visit it had a big stocking of carp mainly mirrors and a few skimmers-silvers . Their was five other anglers on the lake so i thought it must be fishing well although i didn’t see anyone catch while i was setting up and you are always a bit apprehensive when visiting somewhere new or a place you haven’t been for a while , i decided to target it the same as i did at Lathom last week so i could practise my paste fishing because i do struggle using it for small stamp f1s-carp .

My to rigs  today was ;

Paste-5 ft deep and used a 0.4 scone jadz float with two size eight stotz half way down the 0.12 garbo line my hook was a turbertini 808 with 12s preston duro elastic .

Shallow-2ft deep i used a 0,3 matrix series three float with a bulk of size ten stotz under the float with one dropper , my 0.12 garbo line was direct to a size 18 kamasan f1 hook and elastic was 12s preston duro .

My bait was your basic ;

1 pint green swim-stim

2 pints 4mm pellets

Small tub mixed hard pellets

At 330 i was ready to get started and shipped out to four meter i didn’t really want to go further out because of the wind which might make controlling the float a bit problematic i had plumbed up to find a reasonably flat bottom anyway , i deposited my ball of paste plus some 4mm pellets and surprisingly my float settled just right the first time , i waited a few minutes with no indications so i shipped back in and re-fed the same amount as at the start but this time my float slid straight away and fish number one made a spirited fight before hitting the net which was a nice little mirror carp around 8 oz and was the smallest of the day .

I was soon getting into a steady rhythm with a fish or missed bite coming every time i shipped out and they was gradually getting bigger with the average stamp now approaching nearly 2 lb all bar one was a mirror carp , in the first hour i had twenty fish and i had begun getting a few liners with the odd carp taking the paste as it fell , which was my sign to pick up the shallow rig and i started at 2ft deep because their was nothing showing on the surface .

I began getting line bites straight away so i had plenty fish in front of me but i needed to go shallower to find them and when i did get the correct depth it was a fish a chuck , still all mirrors though and like all good shallow anglers i got into a routine ;

feed before i shipped out

slap my rig a couple of times to mimic the loose feed

hook a fish re-feed then ship back in

By doing this i had thirty fish in the middle hour and it looked like showing no signs of stopping but i was running out of pellets so i decided to go back on to my paste line for the last hour , as i thought it would it took a few drops to get them back on the deck and cut out the 4mm pellets to try to concentrate them back on the bottom , they was soon back feeding confidently and yet again i was catching or missing a bite every time i went in . With thirty minutes left it started going dark with some nasty rain clouds making their way over the hill , i hoped that it might pass over me but i wasnt that lucky and it began lashing it down so for the second time in two fishing trips i got soaked , the fish was still feeding well so i decided to stick it out and pack up when it had passed by .

When i called time on my session i had caught nearly 70 fish in three hours for between 80-90 lb all mirror carp except for a solitary common carp and a surprise barbel which i didn’t even know was in the lake but a lot has probably changed since my last visit here the fish have certainly grown too , it was a good practise for my last club match at Lathom fishery and i would recommend coming to Gorses farm to anyone that fancies a good days fishing or wanting to try out a new method because it’s stuffed with fish although a bit of variety would have been nice and next time i think my tip rod might get a workout casting towards the island .

 

Partridge lakes Ribbon

10th August , peg 15

Today was the next to the last round of Balmoral angling clubs season and we headed off to Partridge lakes Ribbon it is a twenty peg donut style water which is between 12-14 meters to the central island , every peg has a 1ft wooden fence around it to prevent you from falling in and there are trees close behind you which can make shipping back a bit problematic . The lake has a good record on big matches+open matches but they only tend to put half the pegs in and in my opinion they do seem to be a bit close together , the fish in here are mainly f1s up to 2lb , ide around the 1.5lb with a sprinkling of skimmers and carp .

The weather leading up to the match had been nice and sunny but a bit blustery , when i woke up in the morning though we had caught the back-end of hurricane Bertha and was greeted with it persisting it down with rain which lasted all day plus a really strong wind , luckily on Ribbon it was very sheltered so at least you could shelter under the brolly which most of the club choose to do whereas the fool hardy me and kenny made do with just the water proofs although i did have my bait brolly to keep my essentials dry .

I was half expecting a lot of dropouts due to the conditions , so i was pleasantly surprised when we had sixteen anglers attending todays match which meant four sections of four and as a result we could also leave a few pegs out , i hoped that this might ease the pressure a bit as a few in the club had been up to see the weigh in on the earlier Saturday where only 20lb had won and a few had even blanked on the high teen numbered pegs which i wasn’t expecting to hear from water on Partridge lakes in summer but i am sure it wont fish that hard surely .

