Upcoming matches

Wildmarsh on Sunday 16 June , Father's Day, selling well with over twenty booked in already

Landsend short pole match on Sunday 23 June, it will be top set plus three more, taking you up to the number 6 section, and with 17 booked in already I think that ones going to be popular, 

As always book early to avoid disappointment 

Yesterday's match at summerhayes was a good affair especially as there were a few faces from the past I haven't seen in years, Colin Wilkins, clive Cunningham and Jamie rich to name but a few, and with there being free choccy and crisps for all , a nice little touch, I think, that on its own will be enough to tempt me back, there is an open there on the 30 th jo June and I think it's on longs which according to the locals is the better lake with lots of silvers aswell as carp so I can foresee another trip down the m5 looming

Sunday open , summerhayes fishery

Only my second ever visit to this fishery, the last time under different owners it was very hard , in fact dean malin won that match with one bream, but reports coming back now seem to show that the present owner , Pete has worked really hard and now has a nice well run fishery and gives everyone a warm welcome, but then again nearly all the venues in Somerset are the same.
There was 29 booked in to this match so there was 20 on sellicks and 9 on Lilly pond , most of the locals were of the opinion that the fish in Lilly were to small to compete withy he sellicks fish, so a draw on the latter was favoured, after a walk around the lakes I fancied 13 on sellicks as there are plenty of options with a small island to fish to plenty of Lilly,s in the margin a ice far bank and the wind was blowing into that bank, into the draw tub and out comes 17 sellicks, a good area according to the people I asked, peg 13 was drawn by bob gullick so he was smiling , I had only bought meat and pellets with me , so I set up two meat rigs, one for the margins and one for 5 mtrs but apart from a lost fouler in the margin I never had a proper bite on either so the less said about those two rigs the better, I set up two pellet rigs to fish the far bank, one for shallow against the bank and one for on the deck by the island aswell as I had a good depth there at nearly 2 foot deep, I had rich Lacey on my left for company and he got a nasty shock whilst tackling up as he touched the live otter fence and got a bit of a jolt, I thought he was going to cry,
Basically my match was spent fishing banded 6mm over loose fed 4,s , I had a couple of early fish shallow but they weren't really competing enough to keep them shallow, so all my other fish were caught on the depth rig over, I was suffering a few foulers so I kept trying the shallow rig but it was no good, in the end I fished at depth with one number 10 down the line , I did get a few on the drop but most came after the rig had settled , I ended up with over 20 carp but was several behind bob who was admitting to 25, Lilly pond seemed to have fished well with the corner pegs producing well but the fish were of a small average size in the end it was bob gullick who took first spot with 63.6 catching mainly on pellet over to the far side and by the small island
2nd was me with 47.4
3rd joe McMahon 46lb peg 3 on Lilly
4th Aaron britnell 44.7 peg 6 on Lilly
5th kev molten 42.10 peg 4 sellicks
6th mark lehay 41.1 peg 7 Lilly
Silvers
Steve Jackson 9.12 peg 7 sellicks
All in all it was a good tight match with plenty of bites, and it never fished as well as it can, but then again. Most places seem to be fishing a bit wierd at the mo , the fish don't seem to have spawned proper and it seems to to be fishing a bit wierd

Weds viaduct open

18 fishing today so the management decided to put us on Campbell only, I let roger andoniou pull a peg for me today, I should know better as he generally draws crap for me , and he gave me 130, not a peg I would generally chosen, 110 and 132 would have been my preferred choice with 135 being good but roger kept that for himself, with dan squire pulling 110 and axel Murray rolling up onto 132  
A minor placing or silvers money looked like my best option. I set up a couple of meat rigs , one for the margin and one for 5 mtrs , and a couple of pellet rigs , one for on the deck and a slapper/shallow rig, for company on my left I had ridgeway aa stalwart Jon rowland, the whistle goes and it's straight out on the deck with 8 mm banded pellet ,but after a couple of lost foulers it was out on the shallow rig, but the fish didn't want to play ball, it seems they have only been spawning in dribs and drabs so they didn't want to feed to well, I did managed to mug about 6 but it was hard, by the Galway mark I was still on 6 carp and a few silvers. A look on the meat lines gave me one small roach down the edge and a couple of small skimmers on the 5 mtr line, by now dan over on 110 and axel on 135 were catching a few but dan was well in the lead fishing pellet shallow 17 mtrs down his edge by the brambles, but he was having a bit of a torrid with lots of the carp taking him under the brambles but he was getting enough out to be well ahead of everyone else, the last two hours of the match were my best with the fish seeming to settle a bit and I managed some on the deep pellet rig as well as on the meat ,by the end I had 17 carp and a few tench and skimmers for 110 plus pounds, Alex in the corner had 156 lb , I new I was well off that , I ended up with 126.10 , after having 6  1/2 lb deducted as I went over the 70 lb net limit in one net , bugger.
1st was dan squires over on 110 with 2477
2 nd  axel Murray on 132 with 156.8
3rd Tom thick with 130.10 which included the top silvers weight with 35.2 of mainly skimmers
4 th tony Rixon 126.10, going over cost me 3rd
5 th fabio on 112 with 102 .15
6 th John ( turkey) Thompson with 98.13 on peg 114
Matches coming up
Sunday 16 June chiton trinity on wildmarsh and Sunday 23 a short pole match at landsend fishery, ring me at the shop on 01179517250 to book in on either

