My first time on the Main Lake at Shiplate Farm, the other
visits I have made to this venue have been enjoyable and I have picked up
something everytime. I didn’t think that was likely to continue today, as it
started off pretty disastrously, realising that I’d left my groundbait bowl and
riddle on the garage floor, this being compounded by then realising, once I got
to my peg that I had left my feeders and floats at home. That’s what you get
for working until 10pm for a few nights before the match, no proper
preparation.
I drew peg 13, pretty meaningless to me, but at least I had
the wind off my back. From the little info I had managed to find out about the
lake, meant I had a simple bait tray, caster, maggot, dead maggot and pinkie.
My groundbait mixed up in a spare 3 pint bait box completed the bait selection,
although I did wonder if soft pellet or corn might work as the water didn’t
feel too cold.
Keeping the simple theme, two rods and one topkit were all I
set up, it was as I started threading the line through the rings of the tip rod
that I realised the feeders and wagglers weren’t in the box ( I took them out
for the last match, trying to reduce the amount I carry). Thanks to Fabio, I
managed to finish setting up the feeder rod, as he leant me two feeders. The
waggler rod was already set up, but with a middy plastic straight waggler, that
I wouldn’t normally choose to use with maggot or caster, preferring an insert.
Still beggars can’t be choosers, so I took off the banded B960 and replaced it
with a 0.12 and a 18 carp match hook. The top kit had a 0.5g float on 0.14,
with a 0.10 hooklength with a 18 Drennan silverfish hook.
On the all in I cupped in a couple of tangerine sized balls
of groundbait at 11.5m and left it to
settle, picking up the feeder and
fishing that at about 30 yards, the response on the feeder was instant, with 3
fish in the first three chucks, small skimmers,
then the bites got finicky and with each cast I had to wait longer for a
bite. This set the pattern for the day, on the pole and feeder lines, the
waggler produced one skimmer, although I did have a few crushed maggots that
didn’t show up as a bite. When the feeder line went quiet, I unclipped and had
a look further out, but this just resulted in the odd liner, so I shortened back
up to the original line.
With about 2 hours to go, I felt that I was struggling and
had switched from feeding groundbait on the pole line to loose fed caster,
dropping double pinkie in amongst the caster saw the float bury and a decent
bream netted after a nerve wracking few minutes. A few skimmers and roach
followed on caster or pinkie before the line died. Reverting to the feeder I
managed three more skimmers in the last 3 casts before the all out.
I think with the head of bream and skimmers in the lake it
would be interesting to fish bloodworm and joker at this time of year, maybe
that would be the answer to stop them backing off so soon after a couple of
their mates have been caught.
My fish went 12.04 for 5th overall and
3rd in the silvers, but thanks to the default rule, I pocketed the 1st
silver payout. Just as well as I lost
one of Fabios’s feeders and the other split and had to be held together with
insulation tape, they suddenly became top of the range, once I’d asked Tony to
replace them and bill me!!
1. Clint
Wojtyle 25-10-0 peg 1
2. Matt
Tomes 23-12-0 peg 14A
3. Tony
Rixon 18-12-0 peg 15
4. Mike
Nicholls 15-07-0 peg 14
5. Chris
Fox 12-04-0 peg 13
6. Nick
Collier 10-02-0 peg 12
Top Silvers:
1. Tony
Rixon 18-12-0 peg 15
2. Matt
Tomes 16-05-0 peg 14A
3. Chris
Fox 12-04-0 peg13
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