As it was still lashing it down with rain we did the draw from the dryness of the cabin , when everyone had finished picking i ended up on peg 15 not really the area i wanted to be in especially when i got to it i found that i was in the middle of six of the best anglers in the club and i also had two of the clubs moaners to my right so it was lucky that i had my earphones today .The peg itself was 13 meters tight to the island were it was only six-inch deep near the mud bank and i felt that was too shallow in the conditions, i was happy to find 2ft at the side of the reed bed and 3ft flat area down the far slope , i had also been told not to bother with the channel or margin so i just had three rigs to set up today ;

1, Pellet rig 3ft deep on the far slope i used a 0.3 scone float which had a spread bulk of number ten stotz with 0.12 garbo line direct to a size 18 gamma pellet hook .

2, Maggot rig 2ft deep near reeds i used a 4×8 maver float with a n on the drop shotting pattern with 0.10 garbo direct to a size 20 drennon silver fish-hook .

3, Maggot shallow rig 1ft deep , i used a 0.1 scone float with an on the drop shotting pattern with 0.10 garbo line direct to a size 20 drennon silver fish-hook .

My bait today was going to revolve around just maggots but after seeking some advice on the internet about the venue it came to my attention that soft pellet would be worth starting on .

2 pints red+white maggots

1 pint micro dusted with ground-bait

small tub 4mm expanders

As the all in sounded and with the rain still lashing down i decided to take it a bit easier on the feed until i knew what mood the f1s are in plus i needed to find out if any fish was in the area , i kinder potted in some micros then lowered my expander amongst it and i had shotted my float so the weight of the pellet would pull my float under which meant that i needed to push my rig up the slope slightly until just a pimple was on the surface , it took a couple of feeds before i enticed my first bite and the f1 or carp proceeded to take me round the corner of the island through the next peg before the hook pulled out .

I was unsure at the start of the match on how to set up my elastic today because i had expected to catch ide which have really soft mouths and you can suffer lots of hook pulls if its set too tight , but while i was fishing pellet i tightened it up a bit which offered me some control over the fish but my next two f1s also came off ,the  first was when on shipping back my pole through the undergrowth i managed to hit a tree and off it popped , the other was when the hook pulled as i was guiding it to the net because their was quite a steep drop from the peg to the water and i couldn’t get the pole tip low enough because their was a safety fence in front of every peg ,thinking about it i should have moved my box to the right a meter as i lost a few ide later in the match due to hook pulls which along with the f1s cost me a better finishing position .

After managing to sort out my elastic situation i finally began putting the odd fish in the net with no more dramas , my peg was gradually getting stronger and i wax feeding half a kinder pot after every fish but the bites were very hard to hit and it seemed they wasn’t very happy in that area , so it came as no surprise when the f1s drifted off to the other end of the lake and they was replaced with a nice stamp of skimmer but when one did its best dolphin impression it seemed to unsettle the shoal and after half the match i had about twenty pounds in the net which if i continued going the same way then i might have a chance of framing but as the rain eased and it warmed up slightly my peg died on me .

I had fired half a dozen maggots at the reed bed every couple of minutes for the past hour so this is where i hoped their might be a few ide waiting and i could continue building my weight again , but my first few fish where 4oz silvers not really what i wanted and for about an hour i didn’t catch a great deal . I had used my stronger pellet rig against the rushes because with the stamp of f1s i had caught i was reluctant to use my lighter silver fish rig which had the solid 8 elastic so would have meant controlling them a nightmare but when i tangled this rig after yet another hook pull i had no other option but to change .

But after changing it i began getting the odd ide and when i started kinder potting maggots and not using the catty i managed to concentrate them on the deck which made them easier to catch plus i also picked up the odd f1 too , with thirty minutes to go the heavens opened again just in time to soak everyone’s gear but it had a good effect on the fishing as the ide began to feed in earnest with a few of us playing fish at the same time .

All too soon it was the time for the final whistle and it fished remarkably well in the conditions but only in patches with certain areas struggling especially on the more fancied pegs , it seemed that many different baits worked today but the best weights came from fishing tight across . We started the weigh in on peg one and they were pretty dismal until we got to peg nine who had 45lb , peg ten had 60lb then a couple more bad weights before my 26 fish went 34lb on peg 15 and peg 18-19 had 35lb + 38 lb .

So overall i finished fifth and lost enough fish for at least third due to angling error but that’s the way it goes sometimes in match fishing , i did manage to beat my main challenger for the club leadership but not by enough places to make it last to the final match , so well done Dave Benson you fished really well this season winning two matches on the way to the top of the table but the second place is still up for grabs at Lathom fishery so lets hope i can finish my time at Balmoral AC on a high .

1st Kenny Baxter 60lb

2nd John Unsworth 45lb

3rd Aidy Hardman 38lb

 

Hall lane , Merlins lake

Peg 33 , July 13th

After having a months break i was back on the club match trail at Hall lanes Merlins lake , i personally hadn’t fished this lake for well over two years and even then i had not had a good experience fishing it coming nearly last in the match , i knew that plenty of club members had fished it a lot in the previous weeks so they should have it sorted by now and should be hard to beat . This year i have decided not to waste my time doing practice sessions as they tend not to fish the same as they do in matches and so far it is working out for me because i am sitting towards the top of the league table even after missing a match .