Float only round 2 landsend fishery

With 40 fishing we used all three lakes today , I didn't rally mind where I drew but when I found out the carp were spawning on lake 3 I would have likes to avoid that one , so where do I draw for myself, yep lake 3 on peg 62 not the best of pegs and when Tom thick drew peg 1 on the match lake it looked as though my time in the knockout  was over aswell for company I had Adrian jeffery on peg 61 to my right and Phil fabio Harding to my left on 65, my peg looked nice if not a bit overgrown, I had a tree going out 6 mtrs to my right ,so no margin that way , to my left I a bush going out 2 mtrs but I could fish over the top of that one into the empty peg , but I had to stand up to do it, so I set up a meat rig for that part of my swim ,another  meat rig for 5 mtrs to my left in front of the tree/bush. A slapper pellet rig for chancing the surface swimmers ,and one for on the deck across on the island, me like most people started on the slapper chacing the shadows but these fish had other things on there minds and were not playing ball at all , I did get three fish on this rig but they were fish feeding against the island and the three would have struggled to make 8 lb between them, I went over on the deep rig agains the island and had another and lost one but bites were virtually impossible  get, there were no line bites either , very strange , most of the lakes carp seemed to be spawning under the various bushes and weedbeds around the lake , our lake was very hard , but news came up from the other lakes that they were fishing well, there were no spawning fish on the other lakes , probably due to the fact they are slightly deeper so the water temp would be a bit lower, I looked n the meat line at 5 mtrs and had a nice 10 lb common, I had a first for me whilst playing this fish as a smaller male fish tried to spawn with it as I was playing it, I went down to the empty swim which I
Thought would be a banker but only hooked and landed one small carp from there, I expected more from this area but again they were to interested in spawning in the trees branches, there were no silvers feeding on this lake , to busy eating spawn probably, I ended up with 11 carp for 52 lb and a needed section win, catching a few late fish on the corner of the island and on the 5 mtr line all on meat, top weight on our lake went to craig(des) Edmunds on 45 with 79.11.
Overall went to Tom thick ( I thought I would be knocked out. ) with 189.14 off peg 1 , mugging
Quite a few and catching on meat at 5 mtrs
2 nd bob gullick on peg 21 with 149.3
3rd Anton page 140.4 on peg 33
4 th Leon Hubbard on 29 with 133.2
5th Tom mangnall on 32 with 121.14
6th Paul elmes on 38 with 117.2
Silvers
Clint wojtyla on peg 3 with 33.2 of alla sorts on caster and a bit of soft pellet

Weds open landsend fishery

Only 10 today which was a bit of a suprise as it fished its head off at the weekend,
I had the last ticket in the draw and ended up on peg 5 , which has been a good peg to me over the years so I wasn't disappointed , the biggest downfall With the peg today was that I was opposite Tom thick who was on 19, and with a pound side bet on it I was up against it as 19 has been the better peg recently( that's what I was telling Tom anyway), plenty of rigs to set up today, a couple of meat rigs, one for 5 mtrs and one for down the edge, a stalking rig and a pellet rig for over on the island and another rig to fish hard pellet at 11 mtrs . At the start there were a few fish down by empty peg 4 so it was straight in with the slapper  and I soon had a 6 lb fish in the net, but the fish disappeared from that area, but there were a few small packs of fish about and I managed to mug a few more in the next hour but that was it , by now both Tom thick n 19 and andy hembrow on 18 were catching over to the island but apart from those two most people were finding it hard, I went on to the 11 mtr line with banded 6 mm over loosed fed 4,s , first fish was a skimmer , the next bite was from a carp, I played it down to my top set and all seemed good , that was until the elastic snapped and I lost the lot, but it has been in since last summer so only me to blame for that one, over on the island it wasnt to good either with only one small carp and a few f1,s, so down the margins on the meat and 4 quick carp from the left and one from the right , then that went quiet, so onto 5 mtrs and one there aswell, but that was all there , by the halfway mark I was not to far adrift of Tom and andy , and with some fish off the island it was all getting a bit tight, but the fish seem to have other things on there minds as it was hard to line them up anywhere, back onto the 5 mtr meat line and I was catching a few , then elastic number 2 decides to snap while playing a fish, the elastic dropped into the water and I managed to wrap the elastic around the top set , I was now handlineing an angry 8 lb fish . Then the line broke and the float bristle went right into my finger, but I never cried, it certainly hurt more pulling it out than it did going in at 100 mph, I also got my other piece of elastic back from ziggy on peg one when he caught the rig, and landed the fish , I did ask for the fish aswell, but I think he may
Have said no, but swapping round the various lines I kept odd fish coming, ending up with 22 carp
And double figures of silvers, with some of the fish being doubles I thought I would have120 plus,
So I was pleased when my nets went156.4 for first
2nd was Tom thick on 19 with 107.6
3rd joe McMahon on 21 with 82.8
4 th andy hembrow on 18 with 73.15
5 th ziggy slowisnki on peg 1 with 70.8
6th stuart Stevens on 15 with  58.15
Silvers went to Aaron britnell on 11 with 24 .8 of skimmers on meat

