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