Saturday 27/10/2012 - Viaduct All Winners Silverfish Final - Campbell, Carey and Lodge lakes

At one time I thought I would have to miss this match due to issues with the car. Luckily my friendly tackle dealer (pictured right) came to the rescue. The last time we travelled together was to the semi final of the Shakespeare 2000 match at Arrow Valley Lake. Thanks matey.

 

After weeks of warm overcast weather the fishing Gods were against us as we were faced with an over night frost and bright clear skies and a bitterly cold North wind. Not conducive for a Silver match where Skimmers would be the main target.

 

Tony and I were joined at breakfast in Woody’s by Des Shipp. As per usual the discussions turned to which pegs would be the preference – Tony went for pegs 70 or 78 as did Des. I stayed quiet as have this recent habit of drawing pegs that I say I didn’t want. In to the draw tin and Tony pulls peg 70 and Des peg 78 – and that’s how it’s done!

 

I pulled peg 88. As I wanted to be on Carey I was reasonably happy with this draw especially as the cold wind would be off my right shoulder, but sun in the face. This has been a fair section when it was pegs 81 to 90 but not so, since peg 96 have been included. For company I had trigger on peg 90, who kept me amused and bewildered throughout the match. Every time Trig tried to net a fish his landing net would become detached from his handle, falling in the water. So it was fish around with the handle, retrieve the net, and then use the net without the handle to net the fish. OK if you do this the once but Trig followed the same process for every fish! I guess you don’t keep a nick name for 20 years without good reason – do you Dave!

 

I set up a 4x14 Jolly to be fished for Skimmers at 10 meters. A Ronnie rig which I fish short but was apprehensive as to whether this would work as the water had gone clear. This peg does respond to the GB feeder so I set this up to be fished at 25 metres.

 

I started by feeding two balls of GB laced with a few casters and started to loose feed the Ronnie line. Out went the Jolly with double dead red maggot. I must say the presentation was spot on picking up the tow against the wind. Interestingly I didn’t get a bite until I was a metre away from where I fed the GB which shows how strong the tow was. It was soon clear that the fishing was going to be really hard as in the first hour I had only two small Perch, a Ruffe and six Ronnie’s. There were plenty of Anglers still bites less at his stage. So after re-feeding the Skimmer line I tried the short Ronnie rig and as expected this produced nothing. So back on the Skimmer line and I foul hooked a big Skimmer which I lost. I did have a couple of the 4oz specimens that live in this swim before I hooked one of two Carp, which decided me to try the feeder. So again with double red maggot on the hook I had a bite first cast which was a 6oz Skimmer, out again and again a bite straight away which resulted in a lost 1lb Hybrid at the net – bugger. Not to worry as I had it sorted - not. Out again and luckily I had hold of the rod as A Carey Carp took it on the drop and that was another lost hook. After 15 minutes bite less and had to decide whether to sit on it for the remaining three hours. Instead as the sun was now glittering over my Skimmer line I fed a whole pot of caster in to an area that the sun had already visited. One last visit over the GB line and I hooked and lost a Bream at the net – another bugger. So it was out went the Jolly with double caster over the new line and I had an 8oz Perch first put in – the sought after species. I then proceeded to bump small Ronnie’s. So I decided to set up the 4 metre whip which would nearly reach the caster swim. I then had a run of small Ronnie until the last 15 minutes when everything went dead.

 

I weighed 10lb dead and with 13lb framing I rued not starting and finishing the match on the 4 metre whip as I am sure that with some hard work I could have got a low framing weight – of course I would have to have known it was going to fish as hard as it did. Lack of hindsight me thinks?

 

The match was won by Andy Power (pictured right being presented with the winning purse of £750 by fishery owner Steve Long) with 23lb 13oz from peg 114. Andy caught a mix of small Skimmers and Tench fishing at 14 metres fishing caster over caster (no GB). Andy fed about two pints which no doubt contributed to the high number of Carp that Andy hooked. Well done matey.

 

Full Result:

 

1.      Andy Power 23-13-0 peg 114

2.      An-Ton Page 21-02-0 peg 125

3.      Paul Greenwood 17-12-0 peg 96

4.      Gary O’Shea 14-04-0 peg 112

5.      Tony Rixon 14-02-0 peg 70 (2 Ronnie’s more)

6.      Dave White 13-14-0 peg 69

Thursday 25/10/2012 - Bathampton AA - Over 55's and Disabled - Bridge Pool

Loaded up the car and started her up only to find an Engine fault light on. Although the car ran Ok I decided to give that friendly Auto Electrical Engineer – Mr Tim Clark a call, who agreed to come round at 10 o clock with his diagnostics kit. Another quick call to Bob Warren and we were soon on our way to the Coffin Dodgers via Asda for breakfast. Not a good start to the day I was hoping it wouldn’t get worse, but I was concerned when Bob said he was sporting a new hat – not the I am superstitious – ask Bob!

 

The Coffin Dodgers are still turning up in good numbers with 24 pegs in the bag. I was first of the able anglers to draw and pulled peg 9 on the disabled bank. I was happy with this as it’s a good Silvers peg – particularly for Skimmers.

 

I set up:

4x16 Jolly for the Skimmers

Ronnie rig

Margin paste rig

 

As the colour had dropped out a bit so I decided to start by feeding a small ball of GB laced with 2mm soft pellet at 7 metres. The intention was to fish both 4 and 6mm expander over it (the Worms staying in the bag). However, I started on the Ronnie rig with caster and started catching a good stamp of Ronnie which unfortunately only lasted 30 minutes before the swim died - I wonder why. So it was out on the 4mm expander where I was getting shy bites from tiny Ronnie’s which once hooked would fall off. I then hooked and landed a 5 lb Carp. It was clear that the Skimmers had been bullied out from these swims, which tends to be their haunts during the winter, so perhaps signs that cold weather is on the way.

 

The upshot was that after switching to feeding hard 4’s with 6mm expander on the hook I connected with five more Carp on the long line, landing two as three were foul hooked – no more Silvers whatsoever. With 45 minutes I went in to the margin with paste where I had been lightly feeding hard 4’s landing another three breaking on another foul hooker – I should have switched to the margin earlier. My early Silvers weighed 6lb 6oz and my six Carp weighed in at 52lb 15oz for a grand total of 59lb 5oz for first on the day.

 

The Silvers was won by Bob “MD” Feltham (pictured right with the winner, who happens to be 13 inches shorter) with 17lb 4oz from peg 14. Bob had two lines running, one at 10 metres with meat and the other shorter with corn. Bob caught biggish Skimmers to 1 ½ lb steady throughout by switching between the two.

 

Bob was helped by the Carp keeping well away as on the whistle pegs 10, 9, 8, 7, and 6 all shouted fish on!! So we know where the critters are at present.

 

Full Result:

 

1.      Mike Nicholls 59-05-0 peg 9

2.      Dave Bacon 54-0-0 peg 8

3.      Terry Church 45-06-0 peg 7

4.      Pete Phillips 42-0-0 peg 5

5.      Mike Jones 30-12-0 peg 16

6.      Harry Muir 28-11-0 peg 10

 

Top Silvers:

 

1.      Bob Feltham 17-04-0 peg 14

2.      Rich Coles 15-08-0 peg 25

3.      Dave Gillard 10-01-0 peg 29

Sunday 21/10/2012 - Viaduct Silver League - Round Three - Campbell, carey and Lodge Lakes

I didn’t fish the Stafford Moor Festival this year but matey Bela did and at last he had some decent draws. Bela (pictured right) finished joint second overall and after weight count back he finished a credible third overall picking up £700. Well done matey it’s about time Bela had some decent draws.

In to the draw box and out comes peg 69 on Lodge Lake. Once again I found my self next to Tony Rixon who was on peg 70. Having a look on Clayton’s I Phone for the previous league results I was a bit disappointed to find that the peg had one DNW (Nigel Barrett) and 11 lb the previous match, whilst peg 70 have had a first and a third match overall wins with peg 71 also framing on the first two matches.

After rewetting my GB and with Ronnie’s as my target I set up four rigs:

4x14 Jolly; to be fished at 10 metres towards the right close to the rope

4x14 Stainey; to be fished at 5metres out in front

Ronnie rig: to be fished everywhere

4 metres whip with a small waggler: to be fished everywhere

I started by feeding the 10 metre line with two ball of GB laced with a few CW’s, caster and dead reds, followed up with an half a pot of caster for the 5 metre line. Then quickly on to the Ronnie’s, catching 1-2oz specimens a chuck using single caster over caster. Knowing that Tony would target the bigger fish my plan was to stay with them until he caught a Skimmer then try the longer line. In between I did try the 5 metre line and caught a 2lb Skimmer then found the Ronnie’s arrived on this line too. With a hour gone it was looking interesting as the Skimmers hadn’t shown up as of yet. Then Tony started to catch Skimmers as did Andy Neal, so it was out on the 10 metre line where there was a lot of fizzing going on, which raised my anticipation. After trying every bait on the table I just couldn’t catch what ever was munching on my GB. I tried a 2 mm soft pellet over it and caught two tiny ½ oz Skimmers. I now believe I had attracted a shed load of these tiny fish over my GB and were too small or too unwilling to take bigger baits. Luckily I didn’t let this distract me too much, nor Tony now bagging on big Skimmers, and got my head down for the Ronnie’s, I love this sort of fishing as it is very busy adding a couple of 1lb Hybrids’, losing a big Perch near the death. Unusually I only managed three late Carp! I don’t think Tony hooked any!

My Ronnie catch weighed in at 19lb 10oz for a section second pick up by double default – now that is lucky. The Ronnies tend to be small on Lodge Lake, if I had this many Ronnies on Carey I would have weight nearer 30lb.

Tony Rixon (pictured right with his net of Silvers) won the match with 46lb 12oz from peg 70. See his blog for the blow by blow account. However, what impressed me most was that there wasn’t a worm in sight (chopped or otherwise). Well done matey.

Full Result:

1.      Tony Rixon 46-12-0 peg 70

2.      Andy Neal 44-04-0 peg 71

3.      Paul Fairies 35-06-0 peg 103

4.      Richard Ahearn 32-12-0 peg 68

5.      John Green  30-15-0 peg 126

6.      Dave Roper 30-10-0 peg 130

7.      Gary O’Shea 27-06-0 peg 85

8.      Craig Edmonds 27-02-0 peg 101

9.      Bobby Gullick 25-12-0m peg 110

10. Vince Brown 25-06-0 peg 64

Saturday 14/10/2012 - Viaduct All Winners Final - Campbell, Carey and Lodge Lakes

Bela arrived early keen to get his hands on the £1,000 first prize, as was everyone else.

 

It was strange preparing for this match as there wasn’t any Silvers pool, although they would count to the overall weight. So I settled on just two hook baits – paste and 6mm meat – simple. I decided to take my lead and waggler rods – just in case!!

 

Standing in the draw queue I found myself next to Tim Pallant, we discussed which pegs we wanted. I said I didn’t mind which peg, so long as it wasn’t either peg 130 or 131. Tim said I would regret saying that, and I did, pulling peg 131, no £1,000 pay day for me and I didn’t fancy the peg for any section money either. Tim pulled 110. Bela didn’t fair any better he was on peg 68 on Lodge Lake – he’s a Jinx and off to the Stafford Moor autumn festival next week.

 

I set up two rigs a 0.4 gram paste rig to be fished at 11.5 metres at 2 o clock and a 4x14 Jolly to be fished at 7 metres out in front.

 

I set up the waggler and lead rod and put them back in the rod bag!!

 

I must say the Lake looked wintery so decided to initially take it steady with the feed so out went the paste with a few hard fours. As scripted for this peg I was first to hook and a land a Carp. I soon had another, it then all went quiet. No one below the spit was catching including favoured peg 132. Within the first hour the anglers each side of me had tried all sorts to catch, however I stayed with the paste landing another two Carp. It was of note that I wasn’t getting any nibbling from Silver fish whilst on the paste. With two hours to go I switched to the meat at 7 metres to see if could just get bites. I was getting indications catching the odd tiny Skimmers. With an hour to go the anglers each side of me had had enough and packed up early. I decided to fish a lighter 4x12 Jolly set to fish on the drop with the meat. This resulted in a few more Skimmers and three decent Carp but the float was going through with the wind not helping presentation.

 

My few Skimmers went 6lb 3oz and my seven carp 46lb 2oz for a total of 52lb 5oz. No coin today, that said I did enjoy working hard to get a few bites and considering that all the Carp have abandoned this end of the Lake favouring the middle pegs I was pleased with my weight from this peg. I think Steve will be putting my name plaque on pegs 130 and 131. I seem to get one good draw then back to these two pegs.

 

The match and the £1,000 cheque went to Fishery Manager Paul Greenwood (pictuted lower centre with 40lb of his catch) with 18 Carp for 188lb 7oz from peg 105 on Carey Lake. Paul caught fishing in his LH margin down to peg 106 fishing 8mm meat over meat. Paul fed about two tins throughout. Paul also picked up his section money worth £80, because anglers threw back section default winning catches!!

 

Full Result:

 

1.      Paul Greenwood 188-07-0 peg 105

2.      Nick Merry 171-07-0 peg 100

3.      Roy 164-08-0 peg 114

4.      Dan White 152-02-0 peg 78

5.      Dave Cockayne 151-00-0 peg 127

6.      Ash 139-11-0 peg 126

Thursday 11/10/2012 - Bathampton AA - Over 55's and Disabled - Withy Pool

Arriving at the draw we were offered a doughnut to celebrate Chris Rolfe’s 65^th, complete with jam. After a poor rendition of happy birthday, it was into the draw bag and out comes disc 69 for the second time in a month. At least it’s a short walk which was handy as my Arthritis in my foot was playing me up.

 

Taking the learning from the last match I set up four rigs:

 

Ronnie rig

Skimmer rig – 4x16 Jolly

Deep paste rig – 0.5 gram

Margin paste rig 0.3 gram

 

I decided to go positive with a pot of micro at 7 metres at 12 o clock and fish paste over the top whilst loose feeding caster for the Ronnie’s. I wasn’t long before I switched to the Jolly and soft pellet, It was even shorter before I abandoned the swim due to inactivity. Out with the Ronnie rig and after some perseverance and one tiny Perch it was obvious it wasn’t going to fish well at all. "Where have all the Ronnies gone"?

 

So I mixed up a bit of my Skimmer GB and opened up another swim at 7 metres this time at 10 o clock. First put in with single maggot on the same Jolly rig I hooked and landed a 3lb Skimmer. This was followed by a foul hook Carp which broke my hook. So after a retie and another nugget of GB laced with dead reds I hooked another 3lb Skimmer. After losing two more big Skimmers which I think were foul hooked the swim died, catching only another 2lb of small Skimmers.

 

The heavens then opened up and I decided to install the umbrella, for which I am a complete novice as they really get in my way and frustrate me.

 

With two hours left it was paste in the margin over loose fed hard 4’s. First cast I missed a bite, however, next put-in saw a 17lb 2oz Mirror grace the net. I did my best to lose it catching the umbrella a few times with top set and landing net handle. It took an hour before I hooked another which was a smaller variety. With only a few minutes left there were signs of another Carp in the swim, but time did not permit me to bag it.

 

My Silvers weighed in at 8lb 5oz and my two Mirrors 24lb 5oz for a total of 32lb 10oz and fourth overall.
 

The match was won by John Smith (pictured right with the Silvers winner) with 46lb 14oz from peg 42. John caught at 13 metres over to the island using paste and pellet.

 

The Silvers was won by Dave Gillard with 12lb 14oz from peg 48. Dave caught on his usual GB feeder and maggot/worm hook bait.

