Weds landsend open

Only 8 fishing today so not a match as such, more a New Year's Eve gathering. Getting to the fishery and it seemed mr frost had done his job and put a hard lid on the lakes, so out with the ball and chain for the second match in a row, I was last but one to draw and out came 13, a nice corner peg and it's possible to get along the end bank making ice. Breaking easier. It wasn't to thick in my peg so it didn't take me to long to clear 16 mtrs along the end bank and 9 mtrs on an angle to my right, so after doing mine I went along to the gimp whose sache weight breaker was well and truly stuck in the ice, so I broke his out to 12 mtrs then went round to help Martin lenaghan on 11 who was in danger f pushing his ice flows into my swim, so we managed to shift away under the ice to hs left, job done, the ice wasn't particularly thick but it was that very clear stuff which is normally very hard and it was !!!!
I set up two rigs of identical weights .3g both with 6313 hooks to .12 line. The two lines were a bit different in depths hence the two rigs . I was going to fish two spots up the left one at 9 mtrs and the other at 14 mtrs, and the other was to the right in that cleared channel. At the start I cupped in some maggots and casters on the three lines and started on the 9mtr right hand channel, I gave it thirty mins  with only a couple of dips so with a quid on the first fish with Martin I went to the left hand bank, by now Martin had missed three bites and lost a fish , so he was gutted when I hooked a perch first drop but he cheered up massively when it came off approaching the net, but his cheery mood soon changed  when I went straight back in and landed a 8oz perch . During the match the right hand channel wasn't to productive giving me 2 f1,s , a lost fouled carp and a skimmer which came adrift when my elastic caught on the edge of the ice, by far and away most of the action came from the left hand margin I had quite a few perch and roach, nothing big but plenty of bites, on the 9 and 14 mtr lines as the ice thawed a bit I fed some micros with a few maggots straight in front on the edge of the ice at 14 mtrs as Martin had had three carp opposite me, I did get one carp from here and two more f1,s , but I was always behind Martin as he had three carp and some silvers including three good skimmers in the last hour, and looking down the lake it was going to be an easy win for him.
1st Martin lenaghan on 11 with 27.2
2nd me with 17.13 my silvers went 12.4 and the golden ghostie carp was the rest
3rd nick Ewers on 2 with 12.10 of silvers to take that then
4th trigger on 19 with 11lb
5th Adrian jeffery on 24 with 9.2

Silvers two dayer at viaduct

I partnered Anton page for this pairs two day fixture, only 13 pairs so a bit disappointing really , I was on Cary for the first day and drew peg 86. Not really a peg I would have chosen as the diagonal bank was still the draw most wanted, and with steve tucker on 85 it was going to be hard to win his pound. I set up two pole rigs , both pencils , one .4 and the other .25 both with an 18 6313 on ,10. I also set up the wag to fish at about 25 mtrs, I can't right to much about today , I. Put a ball of g bait on a couple of lines and fed some caster on the wag line, it was really slow for everyone and it took me 20 mins to get my first bite and that was a small roach, my day never got any better really , I did manage two better skimmers on the wag line , both about 1lb , but carp were a problem, I Hooked landing one , if I had taken my time I would have landed all of them , but there was no point, I ended up with 3.10 oz for third from bottom of the section, steve to my left won the section with 7lb , which was a couple of skimmers and perch and some plippy roach, top on the lake was mat tomes who managed it with only a slight bit of rule bending lol. My partner drew 115 on cambell and managed a lowly 2.7, so that was our push for the top over then
Day two and after a really good breakfast in the brewers Fayre in Glastonbury , it was into the draw at the fishery and out come 110 on cambell, not to bad and. It had 5 lb on it the day before, and that end of the lake fished ok with the wag being the best option with lots of small roach and occasional bonuses in the shape of skimmers and tench, trouble was today is that it was frozen over , so the ice breakers were out and a nice channel was cut out to 14 mtrs, I also did a line down to the left as some good perch are known to hang around a stump , I won't mention the left hand swim again as I was in the shade all day and it froze back over with cat ice before I could fish it, I set up the same two rigs as yesterday, at the start I fed two g bait lines on the right hand side of my channel, at 8 and 14 mtrs, and a caster line to my left against the ice at 14 mtrs, it turned out to be another grueller, with no bites for an hour and a quarter then bite from small roach from then on , but that wasn't even to active, to my right nick Collins on 112 started catching small roach straight away and he had a good tench towards the end, glad I never had a quid with him then, I already. Lost one to mr tucker the day before , which I paid up straight away. On the bank, (take note mr russell) lol.
I ended with 2.14 of plippers, for no good again, our lake today was won Dom Sullivan on 118 with 7lb which turned out to be top on the day, mat tomes struggled today when he had to abide by the rules ha ha ha ha , having just one roach from 123, but. That was one more than my partner who was on 74 and never had a bite, but there was no shame in that as des shipp only had 12 oz off it the day before, and that was with no ice so he could fish the peg properly, for the full results check out dom Sullivan's blog, me and Anton were well and truly on the way home well before the results were done, after sitting in the shade all day I was pretty much chilled to the bone.
Off to landsend on weds , ring me on 07974807941 to book in and on Sunday I an running one at Avalon(yes you read it right) , so ring me on the same number to book in , or ring vic on 07977210078

