Tuesday costcutter at Landsend fishery

Travelled alone today as my official photographer, Judith rixon had to go to work. Stopped off at shipham for breakfast, it was ok.
Got to the fishery to find only 9 fishing, a bit disappointing, but in will persevere trying to do it every other week in the hope the numbers will increase, there aren't many better places to sit with the peace and quiet and wildlife.
Waited till nearly last to draw, there was only me and Lee Waller to go, so I picked up a ticket and opened it to see 15 on it, Lee had 13, stu Barnett was on 15 on Sunday and struggled, but it has been a good peg for a while yet, but saying that with only 9 fishing there wasn't a peg I didn't mind drawing.
Got to my peg and soon had the relevant rigs assembled, a margin meat rig to fish either side , a meat rig for 6 mtrs, and a pellet rig for across on the island, which I left with quite a long line on so it would double for a mugging rig.

I started on the short meat line , and to say it was slow would be an understatement, I did lose 3 foulers but it took me 2 hours to land my first carp, so I was a few fish behind the anglers on my bank and several fish behind Martin lenaghan who was using the empty pegs around him to good effect, putting regular fish in his net. But I have learnt that on some of these smaller lakes it pays to be patient, and today was no different, as it went on the peg began to come to life, with fish over on the island, although it was only 12 inches deep, it was hard to see them, but an odd tail tip or a tiny movement on the water was the only thing that gave them away, and the margins also started to pay up, the left hand side is normally the best side as there is lots of cover.

But not today , I only hooked one down on that side, but the right hand side really kicked into life towards the end, I was torn between the island and the right hand margin, both areas were giving me fish,

I was catching only about 3 mtrs past the end of the toolkits on the roost, which I must say is a very good piece of kit from Preston innovations, although I was catching well, it was never going to be enough as Martin on 5 had built up a good lead, he was catching as well as me at the end but the early lead was going to be unattainable, and that's how it ended with Martin running out the clear winner with a very good 159.4, catching mostly on shallow pellet , or mugging a few , also some down the edge on double corn, well done Martin.
I was second with 119.10, it should have been more as I went over (AGAIN) in one net, so I got knocked back to 80lb. (Twat)

3rd rich Heatley on 11 which has been a bit of a peg of death recently, but he did well off it today with 76.13
4th adriano(adj) Mercato who seems to be enjoying his break from speci carp fishing with 66.3, even though he did keep throwing various pieces of kit into the lake all day. On peg 22.
5th kev molten on peg 18 had 64.2.
6th Leon Hubbard on 20 had 61.3, which included the top silver's weight on the day with 20.2.
I will run another another one in a fortnight so give me a ring to book in,
Got a day off Saturday to fish the fishomania qualifier at viaduct, then Sunday I'm off to Barston with Chris Fox to fish a fundraiser for the England disabled team, best dust off the method rod lol.

Landsend league final round

The forecast for today was for unbroken sunshine, and they weren't wrong , it was a warm day,as long as you could sit in the sun, hopefully the sun will stay out this week as I'm running a costcutter down here on Tuesday, so ring or txt me on 07974807941 to book in, or ring in veals tomorrow on 01179260790,
Back to today and with the later draw it was a nice easy day , shame we had to lose an hour's sleep though, Judith was with me again today so I spoilt her and paid for breakfast, well it is mother's day.
I was quite late into the draw but was more than happy to see 13 looking back at me again for the second time in this league, last time on here in won the lake and the day with 130lb, so hopefully I could emulate it today, company wise I had stu Barnett on 15 and opposite was Dave Westcott on 11 who was standing in for Nick duckett,
Last time I caught well on maggot off the deck at 14 mtrs to my right, then later on meat in the same place, so two rigs done for that, a pellet rig for up on the island shelf, a pellet rig for along the left hand end bank, a couple of rigs for meat, down by the Bush to my left and at 6 mtrs in the deep water.
To say it started.slowly would be an understatement, the maggot rig never worked apart Rom a lone roach, so 20 mins in and I put some meat in expecting a quick response especially as stu had a carp first put in then lost one soon after, but 30 mins on that and only a liner and I was beginning to think up some believable excuses for not catching on this flier, I never actually hooked a carp till about the 90 minute mark and that was against the island on pellet, with  the Sun out today I expected to see quite a few muggable fish cruising about , but they were very noticeable by there absence, I did get a couple more off the island but they soon disappeared never really returning, the water had a Brown tinge to it but not enough, and these canny fish are super spooky on some days, and today was looking like one of those.
A switch to the long pellet rig against the end bank gave me a few  , suddenly the day was getting better, the fish were on the small side really , just the resident fish that live in these end pegs all year long, I needed some bonuses as Gary o,Shea on 18 was beginning to catch well , and I new his fish would be bigger, I kept switching between my various short meat lines and the long pellet lines and kept putting odd fish in the net.

