Triple catch up

Three matches to report, a few fish caught but not to much to report, last Thursday and it was the Flanders ripoff at Shiplate farm, we drew our own pegs from the table and I opened up peg 10, happy, it's a full 18mtrs to the island but it has a tree at 16 mtrs to fish under and a really good right hand margin

, it was a bit harder than I thought it would be , I caught from the off under the tree but skimmers were an issue , especially when I was trying to catch carp, I did get a few more more skimmers and one carp short , and some swinging a rig into the island , the margin never came good till the last 45 minutes when some fish showed up, to little to late, ending up with 126lb for nothing in the main frame but I did sneak a bit of silvers money with my accidental skimmers., Organiser end was top on the day off 14b , well done.

Sunday and down to trinity waters on woodland lake, it can be a tough one to sort under match conditions, and today was no different, draw from the bingo balls today and I rolled out 22 for myself, another tough day with struggling home with 60+ pounds for a section win by double default, I was resounding beaten to my left by big ry  Jordan who had over 100lb so I handed the quid over, but it has been a long time coming for him, he was second behind Ryan shipp on peg 2 who made no mistakes with 124lb, all on work and caster shallow, well done 

Top silvers weight went to mark broomsgrove with 25lb, and Mark cook had a nice eel of 3.8 , he don't like them very much, Martin McMahon tried to steal it to jelly for his supper but it went back safely.

And today Tuesday Chris fox and me travelled.up to Barston to fish the women's England team fundraiser, but of a disappointing turnout with less than 40 fishing, Julie Abbott did the draw did the draw and handed me peg 52, a nice peg for carp and silvers,.lots.of form for shallow fishing for carp and big f1,s, 

well it never panned out that way, the wind was to strong, 14 mtrs was all but impossible, I was getting spun round on my box, even 13 was.painful, most of the day was.spent at 5 mtrs, where I had a few skimme and one big f1, ending up with over 17lb for second in the section, this end of the lake is usually the place to be, but not today, the winner came.from the other end, the angler next to me on my left had 105lb on the straight lead and pellet, but he was 4 pegs away , but I should have followed suit, I think I would have had a few, never mind .

Went down the river again with Judith on Monday evening trying for another elusive lower Avon barbel, no whiskers but Judith did manage a nice bream , although she can't stand the slime she was fairly happy with it as it's her biggest  bream to date, even if it is upside down, 😂

Add caption

Shiplate farm, float only match

This was going to be a date for the float only league but as we all know due to the man made pandemic most leagues this summer were cancelled, I've got my dates in for next year for the leagues but no doubt some fool will let another virus loose or the one we have will rest it's head again, only time will tell,

Back to today I ended up with 43 fishing but the venue is more than large enough to accommodate these numbers as the pegging for the best part is well spaced. The canals are a bit tighter but I made sure everyone had an empty peg on one side of them.

Draw.underway and I let Ryan Jordan draw for me as I always have a quid with him, oh and what a suprise, he pulls me out peg 8 on the squircle, not complaining as I was going to catch plenty as it's full of smallish carp, never going to win the match today so a section win was my only hope.

I enjoy this type of fishing, up on the mud on the far side, but the level was down about 8inches, so only 6inches deep against the bank, but I know the fish will still be in there, for company I had Clayton Hudson to my left on 6 and Paul elmes to my right on peg 10, so as I said plenty of room for all today, it was going to be a hard section to win as the other anglers were all good .

Not to much to say tbh the match went as expected, I began feeding a couple of areas on the far side but started down the .middle, I had a few , but the far bank activity soon had me going across, and that was where I spent most of the match, catching spasmodically , enjoyable but never going to be quick enough to to bother Martin rayet on peg 13 by the water pump who had a good steady day to end up with just over 120lb , and a new lake best , so well done to him, as a whole the lakes fished really well Russ peck made no mistake on peg 1 on the main lake to win with 260+ which is a new best for him, well done.

The siver.weights were good again today with George Woodward on 14b having 82lb of skimmers , with lots of weights between 20 and 30lb, weigh sheets below show how well it fished , and it's a really nice place to fish well looked after and quiet, well not so quiet today as some fool down the road allowed a motocross rally to go ahead shame really, as it sounded a load of chainsaws going. I ended up with 82lb for second on the lake, and a quid off Ryan Jordan, serves him right for drawing me the peg LOL.

Hunstrete coffin dodgers and disabled

Back on bridge pool again today after a short drive from home after a bacon butty stop at a local greasy spoon, sarney was good but the takeaway tea was pants, even worse than the ones colin makes at the shop 😆.

