Ivy House Open, Saturday 18th July 2020

Trying to keep a bit of sanity in my fishing, so back to Ivy House, I had just taken my pole, as I was expecting the match to be on the canals, but there was an overflow section onto the old match lake, so I should have put some rods in - just in case, lesson learnt for next time.  As it turned out, Andy drew me 47 on the Kingfisher, so no need for rods.

Plenty of time to set up, so I had a topkit to fish across on the shallowest shelf I could find, that was 3', which is too deep, but I left the rig set up.  A shallow rig,  a 4x14 Preston maggot float to fish worms down the track, a 4x12 version of the same float to fish short - at the bottom of the near slope, a rig for banded pellet and a margin rig.

Bait tray was caster, maggot, worms and pellets.  I expected to catch some carp across on hard pellet, skimmers short and down the track, with an odd carp mixed in and then some carp down the edge.  It turns out I was end peg, with 48 and 49 not pegged.  Not sure its always a benefit, as the fish can back off, but it does give an area to draw from.

Started across and had a couple of  small carp, but they soon moved off.  I had fed two lines for skimmers, one with GB and chopped worm, one with micros and 4mm pellets.  The worm line was best, not hectic, but a few skimmers, it needed regular topping up, I did think I may get a decent weight of them, but the sun came out and they disappeared.

I had been pinging pellets across and had some fish on the mudline, I went in tight with the shallow rig and had several fish, but with the rules (as I thought) that you had to fish at least 12" deep, I was under the fish. I gave it up and came back on the line over the micros, had a couple of small skimmers and a carp, but that was getting me nowhere,

With a couple of hours to go I fed a margin line either side, one with GB and maggots, one with pellets and corn, I expected the LH edge (maggots) to be best, as that was the side with no one pegged past me, but the RH edge was by far the best, the first of the last two hours was best and it tailed off in the last hour.  Another enjoyable day at Ivy House, I suspect the peg was worth a lake win, but I was pipped by Vince on peg 37 by 4lb.

 When Andy came to weigh in I commented that had I been able to fish 4 or 6" deep on the mudline I'd have caught a few more - he then told me he'd changed the rules last week and you could now fish 6" deep - shame I never knew before.  So my fish went 84.02, which was joint 4th and I sneaked a default section win - bout time, been a miserable run since lockdown ended.