On arrival at the venue there was plenty of people knocking about with three club matches and an open taking place , so after managing to find everyone so i could collect the pools and with only one angler missing their would be 19 contesting the club match on 24 pegs which could make the fishing a bit harder , especially after the recent inconsistent weather because it had rained constantly over night and we now had strong winds to contend with blowing towards the bottom of the lake which is also the better area to be in but it could make for a fairer match ” we shall wait and see.”

Before starting the draw i informed everyone about the new rules on the fishery and that i wouldn’t be attending the next match but as i expected no one came forward to volunteer to run it for me ,you could even see a few people back away while i was talking which was quite funny so we will just wait and see what happens .One by one all the better pegs where going with good anglers on both end pegs and on the split between the islands , when it came for my turn their was two pegs left in the bag and both where in the same section so i let Tony draw my peg and i ended up on number 33 which was towards the bottom of the lake in a decent area for carp “cheers for that mate ”

After the long walk i arrived at my home for the day i found that i was also on a peg between the islands and in one of the more winnable sections and i was kicking myself for leaving my tip rod at home but you can’t be expected to take everything with you , so after getting the usual banter for drawing that peg and was expecting me to get a big weight from their “so no pressure then “.I had decided to keep it pretty simple today regarding rigs ;

Across 3ft + shallow

5m shallow

Margin paste

My bait today revolves around a few different options i decided to follow the information that i had learned from friends on twitter and not follow the dubious tales that had been banded about by various people fishing the match .

Paste

Pellets 4mm

Meat and corn

Maggots

I planned on targeting the point of the island at 14 meters in a little patch of calm water which was in between two reed beds this offered my float a bit of protection from the wind and it also allowed me to go further along the bank if the conditions improved . When i plumbed up i couldn’t find the 3 ft depth which i had been told was the best place to start , in a suitable area so i scrapped that idea and went tight up to the mud bank where it was less than 1 ft deep .

As i was finding the right place for my rig a carp hit my line and bolted off which was a good sign of fish in my area, my margin paste line was a bit deeper than i would have liked too and all the reeds had been hacked back so i didn’t really think this line would work for me today and i should have put a line in somewhere else which could have produced a few extra fish and as you will find out later i could have done with a couple more carp today .

When the all in sounded i cupped in some 4mm pellets on to my margin swim and then another of meat+corn on to the far bank mud line i then went over the top of it with a cube of meat on the hook , my first few fish where small chub around the 8oz mark before the carp moved in but i was having real trouble keeping them on the hook and i bumped off three plus got broke on a 4lb hook length ! !

 

The wind was playing havoc with my pole control and it looked like it could be a long day , after changing my hook for a more robust guru Lwg because i thought that the thinner wired gamma pellet hook must have bent out with the size of carp i was attempting to catch and after the change i didn’t lose any more which was good but i was sure my bad start would cost me in the end .

My second+third hour were pretty straight forward with ten carp coming to the net averaging 3lb a piece and after catching a couple i would re pot in some meat-corn , but the wind was getting stronger and i was struggling to control my pole which certainly slowed my catch rate because i couldn’t keep my float still long enough to get a bite . So i changed my rig for a heavier float with a longer line between pole and float  , i hoped this would keep it steady long enough for me to get an indication and i was spending so long fighting the wind with my pole i had neglected to feed my shallow maggot line- margin paste line .

So in the last hour when the fish backed away i had nowhere to go and as i expected when i rotated my lines i had no bites apart from a small roach , so i stuck it out for another couple of carp because i felt that i would need at least twenty of them to be in with a chance of winning but i could only manage one more . When the all out sounded i was unsure how i had got on as from where i was fishing you couldn’t see the top of the lake and i knew that the end peg nearest to me had caught a lot but they wasnt the same stamp that i had caught .

I didn’t have long to wait though because that was the peg i would start the weigh in on and he had 50lb with treble the amount of fish that i managed , my 16 carp went 45lb so close but no cigar today and i had to put up with second in the match ,bad time management cost me today and i was a bit disappointed with myself for not doing better from that peg but it wasn’t your run of mill peg which i am sure that i would have had a good result from if i had thought a bit more about the best areas to target and had also kept them fed right “but that’s fishing for you”

The weight further up the lake towards the cabin had got gradually worse but most anglers had around twenty pound which was good in the conditions and their seemed to be a lack of carp up that end too but that might have been because of the way they fished it or bait they used . Well that’s me done for fishing for a couple of weeks as the wife is working away again , i just hope i can find something to keep me busy after work and i will put up the results for the next club match on blundells ash pool when or if i get them .