I did see an old friend in my peg in the shape of an orange koi common, so slapped the pellet on its nose and it took it, I've lost count of the number of times I've had this fish LOL.

I've caught steadily till the end but due to the size of the fish in felt owns always behind Gary on 18, stu on 15 had a few fish down his margin, but had really struggled , and left to watch the football just before the end, opposite on 11 Dave never had a carp, he ended up with just a few pounds of silver's, as I thought Gary's fish were of a better stamp than mine and he ran out a clear leader with 162.15 so well done to him.

I managed to come second with 119.2, I did lose 2lb as I went over in a net , luckily it didn't make any difference today.
3rd Russ peck on 29 with 79.15
4th was Lewis Jones on 27 with 71.15
5th Steve hutter on 34 with 65.2
6th Andy hembrow on 55 with 60.12
7th Shaun kitteridge on 51 with 53.8
Silver's went to Ken rayner on 31 with 15.4
Well done to trig Edmunds for winning the league ahead of Gary o,Shea then Andy hembrow and Steve hutter.
And Ken rayner won the league silver's title ahead of fishery owner Mike duckett.
Well done to Ken rayner for running the league in the face of lots of adversity LOL, and a big thanks to Andy seery for sponsoring the league with some of his very good go nuts and so simple  groundbait .
Any one looking for a match in two weeks time , I'm running another open here on that Sunday (9th)

Tuesday costcutter acorn fishery

Bit late with this one as I couldn't do it last night as I was out for a meal with my family celebrating my daughters birthday, we went to aqua up on whiteladies road, very nice to , a definite 5 on the scale , good food , good service and exceptional company.
After breakfast at the bridge on yatton(4), it was off to the fishery, bit of a shock as there 20 fishing, must be spring bit you couldn't tell as it was freezing with a strong wind coming from the west, in the absence of Ray bazeley ed wynne had control of his ball bag of doom, I was nearly last into the bag and pulled out ball 1, its been average all winter , company wise my nearest was Glen Bailey on peg 3 , and across the gap by the bridge was Dave wride, I set up three rigs, a .4 as5 to fish maggot on the deck at 9 mtrs and to my right in the gap , and two rigs for over, one for maggot and one for banded pellet, I intended to use the maggot one for down the edge to the empty peg 2 pallet, at least I had the wind mainly from behind  not like the people opposite who had it in there faces, they looked really cold .

At the start I fed all lines and began with double maggot at 9mtrs, had a decent roach first put in (4oz) and the second and the third, and it continued, I had either a bite or a sensible roach for 2hours, amazing , nice fishing, towards the 2 1/2 hour mark things began to slow , and to be honest the silver's were well won by this stage, and looking round there didn't seem to be many carp being caught, so I began to think if I could get a few carp I may get into the frame aswell overall, but it never happened, I had two carp from across , one on maggot and one on maggot, I lost two foulers across and two down the edge, I kept trying the 9 mtr line, but apart from one or two more roach they seemed to have gone , or just stopped feeding, and towards the run in towards the end people started catching some carp with Dom Sullivan on peg 9 leading the way , but Mike Owens on 15 was doing ok. But Dom had the best finish and came out on top today with 69.12, catching on soft pellet against the far bank

2nd was Mike Owens on 15 with 54.4
3rd ed wynne on 7 with 51.14
4th Mike Wilson on 13 with 47.15
5th Glen Bailey on3 with 44.1
6th Mike Chapman on 21 with 40.14
Silver's went to me with 23.9 all roach net which was most unexpected, all on single maggot on an 18 guru f1 hook on .14 line , typical roach gear lol, it was solid mind.

