Landsend Winter League, Final Round. Sunday 29th March 2015

Final round of the Landsend Winter League, thanks to Ken Rayner for organising it and being the butt of much piss taking, all of which he took in the good humour it was intended.

My intention this year had been to have a decent attempt at framing in the overall table, after last years second place in the silvers.  The first couple of matches and the lack of carp put the mockers on that and left me with the silvers to pursue in the hope of an envelope at the end of the series.

Going into this last match, I was leading the silvers league by 1 point and a fairly decent weight advantage, but if the decent skimmers/bream in the match lake fed in the forecast windy conditions, that weight advantage could be easily wiped out.  I was on lake 3, which is probably the toughest lake to be on when trying to gain a silvers section win, as a couple of the pegs hold F1’s which count as silvers on this venue and there are not the bonus big perch, tench and bream that show up in the other lakes.

I felt I needed to draw 41, 42, 68 or 70 to compete, but the forecast of gusts up to 65mph might level things up a bit, I wasn’t disappointed to see 41 on the draw ticket when I extracted it from the bucket, so in with a chance of holding onto top spot.

I set up 3 rigs, a 4x12 sensas pencil float to fish topkit or topkit +1 to try and catch roach, rudd  and perch, this had a 0.10 hooklength and a 18 6313. A NG Gimp with 0.10 hooklength and a 16 6313 for pellet in case the skimmers had a go, and a float whose name eludes me to fish worm, caster or maggot over some GB , this had a 0.10 hooklength and a 18 6313 as well.

The forecasters weren’t wrong and it was a thoroughly unpleasant day to be pole fishing, I only got out topkits and 4 sections and at times, just fishing the topkit was bad enough.  On the all-in I fed some micros and 4mm’s on a line off to my right at about 7m, this produced one tiny skimmer on a 6mm expander, so little else to say about this, the GB line was fed with two ‘jaffas’ and left to settle as I started on the topkit+ 1 and managed a few small roach and perch.  After wasting time not getting any bites on pellet, I dropped a worm head onto the GB line and had a small skimmer, but the float was far too light in the windy conditions, so took it off and on went a 0.5g rig, this saw two skimmers (3-4oz, so nothing to get excited about) in two put ins before it went quiet again.

Rotating round the lines and just getting odd small fish I was concerned when I saw what looked like a big F1 landed on the feeder from peg 42, if it was an F1, it had just wiped out all my tiny fish in one cast.  I decided I needed to try and catch some F1’s, so set up a 9’ lead rod with a small cage feeder and had a few casts to the spit, this produced one unwanted carp and 2 small roach, no sign of an F1.

By now the wind had swung round a little and was blowing into me from the left, making things even more tricky and unpleasant, especially as I could see Tony Rixon and Paul Faiers catching carp quicker than I could catch tiny skimmers. 

I had to improve my catch rate and decided to stick with fishing a topkit to hand and feeding maggot/caster.  I upped the hook size to a 16 and started centre hooking the maggot to improve bites hit ratio ( and the maggots last longer) and just got my head down, its not something that I find particularly enjoyable, but it was a means to an end and it paid off, with 10.02 of whitebait for a lake silvers win and the silvers league by one point from Gary O’Shea, who had been pushing hard. I dropped 2 points weighing 68.15, Gary dropped 3 points weighing 42.13.

A nice way to round off the week, with a couple more envelopes, well done to Tony Rixon for winning the overall league only dropping one point and with a huge weight advantage of 200lb+.

Bait Tech Festival, Whiteacres, 2015

The eagerly anticipated Bait Tech festival has come round again and with all the arrangements taken care of by my lodge companions, it was just a matter of turning up and fishing.  I had got some nice fresh caster, 30 pints of it from Veals and some worms, so it amounted to 10 pints each and 2 kilos of worms each, for myself, Paul (Faiers) and Glenn (Calvert).  The fourth lodge resident was, as in previous years, Chips Rafferty, Pauls Father-in –Law, many thanks for all the chalet maid duties he carried out during the week and for his company and stories.

