Avon Angling Open, Acorn, Wednesday 1st August 2012

First Wednesday match for a while due to work, hopefully now I've got a settled work pattern, I can get a few more mid-week matches in - but the house is still in need of much work, so a balance must be struck.....

Disappointed with my draw today, peg 29, a few comments along the lines of "I wouldn't want that" and "wrong end of the lake, mate", but when the lake opened I managed a frame from peg 28, so there was some hope, but it was slight.

After Sunday's lesson in fish catching by the meat masters, I had brought some 6 & 8mm meat, caster, worm and pellet. Completing the bait selection was groundbait for making paste up on the bank if req'd.

I could see some fish moving on the far bank and tried two lines at 10 and 2 o'clock, a line straight in front at the bottom of the far shelf and a caster line off to my left at 3m. The far bank swims proved to be a non starter, the fronds of grass sticking out up to 2½', I had no bare bank and the fish would not come out from under the grass, the attempts  to push the rig into the grass inevitably ended in the hook snagging in it. The line at the bottom of the shelf was fed with caster and softened 4mm pellets, caster, worm, soft and banded pellet all failing to get more than an occasional small skimmer.

The near caster line produced small perch, a tiny tench and several skimmers from 1oz to 6oz, but nothing consistently, nor of any size. The match was a struggle, it may have been better to stay targeting either silvers or carp, but looking at the final result, I know that I couldn't have caught anywhere near to the top weight in either category. I had kept feeding the line at the bottom of the far shelf and at 4 o'clock with an hour and 15 to go, I noticed some bubbles, at this point I reckon I had 2 carp for 3lb and about 8lb of small silvers. Dropping in with paste, there was a large patch of bubbles and the float sailed away, first better carp of the day. I had another 7 or 8 in the last hour, weighing 44lb odd of carp and 11lb odd of silvers (boosted by a couple of better skimmers on the paste), so over 40lb in the last hour - if only those fish would have shown all match!! I wasn't alone in my feeble weight, it seemed about right for pegs 24 round to 32 - how the hell do you turn draws like that into framing pegs

For the results see Tony's or Mike's blog.