Silverfox Match Angling: Sunday 28/05/2017 - Tony Rixon's Float Only - Viaduct Fishery

Monday, 29 May 2017

Sunday 28/05/2017 - Tony Rixon's Float Only - Viaduct Fishery - Campbell and Carey

Bela’s battle wagon is back on the road, just hoping I didn’t have to ride in another pickup truck. It was the first round of Tony Rixon’s Float only but first stop for breakfast at Canards Well. A bit of a wait as the PSV club who were fishing at Todber Manor had arrived before us. The breakfast was well worth the wait.

I can safely say were we all hoping to draw Campbell, 47.5% were going to be disappointed. I pushed through the youth in the queue to get in the draw coffee tin first and out comes peg 95 on Carey which I’ve now drawn 3 times in this league and is a peg not normally pegged in Viaduct matches. I have thought of all various possibilities with the pegging and can’t find a reason for Tony to leave it out – bugger. There are worse pegs. Good company with Mr & Mrs (pictured - whats going on) opposite me both on peg 88, Chris Fox peg 90, Gordon Cannings next door on peg 94 and Gary PermOshea (pictured) on peg 86.

Steve Long had told me Carey has some Algae issues and noticed that my peg the water had a back tinge. Gary had told he had fished Carey the day before and found it hard with a lot a fish on the surface and not feeding. I was therefore worried my banker of paste might be a non goer. No sign of spawning fish.

I set up a Barnett (I wonder if he’s found any mates yet in Oz) paste float to fish from top-set to plus four sections. The water depth was about even probably because it’s rarely fished hence no grubbing craters. Although it’s unlikely that the Silvers will be won from Carey I did set up the Ronnie rig, the final rig being a 4x10 F1 winter for meat and anything else.

I started at top-set plus two with the paste fished over hard fours. As half expected it just sat there but what was more worrying I wasn’t getting the usually Silvers nibbling, umm. The diagonal bank was really fishing hard; however, Team Rixon was bagging on his favourite “Stalking” rig. It was obvious the fish were not feeding on the bottom probably due to the Algae and its oxygen lowering affects. I went out further with the meat rig and did hook a decent Carp which I lost near the net with the hook pulling. I had only fed a few cubes of meat so decided to feed a little more which led to one foul hooker and the fish disappearing. The fish wouldn’t follow the offerings down. I couldn’t get any indications on any bait I tried, I even tried the Two-Pots method of dumping loads of pellet in – nothing not even a fizz. I get bored quickly so had a go on the Ronnie rig which can be productive. I did have a few small fish which helped with the boredom, but it wasn’t quite good enough to threaten the Campbell Silvers. So out on the meat at top-set plus two where I could loose fed it. I started to catch small peas in the pod 4oz Skimmers which messed about with the meat before getting a proper bite. It was too slow so switched to meat on the top-set and blow me after feeding two pieces of meat I hooked and landed a 15lb Carp which to say the least was in awful condition – no tail whatsoever – Steve Long seemed to be friends with it. Two more pieces of meat and another Carp of 10lb, switched to paste feeding hard 4’s and hooked another decent Carp which took me through the Lily pads to my right not to worry my 0.2 GLine cut through it. However, the pressure on the hook was too great and it came off. Next put-in another Carp, this time foul hooked. Got it cracked – not - that was it Carp wise started again to catch the small Skimmers.

I weighed 7lb 2oz of Silvers with the two Carp weighing 24lb 14 oz for a last in section total of 32lb. With hindsight and with only 16lb of Silvers getting coin I wish I fished 4mm expander all day.

The match was won by team Rixon (team pictured upper right) with 197lb 13oz from peg 88. See his blog for details, but certainly a lesson for any up and coming stalkers.

The Silvers was won by Shaun Townsend (pictured) with 29lb 13oz from peg Campbell peg 115. Shaun caught most of his Silvers during the first ¾ of the match, initially fishing meat then swapping to a more robust corn bait to avoid the small fish nibblers. Shaun also went on to have a good two hours on the Carp, again with corn to take him to second overall.

Full Result: