Weds open plantation main lake

19 booked in for today which was a suprise at it was pole only match and we were due to have 30 mph winds for most of the day, and we didn't get disappointed, the weather men seem to get it right more times than wrong these days. I let andy France draw for me which was a worry as he normally gives me rubbish pegs, I fancied a peg on the far side as the wind would be off  my back ,but it wasn't to be as he handed peg 19 which is on a spit at the far end of the lake ,and its the closest peg to the main island. The wind was gusting from my left and slightly over my shoulder whereas all the swims on the bank to my left had flat water and no wind due to the trees giving them shelter, whereas the pegs between 1 and 12 had it full on in there faces .
I made up a couple of 4x14 rigs ,one for caster and maggot over groundbait at 10 mtrs and the other for soft pellet or maggot over micros at 13 mtrs slightly off to my right slightly with the wind, any further than that and I think I may Have broken something, the caster rig had the normal 18 middy 6313 on .10 whereas the soft pellet rig had a middy 8313 size20 on .12. I. Also set up a 4x12 rig for my left hand margin but I only missed one bite down there on maggot so I think it was a small fish,
At the start I cupped in 3 balls of groundbait on the 10 mtr line with a few casters in it and some soaked micros at 13 mtrs.
Starting with single caster over the g bait it didn't take long to get a bite from a roach , then for the next 2 hours I caught steadily with the peg really coming alive after about 45 mins and I was catching skimmers really well, with double caster accounting for a few good skimmers up to 3 lb then as soon as they arrived they were gone, never to return, I did get a couple on maggot over the micro line but the rest of the match was a bit of a struggle, I could catch small roach on caster over the g bait but I had to wait till the last hour for any carp action and then I had 2 smallish ones on maggot, the pace setters for today seemed to be mat tomes on 27 and john(turkey) Thompson on 28 which was the best pegs last time we had a match on here, also andy France on peg1 seemed to be catching a few, and going into the last hour Aaron britnell on 32 began to catch well, andy curry to my right no 18 had 7 carp plus a few skimmers but his carp were on the small side so he would be out of the reckoning,
At the end mat tomes thought he had done enough but he hadn't banked on turkey having caught on paste(aargh) and his fish were of a better stamp, and that's how it turned out with John Thompson,s paste caught fish going 66.4 off peg 28
2nd was andy France on peg 1 with 59.1
3rd mat tomes on 27 with 58.7
4th Aaron britnell with 53.10 on peg 32
5th Anton page 44.10 peg 38
6th andy curry on peg 18 with 35.7
Silver went to me with 26.12 of mainly skimmers , my 2 carp went 7.8 for a total weight of  34.4
All in all a nice close match

Landsend lge round 4

As this was the fourth round, we had an open draw today to determine the order of lakes, I didn't really fancy lake 3 today as the forecast was for strong winds from the west and some hefty showers aswell so I wasn't to upset when I asked mark Brennan to draw for me after he had pulled 13 for himself which was at the sheltered end of the lake, then he drew 11 for me which was opposite him and also sheltered and a peg which I really like and it has been good all winter, for silvers and carp,
I set up 3 rigs today all 4x14 ,one for caster at 10mtrs in a deep run that's created by  the aerator with a 18 middy 6313 on .10. Then one for soft pellet out towards the water whirler at 14 mtrs ,and one for against the end bank and 14 mtrs to my left down the middle , both with size 20 middy 8313 hooks on .12.
At the start I cupped in some casters at 10 mtrs , some against the end bank and some micros out towards the aerator and to my left . Starting on the caster it didn't take long to catch my first perch on single caster, soon followed be several more, then I hOoked a carp which felt lip hooked but the hook pulled after a minute or so, my next bite was also from a carp but it felt fouled and it bust me so I changed the hook length to .12 , the only other angler I could see was mark opposite on 13 who was catching on soft pellet out towards the aerator , but I stayed on the 10 mtr caster line for about the first hour and had several more perch but they were on the small side, so I went out onto the soft pellet towards the aerator and had 2 good skimmers and 2 carp quite quickly but apart from one missed bite bite that was my lot out there , I kept putting a few micros in but the area seemed devoid of fish , mark was now struggling out towards the aerator so he started to move around his peg nicking a fish here and there mainly on soft pellet, I could hear some of the usual banter going n mainly between Tom thick and bob gullick opposite so they were getting a few but it turned out bob was losing all his carp whereas Tom was landing a couple, the middle part of the match went really quiet for everyone so I stuck to the caster line and did manage 2 carp there plus quite a few small perch and roach so at least something was going into the net,  the last hour was ok as I had 4 more carp on double dead maggot over my micro line to my left so at the end I thought I would have about 50lb which sounded as though it was going to be there or there abuts for second on the lake but I thought mark Brennan had won by a country mile as he had caught odd quality fish all match from most areas of his peg, 1st went to mark. Brennan on peg 13 with 71.2
2nd was me with  64.5 on peg 11
3rd mike duckett 60lb on peg 32
4th bela bakos 59.1 peg 22
5th Clint wojtyla 56.14 peg 33
6th mark poppleton 48.1 peg 19 yes I did say 19
Silvers went to bob gullick on peg 17 with 23lb of mainly skimmers on soft pellet

Weds open landsend fishery

After not fishing Sunday I was looking forward to today, but with a heavy fall of snow on tues night into Wednesday it was looking as though we may to be able to get there as we have to go across the men dips and past Bristol airport which had been effectively shut down by the weather,  a quick call to the fishery to see how the roads were and I was suprised to hear they had no snow on the Somerset levels on the other side of the mendips, our intention was to have a brekkie at shipham cafe but with 8 inches of snow in the village and a downed power cable in the village we had to turn round and make do with a breakfast baguette from the local filling station which for £2.50 wasn't to bad then after a bit of a detour we got to the fishery and there was hardly a drop of snow in sight  which was nice, although it had started snowing now and it did for about 4 hours and heavily but it never settled so it wasn't to bad, although shipping out with the pole made your hands cold as it was all to keen to pitch along the poles, I also forgot my waterproofs but I managed to shoe horn myself into mike ducketts bib and brace but I couldn't do the zip up, there was about ten pound coins in the pockets that mike said he has won off of various people and as he has had the clothing for over ten years that amount of coins is probably about right,
I had about twelve people booked in on tues night but due to the weather and a work I ended up with only 8,  now this small number makes pegging very difficult as there ends up being to many gaps in the pegging giving fish to many places to hide if they don't want to feed .
I drew for myself again today and ended up with 24 stuck in my mit, I was happy as the pawlett club match was won there on Sunday by Eric fouracre with 60 plus pounds on caster at 14 mtrs up the edge, also he fed nothing , which I just can't bring myself to do, I had for company today on 22 Martin (swinging door) lenaghan on 22 and the slightly overweight ginger ninja andy hembrow opposite on 1 , the water had come up a few inches over night due to the snow melting off the surrounding hills so the cold water influx might slow things up a bit.
I set up two rigs for the deep water , one for the bottom of the shelf for caster at 14 mtrs with a 18 middy 6313 on .12 and another for 14 mtrs out to my left for various baits over soaked micros with a 20 middy 8313 again on .12 both rigs were 4x14 j 21 floats. I set up a 4x12 impact 6 for up on the shelf just in case. At the start I cupped in some casters and micros in the various places but began at 5 mtrs on caster as you can sometimes nick a good fish or 2 early on , but not today, I never  had so much as a tremble on that line , so it was out to the caster line it took about 10 mins to get a bite and that was from a small perch and it continued to be a bit slower than I expected, both andy and Martin were struggling for bites , the only person catching was Adrian Clark up on peg 17 who was making full use of the 4 empty pegs to his left and was getting odd carp on maggot fished off towards the quiet water to his left. I would like to say my peg got stronger as the match progressed, but it never, I did get one carp from my only bite up on the shelf, but it was only about a pound, I had 3 more carp over the micros on maggot along with 2 skimmers and an f1, the perch were mostly unobliging up the edge with only small one being obliging, I had a tench up the edge but it was a struggle , it wasn't really a lack of bites but the fact the fish were to small with the quality perch seeming to have disappeared from the swim, catching small roach seems to confirm this, Adrian caught odd carp right through the match, and Aaron brittnell up on 11 was also catching quality silvers and a handful (5) carp, most people had bites even des" this is the worst peg on here" shipp managed to moan a few silvers and carp onto his hook on peg 7 . But there was only going to be one winner today and that was Adrian Clark on peg17 with 81.8 mainly taken on maggot over micros then a few on corn towards the end
2 nd Aaron brittnell with45.10 which included the top silver weight of 21.10. All his carp and silvers falling to single maggot over caster at 11 mtrs
3rd Alan oram 25.8 peg 5
4th tony rixon 23.2 peg 24
5th des shipp 20.3 peg 7
6th andy hembrow 17.9 peg 1
No sign of fabio,s name here and there won't be for the next six weeks at least as he fell down the steps leading up to his flat and broke his arm, he could go as its his left arm and he only uses that for his landing net, so he could probably get away with that.
Landsend league this weekend and I may have a spare place or two if anyone fancies it, also nick collier is running a pole only match at plantation next Wednesday , if you want to. Fish you can ring nick or give me a ring at the shop and I will pass your names on to him