We arrived midday on Saturday, it was too nice a day to waste, so onto Jenny’s for some practise, we all caught fairly well, although the F1’s and carp were fairly conspicuous by their absence.  Saturday night was a trip to the bar to meet up with a few faces not seen since last year, but a fairly quiet night ensured we were ready for another practise session on the Sunday.  This was a matter of some discussion and it ended up with us going to Twin oaks for a walk round and then onto Trelawny for a few hours, we caught, but not huge weights, mainly skimmers rather than carp and F1’s although several barbel showed as well, although they would just be bonus fish, not viable to target.  

First day for me was to be Jenny’s/Trelawny and I managed to draw myself peg 19, the same peg I had fished on Saturday afternoon, so I had an idea of what to do and it would mainly revolve around fishing caster/worm short and meat at 7 or 8m, as on Saturday fishing longer had proved no better and peg 19 has an island fairly close, so an easy feeder chuck, but it didn’t produce a single fish on Saturday.  As there was so much time I set up a feeder and a straight lead, the wind was really skimming the surface, so the waggler rods stayed in the bag.  As the time drew closer to the 12.00 all-in and no one appeared on peg 20, I realised I would have an end peg, but decided against setting up a margin rig given the lack of carp in the area on Saturday.

I started by feeding some worm and caster in GB, short, then some meat at 7m, before trying the feeder, which as Saturday, was a fruitless exercise.  I came in on the meat line and it was very slow, so a look on the short line with worm produced a run of fish, but a smaller stamp than I had on Saturday.  I could see that the guys on the pegs to my left were struggling, but a bank walker told me Paul Holland on peg 15 was catching well.  The 5 hours passed very quickly and by swapping between the meat line and the short line I managed to keep fish coming, no sign of a carp or the F1’s again.  The scales started at me and I put 43lb odd on the scales, which was top in the section until Richie Hull who weighed 68lb and Paul Holland who had 140lb, so a third in section and with no carp showing I am not sure I was capable of catching another 26lb of silvers to take a second, so have to be reasonably satisfied with that result.  Keeping an eye on the results for the rest of the week, I had top weight from the peg.

On to Tuesday and Trewaters, I drew peg 22, which is the peg or very close to where I practised last year and this may have clouded my rational thoughts, as on that day I caught plenty of F1’s on meat down the track, then even more on maggot short.  Again the wind would render a waggler useless, so it stayed in the bag again, a straight lead and three pole rigs would suffice for my confident approach. One pole rig to fish maggot short, another would cover meat at any distance past about 6m where the depth was within an inch or two, the same all over.  A margin rig, in case the carp would venture in there, as peg 21 was not in.  My confidence in catching F1’s as last year was sadly misplaced and I spent far too long trying to make it work, whilst the correct approach seemed to be fish 16m and very, very lightly feed meat through a tosspot and sit it out for carp, the margins gave up a skimmer and a roach and I was left with egg on my face and an embarrassing last in section, I would say it’s a day to forget, but  some important lessons learnt, which whilst painful, shouldn’t be forgotten.

Day three and a chance to redeem myself, Bolingey, I managed second on the lake last year, so hopefully I could regain some credibility and put yesterday behind me.  Into the drawbag and out came 27, which won the lake the day before with 200lb – no pressure then…….. 

Apparently the bomb had been the killing method the day before, so I set one up and then a spare one, just in case of disaster.  A waggler followed, as there were signs of fish moving in the upper layers of the water, all round the lake and three pole rigs.  One to fish at 5m, another for 14m and a margin rig, to target the area on the opposite bank where a tree trunk is in the water. 

I started on the bomb and bread, but it was slow going and I had to search around for fish, they didn’t seem to be in the deeper water, I had 3 or 4 on this before switching to meat, which was even slower.  The lead rod went up the bank and I had a run of fish on the waggler, fished about 3’-4’ deep, all the fish coming to meat.  I had some dead maggor and GB to put down the edge and with just over an hour to go I fed this into about 2’-2/12’ of water.  There were immediate signs of fish over the bait so I went straight over it with 6 maggots on the hook and caught for the last hour, an expensive decision not to go down that edge earlier, as I weighed 147.04 coming 4^th on the lake, with the top three weighing155.10, 155.02 and 150.12. One fish, the last one I netted was 14lb+, disappointing to have missed out on a frame placing, managing second in section and section money by default.