1st Dave 50lb peg 27

2nd Gary 45lb peg 33

3rd Mick 34lb peg

Sycamore fisheries

9th July , peg 18 Silver birch

After Saturday’s third on here i was eager for a return to Sycamore fisheries and so off i headed to contest the Weds evening rover match , i had been up to practise far bank work for a few hours the day before and had done well using bandit pellet over ground-bait . The weather leading up to the match had been reasonably nice but today it had turned rather windy blowing from the east which would have a bearing on how i tackle my peg and how well it will fish , i did have a quick look at which areas where taking the brunt off the wind so i would have a better idea where i wanted to fish .

When i got back to the cabin i paid the pools and picked a numbered ball out the bag to see how far done the line i was to choose a peg , luckily for me i was in the top half which would give me a chance of getting some were half decent .When it came for my turn i decided to go on peg 18 Silver birch the same one as i had last week , were i did ok catching 38lb of barbel and with what i learned yesterday i could hopefully get the extra few fish required to frame .

As i got to my home for the day i settled on three lines ;

Margin , i plumbed up tight against the near bank four meters down the side where it was 1 foot deep and someone had cut back the reeds , i choose to do this on my left hand side because it would offer me better control over my rig and i intended to feed this every thirty minutes with a cup of ground-bait . My rig was a matrix 0.3 series three float with 0.12 garbo line direct to a size 18 gamma pellet hook .

Near margin ,this was the line which i have had the most success with on here and i expected it to do the business tonite with the barbel , i spent a while plumbing up to find a flat spot about 2 ft from the near bank reeds and would feed a kinder pot of maggots every five minutes . My rig was a 0.3 speedy float with a spread bulk of number 10 stotz , the main line was 0.12 garbo with a six-inch 0.10 garbo hook length attached and my hook was a size 20 gamma pellet hook .

Far bank , after the previous days success fishing across to the far bank i was eager to give this line a go under match conditions , i planned on kicking off this line by cupping in a ball of ground-bait and the kinder potting in half of 4mm pellets and half of ground-bait after every couple of fish but with the wind being blustery i would need to wait for later in the match to give it a try . My rig was a matrix 0.3 series three float with 0.12 garbo direct to a size 18 f1 hook which had a micro bait band attached .

When the all in sounded i potted in some bait on to my margin swim and proceeded to kinder pot in maggots on my near slope , this is where i planned to start the match but things were not going to plan with only a couple of f1s making the way to the net but on looking round all Silver birch was fishing hard and thinking back at last weeks match it was the same but it did come really strong towards the end .So with the wind still to blustery to go across and with their being a few fish topping i decided to have a go shallow with pellet , i began loose feeding a dozen pellets at first to try to get the fish competing but they wasn’t having any of it and the odd fish i was picking up where well worth working hard for because they was big stamp stockies around the 2 lb mark .

 

Slapping the rig seemed to work better than feeding which proved my point about them not wanting a munch tonite , after losing a fish which bottomed my elastic out and just kept going i decided to retry the near slope while i let the shallow swim settle . I had been continuously loose feeding this line so i expected some sort of response and it was far from the usual liner city but a total lack of any indications , when out of the blue my float buried and i felt the jag jag of a barbel had they turned up at last but the answer to that was no with a small tench being my next few fish .

So a return to shallow was in order as this was my only line that i could get a bite from , i had cut back on the feeding and concentrated on slapping-tapping to try to provoke a response . This seemed to work better but it was noticeable that all my fish were stamp stockies and i even had one touching 3 lb which was big for in here it put up a really good fight on my matrix orange elastic .

The wind had eased a bit so a few people decided to try long and i would keep a keen eye on how they fared , we were now approaching the last ninety minutes so i re tried my near slope and the same thing as before happened a quick barbel then a few tench it was really beginning to do my head in as to why they wouldn’t settle like on earlier matches here .

I tried my really tight margin swim which i had fed for two hours but only a few liners ensued and with these two areas not producing i wouldn’t be challenging for a framing position tonite , i decided to concentrate on my shallow line for the rest of the match because at least this produced a few bites but i just couldn’t  get the fish competing and i even tried maggot but this only produced a solitary f1 .

When the all out sounded it was the end of a rather puzzling match , i had managed to get a few shallow which would have certainly been enough for me to frame if either of my margin swims had produced and why they hadn’t been was something for me to ponder about as i wont be able to fish the evening match for the next couple of weeks .

Yet again over 60 lb was needed to win and about half a dozen 50 lb plus weights contested the framing positions , my 22 fish went a surprising 31 lb which goes to show the size of the carp you can get shallow on pellet and my catch was the second best weight off Silver birch and all the bigger weights came from Rowans with peg 28 the one i had got third from on Saturday produced a similar weight , i was kicking my self at not choosing it again but it is usually a bad area to find your self in .

Off to Hall lane to fish Merlins on Sunday for the next Balmoral club match and i have heard some good + bad things about it but we will see how things pan out .