Viaduct silvers open, spring lake

Still only 12 fishing this one, I thought a few more would have shown as it's really the last chance to have a practice before the silvers pairs on the weekend on spring and Cary, still 12 is better than 11 but not as good as 13 lol.
As usual we all wanted to draw on the far side , preferably between 16 and 19, so into the coffee tin and out comes peg 1, about as far as you can get from the form pegs, but at least I could see them, a quick chat with Paul and he reckoned it would be ok as the pleasure anglers had been doing well on these early pegs, as the skimmers seemed to be moving back into spring from middle and there is always the option f some good perch down the right hand margin towards the gap into middle by a bush, as long as the carp didn't turn up, which seemed unlikely as they could be seen swimming under the bridge in the channel between the two lakes.
For company I had Scott russell on 2 and round the corner was Kieran guppy on 25, so the pound was  sorted with Scott and I set about setting up the rigs, .4g pencil for over the g bait lines at 11 and 14 mtrs, a .3 for 4 mtrs and a 4x12 for the hoped for perch down the edge,
At the start and after feeding all ones , 3balls at 11 and 4 at 14, some casters down the edge and then started at 4 mtrs, but it. Was slow with only 1 small roach n the first 15 mins , I did think about going out to 11 mtrs for an early look, but then I started to get a few decent roach in the 2 to 4 oz size, then I had a decent hybrid, with no one catching much , and Scott who started n the feeder only having one skimmer I stuck with it , and was glad I did as I the roach kept coming , not frantic just comfortable , especially as the really small ones didn't seem to want to feed , I also had a few more decent skimmers from that line, also feeding an odd small ball of soft g bait on that line seemed to Help, I've tried before on earlier matches but it never seemed to work as it did today,
Two hours in and with the short line slowing right up I went out to 11 mtrs and really expected a skimmer but all I could get was the same size roach, and not one skimmer, so 30 mins later it was out to 14 mtrs, again there seemed to be lots of roach out there aswell but with a couple of 12 oz fish I wasn't complaining,
I had a look for some perch down the edge and had a couple to 8oz and again some sensible roach, but most of the remainder of the match was spent at 14 mtrs and I did get 7 or 8 more skimmers amongst the roach so I ended up with maybe 30lb, the only person I could see catching odd skimmers was Gary oshea over on 18, and andy powers had been catching all day but he had been plagued with lots of small fish and only a few skimmers, also Scott on 2 started getting some skimmers on the pole towards the end but it was to late to catch up, so the pound at least was mine, I did wait in the carpark for it but he seemed to taking a long time pack up ha ha.
I was one of the last to weigh and with Gary on 18 winning with 21lb things were looking good as I new I had that , my net went 28.10 and I new andy powers on 24 never had that, so I at least I can buy judith a Xmas pressy now and I wouldn't have to go to the social for a crisis loan I'll leave that to all the , no I better not say any more had I,
2nd went to Gary oshea on 18 with his 21.11
3rd andy powers on 24 with 18lb
4th r eagle on 15 with 17.7
5th Scott russell n 2 with 16.5
6th Nigel Bartlett on 17 with 15.6
Definately my last post before Xmas so I hope everyone has a good one