Penultimate day for me was to be Pollawyn, which hadn’t been fishing as well as it can and a poor draw on peg 2 was home for the day.  Tackled up with plenty of time, had a chat with some of the anglers on the end of the spit, Adam Wakelin was on 24 and he said “try and enjoy it mate, that’s a shit draw……”  The wind was whipping down the channel that peg 2 is in and creating a heavy undertow back towards the main lake, so once again the waggler rods stayed in the bag, two topkits for the open water, one for topkit+1 and one for 9m, no point in going further in the wind. Also a margin rig as Alex Nadin had drawn the peg the day before  and had two carp down the edge, but still was at the wrong end of the section.

I did set up a bomb rod to fish right across and first put in on bread hooked an F1, which shook its head when it popped up in front of me and shook the hook out….. great start!!  Nothing else forthcoming on the lead, so I adopted a similar plan to fishing Jenny’s, worm and caster short, meat long, no GB with the worm and caster this time.

I had a decent run of fish on the worm, big roach, skimmers and perch, before switching to the meat line, this produced a couple of hybrids, but was much, much slower than the caster and worm line.  I kept plugging away and trying to keep warm as the peg is shady and windy.  The margin line was no good for carp, three skimmers being the sum total for my efforts there.  For entertainment I had Adam Wakelin on peg 24, fishing the wrong side of a big tree for the last few minutes, he hooked a fish and proceeded to add pole sections until he could lift the pole over the tree and bring it round for netting, a barbell, he then repeated the exercise with a carp – very soft hollow was the order of the day.  I was last on the lake to weigh and fully expected my carp-less net to give me another lowly section placing, even though I had had an enjoyable days fishing, I was surprised when my weight of 25lb odd was enough for second in section, maybe I could have caught the 6lb I needed had I not spent time in the margins.   Got back to the lodge to find that Mr Silverfish Faiers had had a second on Bolingey from peg 7 with 118lb, he’s now a carp convert……

Last day, the week seemed to go by very quickly, with fishing in the day and some good company in the evenings.  Twin Oaks, I have only drawn this lake once before on my first visit, so know very little about it.  Peg 15 stuck to my paw from the drawbag, apparently it can be a good peg in the right area and carp are the target, not F1’s.  Some advice from lodge companions Paul and Glenn, along with some more from Des (Shipp) and I went off to the peg feeling confident I would catch.  All the bait in the bag, with the exception of the meat and bread could have been left in the lodge fridge, as they were the only two to grace my sidetray.

I set up two bomb rods, a waggler rod (on Des’s advice) and a pole rig for 5m, I did set up a margin rig, just because I had so much time, but it was put away unused and the margin remained unfed.  For company I had Adam Wakelin to my left on 13 and Paul Holland on 16, who was looking for a section win to keep up his chance of the festival win.  Starting on the bread I had three fish inside the first 20 minutes, which I clicked at 19lb, so a good start. The bread stopped producing bites so I went onto meat, feeding 8mm cubes across and kept the odd fish coming, if I went too close to the far bank, I got liners and nothing else, so I had to drop it 3’-4’ short and wait for a bite, that reduced the liners.  That was indicating the fish were sat up in the water, so as soon as the wind allowed I dropped over with the waggler and caught on that 2^nd cast, when I hooked my second fish on it, there were wagglers flying out from the pegs either side, but the wind once again picked up and made it very difficult to present.

I went back on the bomb and tried to grab a couple of casts with the waggler when there was a long enough lull in the wind, but the fish had slowed down now, going into the last hour I was ahead of the pegs either side, but not by much, as Paul had struggled to catch on the bomb, but had managed some on the long pole.  The last hour was my undoing and handed the festival win to Paul, as he managed 8 or 9 fish from his 5m line, whereas my 4 or 5 from the same line, meant that he had overtaken me.  The scales proved that to be the case, with Paul winning the lake with 146.11, my fish went 125.10 for second spot and Adam with 120.10 for third.

Had a long chat with Paul after the match, he had worked so hard to catch up and admitted that after 90 minutes he wanted to cry and pack up, as he couldn’t catch, suffice to say he didn’t and he fished well all week for a much deserved festival win.