 

Widdows fishery

15th June , peg 9

Well here we go again round five of Balmoral Angling Clubs season and after a win in the last round i was looking forward to this one as its one of the venues on our match calendar that i have done well on with two consecutive thirds .

The lake has 36 pegs which enabled me to give most anglers plenty of room , it has an island which you can reach at 16 meters and it has a good stocking off carp around the 3lb mark with lots of skimmers to catch too .As you can drive to every peg on here and with everyone present we decided on an early draw , when it came for my turn i was left with peg 9 right at the side of the car-park which is far from where i wanted to be but everyone in my section was in the same boat .

On my last two matches here i have done really well targeting the skimmers and with the recent changeable weather i felt that was the best way to fish it today ,especially after finding out their had been a match the day before which was only won with 25 lb and as you all know waters don’t fish well when there’s two matches in as many days .

I decided to fish a few areas ;

16 m , i had 2 rigs for this line one at 1ft the other at 2ft both had 0.12 garbo direct to a size 20 f1 hook with a micro bait band and my elastic was red matrix

5 m ,i used a 0.4 scone float with 0.12 garbo line direct to a size 16 gamma pellet hook with red matrix elastic

Margin ,i used 4×12 malmam diamond float with 0.14 garbo direct to a size 16 guru lwg hook and my elastic was yellow matrix .

My bait was ;

1/2 kilo worm

1/2 pint micro

1/2 pint ground-bait

1 pint hard 4mm pellets

When the all in sounded i put two big pots in on my 5 meter line which i intended to leave for an hour for the skimmers to settle and so while i was waiting i went across to try to catch a couple of bonus carp , i started on my 2 ft rig because it wasn’t that warm yet and their hadn’t been any carp showing along the far-bank either .

I began by pushing my rig tight under the far bank rushes and then flicked four pellets at the float every few minutes,but nothing seemed to be working and thirty minutes in i was still bite less-fishless . Every one else seemed to be in the same boat apart from the lad to my left who was catching the odd fish on his feeder ,i began getting the odd indication but nothing i could hit so i decided to change to my shallower rig a bit earlier than i had planned .

This produced a solitary carp about 2 lb which but up a fight of a fish three times its size , so in the first hour i had not a great deal to show for it but neither had anyone else and it was fishing extremely hard .So i decided to go on my skimmer line which i had hoped would be my main line of attack but unfortunately it didn’t turn out that way , first drop and my float slid away so i counted to three before a firm strike which saw a tiny perch fly out the water followed by another of similar size .

I decided on a refeed to try to draw some fish into my peg this kind of worked with a few small 8 oz roach , when i did finally hook a big skimmer it did its best dolphin impression shedding my hook in the process , after two hours i was going nowhere fast with less than 3 lb in the net .So i decided on a new swim at 11 meters and fed this swim negatively with a kinder pot .

I went back on to my far-bank without success but when i noticed bubbles coming up from my negatively fed line , i took the opportunity to drop my rig over the top and this did not produce the hoped for skimmer but another small carp . A few small silvers came to the net so i risked another feed and it seemed that i had stumbled on a pattern with the bites because after 15 minutes i would hook something decent just as the bubbles appeared before the small silvers returned .

You will notice that i said hooked and not caught because i had two more big skimmers shed the hook plus i lost a 5 lb ghostie which somehow managed to break my main line above my float just as i was about to net it and after putting another rig on – plumbing up it disrupted my swim which never recovered because it never produced another bite.

So in the last hour i concentrated along the far-bank hoping for a few carp to boost my weight and their fore push me higher up the match placings , i missed a few bites but did manage another solitary carp around the 3 lb mark . When the all out sounded majority of the anglers were relieved because it had fished extremely hard as you can tell by the weights and my near 13 lb was good enough for sixth but if i had landed the lost fish it would have raised me up to third .

Having had a few late nights and early mornings leading up to the match definitely had a baring today on my decision-making because ;

1, I knew before the match that expander was working better than hard pellets tight across and feeding also seemed to make the fish back off .

2, The lad too my left fished the feeder across all match managed third so with the lack of carp showing shallow and the fact he was catching , it should have made me set up a deck rig for tight across especially after seeing the lad to my right catch four carp in the last hour doing just that .

3, Should never have big potted knowing the match result from the previous day and two negative lines would have worked better .

4, With more composure i might have landed a couple of the lost fish .

Any way we now have a mid-season break before some more dodgy matches that I’m not looking forward to fishing , but i am still second on the overall club points not bad after missing one match but i can not afford to miss any more because it’s getting tight at the top and i am having another enforced break while the wife works away it is something that i will just have to get used to but at least it will give me time to recharge my batteries .

1st Dave peg 19 , 41lb 12oz

2nd Aidy peg 7 , 27 lb 14oz

3rd Terry snr peg 35 , 26 lb 2oz

 

 

Sycamore fishery

Peg 16 Silverbirch , 11th June

After the weekends some what strange match i was back at Sycamore fishery to try to put a few things right but yet again i was left with more questions than answers just your typical f1 match then .After the previous days thunder-storm which will have hopefully freshened up the water a bit , today we was faced with warm weather , blue skies and little in the way of breeze which isn’t actually what you would like for fishing but can’t do much about that .

I had heard rumors that their might be a full house for todays match so i was a little disappointed with the 21 we had attending and it seems to be attracting some better class of angler these days too which can only help in improve your fishing technique .But at least we would all have a bit of room and come draw time that’s exactly what i was looking for , with the club not turning up at the weekend to fish Silver birch it meant that it was a week since anyone match fished it and i was eager to give it a try , so when it came to my turn i choose peg 16 halfway down the straight with two empty pegs either side .

My match plan was the same as always on here , start in the margin before going across and spend the last 40 minutes back to the margin but i had decided to try a different bait combination today ;

Rigs

margin 2.5ft deep ,0.3 scone pellet float with 0.10 direct to a size 20 gamma black hook and elastic was red matrix .

far shelf 2ft deep , 0.3 matrix series 3 float with 0.12 garbo line direct to a size 20 kamasan f1 hook and micro bait band , my elastic was orange matrix

tight across 1ft deep , 0.3 matrix series 3 float with 0.12 garbo line direct to a size 20 kamasan f1 hook and micro bait band , my elastic was orange matrix .

Bait

1 pint mixed maggots

1/2 pint micro dusted with ground-bait

1/2 pint soaked 4mm pellets

small tub mixed hard pellets

As the all in sounded i went onto my left hand margin and began flicking maggots at the float , it didn’t take long before i had my first which was a f1 and the fish seemed ravenous because i had 17 over 8oz plus a dozen silvers in the first hour but i noticed the bites beginning to slow down so i was eager to give the swim a rest and not take the last fish from it like i did on my last evening match here .

My next line of attack was at 12 metres which was half way up the shelf at 2.5ft depth , i haven’t been happy with how my expander fishing has gone lately so i decided to change to a 4mm banded pellet also i had given up on the sloppy ground-bait too and gone for lightly dusted micros which could be made into a ball , i hoped this would make a difference to my far bank work which has let me down on my last few visits here .

I taped in a kinder pot full of micros and followed it down with my banded pellet , the bait hadn’t even touched the bottom before my elastic ripped out of my pole and a nice sized stockie made its way to the net , i then had a variety of species before it started slowing down and i probably wasted twenty minutes without changing swims which cost me a fair few fish because i worked out that 15 fish an hour would be needed for a good weight as they are slightly smaller on Silver birch .

After setting up a new far bank swim to my right i was back catching again but they was a smaller stamp of f1 , after two hours i had 27 fish over 10oz which was slightly off my target number but it was more than i caught all match on Sunday and it just shows how different these evening matches are .When i started missing bites on this line and then bumped of a small skimmer i decided on another change of rigs , so i cupped in some loose ground-bait tight against the far bank and gave it twenty minutes to settle while i was waiting i re-tried both of my far shelf rigs although i caught they wasn’t coming quick enough for my liking .

When it was time to try my far bank line i didn’t exactly get the response i had hoped for , first put in i had a barbel then a small f1 and then a crucian but i was having real trouble hitting the bites and kept coming back with silk weed on the bait band .Enough was enough i needed to catch some quick fish and as we were fast approaching the last hour out came the margin rig again ,i had been continuously feeding this swim with a variety of baits since the match started and maybe i had overdone it because it was black with fish .

I was struggling to get my rig to the deck and when it did i was getting liners left-right-center , a change of shotting pattern for on the drop produced a couple of stockies and going shallower didn’t work so i bulked up my shot near the hook length and went a couple of inch over depth , i vaguely remember Jamie Hughes fishing like this in the Fisho final last year for the barbel and it worked for me today too because it was barbel central on my margin and when i worked out what the best shotting pattern was , they were literally pulling the elastic out before i could strike and in the final forty minutes i had 15 of them upto 1.5lb .

As the all out sounded it was obvious that it had fished better than at the weekend and rumour was their had been an 89lb from Davids pool which came as a real surprise , there was also two mid 50lb nets from Rowans and my 47 fish mainly barbel was enough for 47lb and second best weight from Silver birch behind an 87lb from peg eight . So as you can see it fished extremely well and a quiet forty minutes mid-match cost me a chance of framing because 60lb was well within my reach from this peg and i cant wait to give it another try as it is becoming one of my favorite venues but it might be a few weeks as my wife starts working away again for a fortnight but before then i have a club match at widdows to contend with so lets hope i can keep my good form for one more match anyway .

