I haven’t fished the venue since its opening day so arriving at the venue I had a walk round Paddocks with team mate Rich Coles who filled second spot in the venues previous Wednesday’s open ran by Rip Off. I must say that it looked completely different now with all the platforms completed and the bank side vegetation maturing. The venue has become very popular with many of my mates from the Coffin Dodgers. Unfortunately I baby sit on their Tuesday opens.
I think everyone was hoping to be on the Old Canal especially as there was only one section of 11 pegs, giving plenty of room, hence less peggy. Stand in Captain Steve Segar pull the team draw and I was to spend the day on peg 5 Paddocks. Luckily we had John Baker standing in for Charlie Barns and came to the peg with me explaining the way he would fish it. John explained that the LH margin was good for the paste feeding 8 mm pellets and down the far shelf not feeding anything over paste, nearly my type of fishing. As I didn’t have any 8’s John gave me a huge box full. Oh yes it was a flyer peg. One of these pellets is equivalent to 100 micro pellets; far more than I would normally feed in one go! So not to disappoint John I fed a couple of hand full’s on the bank!
I set up three rigs one paste rig for the LH margin set at 24 inches, similar again just down the far shelf in 6 footish of water and a 4x16 Jolly again for down the far shelf to be used with 6mm expander pellet – that’s it.
Because of the depth, I started by feeding a compressed bunch of wetted micro in the kinder pot with expander on the hook and happy days I soon had three 3 pound Carp in the net. Next put in I lost a foul hooker and that was it for this line except four 3 oz Skimmers. I was surprised how quick the bites were from these tiny fish, every time thinking they were Carp. That was the end of my Silvers.
Far too early for the margin I know, but I had to try it. I had been feeding three hard 4’s regularly from the start and with the paste rig dotted down I had a Carp first put in. Unfortunately the Common Carp on this venue fight very hard and as I learnt at my cost you have to take your time, but they do their best to ruin your peg. I always try hard to keep them out of the line I am fishing which was difficult enough. Landing these fish was upsetting the swims so once again after three or so fish it would go quite. I had been feeding a Silvers line at a “stretched” 4 metres. So gave that a try and I started to catch more Carp, but this time they stayed there for the last two hours. I switched between double casters on the Jolly and once I saw a blow would go over it with paste. Getting near the end of the match I was catching well and unfortunately this also started me try to force the fish to get back out for more, loosing three decent Carp for about 10lb – a spell of bad angling that cost me framing overall. My Carp and silvers weighed in at 55lb 4oz for a section win and sixth overall. I am still dwelling on my bad angling especially as it cost me second place. Top tip don’t try and force the fish on this venue – take your time – another lesson learnt.
The match was won by Tony Rixon (pictured right with his catch) with 76lb 10oz from Old Canal peg 9 (the meatier end of the dog bone). Tony caught …see his blog. I was impressed with how close the weights were on this Canal.
The Silvers was won by John Bradford (pictured with match winner and shop manger discussiing the issues of the week) with 12lb 12oz from Paddocks peg 10. John caught at 7 metres using worm over casters – John doesn’t feed worms because he would rather sell them in the shop!
I must mention Silvers runner up Kev Perry who was pegged next to me, what a class angler this man is.
Full Result:
1. Tony Rixon 76-10-0 peg 9 (Old Canal)
2. Andy Neal 63-12-0 peg 33 (Paddocks)
3. Nick Collins 57-01-0 peg 40 (Paddocks)
4. Paul Elmes 56-12-0 peg 1 (Old Canal)
5. Tom Thick 55-04-0 peg 22 (Paddocks)
6. Mike Nicholls 55-04-0 peg 45 (Paddocks)
Top Silvers:
1. John Bradford 12-12-0 peg 10 (Paddocks)
2. Kev Perry 9-09-0 peg 4 (Paddocks)
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