I ended up 39th, but for a couple of dropped points I would have had a solid top 20 finish which would have been good, the last in section cost me top 30, its so tight on these festivals, a dropped point or two is a real blow.

Some thoughts on the festival are that taking all that worm and caster was a waste of time, meat was the way to go.  Its very difficult to compete with the top guys who are fishing most days of the week, the better strategy might be to go and fish every match to win it, rather than worry about section points.  Its imperative to try and get some good information on the pegs as 5 hours seems very short when you are used to 6 hour matches on venues you know.

I did loads of prep and only used a few hooks and a couple of rigs….. 

It was nice not having to take waders, platform, different rods and microbarbed hooks for Porth.  

Already looking forward to next year, although my Preston Festival Invite has just landed in my inbox, tempted, very tempted..... anyone want to share a caravan?

Landsend Winter League, Round 5, Sunday 15th March 2015

Last Tuesday it seemed like spring had arrived, before the temperatures fell again, but I did decide to man up and leave the merino base layer off today and it wasn’t too bad, so the spring, hopefully isn’t too far away.

My turn to draw on Match Lake, leading the silvers table and nowhere to be seen in the overall standings meant I had little choice but to target silvers for the full 6 hours, no matter where I drew.  It was disappointing to see so many empty pegs round the lakes, even though Ken had done his best to get stand-in’s.

I dipped into the plastic bucket marked up Match Lake and on opening the swimcard, saw 3 staring back at me, I wasn’t too disappointed, although I would have preferred  5  – often the home of a few F1’s, maybe 15 or 17 as I’ve seen big skimmers come from there and 11 has won the silvers in amongst a decent weight of carp on the last 3 occasions I’ve been on this lake. It turned out peg 5 wasn’t drawn and for company on peg one, I had Tony Rixon, who would be doing his best to keep the carp to himself.

The water wasn’t as coloured as I’d like for skimmers, but clear enough for the perch to feed, the level is down and I didn’t set up a rig to fish right up the shelf, I thought the water was too clear for it to work.  I did set up a Hillbilly Chump on 0.16, with a 0.10 hooklength and a 18 6313, to fish down the track, this with a standard bulk and two droppers.  I also set up a MW F1 slim wire, with spread N011’s, in case the fish were off bottom, this on 0.14 with the same hook and hooklength as the first rig.

I also set up a rig to fish just at the bottom of the far shelf, this was a NG Gimp (just because it had a yellow tip and was easy to see), again on 0.16, with the 0.10 hooklength and a 18 6313.  Finally, a rig to fish down to the brambles and pallet of peg 2, this didn’t produce a bite, so no more keyboard effort explaining that one. 

The rigs for down the track would be good for two lines, one at 9m at 10 o’clock and also at 2 o’clock at 6m.  The 9m line was fed with a mixture of micros and 4mm’s with just a little fishmeal GB to coat them.  The 6m line was fed by hand with caster.  After feeding these lines I started across at the bottom of the shelf, toss potting caster in and it wasn’t long before I had a bite, a 4oz rudd opening my score.  I carried on tos potting the caster and had a run of rudd and perch up to 8oz, before a couple of slightly better perch were netted.  The bites weren’t savage, so I had the float dotted right down to see them.  I then lost a couple of fish and started missing bites, liners I suspected, although I think one of the lost fish was a decent perch.

I tried dragging the rig up the shelf slightly and this didn’t improve matters, I had tried feeding heavier and less often to keep the fish down on the deck, but this didn’t work either.  I got of my box and set up a rig to fish up the shelf in 18” of water, after losing a big F1, but this only produced 2 bites, one of which was a 1oz rudd.

I had been topping up the pellet line and watching out for signs of fish over it, as they usually give themselves away with the odd bubble, but it appeared devoid of fish after 3 hours.  I managed a couple of big skimmers on the caster line, and by rotating between here and the bottom of the far shelf I kept the odd fish coming. 

Finally with a couple of hours to go, I saw a solitary bubble on the 9m line over the pellet, slipping a 4mm pellet on the hook and dropping it in, saw the float settle and almost immediately bury, a 3lb bream was gratefully netted.  I managed a few more decent skimmers over the last two hours, but once I caught one, occasionally two in two put ins, then I’d have to wait a while for a bite, I think that was just down to the clarity of the water spooking the others when one was hooked.  I only lost one bream, a decent fish that leapt out of the water, heading straight back towards me as I lifted into the bite, he was successful in his endeavour to shed the hook.

