Sunday 01/12/2019 - Viaduct Silvers League - Round Five - Campbell, Carey and Lodge Lakes

Bela and I had a tortuous drive down behind some old twat driving at 30 MPH irrespective of the speed limit, not wise keeping Bela from his breakfast. I have found the breakfasts at Shipham generally mediocre, however, today it was spot on and was very welcome.

I had my usual walk around and took the picture opposite looking back to the shop of where I would like to draw today.

Into the draw coffee tin and out comes peg 103. It's the third time I have drawn it this year and again will have the cold northerly in the face.Have no doubts it can be a very good peg, but appears to my boogie peg. For company I had Nigel Easton on peg 105 who said the Skimmers had moved up the lake and wasn't that enamoured with his draw. On the other side peg 102 was the Dude - aka Dan Squires. Always interesting fishing next to him - especially today when he broke his waggler fencing with a tree.

I had planned to fish the waggler for the majority of the match with caster feed and either DR's on the hook or single caster, so it was first to be set up. The light is generally very bad on this venue and choosing a float is difficult. However, I had two Drake floats - a red and a yellow tip which I could easily change with a clip attachment. Next was a 4x12 to fish at 11.5 metres which is about as much as Joe McMahon would allow who was behind me on Lodge peg 71. I hate unshipping. I knew The Dude would out gun me and he certainly did I'm not sure how far he went out but I could hardly see the end of the pole. I reckon he was triple unshipping. Last rig which I didn't expect to use was the Ronnie rig.

Laying the bait table I noticed the caster bag had been nibbled which is something I have to do sometimes to open the bag knot. However, it was clear that the culprit was a mouse. There was enough air to turn them very dark - pictured right - they did sink though - Mouse traps now fully armed! Every single angler around me were all kind enough to offer me caster - thanks Dude.

Steve Long came by and I thought he had a piece of carpet for my stepped platform. Alas not.

I fed two long lines with a bit of caster, Pinkie and DR's plus one ball on the Ronnie line. I started on the waggler with double DR's and was getting indications straight away from Ronnies. I had about four 1 oz specimens after a lot of striking and casting. This lead me to try the Ronnies rig which produced the same size fish but 100 time quicker. Now I regret not keeping to the plan and stopping the waggler I should have given it an hour more. The Dud started to catch small Skimmers on maggot on his extreme line. So I tried my long line an could only catch the same small Ronnies. Again I should have given this longer before switching back to the Ronnie rig too soon - too easy I think. The upshot was I stayed with this for the majority of the match, and should not have - catching about 100 Ronnies.

I weighed 6 lb 13 oz for once again last in the section. Although this is a six match series unfortunately I have to miss the last one with Chris Ollis agreeing to stand in. My series has been awful. Mostly down to me. I have got it wrong three times, got in right twice but changed it to wrong, but mostly being out gunned by the long pole. I must make more use of the waggler next year - I have a plan!! Bela further spoiled my day by coming second in his section moving out of last but one relegating me to his position. We did have a good laugh about our poor results this league. Roll on next year.

The match was won by Scaffolder Ricky Mills (pictured right) with 20 lb 10 oz from Campbell peg 131. Ricky caught on the long pole fishing two lines - one with maggot/GB and the other caster/GB. Well done matey them scaffold tubes will be cold in the morning.

Result:

1. Ricky Mills 20-10-0 peg 131
2. Alvin 18-13-0 peg 59
3. Stu White 17-02-0 peg 69 - AGAIN
4. Tony Rixon 16-12-0 peg 80
5. Craig Edmonds 13-08-0 peg 97
6. Bela Bakos 12-03-0 peg 81

Weigh Sheets: