Fundraiser match, Barston lake

This match had been organised to raise funds for the women's international team, main organiser for the day was Julie Abbott, and she did a good job, especially as it was meant to be at the glebe fishery but Roy Marlow decided to shut as its suffering an outbreak of kHz, so he did the right thing, I can remember when we had it bad in this area about 12 years ago and it wasn't good, but all the fisheries that suffered it seem to bounce back as good if not better than before, so the glebe will be fine,
So myself , Chris Fox and Ken rayner were in the old Toyota blue bus on our way to Barston main lake, a new one for me, we had a brekkie stop in the premier inn just down the road , and it was very good, all you can eat for 8.95, good value for money.
It was a good turnout with 60 fishing with some very good anglers fishing , and Mark poppleton !!!!.
As is my norm I was quite early into the draw and out comes peg 22, means nothing to me but a quick chat with a couple of people and it turns out to be one of the favoured areas, with the long range method feeder being the thing to do, not ideal as I never had a method rod or feeders with me, luckily Chris managed to sort me out with the right kit, even boilies, bandits and bits .
It was only a short walk to the peg on a nice gravel path, for company I had Joe Roberts to my left and my right hand side was occupied by the legendary dick clegg , he did hope I wasn't one of those people who sit there and don't talk all day, I assured him I wasn't, and needles to say I didn't disappoint.

Although I was told it was a lead area in the main I couldn't resist setting the pole up to try and catch some skimmers, so I set up a groundbait worm and caster rig for 11 mtrs and a pellet rig for 14 mtrs, also a meat rig for the margin each side, and lastly the method rod with 45g lump on the end to try and get some distance. On the all in I cupped 10 balls of feed onto the shorter line with a copious amount of chopped worm and caster, some 4mm hard pellets at 14 mtrs, then I picked up the rod which was a very nice daiwa tournament 12/13 rod which felt nice I must say, filled the method with some groundbait with a few pellets on with a white thingy in the band and I was ready to go.

I launched it out to about 60 mtrs and began to count , aiming to get to 100 before another Chuck, I didn't get to the number, as the tip went round and I had a 2lb bream in the net, easy this then NOT, after 30 mins with not even I liner , I took another 10 mtrs of line off and launched it a bit further, I must say this rods limit seemed to have been reached, whereas Joe to my right was probably going 25 mtrs beyond me, it turns out he was using the 13 tournament distance rod , which is a proper piece of kit for this type of fishing, and if I was doing it on a regular basis I would be looking to get one, but after another 15 mins of looking at a motionless tip, I was on the pole shipping a piece of worm out to the 11 mtr line, I had been told before I went that the bream and skimmers preferred corn or pellet, but I decided to give the w and c a go, I can understand why the locals don't use it , the resident shoals of small perch must have thought it was Xmas, I was getting odd skimmers on it but in the main small perch were winning the race to the worm, or caster .

So it was out to the 14 mtr line with pellet, less bites but at least it was all skimmers, but I wasn't going anywhere fast so I upped the feed trying to force it or encourage some carp into the feed

Well that never worked either,  by the end I had added a couple more f1,s plus a 5lb fish from the margin, I also lost a couple of big fish in the margins, both breaking me as the ran through a snag. Joe to my left had 45lb I had 33 and dick never weighed , so I thanked him for making me look good on the day, the other side of dick had 125lb and from him on the weights seemed to get more consistent, so it seemed , right area wrong day, plus a bad bait choice for the pole and inadequate tackle on my part, but I enjoyed it as its a nice venue with seemingly a big head of fish , so I think I may be back as soon as I can, I also had a nice view of the clubhouse, how many places do you know with a place like this for the draw.

Float only league this weekend at Avalon, so looking forward to that one then as it will be ok, with lots of decent silver's hopefully feeding , and the large head of carp also deciding to have a munch, time will tell.