 

Chapel pool , Supercup 2nd round

peg 14 , June 7th

This was a match that all the team was looking forward too after our two practice sessions where we had done extremely well catching over 100lb a man on each of them but the weather was going to make fishing it a bit uncomfortable with heavy constant rain and even thunder-lightning forecast , when i woke on the morning of the match it was a bit grey but dry and fingers crossed it would stay that way at least till we set up and was under the cover of our umbrellas .

After a couple of unscheduled stops we finally made it to the venue and proceeded to have a quick team talk about how we would target the match plus go through the home team rules , it was also nice of a few of the opposing Alliance+Leicester team to say how they enjoyed reading my blog and gave me permission to put this post up of todays match .

You probably know the rules on the Supercup but basically you need to beat your next man so it is eight sections of two anglers and the team with the least points wins , we were facing a very good set of anglers who have a formidable track record in this competition plus they have only ever been beaten once on their home water so we would be up against it today but we figured that if we can get 100lb a man then we might have a decent chance .

Just as we started unpacking the fishing tackle from the car the heavens opened but not your normal rain shower it was actually bouncing off the floor and we was all soaked before we even got to sit on our box it stayed that way for about an hour then we had scattered showers all day , well that’s the weather report for the match lets see how i got on today .

My home for the day was 14 which was an end peg on the narrower part of the lake an area i had never fished before but i was hopeful off a good catch and fully expected my 77 lb personal best match record to go .Our plan was to fish just three swims so we could get a big weight quickly and these where ;

4m , i set up two identical rigs one with a size 18 hook and micro bait band for 6mm hard pellet the other a size 16 hook and mini band for 8 mm hard pellet . My main line was 0.16 garbo and hook length was 0.14 garbo , float was a 0.4 scone doubledeez and elastic was red matrix .

Side of platform ,i used a 0.3 malmams speedy float with 0.16 garbo main line with a 0.14 garbo hook length and a size 16 hook with a mini bait band for 8mm pellets , my elastic was yellow matrix

Margin , i used a 0.3 malmams speedy float with 0.16 garbo main line with a 0.14 garbo hook length and a size 16 guru hook , my elastic was yellow matrix

With a big weight of carp needed we required plenty of bait so we brought lots of it ;

4 tins corn

1 tin hemp

4 pints 6mm pellets

2 pints 8mm pellets

1 pint dead maggots

When the all in sounded i fed a big pot of pellets at 4m and began loose feeding pellets over the top , another of corn-hemp went in on my margin to the left where i had plenty room to draw in fish and this is where i started the match with double corn on the hook . It didn’t take long before i was into a steady precision of carp around the 2lb mark , i refed after every four carp or when the bites tailed off and in the first ninety minutes i had 50lb in the net which is well on track for my target weight but when i lost a big barbel at the net it disrupted my peg and the fish didn’t want to settle on this line again .

I had dripped in pellets right at the side of my platform which is where we had been told to fish and done well-doing so in practice , this only produced the odd skimmer or stockie carp and my 4 meter line which we caught a lot of fish the first time we visited here but it never did today although i didn’t give it much time because my neighbour started getting in front of me .

I could see some big carp feeding really tight to the bank behind me and remembering that i had been told on the internet forums that they came in really close to feed , so i shortened my margin rig to just a foot deep and cupped in some dead maggots i put four on the hook then lowered it among the feeding carp , you could almost see the carp hovering up the loose offerings before bolting off with your elastic tearing out of your pole tip and these weren’t the small stockies but big weight builders over the 5 lb mark .

I was soon building up a nice weight again but with ninety minutes remaining the carp understandably became wary on this line , i also began getting bothered by silvers although they were around the 1 lb mark not really what i needed to catch . I worked out that i had two chances to get a fish from the margin before they drifted away for 15 minutes , in the time they wasn’t there i would refeed and try to get a couple of stockies from the side of the platform .

Their was some big units lurking under my platform one was about a meter long but every time it came towards my hook bait it either felt the line and bolted off or got beat to it by a silver , the only time i thought that i had hooked it resulted in a five-minute fight which resulted in a 7 lb barbel rolling over the net .All too soon it was time for the all out and i felt that i had a good weight in the net , it would be close between me and my neighbour .

When i went to speak to the other team members five of us felt that it could be close but a couple knew they had been beat , so we would have to wait for the scalesman to find out our fate . Anyway not going into too much detail but we got beat 15-9 and only won one section my little match was 114lb to 124lb which i was surprised at because i thought that i had nearly 140lb , not bad for an f1 angler who was well out of his comfort zone today .

On the ones that we felt would be close we got beat by less than 20lb which sounds a lot but the size of the fish in their it would only be about three carp and thinking about it after the match it was only the difference in silver fish nets which cost us because we didn’t get any skimmers today , we found out after the match that they had feed just 6mm pellets plus meat and fished soft pellet over the top , this helped them get a variety of species where we mainly targeted the carp and probably over fed too .

Well done to Allied+Leicester on winning , i hope that you do really well in the Northern final and we would like to be given another chance to fish against you next year because i am sure the result will be a lot closer between us next time .