Weds open shiplate farm

Not surprisingly with the cold winds and a partially frozen lake only 12 decided to brave it, everyone was ready for the draw early ,mainly as mike west wasn't fishing so everyone was on time, I let travelling partner for the day,Aaron brittnell draw for me and he handed me peg 1 which has won. The last two matches I have run on this lake so I was happy enough, the last match was wonbyclint wojtyla with a couple of. Bream and carp for about 27lb but the match before that Martin lenaghan won with nearly 90lb catching carp down to the boat jetty, but that would have involved some major ice clearing to let me do that as the right hand margin down to the jetty  had ice coming out 5 mtrs, so to clear that to 16 mtrs and out so I could get the fish out was more than I wanted to do, and it probably cost me a couple of fish but I just couldn't be assed, plus I never had. Enough time to do it if I wanted to start on time, is I just broke a bit here and there and poked it around so as I could fish 3 areas at 14 mtrs, I did clear my right hand margin. To 7 mtrs but I never had a bite there so that was a waste of line and effort.
My only other rig was a 4x14 rig with a middy 6313  size 18 on .10 , a quick plumb round at 12/2 and 3 o,clock angles  revealed it was getting deeper from right to left with a depth difference of.  12 inches between12 and. 3 with the deeper water to my left, with the deepest part being only 3 1/2 feet deep, at the start I cupped in a small ball of  g bait in at the 2 angle with some dead mags  and caster in then sprinkled some dead mags and casters on the 12&3 angle, starting on single dead red over the g bait it took me 30 mins to get a bite and that was from a 2oz chublet and I had three more in the next three put ins before they buggered off, so I tried the12 swim and had a couple more, a look at the 3 swim produced nothing , so I went back over the g bait line but started cupping a few mags and casters in some cloudy g bait and had another chublet before I hooked what I thought was a good bream but it was a 4 lb carp that fought like a bream which was dead handy. By now andy hembrow over on 13 had taken. A couple of carp and was catching skimmers, and with no one doing much he was leading easily, by now my chub. Had disappeared and I couldn't raise a bite anywhere, I did hook 4 more carp from the 3 swim landing 3 of them and I did snare a 4 lb bream inthe last hour  from the 2 swim but it was never going to be enough to win as andy over on 13 had 4 carp. 2 bream. And lots of. Small fish  he had more than enough to win as he had 15.2 of silvers and his 4 carp went 24.12 for a total of 39.14 and first in silvers and overall
2nd was me with 25.1 peg 1
3rd aaron brittnell 17lb on peg 11
4th Alan oram 10.4 peg 7
5th Anton page 7.12 peg 13
And. No one else. Bothered the scales with nick collier doing his famous swinging door impression well before the end complaining of cold hands ,
Oh we'll it's off to viaduct fishery for the start of the winter league on Sunday but if the weather men have got it right we may not be able to get there , oh well.

Plantation lakes Sunday open

I don't fish this venue very often due to various reasons which is a shame as its a nice venue with plenty of variety in the fishy sense, with skimmers, f1,s, crucians, perch and carp, so plenty of options, I drew my own peg again today , hence I ended up on peg 7 which is one of the flyers so not to much disappointment there then, I had Bristol,s most affable roofer for company on peg 8 in the shape of bela bakos,, and Bristol teenager joe mcmahon on 5 which didn't look to good as it was a bit cut off as its in a corner. I set up a soft pellet rig which was a 4x14 impact 6 with an 18 middy 8313 on .12. And a couple of caster rigs, one a 4x14 for 5mtrs and a 4x12 for down the edge both with an 18 ,6313 hook on .10.
At the start I cupped in some soaked micros at 14 mtrs at 12 and 10 angles and began throwing casters to 5 mtrs and down the edge, by the time I had done this Martin lenaghan over on 28 was playing his first carp , I went out on the soft 4mm pellet on the 12 o,clock line, and had a skimmer then nothing, so I swung around to to 10 0,clock line and had another then a carp so I refed both pellet lines and went back to the 12 and had another small skimmer but then not a bite so it was back to the 10 angle and had another skimmer and carp, while I was doing this. Martin lenaghan opposite was on his sixth carp so it looked as though first place was already slipping away, but I couldn't see Alan oram on 27 who was catching aswell .
I tried my caster lines but never had a bite which was supriseing as the lake is stuffed with roach but I think the cold night and fright sunshine had stopped them from feeding, by the halfway mark I was on 4 carp and several skimmers but was miles off the pace as there was a peg to peg battle going on on 27 and 28 between Martin and Alan with Martin catching the best early on but Alan was now clawing it back in the last half so it was going to be close, I started feeding the 12 angle with a few casters and reduced the amount of micros in the 10 angle which seemed to help as I began to get a few carp so I think I was possibly feeding a bit to much or did the fish just turn up, coming across for the island ,as this was a pole only match we weren't able to go to the islands as they are a wag or lead church away, it was also strange how all my carp came from the left hand end of my swim and it wasn't until bela started fishing back to his right that he began to get bites, he was moaning by the end that he shouldn't have listened to his pensionable travelling partner,
I nearly had bad start to the day , I was going into the lakeside loo, and as I walked up the decking slope to the door I slipped landing on my face and hurting my hand, luckily fabio who I was walking round the lake with missed it , he was gutted
Any way back to the match I think I ended up with 12 carp plus double figures of silvers for what I could see was only going to be good enough for third
1st went to Alan oram on peg 27 with 85.10 , all his fish falling to 4mm expander over micros at 14.5mtrs
2nd and two fish behind was Martin lenaghan on 28 with 75.2
3rd tony rixon peg7 with 61.6
4th mike nicholls 41.4 pn peg one
5th Paul elmes on 39 with 39.2
6th bela bakos 24.12 pn peg 8
Silvers
Me with my skimmers and lone perch catch which went 11.10

