pole only at viaduct fishery

with 32 booked in today the match was spread over cambell and cary so a bit of room for most anglers, arriving in the carpark it was nice to see martyn woodington back in the southwest if only for a holiday as he was staying in one of the new lodges with mike nicholls, glen bailey and mark tanner, and they all seemed to be enjoying themselves as the lodges are spot on, after another good breakfast at shipham cafe i was ready for the draw, any peg on cambell would do as cary has been a bit hit and miss lately as there have been some oxygen problems on the lake but steve and paul are on top of it so it will be back to its good old self in no time at all.
i let dean malin draw for me so i ended up on peg 90 which was a bit spooky as i had said to dean on the way it was a peg i fancied as the south westerly wind would be blowing in to that corner, obviously the weather gods dont check on the internet to see which way the wind should be going as it seemed to be a south easterly which meant i would be in flat water all day which is never a good thing on this lake during the summer as the big fish in here seem more confident under a bit of ripple.
getting to the peg there seemed to be a few fish mooching about shalllow but the light conditions and water colour meant you couldnt see them coming till it was to late so no mugging today.
i know this lake has really been best fished with meat or paste , so what do i do , go and base my attack around pellet at 16 mtrs, with a meat line at the same distance at a different angle, plus meat in the margins each side and to the end bank again which is 16 mtrs, alan oram got it right next door on 88 and really only fished paste which as it turned out was the right thing to do.
i,m not going to bore you with to many details as i wasted the first 4 hours trying to make the pellet work but i dont think there were enough fish in this corner for it to work, i did lose a couple of foulers but all i had to show was 1 5lb carp and a few skimmers and a perch on meat to the end bank, the meat approach seemed to attracting the attentions of small fish as a square piece of meat was soon stolen or turned into a small pink marble.
i started firing pellet to the end bank and there were soon an odd fish slurping off the bank and i did manage one carp and a nice hybrid until the duck family turned up and made life difficult, by now tim ford had wandered around for a watch and he made a noise like a pissy swan and the ducks seemed to take offence and went away, but not for long as they returned with mum duck who stood watch whilst her kids made a nuisance of themselves, so the last 90 mins were spent on the paste over the pellet line at 16 mtrs and i did get 5 more carp , i should know better as the fish on this lake really do like paste, and alan next door had managed 9 good fish plus some good skimmers, further down the lake on 76 the bristol daffodil tony witcomb had landed 14 carp and lost 10 i think all on his normal slimy paste, also tom thick had caught shallow on 99 and steve jackson on 85 also caught shallow, all iether in or close to the ripple.
my 7 carp were on the small side as they only went 61.04 for no good, i think i would have had a few more had i fished paste earlier, but with this game you never know.
no suprise today who won as andy power drew 119 which has been the peg to draw of late and he ended up with 223.4 of shallow caught carp at 16 mtrs
2nd tony witcomd 167.2 on 76
3rd tom thick on 99 with 155.12
4th phil harding on 116 with 130.9
5th glen bailey on 112 with 119.2
6th mat tomes on 111 with 116.14
7th dean malin on 125 with 116.9
silvers were bought, i mean won by tim pallant with 39.9 on peg 81, tim fed 1kg of worm and a gallon of caster, i think he won just enough to cover the bait bill, i still dont think mike nicholls believes him when he told him how much he had fed , that ammount of bait would last him and the gimp(john bradford)for a month and thats for the both of them