Todber league, final round

Off on my own today as my travelling partner set his alarm for the wrong time ,doh.
Into canards for breakfast , it was ok , not the best I,ve had here but it filled a gap, then onto the fishery for the 8.30 draw, only 20 fishing today as there had been several dropouts, mark had done a good a job of finding a few reserves today, why is it people book in for a series only fish a couple then don't bother seeing it out, there are occasions and good reasons for some people needing to drop out or miss a match but to not turn up as they have no chance is wholley unacceptable .
Back to the draw and out comes 28 for me , although Ashley won the section off it last round I wasn't really feeling the love on the peg today, plus I was next to the joint league organiser in the the shape of  a bad tempered nick merry, ooh he can be angry, even launching a top set up the bank during the day with another rig tied in a granny knot around the end,
The pegs I fancied in the section today were 25 which is a big corner peg with lots of room with dan white round the corner on 22 being the next angler, not a flier but with loads of room it may be ok today,
I set up rigs for 13 mtrs on two angles, a rig for a couple of areas against the far bank and a margin rig , I started at 13 mtrs on a piece of corn over micros, not a bite there for the first 30 mins , the anglers around me had started over, and they had a few fish , so I went across and had some bites, firstly on corn then a switch to maggots was ok even if it did attract some small roach, the next couple of hours weren't to bad as I had three proper, if not smallish carp and about 12 or 13 f1,s then the last couple of hours went to rat shit and all I could catch were odd roach, so that was it for me then, dave hodgson on 25 caught some carp down his edge and although I couldn't see dan on 22 as the island was hiding him, I did occasionally see his topkit in the air with elastic out so he was getting a few, the end couldn't come quick enough for most at this end of the lake, dan won our section with 47lb and dave was second with 30lb, I was third with 24lb then it was 13 and 8 after that.
Top on the day was Alan oram on peg 5 with 111lb catching on maggot at 7 mtrs and league winner Ashley Tompkins on 37 was second with 99lb, sealing the league in style so well done to him, the full results will probably be on ken rayners (fishingken) blog, but it may be a few days in appearing as he really had a bad day only weighing about 6lb for last in his section,
May go to acorn on Tuesday for a pre Xmas fix but looking at the weather forecast which is showing wet and windy I may not go at all or I may have a bit of a pleasure session, out of the wind some where.
If I don't do another blog this week , I hope you all have a good Christmas and stay safe

Weds landsend

Can't be to enthusiastic about this blog as only 6 of us fished, it was more like a pleasure session with an edge, oh well small entry Wednesday matches won't be a worry for me come the new year as I will be working weds , with tues and Thursday off to begin with, cost cutters for me then, and a chance of ten quid pick up and a bonus lucky bag on some venues, but then again it's not all about the money is it !!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Back to landsend and last ticket for me , peg 11 nice , right out of the wind, to be fair we put three on each bank at the top end just so we all had some shelter from the gale that was blowing, the only downshot to the day was that I had to sit and look at fabios cheery face all day, did I really say cheery.
The fishing to say was ok , I had one carp of about 7lb straight away over to the weedbeds just off the island , then I lost a fouler and apart from waspy perch that was it from that area, the 9 mtr caster line was ok with plenty of roach and sensible size perch, I also had a good skimmer and big IDE from here towards the end , also I had two good skimmers on corn over micros at 14 mtrs towards the aerator, I also hooked a carp there aswell which I nearly netted before it came adrift, I would like to say the hook pulled or it broke me , but no I had the dreaded curly line syndrome, bad knot then.
First on the day was Ron hardiman on peg 7 with 32lb of silvers and one near ten pound carp ending with 42lb , fabio was second with 37lb which was mainly 8smallish carp, which tend to sometimes inhabit these corner end pegs, I was third with 29lb, which was 19lb of silvers and two carp, one of which was a squeaker taken towards the end on caster,
Off to todber for the final round of that series and it has been a bit of a disappointment this year as it hasn't fished at all well, with a distinct lack of f1,s which can be a nuisance here, seems as though something has happened ,
Still a few spaces for Sundays match at landsend so book in with me or at the fishery if you want to fish.

Final round , viaduct silvers league

This was a match I needed to get a section win in, as it would mean that I was ending on 5 points and unable to be caught by the chasing pack, lead by the very capable Gary o'shea, a section second would do providing Gary had a bit of a blowout,
So into the draw tin and out comes 121, bugger, it's up on the top bank of cambell all on my own, it's been a bad peg peg right through the series, I would have been happier about three or four pegs to my right in the mid 120's, as the needed skimmers tend to hang,
Getting to the swim I was less than happy to find the strong breeze blowing straight at me, in for a cold day then. With it being on the end of the lake it ruled out the wag as it would mean casting past the anglers on the side banks, plus there were loads of carp on the long line and I couldn't have fed more than about 11 mtrs with caster due to the wind, so it was three pole rigs then , a .5g rig for 11&14 mtrs, a .3g for 5 mtrs and 11 mtrs to the left at about 10 o,clock angle and 4x12 for caster down the margins as the peg can throw up some decent perch, at the start I decided to give it some as nothing had worked for the anglers in previous rounds, so put in 3good balls at 11 mtrs and four at 14, fed casters at 5 and 11mtrs to the left and each margin, and I would like to report that it all went to plan, but no, I had no bites n the first 45 mins at 5 mtrs, so I went out to 11 mtrs and had my first bite just over an hour in, and that was a carp, 20 mins later I had my second bite, a plippy roach, GREAT,
Out to 14 mtrs and it wasn't to much better, with the wind blowing straight it, presentation was crap with the rig constantly blowing in and under the pole tip, if I let it happen I could get the rig to blow in and end up at my feet in about 3 minutes, the wind did stop for about 15 minutes at one stage and I did get some more small roach and I pulled out of a decent fish which felt like a perch,then the wind picked up and finished that off, the 11 mtr angled caster one gave me one good perch of about 2lb, but some carp turned up there and became a nuisance , I landed three and lost the same, I need up with 3lb 3oz for jnt 4in the section, meaning that if Gary won his section he would win with six points leaving me with 7 and hopefully 2nd or 3rd depending on a weight count back .
It was a hard day with most struggling and some even blanking,
1st on the day went to dan squires on 59 lodge with 16.14 of wag caught skimmers and roach, mainly on maggot
2nd Sam Powell on 64 lodge which is the monk peg with 16lb
3rd Paul faieres on 97 with 13 lb
4th Craig Edmunds on 126 with 12.14
5th Gary o'shea on 111 with 12.13
6th Paul greenwood on 56 with 12.8
League
Gary o,Shea, 6pts
Tony Rixon 7pts     144.14
Dan squire 7pts.   116.1
Craig Edmunds 8pts dropping 4
Bob gullick 8pts dropping 5
Paul elmes 9pts dropping 3
Gary webber and travelling partner Sam Powell 9pts but both dropping 4,s
Next Sunday the gimp is running an open on landsend fishery 9am draw, to book in ring mike at the fishery on 07977545882, or ring me on 07974807941