Thinking of trying to run another costcutter at Landsend next Tuesday, so if anyone fancies it get in touch to book in, if not it will be back to acorn again .

Avalon open

Managed to scrape together 22 for this match which wasn't to bad considering there were several other matches on today.
Stopped off at Landsend fishery for breakfast and really good today, very nearly a 5.
Everyone turned up on time so I got the draw started, Rob watts drew for me and pulled out 20, then pulled out 21 for himself.
20 has a lot of for , its a good pellet wag peg aswell as lead , as there is a small gap in the island with a Bush in it.

As I don't like doing the lead, the pellet wag was assembled, along with 2 pole rigs, one 4x16 rig for banded 6mm hard pellet over loose Fed 4,s, and a .8g drennan as5 for maggot or caster over groundbait, the pellet rig was to fish at 14 mtrs just off to the left and the groundbait line was off to the right at 13 mtrs, and I put together a rig to fish with meat down the right hand margin .
At the start I fed the various pole line but began on the wag, although the wind was slightly off our backs there was enough of it blowing up the lake to make the float travel to quickly through the peg. I did give it nearly an hour , for one missed bite, by now Rob to my left was getting some skimmers on soft pellet on the pole, but Pete nurse to my right on 19 was in the same boat as me with nothing in the net.
So I started on the maggot line but after a few small roach I switched to the pellet line with 6mm pellet, I was soon getting bites and had a run of sensible skimmers up to 2lb.

But I over did the swim by feeding to much trying to get carp to move in, that was a definite mistake as I thought one or two of the silver slayers would be emptying it, anyway I blew that swim away LOL. Of what I could see no one was doing to well so it was going to be a tight affair, which is nice as no one was going to run away with it.
In the end I did my best to make the wag work and was rewarded with some carp, but the wind was making life difficult, and the fish didn't want to come out tofu the snags, even though I fed short, I had to get as tight to the snags a possible, leading to the loss of a couple of floats and several hooklenth, with there being no leaves on the branches it was nigh on impossible to see the horrible spindly twigs, I'm sure if I owned a fishery there wouldn't anything that even remotely resembled a tree or Bush within 12 foot of the bank cos tying hooks is a right chore, but the gizmo hook Tyer has helped.
I had three bites down the edge , missed one and had a skimmer and my biggest carp of the day of about 7lb

I thought I was well off the pace, as I thought Pete to my right had beaten me as he had a good run of carp on the lead in the last hour, but it turned out they were quite small.
As is normal on this venue it was a close affair with Paul elmes on peg 16 came out on top with 57lb which included the top silver's weight on the day with 18.8 of skimmers to go with his 38.8 of carp, most of his fish coming on the pole with soft pellet,
2nd Joe McMahon on peg 37 with 56.6
3rd Steve seager on 44 with 48.3
4th me with 46.9
5th Vic Bush on 24 with 43.2
6th Pete nurse on 19 with 41.4
After the Paul winning the match the default silver's money went to Leon Hubbard on peg 33 with 17.14.
Not a big weight match but a nice close one , so it was interesting and a working match trying to Nick odd fish to stay in the running,

All pictures courtesy of Judith rixon, pink wellies and all,

Huntstrete silver's league final round

The Toby inn in whitchurch was busy this morning due to a load of people going to Cheltenham, but I managed to sneak in before the rush via the emergency exit, so first in the queue for me then , yay, and it was as normal a really nice breakfast, 4.5.
I was soon on my way to the fishery and very nearly got there early, but I was turned back just before Huntstrete village due to a cyclist being knocked off his bike and looked in a bad way so the road was shut, but in still got there well before draw time.
Into the bucket and out comes b8 on the road side, so quickly into the van and parked in the bay behind my peg.
Three rigs today , a .4g and .8g for fishing on the deck with caster or maggot over groundbait at 4 and 13 mtrs, and a .3g for caster down the edge for possibly a perch and some roach.

On the whistle I fed a couple of lines at 13mtrs with 2 balls on each, and one ball at 4 mtrs, and began throwing a few casters to my left, I began on the short line and had a few roach and small skimmers fairly quickly, so a good start, especially as most were struggling, but as expected it didn't last so in was soon out to 13 mtrs, and had a few slightly better skimmers, although it wasn't manic, it was good enough as my section was still fishing hard, that was until Dave wride on 6 had a 4lb tench, which probably caught me up and overtook me, the first half I kept switching between the long and short lines picking up 4 to 8oz skimmers, so quite interesting, trouble was Dave on 6 although not getting as many fish as me was getting quality in the shape of good skimmers up to 2lb, and Paul barnfield on peg 11 was also moaning some action in his peg. With about 2 hours to go and and my 13 mtr.line setting hard I decided to put a couple of balls in at 16 mtrs, that provided worthwhile as I had my biggest fish off that line in the shape of a 2lb skimmer, at the end it was always going to be a bit tight as Barney was admitting to 16lb , and Dave wride thought he had over 20, I thought I would be in between the pair of them, but it wallflower than I thought, to stand any chance of me getting in the league pay out I needed to win my section, but I still needed people to dip out above me , any way Dave weighed in 23.13 and  I weighed 23.12, not to close then, and Barney had just over 20, top on the day was Steve Dawson on peg 15 with 26lb, I'm not sure of the exact weights as I did nth get a picture of the weight sheets,
2nd was Dave wilmott on peg 29 with 24lb, then Mr wride 23.13
Then it was John fuidge and myself with 23.12.
Even Mike Jones got in on the act off unfancied peg 13 with 20lb, and up can't remember the rest, but it did fish much better today so sport at the fishery is hopefully on the up.
League wise callum dicks came out top , mainly due to the fact he won his section today using some bait purchased from Scott's that Graham beevor got for him, and he bumped Graham aswell
Second in the league was Mike Nicholls who tied with Steve Dawson on points but beat him on weight , well done to all the winners and to league organiser Chris Rolf, it can be a bit of a thankless job doing these leagues but it was ok in the end.

Landsend league rnd 5

Judith was back in the van today so plenty of pictures then, also we had Jason Radford with us, breakfast at the fishery and on the ainscough scale it was a definite 4.75 out of 5 so no complaints from anyone, di and olive seem to have it well sorted.
Judith refused to draw for me today as she got me a crap peg last round on lake 3, so I managed to get trig to draw for , that was after he pulled out one of the flyers  for himself, (corner peg 33) and he had the cheek to moan saying he didn't want it !!!!!, anyway he pulled out a peg for me and opened it up to reveal 40, bugger, its been a hard peg with it only having a blank and one carp in the last two matches, I did draw it in the first round and only had two small carp, but it was frozen then  so I was at least hoping for a few, for company I had Stuart Barnett on 39 and opposite was rod (van winkel) wootten opposite on 25.
Firstly a picture just for Jimmy Norris as he seems to have an incurable foot fetish.

Several rigs today, a margin meat rig for down to my left, a meat rig for 6 mtrs in front, a couple of pellet rigs for 16 mtrs out by the hay bale, up and down the shelf, and one for dobbing maggot , again out by the hay bale, at the start I began on the maggot rig at half depth .

It didn't work today as I only had a couple of small roach, I did lose a carp but it was probably fouled, so in was soon months deck on banded pellet, I soon had a couple of f1,s but no carp.

Rod had a couple and Stuart was losing a some against the island , but he did manage a one, so an hour and fifteen into the match and I was on the 6 mtr meat line, and bigger me if I didn't get two carp in two drops, but that was it, so it was back out to the hay bale, and it was a bit better, with more f1,s in the deep water and proper carp up on top of the shelf, it turned into a nice match for me, Stuart next door had a bit of a torrid damaging his no7 section ruling out his island fishing, which was a shame for him as he had tails up against the island, I also had a couple more at 6 mtrs on the meat and my only bite down the edge gave me my biggest fish , a nice common of about 12lb.

So by the end in thought I may have 80lb, but I was way off the pace as far as the lake win was going as Craig(trigger) Edmunds up on his unwanted.peg 33 had been catching all day, so he had at least 150lb, it turned out trig had won again on the day with 179.4, pushing Shawn kitteridge into second who had 141.10 off peg 16, I was third with 109.01 and Paul elmes was 4th with 103.8.
5th Russ peck on 51 with 88.8
6th Pete nurse on 18 with 80.14
Top silver's went to Mike duckett on 34 with 19.12 with a mixture of roach ,Rudd and skimmers.

Tuesday costcutter, Landsend fishery

Bit of a change today and decided to try and organise a cheaply match at Landsend fishery, not a roving success as I only managed to get 9 fishing, but then again there have been less than that at acorn the last couple of times I have fished the Tuesday costcutter.
Into lillypool cafe for the first time for a while, and I must say it was very nice with cheerful staff , so it rates a 4.25 in the ratings, I travelled down with Chris Fox today and just hoped he had a better day than Sunday or I could be in line for a load of cheap fishing kit.
Steve Sewell was fishing so the insults and banter was soon flowing, all good natured with ade crawley and Adriano Mercato coming in for a fare share.
Nearly last to draw hoping for the form pegs at the top end , but no I end up on 20, for company up had Mike duckett on 22 and Ray white on 18.
It was nice to sit on a venue that was nice and quiet, only the birds and Steve Sewell making noises.

Rigs today were a pellet rig 4x12 for hard 6mm pellet over 4,s at 14 mtrs left and right at the bottom of the island shelf, a pellet rig for on top of the shelf, a meat rig for 6 mtrs each side and a meat rig for down to empty pallet 19, well the 6 mtr meat line didn't produce a bite so nothing to mention about that again, most of the action came from the pellet rigs down the shelf and and a couple on top of the shelf , I also had a carp from down by peg 19 but that was my only bite there, Mike duckett started catching late on down by peg 21 , I resisted it for as long as possible as I don't like encroaching on someone's else's feed, but in the end the little devil sat on my shoulder talked me into it, I went down just short of the pallet but never fed anything hoping to get a stragglers, and I did in the shape of an 8lb common, Mike didn't give me to much stick, oh how we laughed, by the end as far as I could see , the only person who had seemed to have caught much was Bristol very own Peter pan on form peg 15 (Leon Hubbard )
And he just pipped me by one carp as he had 54lb to my scraper 50lb, it never fished as well as in expected, but at least we all had a few and Chris won the silver's off peg 11 with 13lb of accidentals, weigh sheet below.

Viaduct winter league final match

Decent breakfast at cannards to start the day ,(3.5). Then off to the fishery,
Tim Clark was drawing today and I requested a peg on Cary with the wind off my back, and he didn't disappoint as he pulled out the draw we had in the first round, 113 on Campbell for Clayton ,(flyer) , 79 for me , an ok peg, 73 for Clint, was ok for me in the first match but has been carp ever since, so not expecting our leader to do to well, Ron on 43, good peg and Tim on 5 flyer.
I got to my peg and found I had Steve Skelton on 78 and Steve Jackson on 80, so I was in a Steve sandwich, I fancied a go on the wag today so I set up a 4ssg drake bodied wag to fish meat about 30 mtrs out, a lead rod and a pole rig for meat at 14 mtrs.

Not to much to say about the match really as I went all out to catch carp on meat on either the lead wag or pole , well I only.managed one carp and I had that on the wag, I also had a 3lb tench, a one pound perch and six decent skimmers , the carp went 13lb and the silver's just over 12, for 25lb and 8 points out of 19, so a bit disappointing really, but at least I had the wind and rain coming from behind, the people opposite had a real torrid time as the wind gusted to 40mph and it was pushing rain and hail along at the same pace, Steve Skelton had a couple of late carp to beat me but at least I beat Jacko to my left,
Well done to Craig Edmunds on winning the individual for the league and Ben hagg for second and Shawn Townsend third ,all three showing great consistency throughout. Weigh sheets and final team places below.

I'm running a costcutter at Landsend on Tuesday so if anyone fancies it let me know by txt on 07974807941, 9.30 draw £12 entry, no breakfast at the fishery so lillypool at shipham it is for me then .
Also this Saturday the fishery is hosting the Don Sutherland memorial match, its a silver match and with 40 booked in already its shaping up to be a good match for who was a top bloke , ring the fishery to book in tel 01458 274022

Huntstrete silver's league rnd 5

After the tasty help yourself breakfast at the Toby inn in whitchurch, it was off on the the 10 minute drive to the fishery for the penultimate round of the series, it was my turn in section D, which runs from peg 21 to 30, I fancied 24 or 26 as they would have a bit of shelter from the wind which was forecast to gust to 40 mph, but those pegs went to Steve tanner and Paul Dickson, I pulled out 30, which was the end peg in the section plus I had the bonus of an empty peg to my left,
As I walked  to my peg after a loo call I had to walk past Jimmy Norris who has been around for ages, when up began fishing matches on the river over 40 years ago he was one of the stars of the time , and a member of the all conquering bathampton squad , he was definitely one of the anglers I looked up to at the time, along with the likes of topper Haskins , Mike Jones and Melvyn Holbrook, to name just a few, back to Jimmy and he can still catch a few as he is still showing.

He certainly seems to have been around for an age , as has his seat box, he even showed me his waggler selection inside the lid in some slotted foam, I can't remember seeing a better selection of cork avons and porcupine quills anywhere, but then again I havnt looked in rich Coles,s box.

Back to my peg and the wind was going to make it difficult as I had an island at 18 mtrs and it was funnelling through at a great rate of knots, so 2 rigs today, a 1.25g drennan as7 to fish over groundbait, and a .6 g as5 for down wind and just down the margin shelf for hopefully some roach and maybe a perch. For company I was hemmed in by a couple of old boys , Mike Jones to my right and league organiser Chris rolfe to my left.

I plummed up and found I had the same depth at 6 and 11 mtrs, so at the start I fed a ball of groundbait on both lines , and fed some caster down the edge .
I expected a bite fairly quickly , but it took 20 mins to get a fish and that was a small skimmer on the 6 mtr line, I did get a couple more but it was very slow for everyone , 1 1/4 hours in and I had a 3lb bream on the short line , and I would like to say I had several more , but it never happened, with only small skimmers finding the bait and not really to many of those, bites became harder and harder to get , and the wind wasn't helping, Paul barnfield on peg 28 had the right idea and fished a small feeder for the most , and had odd skimmers on it, he did manage a couple on the waggler early doors and a few towards the end of the match on the pole , as the wind eased for the the last 45 minutes, and he ran out the winner today with just over 16lb, beating Steve Dawson into second place off peg 7 with 13lb +
I ended up with 6.12 which was third in the section, which keeps me in with a bit of a shout as far as the league goes, but Mike Nicholls must be favourite as he had a second in section today meaning he is sat on top of the pile by a couple of points , the last match is in a fortnight, but the draw can be cruel with some very bad pegs in the hat which can really upset the results.

Barney with his catch, well done matey, amazing you don't seem to moan when your catching LOL.