 

Full Result:

 

1.      John Smith 46-14-0 peg 42

2.      Ray Bazeley 37-06-0 peg 46

3.      Bob Warren 34-11-0 peg 43

4.      Mike Nicholls 32-10-0 peg 69

5.      Dave Bacon 27-08-0 peg 74

6.      Mike Taylor 24-02-0 peg 62

 

Top Silvers:

 

1.      Dave Gillard 12-14-0 peg 48

2.      Rich Coles 12-09-0 peg 53

3.      Alan Jones 12-07-0 peg 59

Sunday 07/10/2012 - Viaduct Silvers League - Round Two - Campbell, Carey and Lodge Lakes

From rags to riches (http://silverfoxangling.blogspot.co.uk/2009/06/sunday-28062009-avon-angling-open.html) and from second best man to Best Man (Matey Darren Gillman married the beautiful Corrina on 29/09/2012):

Bela arrived dead on time however, he looked a bite jaded – ask him! After our usual grumbling about our ache’s and pains it was into Woody’s for breakfast. Use it or lose it.

I noticed last match that everyone that waited until last drew on Lodge Lake, which I wanted to avoid, favouring Carey. So I went in middle queue and pulled peg 101 – happy with this until I found that I had Bob Gullick on peg 99 and even worse Tony Rixon on peg 100 - the current form Skimmer peg and Matt Tomes on peg 103 – all good Silver anglers in good pegs and all in my section, so it was going to be tough for the poor Pensioner.

Kevin Moulton came by my peg and told me he had 16lb from the peg last match, not being able to catch long, catching some late Skimmers down the edge, whilst peg 100 weighed 40lb. My peg use to have an over hanging tree until with the use of Matt Tomes saw and the brute force of An-Ton Page it was cleared enough for my Ronnie rig – thanks guys.

I set up just the two rigs – 4x14 Jolly to be fished long at 11.5 metres into the white water (you can’t beat a black top float for viability) for the Skimmers and the Ronnie Rig. Both had 0.1 hook lengths, only because it’s much easier to loose the Carp! I much prefer 0.14 for the Silvers. On the whistle I fed the long line with two balls of my neat Skimmer mix GB and started sparingly loose feeding casters in my LH margin. Whilst I waited for the GB to settle I started on the Ronnie rig and caught a few 2oz specimens before it went quite. I must say I was a bit disappointed that the Ronnie’s didn’t appear to be chasing the feed. So it was out on the Skimmer line and after trying all the usual baits I could not catch, whilst Tony on the next peg was catching Skimmers regularly. I tried kinder potting CW&C which only resulted in encouraging the Carp to break my hook lengths. I switched to feeding a ball of GB laced with casters with caster on the hook and did catch two Skimmers, one big and one small before it died again. So a pattern formed it was feed a ball of GB (I dare not feed any more because of the active Carp) then on to the Ronnie’s, but this time out in front one foot off bottom. I kept a few Ronnie and small Hybrids coming, and then it was out after the Skimmer again catching another two. However, after losing five hook lengths to Carp I gave up the long line to concentrate of the Ronnie’s. With 1 ½ hours to go I switched back in to the RH margin with the Ronnie rig, but this time with my favoured 0.14 hook length which resulted in a tremendous run of Bream and Hybrids to 3lb adding about 30lb to my catch – I didn’t want the match to finish – but it did, but not before I had “lent” Tony some of my GB because he had run out in which time he added another five Skimmers to his catch – a mistake – not - as he would have lent me some of his rubbish GB if I had run out – but being beaten with your own GB - bugger.

Because my catch consisted of all sorts I wasn’t sure what I had caught. Tony was certain that Bob Gullick had won our section, with himself second and Matt Tomes just a head of me. Luckily Tony got it all wrong again. Tony won the section with 48lb 10oz and I was amazed (again) that I ran him so close with 46lb. A memorable day especially as I fed 1.1 pint of casters and took six pints of freebies home with me!!

The match was own by Tony Rixon (pictured right with his catch). Tony caught on … see his blog.

Runner up was me (pictured right with the winner).

Full Result:

1.      Tony Rixon 48-10-0 peg 100

2.      Mike Nicholls 46-00-0 peg 101

3.      An-ton Page 43-04-0 peg 70

4.      Bob Gullick 36-14-0 peg 99

5.      Steve Kedge 36-05-0 peg 121

6.     Andy Neal 35-10-0 peg 77

7.      Lee Werrett 34-02-0 peg 71
8.      John Green 32-0-0 peg 128
9.      Tim Pallant 31-09-0 peg 94
10. Joe Mc Mahon 31-04-0 peg 78