Weds open lands end open

Back to landsend again today and with 17 fishing we used the match lake and the carpark bank of the speci, I was made to draw my own peg today and pulled peg 22 out which is a good all year round peg, bob gullick drew it at the weekend and struggled, so much so that he has hung up his tackle and pulled out of the viaduct winter league, drama queen springs to mind , come on bob sort it out.
Well that should get him biting, which is more than the fish in the swims he has drawn recently have done .
I set up several rigs today , a caster rig for 5 mtrs which was a 4x14 float with a 18 6313 pn .10.
A soft pellet rig ,same size float and hook but on .12 to fish at 14.5 mtrs on an angle towards peg 21.
A 4x10 float for caster over by the island and down the edge(same depth) on .12 and a 18 hook.
And a 4x12 for banded pellet on the end of the island with an 18 b960 on .14
At the start I fed all lines with the relevant baits and started at 5 mtrs on caster, first drop I had a 4 oz roach and I said to steve kedge on 24 that the next bite would probably be from a carp, and I wasn't disappointed as I hooked an 8lb fish on but it as hooked under the chin and it pinged off after playing it for several minutes, I stuck on this line for the first hour but it was only giving up odd small roach so I went on the soft pellet line but couldn't get a bite on it so I tried the caster line by the island and had a small carp and a few Rudd and perch then that died , so I refed it and went onto the banded pellet at the end of the island, and I had tench and a carp , back on the soft pellet swim and I had 1 carp and a small skimmer, back to the 5 mtr line and a few more roach and perch, by orating round the swims I managed to keep putting odd fish in the net, what suprised me was total lack of bites on the soft pellet line, it's normally a bit of a banker at this venue, perhaps bobby g was right and the area was devoid of fish, I did manage a run of sensible perch from the far side but as is normal they back off after being plundered to harshly, I came back to the short caster line and had two good skimmers, then went back on the hard pellet at the end of the island, and had odd bites , I ended up with five carp, two tench,  a couple of good skimmers and a mix of Rudd, roach and perch from various parts of the swim, I thought my silvers would go 16lb and the five carp may just go 20, I wasn't to far out as the silvers went about 18 lb and the carp went 21 for a total of 39.8 and fourth on the day
1st Tom thick on peg 40 with 66.10 which included the top silver weight on the day of 26.14 , all caught his normal way of feeding next to nothing and catching everything on 4 mm soft pellet
2nd was mike west putting aside his dismal performance at the weekend and weighing in 52.5 off peg 11
3rd andy he brow on peg 5 with 46.1
4th tony rixon 39.8 peg 22
5th mat tomes on peg 5 with 35.4
6th nick collier 34.13 on peg 17

Landsend individual league round 3

My turn for lake 3, johnswalter, I let mark brennan draw for me as he never has before, and he handed me peg 68 (best peg on the lake), I,m getting calls to draw my own peg now as people are drawing me to many flyers, well mike nicholls was moaning lol , especially as he was on 50 again which isn't the best of pegs but he has done well off it before. For company I had fabio on 70 , Aaron brittnell on 41, Adrian jeffery opposite on 42 and nick duckett to my right on 66, the only other angler I could see was trig Edmunds on 46, well I couldn't see him the only way I new he was there was the flash off his head from time to time when the light was right.
Rig wise today I excelled myself assembling 5, I had 2 for banded 6 mm over 4,s on top of the island shelf and at the bottom of the slope at 13.5 mtrs both with 18 b 960 hooks on .14. A margin rig but all that gave me was three roach during the day with not a sign of a carp from each side. A 4x14 caster  for 5 mtrs and just on my topkit as it was the same depth hook was the ever reliable middy 6313 on .10, my last rig was a 4x12 float with a 6313 on .12 to fish soft pellet over micro,s to the weed bed to my left, I really had it mind to target the silvers today cos as far as the league goes my best chance was some overall silvers money at the end , and in the last match Tom thick had won the lake silvers off this peg with roach, so with this in mind I started at 5 mtrs ,and my first bite was from a 4oz roach, next bite came from a 8lb carp , then some more small roach , so I came in on my topkit and had a few more roach ,then another carp, but a bit smaller, some more roach then another slightly smaller carp again, and after that  I struggled for bites from silvers, I think the disruption from the carp unsettled them, if I waited I could get a bite from a roach but it was to slow, and with Aaron getting some good perch silvers weren't going to feature in my game plan today, fabio by now was catching some smallish carp up his margin , so carp for me it was then , the normal reliable weed bed seemed almost devoid of fish, and apart from 2 lost fouler s and one tail hooked fish landed from there I couldn't get a bite there, most of the remainder of the match was spent on banded pellet over by the island up and down the shelf, I ended the match with ten carp and about six pounds of silvers my catch went 47.1 which was just enough for a lake win over trig who had 43.7.
The whole venue fished quite hard which was a suprise as we have seen having some really warm temps, but I think the fish are a bit confused, as I had watched fish taking floating bits off the surface and we are catching fish in the shallow water on top of the island shelfs ,which isn't right for January.
The match was won by the leagues mr consistent , mark poppleton on peg 29 with 73.2 which was seven carp, some from his right hand margin and some from across on soft pellet
2nd Paul homewood on 34 with 70.2
3rd Paul elmes 53.15 on peg 36
4th tony rixon, 47.1 peg 68
5th Craig Edmunds 43.7 peg 46
6th Tom thick 42.7 peg 25
Silvers
Tom mangnall 19.3 on peg 31 , mainly skimmers on soft pellet
Ken Rainer has kindly offered to post the league so far on his blog so if you go onto fishingkens blog the results will be up on there in a day or two