 

Sycamore fishery

1st June , peg 38 Rowans canal

After yesterdays good result at Partridge lakes Fish O qualifier it was time for Balmoral fishing clubs fourth match of the season at Sycamore fisheries Rowans canal , the weather today was forecast to be warm-sunny with light winds not the best conditions for a day’s fishing and with every peg on the canal expected to be taken i was unsure at just how it would fish but it wasn’t looking promising .

On arrival at the venue i spoke to Phil the owner to pay the club peg fees and he informed me that their had been a little match on Rowans the day before not what i wanted to here ! ! ! As i drove round to the car park most of the club was already there , so i did the usual of collecting pools + bonus then started the draw and one by one all the good pegs went . When it came for my go i was left with peg 38 which was in an area that had some good form but i had end peg 40 in my section which frames on most matches plus a few of the better club anglers to contend with so i could be up against it today .

When i got to my peg it was the same as most others on the canal with it being 14 meters across with a nice looking mud bank which i planned on targeting and some nice rushes along both margins , i decided to fish more or less the same way as i had done yesterday so used the same rigs ;

RIGS

1ft and 2 ft deep rigs for fishing the far bank ,using a Matrix series three 0.3 float with 0.12 garbo line attached to a 0.10 garbo hook length with a size 20 gamma pellet hook .

3ft deep rig for the margin which was a 0.3 malmam speedy float with 0.12 garbo main line attached to a 0.10 garbo hook length with a size 20 gamma pellet hook .

BAIT

1 pint red and white maggots

1/2 pint micros

1/2 pint 4mm pellets

1/2 pint ground-bait

As the all in sounded predictably everyone went straight across to the far bank , so i decided to concentrate on my margin and wanted to leave the usually more prolific area for later in the match where hopefully the fish would back away from my neighbours pegs into my safety zone . I began loose feeding maggots on to my left hand side and it wasn’t long before i had my first fish which was a stockie about a pound , in the first hour a mixture of f1s-stockies came to the net ten in total but it seemed that they was being extremely finicky and the bites would be either proper elastic ripping out gazunders or just the tiniest of little dinks but by getting my hook bait to register on my float tip and by keeping altering my shotting pattern i was hitting more than i missed .

I decided to rest my margin swim because it was noticeable that i was waiting longer between bites and i was eager to build on my good start by going on what should have been the best area of my peg , i started on my 2 ft deep rig with a 4 mm expander on the hook and sloppy ground-bait rolled in my micros in the pole pot , i tapped the contents out and proceeded to lift-drop my hook bait but to my surprise nothing happened but not to worry a refeed with slightly less bait should get me a response and that it did but not the hoped for f1s but a procession of small skimmers and missed bites which is usually a sign of no decent fish being in the vicinity so a change of swim was in order .

I re-plumbed up a meter further to my right which was a lot closer to some overhanging reeds thinking that they might have backed off underneath them with the sun blazing in the sky and this seemed to work because i managed a couples of f1s but the bites became really hard to hit , i found myself shipping in and out more than i was actually fishing so i tried maggot over their but this did not produce a single bite neither did my mud bank line which was a surprise and in the second hour i only managed a miserable three fish .

All the time i had fished long i kept trickling in the maggots on to my left hand margin so i re-visited this swim while i had a think on what to do next about putting some fish in the net , but my float kept on going under here and because i was putting fish in the net so i decided to keep at it . Upon looking round the canal it became clear that lots of people were struggling to catch especially on the bank facing me but rumors came up the bank that two lads who was catching shallow had just put in their second net so they must be doing well .

We was now approaching the final two hours and i had problem because i had started to run out of maggots plus i doubted whether i could keep one swim going for the rest of the match , so i decided to set up another swim on to my right hand side but this time using pellets and just like on my far bank i began feeding sloppy ground-bait rolled in micros , by lifting-dropping and dragging it up the slope a touch i was back among the fish .

The rest of the match went quite swimmingly and by rotating my two swims i kept putting fish into the net , i did notice that on the pellet line i would get bursts of fish where on my maggot swim it was more steady but did benefit with a rest once in a while . When the all out sounded a lot of people were relieved because it had fished hard in places which was only to be expected with every peg being took but i felt that i had fished one of the best matches for a while on here , which was reflected in the result with me winning the match quite convincingly and the lads who had two nets in didn’t even get into the top three so they must have done it to wind me up ! ! !

Anyway the enforced break had made me really look at how my fishing was going and going back to basics has done me the world of good with two good results in consecutive matches , lets hope my form lasts because i have the second round of the Angling times Supercup at a private water next Saturday and i might even try to get on the mid-week open at Sycamore fisheries but unfortunately we are due a break in the sunny weather with plenty rain forecast so i will have to wait and see .

1st Gary 48 lb

2nd Dave 33 lb

3rd Richard 30 lb