Wes silver match, viaduct, Cary lake

There were 8 names for today which is still crap numbers , oh well when I start work in veals on the second of jean that will all change as I will be working Wednesdays so it will be costcutter on a tues or weds, not ideal if you are looking to cover costs but at least they are 30 peggers in the summer and normally 15 plus in the winter, oh well.
Back to today and with a weather bomb forecast I fancied a peg with the wind off my back, 77/78/81 but it wasn't to be as I pulled 100 , at least it was the end peg on this bank, for company I was next to mr Preston southwest mark harper on 98, the peg has had a bit of waggler form lately so I set a 3aaa affair up to fish caster at about 20 mtrs, one pole rig , a .4g rig for the pole at 11 and 14 mtrs, weather bomb permitting, I never set up a light rig which possibly turned out to be a mistake, at the start after feeding 3 balls of groundbait on both pole lines and loose feeding some casters at 5 mtrs I began on the wag with caster, but after 40 mins small roach were being a nuisance, and it seemed the same problem for everyone on the wag, Gary webber over on 78 was on the feeder and had taken a good skimmer and a perch, I went onto the 11 mtr line and the roach were still present there aswell, I gave that an hour but only roach graced the net, plenty of bites but not the required skimmers that are needed to win, out on the 14 mtr line it was the same, 2 1/2 hours in and going nowhere I decided on do or die, so I put in two big balls in at 11 mtrs and 4 proper cup fillers at 14. I gave it 15 mins to settle and had a go at 5 mtrs , a few roach and perch later I went back out to 11 mtrs, after a couple of roach (urgh) I had a pound plus skimmer , I expected a couple more off that line but it was back to roach, and not another skimmer from there for the rest of the match, even though I did give it regular goes, I went out to 14 mtrs and never had a roach bite , which i liked , and I was soon netting a skimmer, I had three on the bounce, to which mark observed that it must be solid, as normal this was the kiss of death, I lost one and it went quiet, so I cupped in anothe ball and had some more skimmers , but an hour from the end my swim totally dried, only the very occasional roach obliged, whereas mark had a reasonable last hour netting 5 good skimmers on a very light rig just dropping it through the groundbait line, I should have set one up but for most of the match I was glad I never as the roach would have loved it, but it may have cost me , but then again the four skimmers I pulled out of  were more to blame , first n the day was mark on 98 with 25lb, I was second with 21lb , Gary webber on 78 had 18lb, andy power on 96 had 15lb followed steve kedge on 87 with 14lb,
Back down to viaduct for the last round of the silvers league , I need a section win really so a good draw is necessary , same peg would peg nice lol, please.
Next weds back down to landsend for a match so let me know if you are interested .

Landsend winter league round 1

36 fishing this league with 12 on each lake , the first match s a random draw , then you rotate round the other two lakes then back to a random draw to repeat the process with hopefully some different anglers in the section for the last three matches.
Into the draw tin nice and early when all the good pegs are in there, trouble is all the bad ones are in there aswell, and I got a bad one in the shape of 39 on the speci lake, the other end is normally always the favoured place to be , but you never know, (I did really), I,m not going to bore you with the details of a bad day, enough to say that I never had a bite on the normal carp baits in the way of meat , soft pellet and banded pellet, I had to fish single caster along the far bank cover picking up odd perch and a couple of chub, for a bad day and not the start I needed for this league, I did get one carp at the start but at 2lb 13oz it was probably the smallest carp in the lake , and I hooked that in the wing, I did lose a big carp towards the end but my .10 hook link was never going to be up to it.
I ended up with just over 10lb for 4th in the section, so that will hopefully be my dropper, but it's a hard section with some good anglers in it, so the draw is going to be all important, the full results will be on ken rayners blog, but our lake was won by dan white on 31 with 90lb ish second was Adrian Clark on 34 with 70lb, third was Kendra Rayner n 32 with 65lb and nick duckett on 33 with 35lb, so we were definitely at the wrong end,
Off to viaduct on Wednesday for a silvers match, hopefully it will be on Cary or lodge so it will be good practice for the weekends last silvers league match.

Wes open, landsend , lake three .

