Landsend Winter League Round One, Sunday 10th November

I didn't spend ages preparing for this match, as I was wondering what had possessed me to enter this league, I really did think I may as well post the £86 it cost on the day, down the drain, I was expecting the same return on my 'investment'.  I didn't fancy lake 3, as it never seems to fish well when I draw it, so of course, when I went into the draw bucket, out comes lake 3, peg 70.  I have drawn this peg before in a short pole match and struggled, as its a peg that needs 14m to reach the spit where some small carp live.

At the draw there were a few comments as Ken (Rayner) has now set new standards for league organisers to be judged by, no more taking league records and weigh sheets to venues in asda carriers or plastic wallets 'borrowed' from work.  Ken has shamed us all, by having his documentation all neatly printed up and transported in a spick and span briefcase, to complete the shaming of the rest of us who run leagues, no stuffing the cash into old ice cream tubs, bait boxes or trouser pockets for Ken, no its a lockable cash box to complete the professionalism - just a shame that didn't carry over into his fishing.......  :-)  see his blog for the sorry tale.

With plenty of time to tackle up, even I was ready at the start, having had some advice on the peg from several anglers and quite varied the advice was, I stuck with the advice from Tony Rixon, as there aren't many anglers with a better record on the venue.  I had set up a pencil float to fish catch close in, a margin rig for fishing caster that was on 0.16 to 0.14 with a size 16  6313 Middy  hook.  A yellow topped small Daiwa float to fish across in about 3' of water, this was 0.18 to a 0.16 hooklength and a 16 Drennan carp hair rigger hook. A bit strong for this time of year, but the end bank has been eroded away and is a jungle of exposed tree and bush root and stumps.  Finally, a Carpa Chimp to fish caster or devils spawn to the weed bed.

I started feeding 3 lines, a short caster line, which apart from 2 roach, one of which dropped off swinging it in, was a waste of time. I fed some softened micros and caster at 7m to the weedbed and catapulted 4mm pellets across to the spit. The weedbed produced a couple of crucians before the tiny rudd moved in and were holding up even a 6mm devils spawn.  Over to the spit with a banded 6mm and I had a couple of carp, but they were small, one of them going into the silvers net as it was about 8oz.  The fish wouldn't stay in the baited area, I think there were odd fish coming out of the snags and roots, feeding, getting caught and then I had to wait for the next one to venture out. During a quiet spell I went back to the weedbed swim and had a 2lb carp and a F1, before once gain, the tiny rudd made it a pointless exercise.

One bit of advice was feed the margin heavily with caster, which I did from just after the halfway mark, I kept looking in there, but not so much as a twitch on the float.  By persevering with the line against the spit I managed to keep the fish coming, but they were small and coming slowly, I was sure Mark Poppleton on 68 was beating me.  I had ventured a little nearer snag city and lost a couple of fish and ended up having to remake the rig, the small carp are so quick they take you into the snags as you lift into them.

With 20 minutes to go, I had a fish nearer the 4lb mark from the spit, by far the biggest fish of the day so far and then with 15 minutes to go I saw a big swirl over the margin, I dropped double caster in and the float settled and went under, I was connected to the biggest fish of the day and it took me a few minutes to net it.  I quickly rebaited, dropped it back into the margin as my watch showed 4pm and I missed a bite, before I could get it back in, the all out was called.

I thought I had about 50lb of carp and 5 or 6lb of slivers (crucians and F1's), I was first to weigh and my 14 or 15 small carp went 35lb, the two bigger fish  went 14lb, if only they'd all have been that stamp.  My silvers went 8.04 which gave me 57lb odd, for second in section, behind Trigger who had a 70lb odd and it was third on the lake and top silvers weight. The silvers couldn't have been tighter, my 8.04 was followed by Alan Oram on 41, with 8.03, Anton Page had 8.02 and John Bradford a high 7lb.

I didn't stay and take down the results, as I was off out for a beer and a curry, which were both a bit sweeter after having a decent result on a venue that usually leaves me deflated and beaten.

Have a look at Ken Rayners blog for the results, once he's extracted them from his briefcase.

http://kenrayner-fishing.blogspot.co.uk/

Avon Angling Open, Plantation Main Lake, Wednesday 6th November 2013

The weather forecasters were promising rain and even gales in coastal areas for today, so I decided to leave the waggler rods at home, just bringing the pole and a lead rod.  To go with the lead rod I had a rummage around at the back of the garage and found a couple of method feeders and decided to take them.

A reasonable breakfast in the café at Plantation was had, then into the landing net which was serving as todays swim card receptacle, where there were 17 eager hands trying to pick out one of the known flyers.  Once a again I failed to draw one of the ‘form’ pegs, but I had resolved to go and fish whatever I drew positively today, so off to 26, an island chuck, but I felt just too far up the lake.  There was some confusion over Tim Clark’s draw and Tony directed him to peg 25, which is about 3 yards from 26 and with 27 and 28 in, I did feel a little hemmed in.  It turns out that Tim read his swim card incorrectly and should have been on peg 8, so he moved round there before the start, luckily for him, peg 8 is a much better peg.  Let’s just hope his use of figures is a bit more accurate when applying Ohms law!!

Back to the fishing and it would appear that leaving the waggler rods in the garage was a big mistake, an island chuck, with the gentle breeze off my back - perfect waggler conditions, oh well, no choice but to stick to the plan.  I set up the lead rod and put a method feeder on, with a 3” hooklength (quite why I did this, I’m not sure, as I have never caught a fish on a method feeder and have no confidence in it), some micros with a bit of groundbait were prepared to go on it, along with assorted hookbaits, such as band um’s, pellets and maggots.  Little more to say about the method feeder set up, I started on it and had another go with an hour and a half to go, I am still waiting to catch my first fish on a method feeder………

3 pole rigs were assembled, a MW diamond to fish banded pellet at 14m, a Carpa Chimp to fish soft pellet over the 14m line and as it was the same depth, caster at 8m and a pencil float to fish short with caster or maggot.  On the all-in I cupped a few 4mm pellets and micro’s in a 14m, then 3 balls of groundbait with caster in at 8m and loose fed caster short.  I started on the aforementioned method feeder and gave it half an hour, before chronic boredom set in. 

I had a look over the 14m line with a 6mm hard pellet, but that was as devoid of action as the method feeder, so I topped it back up and dropped a maggot in on the 8m line. I had a skimmer straight away, which was encouraging, but then a couple of small roach before the line died, another top up brought the roach back and one more skimmer.  I had another look over the 14m line, this time with soft pellet and had a small carp and a skimmer on this line, then the wind got up, making presentation tricky and float visibility was very poor.

Switching to the short line brought a decent skimmer and a near double figure carp to the single maggot, but the roach were playing hard to get. For the rest of the match I switched between all 3 pole lines, the 14m line remained dead, the short line produced another big skimmer and a 12lb carp, along with the odd roach, the 8m line did produce odd roach, but was slow going, I think I probably overfed it.

The scales gave me 40.0, 29.04 carp and 10.13 silvers which was 6^th overall and in all honesty, I wasn’t too disappointed with that from the peg. Maybe if I’d have targeted the silvers more specifically I’d have lifted myself into a payout position as the top two silvers were paid.

1)   Nick Collier 92.10 peg 31 

2)   Anton Page 85.02 peg 3

3)   Tony Rixon 81.09 peg 4

4)   Rod Wotton 71.07 peg 7 

5)   Tim Clark 67.09 peg 8 

6)   Chris Fox 40.01 peg 26

Silvers:

1) Steve Kedge 17.08 peg 27
2) Tony Rixon 13.00 peg 4
3) Mike Nicholls 12.07 peg 19

Viaduct Silvers league R3. Sunday 3rd November 2013

First trip out for my new (to me) van, I was tempted to get another Astra Sportive and looked at a couple of the 1.9 150PS versions, but realistically it's just too small, a squeeze for one and virtually impossible to get two and the ridiculous amount of gear we carry now.  I picked up Tony Rixon and was pleased to see that two lots of kit fit easily into a LWB Connect.

On the drive down and in the cafe, Tony said he fancied peg 78, as the favoured diagonal bank on Cary would be a bit exposed, something up with Tony's  influence on the drawbag today, he drew 119 and I drew slap bang in the middle of the diagonal bank on peg 100.  With the wind blowing into the bank, I did feel that I had drawn the right area on the wrong day and then compounded it by fishing it all wrong.

I guessed that a good 30lb+ weight would be needed to frame and set up to catch this, as with two poor results previously, the league and any chance of picking up in it are a lost cause.  A small cage feeder was set up, in case the forecast wind got up, a rig to fish at 11m (closer than I'd like, but didn't want to feed a line too far out and then not be able to fish it), the rig would also do for 14m if I could hold it there. A pencil float to fish short and a small diamond to fish the edge, hoping for hybrids or perch.  I also set up a waggler.

The short lines (topkit and 6m) produced nothing, not even a bite, even though I felt there was enough depth for them to give up a few roach, if nothing else, so no more about them.  The LH edge also was devoid of feeding fish and the RH edge  gave up two 4oz perch in consecutive put-ins and nothing else, not even a bite.

I think I overfed the peg, trying to catch 30lb+, instead of trying to coax a few fish out and had to switch between the 11m, 14m and waggler lines to keep the odd fish coming, where with hindsight, sitting it out on a long pole line for skimmers, or staying on the waggler and concentrating on roach would probably have given me a point or two more, but still not enough.

For results, see Tony's, Mike Nicholls or Clayton's blog.