Tony ran this open over both canals, with a continental pay-out, so not too concerned where I drew, Judith did the draw and plucked me out peg 9 on Hawthorns, not fished it loads, so I don't really have entrenched opinions on any of the pegs.
Peg 9 doesn't have any margins as such - at least, nor ones you can reach to fish, by dint of being set back slightly and having an aerator rope across from the lake, I did cut back a few overhanging fronds to get me tight to the bank, but it was only a topkit distance. Far too deep really, the edge is a steep slope that the plummet tumbles down, so I set up where I could pull it into the slope, at over 3' it was far too deep, but it was all I had.
Plumbing up across, I had no bare bank, so got tight into the rushes, but again, too deep, being over 2'. I also set up a shallow rig and a mugging rig, as the sun was up and the fish were more interested in cruising and pairing up than was good for fishing.
Started across on the hard pellet, had a couple, but then as was always likely, a flurry of foul hookers, none of which were landed, I tried the shallow rig across, but that was no good. I tried the meat line I'd been feeding, not so much as a liner, didn't really expect one I suppose. I tried mugging fish, I couldn't even manage that.
Matt next door was catching on caster shallow - although that knowledge wasn't much use to me, as I had no casters, I did try it with maggots, but never had a bite. It does create a range of opinion, that Matt brings a gallon of casters with him and often does well - some seem absolutely obsessed with the cost of them - I personally wouldn't spend that on casters for a 20 pegger, but would happily do it for league, team match or big open, but each to his own. I recall similar moans and groans about bloodworm and joker.
I managed a couple more across on banded pellet and 4 down the edge on maggots, never had a bite on meat. I also had a chub that was probably 10 or 12oz.
Come the weigh in, I put one net of carp on the scales and with the agreement of the scalesmen, put the chub on top. Total weight of 73.08.
That ended up third on the lake - so one out of the money in the overall, as the continental payout was top four, not weighing that chub separately cost me 2nd in the silvers, as even though there were two silvers anglers on my lake, they never caught one, the only other silver was a chub caught by Matt on the next peg who battered me (and everyone else) with his casters,
I'd had a feeling all day of something not being quite right and that proved to be true, needed one more fish or to have weighed the bloody chub separately.....
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