For the second Sunday running I could have easily fished on at the all-out, a nice contrast to some of this winter’s matches, that I wouldn’t have minded had the all-out come within a couple of hours of the start.

Ideally I needed a silvers section win to keep my hopes of winning the league alive, as the draw will be crucial next  match on John’s Water.  Stand-in Nigel Bartlett pipped me to it, with a nice net of silvers from peg 11 ( that s three matches in a row I’ve been beaten by that peg….) weighing in at 30.06, my lost fish proved expensive, as the leaping bream would have done it, as I weighed 28.02.  That was enough to keep me one point clear at the top of the silvers table, with a decent weight advantage – just praying for a peg with some silvers in on the last round!!

Next up for me is the Bait Tech Festival at Whiteacres, looking forward to that, trying to get ready but working until 10pm every night this coming week, bound to forget something.......

On the day:

1: Adrian Clark 114.09 peg 13

2: Craig Edmunds 110.01 peg 15

3: Ken Rayner 100.09 peg 20

4: Mike Duckett  100.01 peg 37

5: Tony Rixon 88.02 peg 1

6: Sean Townsend 67.12 peg 7

Silvers

1: Nigel Bartlett 30.06 peg 11

2: Chris Fox 28.02 peg 3

3: Gary Ethridge 17.4 peg 39

Acorn Open / Costcutter, Tuesday 10th March 2015

It's been 9 months since I last visited Acorn, the length of time was partly just due to other commitments, partly due to the big 'hangover' I had from the Pole only series last year, which was a dismal series for me personally.

I think there was about 20 fishing this match and after finding that the fish were looking for a bit of feed on Sunday, I was hoping to catch a few today, I had plenty of caster left, so was going to base a plan around that. I managed to get into the drawbag pretty early and ping pong ball 17 was my reward, not one of the bridges or corner pegs.

2 rigs for silvers, a 0.4 NG Gimp with a 16 63.13 on 0.10 and a HB Chump with a 18 6313 on .010, the latter being good for the near and far shelves, the former for down the track.

The pegging was fairly spread out along the back bank, with Charlie Barnes on 13 and Barry Fitchew on 15, then next peg was Eddie Wynne on bridge peg 21, so plenty of room. I decided to fish for silvers, 4 balls of GB down the track on the all in and loose fed caster at the bottom of the near shelf.  leaving that to settle I went across to the far shelf in about 3' of water

It was a slow start, apart from Des Shipp on peg 40, who had 4 fish in as many put ins, after 20 minutes of no action across, I looked over the GB down the track, feeding that much GB may well have been a mistake, as that area too seemed devoid of fish and if they had backed off the bait, they had plenty of water to back off into.

After an hour of having had a couple of tiny perch, 3 roach and one small skimmer, I switched to feeding micros across on the 'second' shelf, with soft pellet on the hook, this resulted in a carp and a missed bite, I decided to switch to fishing for carp as the silver 'action' was so slow and set up a rig to fish banded pellet tight across and a margin rig for down to the pallet on my left.

The fish were few and far between, once I caught one then I wouldn't get another bite from the same line until it had been well rested, so it was a game of patience to rotate lines and keep the odd fish coming, in between carp I had 2 f1's and 2 better skimmers, so more silvers when carp fishing, than when targeting them!!

I saw a swirl tight to the far bank and shipped the banded pellet rig out and dropped into the gap in the far bank grasses, the float buried and a 3lber was netted, back across, not another bite from here, I tried toss potting bait and towards the end, catapulting 4mm pellets to the far bank, but the fish wouldn't settle there, I had one more from that line.

I fed some micros, maggot and a bit of GB down to the pallet of 18 with just under 2 hours to go, this produced 2 carp to triple maggot, couldn't get a bite on pellet down there.

At the all out I knew that I was behind a few pegs I'd seen catching, but had a better day than some others, who DNW, I believe Darren Vowles had one fish all day from 26.  The weather was lovely, it was the least wind affected day I have had on the venue and it was frustrating to be 4 or 5 decent fish off a pick up, but it was better than work.  Poor decision making to spend time fishing for silvers  and my incompetence at pellet fishing, especially on snake lakes was probably a major contribution to being an also ran.  My fish went 40.06 for 8th on the day.