12 fished today which is a nice number on any of these lakes at this popular Somerset venue, we were  met by quite a hard frost this morning and with a strong northerly wind blowing it was going to be a chilly day for some, especially those on the south bank, Ron hardiman and me argued about who was going to have the last ticket , I let him have that ne and was glad I did as he ended up on 51 whilst I opened 41 which is in the first corner of the lake, unfortunately it was probably the coldest peg on the lake with the freezing wind blowing into me, and it turned not the coldest day I have had to endure so far this winter, I was next to. The gimp on 42 and opposite on the Majorca was bob(super G) gullet on 70 and rod the re-invented silver ace rod wootten on 68. I set a caster rig to use at 6 mtrs and out by the aerator with an 18 6313 on .12 , a meat rig rig for the right hand margin and a depth pellet rig for 14 mtrs just off the spit sticking out from the end bank.
After feeding all lines  I went out onto the caster rig at 6 mtrs, and never had a bite for a while ,which us unusual in this swim as small roach can be a proper pain normally, by now the midsomer norton superstar was getting odd small carp and bits on soft pellet against the far bank, but his fish were on the small side which is normal in that swim, it seems to be a nursery swim. Rod had begun n meat and was catching small skimmers on it, and the gimp was biteless, I started catching small roach after about 15 mins then I had a 4lb carp, then back to the roach again, at the end of the first hour I had another carp off this line in the shape of an 8lb common, and that really signalled the end for bites off that line, so I went out and tried the hard pellet line at 14 mtrs, first put in I had a 6oz roach but that was it, I never had another bite on that line till about 15 mins from the end and that was from a 4 pounder (carp not roach). The swim never got going , I. Did get another carp on caster out by the aerator, and 5 on meat down the edge, losing one down there aswell, the other end and the other bank, seemed to be the place to draw as I could here splashing and see Kendra Rayner up on 55 netting regularly, whereas the anglers on my bank up to the left were left struggling, it seemed the swims without the wind chilling the surface were the place to be , with mark poppleton up on 58 coming out on top with 69.15, mainly caught on soft pellet over micros, I think the peg may have been solid as he left his bait dangling in the edge whilst he was doing something, when he picked up his topkit to ship out there was a carp hanging on the end !!!!!!!
2nd ken(Kendra) Rayner opposite the winner on 55 had 65.15, catching the same way as the winner, but he never managed to snare a freeby on his topkit
3rd rod wootten on 68 with 55.13 and he had top silvers weight with 13.11 of f1,s and small skimmers on his favoured banded hard pellet
4th steve tucker on 62 with 55lb
5th Adrian Clark on 66 with 51.14
6th me with 44.01
The lake fished better than expected with the cold bright weather , but the fish certainly seemed to favour the more sheltered swims, the average weight was over 40lb even with bob gullick trying to reduce the average with a paltry 20lb, no doubt the super G will be back after his face book sympathisers get on the case LOL, (it's only banter)

Tuesday, costcutter, acorn fishery

It's probably been about 18 months since I last visited this fishery, so I was quite looking forward to today, the only downside was the weather, although dry we were going to get a strong northerly wind, so a nice draw with the wind from behind would be nice, after a couple of bev,s tasty bacon and egg sarnies made with Charlie Barnes,s bacon and or was time for the draw, into the bag bag and out comes peg 6, nice ,a bridge in front and wind off my back, NICE.
Only three rigs today , one for caster at 5mtrs, .4g. Another .4g for against the bridge and a 4x12 for slightly off the island shelf and down the edge, not to much to report on that rig as all I had was a perch over by the island and not a bite down the edge, so no more of that then, to cut a long story short I had three carp and a few bits at 5 mtrs, 5 over by the bridge and I started a new line at 13 mtrs to my left and had 2 there, all the fish being caught on double maggot over potted maggot and a mix of micros and 4,s. Ending up with 35.01for 2nd, being beaten by mike Owens on 21 with 39.10
3rd nick green on 31 with 30.5
4th andy gard on 22 with 22.08
Off to landsend tomorrow, which may be quite hard as there looks as though we are going to get a frost tonight and a clear cold say tomorrow , but you never know !!!