Tuesday 31 May 2011

Viaduct, Bank Holiday Monday Open, 30th May 2011

Cary and Lodge were in today, I had no real preference for which, lately, whichever lake I've been on, the other has won. 28 fishing today, I assumed my usual place near the front of the queue for the draw and pulled out 81, a peg that has not been top of everyones wish list recently. It was good to see my old travelling partner and drinking buddy, Graham Hunt today, one of his very rare appearances on a commercial.

I was inclined to fish for silvers, but when I got there, carp were visible, by their black shapes and the large blows off the end of the spit. With the wind off my back, I knew presenting the waggler wouldn't be difficult, so set up a full depth waggler to fish banded 8mm, a lead rod, two similar rigs to fish open water on the pole, MW diamonds one for caster/worm and one for banded pellet. A rig to fish the margins completed the set up.

I fed the margins heavily with caster and included some meat, suffice to say that I had one bite on meat and a couple of very small skimmers and one roach on worm, the margins didn't seem to have any feeding carp or tench in them.

I started the match on the lead, without so much as a liner, so after 20 minutes, switched to the waggler, this produced 5 fish in the first 2 hours, then I started fouling fish, they seemed to be coming up in the water, although I couldn't catch shallow, not even a bite. I then had a tench and a skimmer on the waggler - surely signifying that the carp had moved. All bites on the wag then dried up.

I persevered with the margins, to no avail, tried searching round the peg with the lead, not so much as a liner - the match was rapidly turning into a slog. In desperation, for the last hour I tried 6mm devils spawn, at 14.5m where I'd been feeding 6mm hard pellet and 3mm devils spawn. I had a few skimmers until the end of the match, although a carp did move in and push them out for 20 minutes. To really rub salt in the wounds, I was on the next peg to the winner (although the spit had meant I didn't know until the end), although I managed to avoid the battering either side by beating peg 85, with my 5 carp going 40.10 and 11.14 of skimmers and a tench for 51.14.

It will be good to get some settled weather and the spawning season behind us, as the fishing at most venues has been inconsistent lately.

1) P Cardwell 131.04 peg 80
2) J Parkin 127.04 peg 76
3) R Hayward 125.06 peg 102
4) C Davis 119.14 peg 99
5) D Bull 95.13 peg 105
6) D Vickery 83.09 peg 86

Silvers

1) J Green 49.12 peg 100
2) G Hunt 39.11 peg 68
3) N Easton 39.03 peg 69
4) R Coles 32.09 peg 97

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