1: Des Shipp 90.11 peg 40
2: Lee Wadler 77.03 peg 9
3: George Sumison 57.08 peg 22
4:Mike Owens 56.04 peg 33
5: Rich Heatly 51.01 peg 34
6: Dave Wride 50.06 peg 5

Silvers

1: Des Shipp 22.07
2: Rich Heatly 14.03

Viaduct Winter League, Final Round, Sunday 8th March 2015

With the team in no position to pick up anything, there was just pride to salvage and make sure we weren't last, that gave everyone a chance to fish positively to win some coin, with any luck.

The breakfast at the pub was OK again, so with that and a few conversations done, it was down to the fishery car park to get a parking place, whilst Paul Faiers took his turn at plucking the numbers from the tin.  I had commented on Fred Roberts facebook page that Paul would draw him a flyer, but not sure about the rest of us and Mystic Maesknoll was proven correct.

Glenn found himself on unfavoured 113, Mike Walker on 79, Fred on 73 (two match wins to its credit in the series), myself on 43 and Paul had plonked himself on 5 - an island chuck where sitting on your hands is a requisite, so sadly the wrong man on that peg, as I knew the lure of some silvers on the pole would distract him.

I wasn't disappointed to draw on Match Lake, as in all the previous rounds our team has drawn on the Spring/Middle pegs of this split section, but I would have preferred 41 or 42 to my home for the day 43.  A good look and think about the peg when I got to it, the wind looked awkward for the waggler, but there was a chance it could drop or switch round, so I set up a straight Drake peacock with a hollow plastic bristle, this would easily cover all of the water in the peg and the hollow bristle giving visibility in the difficult light conditions.  3lb reel line, with a 0.10 hooklength and a 18 6313 completed this set up, with just 2 No 10 down the line.

Two lead rods out of the bag, both 10' Tournament Pro, one with a straight lead and one for a small cage feeder, the straight lead on 6lb Daiwa TDR reel line, the feeder on 10lb Maver Jurassic (not needed that heavy, but had nothing lighter).  0.16 hooklength and a 16 QM1 on the lead and 0.14 with a 16 LWG on the feeder.

Topkits were selected, white Avalon elastic for a margin rig, which should cover F1's, Carp and Perch, this was 0.16 straight though to a 18 Guru Super Spade.
No5 doubled up and a Hillbilly Chump, with a standard bulk and two droppers, this rig did not get used, so no more about it.
Yellow Middy with a .2 NG Gimp, 0.10 hooklength and a 18 6313, this was a 4" hooklength and double bulk rig for the skimmers that inhabit this lake.
A light rig for F1's in case they were up in the water, feeding on the drop, Middy 6-8 orange elastic and  MW F1 Slim wire, with a strung bulk of No11's, this rigs saw little use......

On the all in I cupped in 4 Jaffa's of groundbait at 12.5m, leaving it to settle I tried popped up bread to the island on the straight lead, not so much as a liner from this, so I tried maggot and meat, all to no avail.  looking round there wasn't much being caught and mindful of it being a 5 hour match, I picked up the pole and dropped the double bulk rig in over the groundbait.  Indications straight away and 4 fish hooked, 4 lost, 3 small fish and a decent skimmer, so up the bank with the Middy yellow elastic and another topkit with the orange 6-8 in attached to the rig.

This was an improvement and the first of a run of skimmers came to the net, oddly the double bulk rig was not giving the expected lift bites, but just tiny knocks, which resulted in a missed bite if struck at, the first 2 or 3 knocks had to be ignored and only strike when the float disappeared.  The float was dotted right down to the tiniest pimple, so the bites were really finicky.  I tried both the other rigs, but the the double bulk was by far the best.

I topped up the groundbait after an hour and this brought  several more bites, I had also been feeding a 5-6m line with caster by hand and the margin in front of the dead rushes with maggot and caster. I kept the skimmers coming by topping the groundbait when bites tailed off, the groundbait had caster, pinkie and a few maggots in each ball.