Chiton trinity , woodland lake, weds open,

I had 19 turn up which is one more than is comfortable on this lake in the winter, but the pegging was still ok with only two anglers not having an empty peg on one side at least, after the usual warm welcome from fishery manager misha with the free tea and coffee for all I got the draw going, steve evans picked out two tickets and handed me one which turned out to be 26 , the other ticket in his hand was peg 2, why couldn't he have handed me that one, he must have spotted the 2 staples in the ticket and realised it was special lol.
For company I had mike gaga west on 27 and Leon Hubbard on 24, I set up a 4x18 rig with an 18 middy 6313 on .12 and after a bit of plumbing around I found two areas where I had the same depth so need for another rig as this would do for the 13 &16 mtr lines, I set up a 4x14 float to fish into the empty peg to my right as this can be very effective on this venue, but not today as although I tried it several times i only managed one bite which was a roach so that was a waste of time so I won't mention that again, but I will say that I don't think I could get in tight enough to the edge as there was a bush in the way and I had to fish into 5 foot of water which was about 2 feet more than I wanted.
Recently a bit of soaked pellet of various sizes as feed and double maggot fished over the top has been working ok, so after feeding both the long pole lines I started at 13 mtrs but was struggling to get maggot to the bottom with micro roach and Rudd nailing the bait on the way down, a change to corn produced not even a tremble on the float, mike on my left was on the soft pellet and had an early carp and a couple of skimmers, a few carp and skimmers were being caught but it wasn't as good as thought it may be , we all thought it would fish really well as it was so mild, but we should have known better, as most venues in the area were hard, all the excess water may be unsettling the fish,
I upped the feed which seemed to stop the small roach but now I couldn't get a bite off anything, mike was still getting odd bites on soft pellet, so I got off my box with my begging bowl for some expanders, back on my box I did get some skimmers but I was going nowhere fast, and with several anglers now catching carp it looked as though the main money was going to be out of reach, by switching between the two long pole lines I kept putting odd skimmers in the net, but they were a bit small with them going 2 to 8 oz but even they were hard to get a bite from, about 90 mins from the end I started feeding caster at 5mtrs and I soon started catching chunky roach in the 2 to 6 oz bracket, I should have done it a lot earlier (this will be a telling off from mr nicholls) as I think I would have been at least second in the silvers or possibly first but I will never know, I also had a 6lb carp here and apart from being briefly attached to a fouler early on that was the only carp I hooked.
The scales gave me 10.9 of silvers and my lonely carp was 6.4 for a 16.13 total, I was only  5 oz short of second in silvers and about 2 1/2 lb off first in silvers, never mind there is always Sunday
1st on the day went to mark peopleton on peg 31 with 66lb, catching most of his carp down th edge into empty peg 39 on soft pellet, he also had the biggest fish I have ever seen weighed in on this lake at 15.2
2nd Anton page who managed to moan 40. 8 onto the scales off peg 17
3rd dave evans 28lb peg 6
4th steve evans 27.9 peg 2
5th Philip Harding 27.5 peg 3
6th eddy wynne, 23.2 peg 7
Silvers
Nick collier 13.2 peg 32
Philip Harding 10.14 peg 3
Tony rixon 10.9 peg 26