Anyway got to the lake in plenty of time, and Dave Gillard soon had the social distancing draw underway, when my name.was.called there were still a few.pegs I would have liked, but Dave pulled out peg 8 for me again, that's two matches in the trot, and I had peg 7 the match before that, so not moving to far at the mo. 

I had John fry to my left and Wayne storry to my right, and Barney directly opposite.

The peg looks nice, with an island at about 25mtrs, and up until this year had been a good skimmer peg but for some reason it's gone off the boil this year, last match on here I struggled with conventional silvers baits on the pole so all I set up was a deep and shallow rig for hard pellet, 6,s over 4,s, and a margin rig for pellet to my left to the empty pallet, and a waggler to fish to the island which was the best method last time, again for hard pellet, so a nice simple bait tray, 4,s and 6,s to feed and a few 8,s for the band .

At the start I fed some 4,s on the long pole line, which was only 13 mtrs, any longer and shipping in and out becomes a pain as the peg is only 2 mtrs from the track leading to the other lakes , so it entails breaking down every two sections, anyway after feeding that I picked up the wag rod and began on that, oh and I nearly forgot , Barney opposite was going to fish the wag aswell but snapped his rod after a few practice casts before the start, just when I thought I was going to get the island to myself, rod dufferty next to him came to his rescue and lent him a rod, 

I had bites from the start, but f1,s on the waggler are a tricky opponent, with lots of missed bites, I would get a few bites, then nothing as they backed off into the brambles, so I needed to rest it, try the pole ,maybe catch a skimmer or two then go back out on the waggler to repeat the catch and rest process. The whole lake seemed to be very hard , as far as I could tell Barney was doing the best, on the pole for the biggest part as he really struggled to get a bite on the waggler, by the end I thought Barney had won , but not being able to see the pegs behind the islands it was hard to know what else had happened.

But it turned out Barney did win with 43lb , and I came in second with a bit under 38lb, I had 9lb of skimmers, and the rest was f1,s, so ok really, but for some reason the lake switched right off, pleasure fishing on this lake can be really good, but stick a match on it and it just turns off, lots of people have a theory, I just think it's the onslaught of bait and tackle going in at  the same time upsets the fish , they don't like it.

Weigh sheets below as normal.

John dursley thursday open, shiplate main lake

Only 13 booked in for this, then we had a couple of no shows, so down to 11, plenty of room for all then, John did the social distancing draw and pulled out peg 6 for me, a good silvers swim, plus carp are always going to put in an appearance at some stage.

 I decided to go primarily for silvers, so I set up a .3g pencil with an 18 b960 on .16 for banded 6mm hard pellet over hard 4,s, two lines one at topset and two and the other at 13 mtrs, it was the same.depth, a meat rig for the margins and a shallow mugging rig just incase, tried for a couple but they didn't play ball, so that rig was out to one side, the margin meat rig never happened, I had one eel and a carp to my left and a skimmer to my right. I spent most of the match fishing the short line, and I've had a lovely day catching skimmers on the hard pellet, plus a few rogue carp, I thought I had about 45lb of carp, but never had a clue as to how many skimmers I had in my two silvers nets, when the scales got to me Jamie Cooke was top on 15 with 150lb, and ade bishop on 10 had 69lb of silvers, my silvers went 86lb and my few.carp helped me.to 129lb, a great days fishing, at a lovely venue.

The match was won by Andy fry on peg 2 with 216lb, well done matey, beating Steve Jackson on peg 1 into second place with his 183lb, weigh sheet below.

Landsend open

Struggling to find a match for this weekend so I decided to run one myself, a quick call to Landsend and managed.to get the match lake, only going to have 15 fishing but ended up with twenty, so the fishery allowed me.to use 58 to 70 on lake three, thanks for that.

I did the draw with the bingo ball machine and ball 24 popped out for me, happy with that peg, especially as it had top weight the day before, it's a nice peg with a long end bank margin to fish along, it always holds fish.

I had Chris fox to my left and Glen Calvert opposite on peg one. I set up a meat rig for topset and two, a mugger rig and a couple of pellet rigs for along the bank, one at 13 mtrs and another at 14 mtrs where it was about 12 inches deeper than the 13 mtr line, 

I called the all in, and began on the short pole meat line, I stuck here for the first hour and was rewarded with two carp and a hybrid, not much but no one else was doing particularly well so I was my to worried, I had been firing some pellets along the bank the whole time, or at.least when I remembered,😏, there were a few.fish cruising about, but they just weren't interested, but luckily I was getting some fish along the end bank, I had been feeding 6,s , and was fishing an 8 in the band, by now most people I could see were catching a.few, but I thought I was just ahead of most , after about 3 1/2 hours I managed a few muggers, but just as quickly as the fish switched on for this method, they stopped, so it was back down the bank. I had only fished the 13 mtr but up till now, it for the last hour I switched to 14 mtrs, a good move as I had several more carp from here.