Bank holiday Monday open , landsend fishery

28 turned up today so mike let us spread out over the three lakes so plenty of room for all,  I let beamy draw for me which was a mistake as he gave me  35 which has been very hard for months, the only good thing was that he drew 40 for himself  which has been on a par with my peg, serves him right .
I set up a couple of pellet rigs for over , one to fish shallow and the other to fish on the deck by the island , a meat rig for 14 mtrs on and angle towards peg 36 which was empty and a meat rig for the margins which only gave me one bite which was a three pound bream , so no more about that then , I started the match fishing small pieces of meat over soaked micros on the  14 mtr line and feeding 6,s to the island in a couple of spots, by now Tom mangnall on 31 was catching carp as was mat tomes on 31 but I wasn't to suprised about that as he had practised on the same peg on Saturday morning,
I,m not going to bore with the details but the fish went mad , it's not often these wary landsend give themselves up to readily, but today they had a bit of a munch, I ended up with 17 carp and 24 lb of silvers for 107 lb and tenth on the day,
1st on the day went to rob Wooten  on 28 with 223.1 which is his best weight to date so well done, rod caught early on hard pellet over to the island , but he caught really well in the last couple of hours fishing banded pellet down to empty peg 27 pallet
2nd and it was that man again , Craig Edmunds on 17 with 189.13
3rd Tom mangnall on 31 with 182.2
4th chris Davis on 55 with 171.7
5 th andy hembrow on 42 with 170.14, he would have had more but didn't take enough nets down the bank and threw back 8 lb of silvers to use the net for carp
6 th mat tomes on 33 with 170.4
Top silver weight went to nick Collins on peg 3 with  40.7 of crucians, f1,s skimmers and roach on caster
So it fished well which hopefully bodes well for next Sunday when it's round 2 of the float only league ,for anyone who needs to practice there is a match there weds so give me a ring at the shop to book in

Acorn pole only series, final round

This match was back to a random draw so into the draw tin and out comes peg 1 on paddock which is over the bridge and on the right hand end of the island, I had some good anglers in my section including league leader Pete Bartlett who had drawn end peg 9 so he was going to be the man to beat.
As for rigs , I set up a margin rig for meat to fish each side, a 5 mtr meat rig for straight out and a couple of pellet rigs for right over, one to fish. Shallow against the bank and the other to fish on the. Deck on Top of the shelf, at the start I cupped in some meat at 5mtrs and the margins and some pellets across, starting across I expected a bite airily quickly but it was a while before I had an indication, I started feeding a few 6, s with a catty and the noise seemed to help as some fish started showing, I was feeding two areas on the far side and there were odd fish showing on both , but there's far side fish can be cagey at times and with the sun behind me the pole was casting a shadow right where I wanted to fish, so that wasnt helping, the 5 mtr line was useless as I never had a bite on it, the left hand margin didn't give me a fish and the right hand side yielded 5 carp and 1 tench, the only rig I could catch on was the rig to fish on the deck across , and the. Swims were getting stronger towards the end , I didn't want the match to end. But it did and I thought I may have about 80lb but was pleasantly suprised when my catch went 99.15 , but that was only good enough for. Second in the section as, as expected Pete Bartlett won the section on peg 9 with 112.3 but that was only good enough for second as brian slipper on 33 had 112.15 , and with Lewis jones on 23 with 108lb it was a tight affair , silvers on the day went to Paul faieres on 3 on the top lake with 35 lb ish of skimmers,
The league title went to Pete Bartlett with a perfect score of 40 points so well done to him
 Second went to Tom thick with 37 points and third place went to someone at the other end of the age spectrum in the shape of mike nicholls also on 37 points but missing out on weight.
It was a good well. Run league so well done chris fox and Paul faieres for doing it , I think the fishing has suffered due to the crappy spring weather we have had hopefully we will get the weather we want   Next year, who knows , the met office certainly don't !!!!!!!!