Wednesday 16/11/2011 - Teams of Four Practice - Viaduct Fishery - Lodge and Match Lakes

As usual I have picked the grandchildren’s chest virus. I haven’t slept well for the past two nights, last night was no different – cough, cough, cough. Up at 06:00 and after a very slow cup of tea it was shall I or shall I not go. After deciding that going was far better than lying on the couch drinking coffee whilst watching black and white films wondering how everyone on the match was doing. No ones died of fresh air – have they? I had to speed up filling the car as I was going to the Bear Hotel for Breakfast where I met up with Tony and his cronies. Great breakfast.

With Lodge Lake and Match Lake full with 11 pegs on each I was hoping for a day on the waggler which really meant drawing Match Lake or the wider pegs on Lodge. If I were to draw a Carp peg I would choose peg 53 or 66, although I have never drawn 53. I was into the coffee tin one behind Tony Rixon who had pull pee 64 on the Monk. In I went and pulled peg 66 – very happy with this even though the wind was blowing into peg 53.

I walked around Bitterwell Lake to spectate the Monday League and was surprised to find a lot of Skimmers coming to the paste. So I made up a small amount of paste (the only pellet based substance allowed on the hook during the winter) in case I drew a corner Carp peg. With the waggler left in the car as this isn’t an option on this peg. I set up a Skimmer rig to fish over a bit of GB at 11.5 metres, a margin corn/caster rig for the margin up to the LH pallet which the front leg is 11.5 metres and the back leg is 13 meters and a paste rig to fish the same swim as the corn rig.

I started on the double maggot over kinder potted GB on the Skimmer rig and it was obvious that I was going to be pestered by the millions of ½ oz Ronnie’s in the lake (welcome when it’s frozen over) so gave that up in favour of a corn. This bait was just butted about without ant real takers. Tony opposite on the monk was having a similar experience. So it was time to try the banker margin. So in I went to the first leg of the platform (it’s very important that you don’t chase the fish out of reach too soon which is easily done on this peg) with corn, kindering in some caster. It look like the Ronnie’s were line up here too, so I switched to double caster to check and hooked the smallest Carp in the Lake – 1 ½ lb specimen – fought well though.

Tony had also gone in to his margin and also hooked a Carp on corn. However, he was using Girls elastic allowing the fish to go under his platform. So Tony had his Landing net one side of the platform and his top-set on the other – time for the Platform and top-set shuffle. I have never seen this done yet (plenty of attempts – usually ending in tears), if anyone can do it, Tony can and he did after taking out his keep nets – luckily for him it was a small fish (see picture right).

I decided to try the paste over caster and had another three small Carp to 4lb. With two hours to go it was time to go to the back leg of the platform at 13 metres (as far as I was willing to risk). Again with paste over caster I had another quick five Carp before in the last twenty minutes the fish had backed off out of reach. My nine carp weighed 41lb 5oz for third on the Lake and seventh overall and one out of the coin. Other than the winners weight the match results was very tight.

The match was won by lee Werrett (pictured right with his catch) with 92lb 3oz. Lee caught the majority of his Carp over to the tree using five maggots as hook bait. Lee fed about a pint of caster and a pint of maggot.

The Silvers was won by team mate and Coffin Dodger Rich Coles (pictured lower right) with an excellent weight of Skimmers of 41lb 4oz from peg 47 on Match Lake. Rich caught all his fish on the waggler using caster over loose fed caster, Rich fed about 1 ½ pints of caster.

John Green was runner up with another net of decent Skimmers caught on the same method as Rich from peg 62 on Lodge.

What a great day fishing these two anglers had – Just what I was hoping for!!

Full Result:

1.      Lee Werrett 92-03-0 peg 53

2.      Andy Lloyd 56-07-0 peg 51

3.      Phil Harding 55-06-0 peg 59

4.      S. Woods 50-10-0 peg 50

5.      Mike West 46-13-0 peg 52

6.      Clint t Wojtyle 45.05.0 peg 48

7.      Mike Nicholls 41.05.0 peg 66

Top Silvers:

1.      Rich Coles 41-04-0 peg 47

2.      John Green 36-06-0 peg 62