I reckoned on having 120lb, but hoped for a bit more, by the time.The scales.Got to me Clayton Hudson on 19 was top with 119lb, but I was ok as my nets went 140lb , too weight on the lake but beaten into second place by Dan Russell on peg 58 with 148lb, only his second match so well done matey. Weigh sheets below.

I did have a.sausage and bacon roll delivered to my peg, and it was.very nice aswell.

Off to Shiplate again tomorrow for another John dursley rip off, looking forward to it.

Shiplate thursday open

Gary flinders is running there matches on behalf of the fishery, so 15 turned up today which means plenty of room with the generous pegging on this lake, Gary started.The draw and when he got to my name on the list he pulled out peg 11 for me, a lovely peg with several options, an island in front which lends itself to a nice waggler chuck, a nice left hand margin down to a bush, and a long pole line which is normally good for skimmers aswell as carp.

So rigs done for shallow and deep on the long pole, a margin meat rig and a 4mtr meat rig, lastly a small loaded middy fatboy waggler for the end of the island.

On the whistle I started.On the long pole , and after.15 minutes I had three carp in the net, as did Gary flinders on 10, then I began to struggle , skimmers were feeding well as I was catching a few.On 8mm hard pellet, Gary was.getting a.lot of skimmers aswell as.more.carp, and I never managed.to catch him up, he pulled steadily.away for the duration, I had a few on the wag , and very nearly had a nasty accident, booking fish on the wag you tend to have to pull hard to stop the fish going around the island, in one fish I had the acolyte carp waggler rod bent to the Mac when I pulled out, and I could see the float narrowing back at straight towards my face, I just managed to duck a bit and the float but me on the tip of the head, good job I had a hat on as I think it would have drawn blood, I did end up with bump, but it did make me chuckle, any.way to not waste any time with this report, I cant.really complain as I've had 134 lb which is still a good days fishing, but I was well Off the pace as Gary won with 240lb, followed by Anton page on 15 (again), with 207, then Gary (thumbprint) Bowden on 3 with 128lb followed by me, too silvers went to Dave wride  7 with over 45lb of skimmers on his secret soft pellets😂. Weigh sheet below as normal.

Sunday and monday

Booked into the Summerhayes match on sunday, I quite like the venue as it's mud bank fishing which I find interesting, and at times frustrating, Pete did the distancing draw and pulled out peg 36 for me, right in front of the hut, and a good peg for carp, nice and narrow(13 mtrs), which today was.going to help as we were going to have winds gusting to 40 mph, plenty of options to go at , nice left hand margin

Some nice mud on the far bank.

And the aerator off to my left.

So a rig for pellet under the bush to my left, a depth pellet rig for the far side and a shallow rig for against the mud, and lastly a rig for meat by the aerator, 

Pete called the all in and I went straight across on the depth rig, I had a carp fairly quickly, then just liners, but it didn't take too long for slurpers to start showing, so it was out with the shallow rig, pulling it right against the mud, which was working ok, and I was putting a steady run of smallish carp into the net, towards the end the wind for to strong so I switched to the meat line and the margin line , and added a few more fish, which to be fair were slightly larger, on the all out I new I had just over 100lb, and as one as first to weigh, that was confirmed as the scales read just over 112lb, just aboriginal on the day, best me.old mate Glen Bailey by 2lb, then Gary Bowden had just over 100lb, weigh sheet below.

Onto Monday at it was the John dursley rip off on the canals at shiplate, I fancied a day on Hawthorn as I haven't been on there for about 3 years, but no John pulls me out peg 13 on westpool, oh well, just got to get on with it, 

for company I had james(cookie) cool on end peg 15, and Lee Williams on 11. Rigs today were a mugging rig as some fish were mooching about, mostly moving to quickly, but enough going slowly enough to be viable, a right hand margin rig for pellet , and a meat rig to my left at the bottom of the margin shelf, and a far bank depth rig for pellet, but that rig was never used, I spent most of the day mugging, swinging an 8mm pellet at any fish I saw, and I had quite a few, towards the end I had a few down each side , but 90% of my weight came on the mugger, I do enjoy doing this, see a fish and try and catch it, it's all about getting to land your pellet in the sweet spot for these cagey fish to take it, I love it. On the all out I new I had over 200lb, but I had a bit more as my nets went 233lb 6oz for first on the day , and also a new top match weight for the lake, so happy days, weigh sheets below.