To rest the 12.5m line I had a drop in the margin and lost a good perch, before landing a small one and a roach, before that went dead. The wind was swapping round and I did feed a caster line with the catapult to fish the waggler, having had some success doing this in the past on this lake, but I was bitted out with small roach apart from one lone F1.

I could see that several anglers round the lake were catching F1's and carp, so my best bet for a pick up was to concentrate on the silvers, back on the 12.5 m line I switched to a worm head on the hook and this produced several decent skimmers, the best of which was close to 3lb.

With an hour to go, there were a few pin prick bubbles coming up from the 12.5m line and I cupped in a few more caster and some loose GB. Next drop in saw the float bury and a F1had taken the worm head, before in the next couple of drop-in's the skimmers had returned. With 40 minutes to go, I think I made a mistake, the bigger skimmers / bream were in front of me and thought topping up the feed would keep them there until the end, either this or another big skimmer that waddled and wallowed its way in, after jumping, virtually killed the line off, seeing just one fish in the last half hour.

A lovely days fishing to round off the league, even though I was only about halfway in the main section and ounced out of the mini section, my 30.14 of silvers was enough to take 2nd (silvers) on the day and a nice £100 envelope. 34lb won the silvers from spring lake, with some high 20's coming in behind.

As a team it was a poor day, with Fred winning his lake from 73, the others had tough days, a tough league with some shocking draws, but where else would you get a 95 pegger, good pick ups and the big match atmosphere and banter.  Not sure I will commit to much else next winter, but hopefully will be back for this.

Viaduct Winter League R4, Sunday 1st March 2015

Firstly get well soon Mike Nicholls.

My turn on Lodge lake today, I had decided to fish a positve line for skimmers unless I drew a corner flyer, as expected the corner flyer didn't materialise, the team draw was the same as the first round, where we came rock bottom. That put Mike Walker on 118, stand-in Calum Craig on 85, myself on 56, Paul Faiers on 24 and Glenn Calvert on 9.

With so much time to set up I put up two waggler rods, one with a 4AAA straight waggler and a light one with an insert, the latter not seeing much action as it was very difficult to see.  4 topkits, two with wire stemmed floats, the same set up and hooks, 18 6313 on 0.10, one 0.2 float and the other 0.4, a MW diamond with a double bulk, in case the wind became tricky, this with a 18 on 0.12, final topkit was set up to try and coax a fish or two from the margins.

On the all in I cupped in 4 large balls of groundbait at 14m and then started on the waggler and corn, this proved a biteless exercise and a switch to meat was no more productive, after half an hour I dropped in over the groundbait line and started getting bites straight away, roach and a couple of skimmers, before the bites slowed up, this led to a couple of bigger skimmers, before the bites tailed right off on the hour mark.

I wasn't completely sure about topping up the groundbait, but I did and the fish came straight back over it and this was the pattern for the rest of the match, feed, get a few bites, bites tail off, feed again bites pick up.  I had started on the 0.2 rig, but switched to the 0.4 and it seemed better, it wasn't frantic, but it was enough to keep me interested.

I had kept feeding some corn on the waggler line and about 2o'clock had a look over it, the float was dragging through, so I put 6" of line of the bottom and immediately hooked a decent fish, it was hooked fair and square in the tail and gave me a tough battle on the light waggler gear, but I finally managed to net it.  Next cast I had another bite and the line snapped just above the float, how frustrating, to land a 12lb fish foul hooked and then snap off on one just after.

I dropped back in on the groundbait line and the float buried, another decent skimmer and then a couple of roach.  Towards the end the wind got up and it hammered down with rain, I switched to the double bulk rig and a text book lift bite gave me my final skimmer.

My skimmers went 16lb and a 12lb carp for 28lb, which was 5th on the lake and was enough to take the section win, the 16lb of silvers was just out of the money, so maybe if I hadn't fished for carp I might have framed into the silvers, but the carp gave me good points and an envelope.  5th place for the team, with three of us picking up coin, a big turnaround from the result we had on these pegs in R1.

Joint winners, Andy Power and Steve Long, 107lb from 116 & 73, Calum was 3rd from 85, Fabio 4th with about 80lb and Mike Walker with 70lb or so from 118.