Ivy House Winter League Round Two, Sunday 22nd November 2015

With the drop in temperature and the frost visible on the grass whilst driving to the venue, it was likely to be a tough day, but I needed to significantly better the miserable 5 points I had in round one.

Had a chat with Clint before the draw and we ended up opposite each other in the same section, me drawing peg 6, which Clint didn't think was much good and he drew on 12.  I had two aims today, win the section as the main aim and not blank as the second, I still want that beer from Mark Poppleton for avoiding a blank throughout the series.

I decided that the cold snap would call for a disciplined approach, but still had far too much bait on my side tray, just can't help myself, although I did remain disciplined and brought home 10X the amount I fed into the peg,

First rod out the bag was a waggler, a MKII  Normark Microlight, cracking winter rod, this had a Drennan waggler on, one of the glowtop models, they cast nicely, settle showing every shot and the colour banding on the shows up lift or on the drop bites really clearly.  Next was a lead rod, Tournament 10-11' at 10' to fish bread, popped up at various depths, I was then going to set up a another lead rod with mini hybrid feeder on, but then realised that I'd brought my 12-13' Tournament instead of the other 10-11' so didn't bother with that one. 3 pole rigs, one for a very, very optimistic edge rig - nothing on that so no more about it, a .3 Hillbilly chump on 0.16, with a 0.10 hooklength and a 18 808 to fish at 16m.Peg 6 slopes off for a long way and 16m was a distance that felt right, didn't think much would be coming any closer. I did set up a double bulk rig for the same 16m line but that didn't see the water.

For the first 1/2 an hour of the match, I chucked the popped up bread and sat on my hands, a couple of liners, but nothing in the way of a proper bite, I tried from 12" to 5' popped up and 30 minutes was by far long enough.  Onto the 16m line with a 4mm expander, nothing, not a touch, tried a maggot to no avail, so then went right into winter mode and tried double squatt, missed a bite, then had a micro perch, immediately followed by a 8 or 10oz skimmer and then bumped a fish, probably another skimmer.

To cut a long story short, the rest of the match was spent rotating between the lead, the pole and the waggler, the waggler being the only method I got any bites or indications on, resulting in a small carp, a perch and a tiny hybrid, I wasn't alone at this end of the lake, only peg 10 beating me, he managed several small carp getting 9lb odd to my 4lb odd,.

So a second in section and a pick up, as this league is paid out 1st and 2nd in section, no overall, just as well, as I was in the lowest weight section........... just for a change!!!

Weighsheet

Next up for me will be Viaduct Silvers league next Sunday.