Silverfox Match Angling: Sunday 11/08/2013 - Avon Angling Open - Landsend

Monday, 12 August 2013

Sunday 11/08/2013 - Avon Angling Open - Landsend - Match and Specimen Lakes

After Thursday cost cutter match my hands were really playing up and thought about giving this match a miss, but by Saturday and after a few Pinky Ponks with Bela I was up for it albeit, Silvers short.

After the usual breakfast in Shipham café where Clint Wojtyle was seen suffering with a real bad hanger-over. Just the smell of bacon and egg was enough for him today.

In to the draw tin and out comes peg 3 on match Lake again. I was on this peg last match here and found it difficult to net Carp as I was too high off the water. However, Mike Duckett had top the lake up so it was much better. With a Silver pool on each Lake that would be my target. In any case with the top Carp slayers on top pegs it was the only likely way to coin for me.

So I set up a 4x14 Jolly for the soft pellet and 6 mm meat and a paste rig for the bigger Skimmers. The plan was to feed and fish meat at 5 metres at 10 o clock (wind was right to left) and soft pellet over GB or micro at 12 o clock and the line for the paste. During the winter I did catch some big Skimmers over GB on maggot but was a bit concerned about feeding it in the summer as the Ronnie’s and soft pellet can be frustrating. On the whistle I fed 5 pieces of meat and a tester size nugget of my Skimmer GB. Starting on the 3mm soft pellet resulted in a couple of quick bites both missed. Hen I had a couple of small Ronnie’s. Umm, as I suspected. So I took 3 inches off the depth and tried the meat line and caught two better Ronnie’s followed by an 8lb Common Carp. I then noticed some fizz over the GB and went over it with the paste and had another Carp. Not going to plan then. Looking around there was plenty of Carp being caught but very few Silvers. So I decided to not feed this line and fish paste for the rest of the match. This worked as the Carp disappeared nearly) and I had a good run of big Skimmers and one plump Crucian. After landing my eleventh Skimmer I sat there for an hour without another Silver fish (a few Carp still wanted to play though) I was by now pretty sure that was going to be it for the Silvers (I didn't feed a thing for 4 hours), so for last 1 ½ hour I had a pleasure session playing around with various feeding patterns and feed. The Carp seem to like the meat especially when falling through the water.

Why is it that anglers fishing next to me end up chucking them selves in? This time it was the turn of Craig “Trigger” Edmonds who lost his top set with a fish on and did a sort of Spiderman leap in to the lake. Trigger learnt the same lesson as me “look before you leap” as I could see he would find it difficult to get out because of the high platforms and he did (see picture right). Trigger had to go in for a second time to retrieve his keep net that had fallen in. An-Ton opposite was also itching to get and asked Tony if he could get in to clear the island of vegetation. Tony agreed providing he did everyone’s, so for once Anton stayed dry.

My Silvers weighed 21lb 9oz and my nearly accidental 17 Carp weighed 67lb 8oz fro a total of 89lb 1oz and a Lake Silvers win – so mission accomplished.

The match was won by Dave Roper (pictured right with the Silvers winner) with 176lb 13oz from Specimen corner peg 32. Dave initially caught shallow long out to the tree using banded pellet and later at 6 metres in to his RH end margin using meat.

The Silvers was won by John Green from Specimen peg 26 with 36lb 12oz of Skimmers. John caught on soft pellet over micro.

Full Result: