Shiplate Silvers Costcutter, Thursday 21st February 2019

I haven't been to Shiplate since last August, not sure why, as it really is a lovely fishery, well maintained and a great welcome from the owners.  It's obvious that there has been plenty of work going on, with a lot of tree pruning and clearance, the balance between a natural look and the need for a commercial fishery to be angler friendly is being well met here.

Only 9 fishing today, so I am not sure if it is really a match or a knock up?  I would suggest that to really be a match there should be at least double figures fishing and I'd like that to be 20 really.  I guess that there is just too much competition, with the Bathampton matches at Hunstrete, Viaduct, Ivy House and a few other fisheries all within an hours drive hosting Thursday matches, it would be nice to get some decent size matches back on the calendar, as the only way to get this now is to fish leagues and series.

I paid my pools and had a chat with Paul Faiers who had come along, with 10 minutes to draw time I thought it safe to wander off and use the facilities, when I came out, the place was deserted, apart from a smiling Steve (the owner) who had the last ticket in the tub for me, as everyone was there they'd drawn early, peg 10 was left for me.  I wasn't really sure where a good draw was, but nearer the middle is often a decent place to be for silvers on these canal lakes, so not too disappointed and I did have 52lb of silvers off of peg 9 - but that was August 2011, how time flies!!

Roach and skimmers were the likely targets, so I did set up a range of topkits, to rigs to fish for roach, HB Frosties (0.1) with strung out No11's to a 0.09 hooklength and a 20 Gama Green hook, one set at depth and one 6" off bottom.  Another HB Frostie (0.3) to fish a regular bulk and droppers, this with a 0.010 hooklength and a 20 Guru F1 hook, this would do for 3 lines, two down the centre at 10 and 2 o'clock and one across at the bottom of the far shelf.  A lighter NG slim float with the same hook and hooklength and finally a double bulk rig.

The peg plumbed up as being within 2" from the bottom of the near shelf, right across to the bottom of the far shelf, so the rigs would do for all lines with only minor tweaking.  Bait was simple, maggots, pinkies and caster for loose feeding and feeding on the GB line, micros, a few 4mm hard pellets and some expanders to fish the 2 o'clock line, where only pellets would be fed.

On the all in I fed my pellet line, and the 10 o'clock line with two tangerine size balls of GB laced with caster and maggot, one ball on the line right across.  Started on the roach rig fishing caster short, this was a slow start, 4 roach in 15 minutes, so I went out over the pellet line with a 4mm expander, this was instant, but it was a small roach rather than the desired skimmer.  I dropped an expander over the GB line and had a hand sized skimmer, but then couldn't get another bite, I rotated round the lines with a maggot on and had a couple more roach, by now an hour had gone and I had about 1lb in the net.

I refed all the lines and then had another hand sized skimmer over the pellet line, but the bites were few and far between, I tried an expander over the GB line again and had a better skimmer, but nothing was forthcoming after that.  I could see some fish being caught down to my right, but not much off to my left.  I had been feeding the short caster line and looked in on this again, I was getting bites here now and switching from caster to pinkie increased the number of bites, without changing the size of the fish - which were roach 1oz-3oz. I kept the longer lines topped up and had an occasional look over them, but they really weren't productive - I didn't catch at all off the line at the bottom of the far shelf.

I managed to get the fish on the pinkie line to come into topkit range and I even had a bonus chub that must have been nearly 1lb, it wasn't frantic, but steady enough to make it worth staying on, the last hour was a bit torrid, two snapped elastics and a lost rig (double bulk rig, had gone for another look over the GB line with double maggot and immediately hooked a carp).  The carp had certainly woken up and they were actively looking for feed.  Whilst it was a beautiful day to be outside fishing, I wasn't too disappointed to hear the all out after 5 hours, the carp were getting more and more active and I think another hour would have been pretty frustrating.  I wasn't alone, Paul said he had hooked at least 15 carp and a few others were also finding the carp in a hungry mood.

The payout was just two section winners and my 10.14 was enough for a section win and second in the match, beaten by a 13lb, a few more skimmers showed in the pegs to my right.  A lovely day in great countryside and I will make an effort to get to Shiplate a bit more this year.

Not sure how many midweek matches I will get to now, as I am starting a new job next week, after 14 years of shift work and having my weekends disrupted, I am returning to the 'normal' world of Monday-Friday working, at least the series I have missed out on in recent years can get my attention now.