Southern Shandy Matchman

Monkey/Muppetts and Shandies July 4th & 5th

2008-07-28T13:30:00.000-07:00

Every year since the first Total-Fishing.com/ACA match in 2003, I have had the pleasure of visiting Roy Marlows Glebe fishery. This is in my humble opinion one of the best fisherys in the country and I wish I lived closer.
This year due to work commitments I was unable to make the TF/ACA festival at the end of May, but not to miss out I was booked in for THE match of the year, the clash of North Vs Midlands Vs South. The Monkeys Vs The Muppetts Vs the Shandies.

The match was arranged to be fished over 2 days the first being running line only, with the second day to be any method allowed on the fishery. This was to be a team event with one man from each of the 3 teams in each section, the winner of the section getting 1 point down to 3 for last. After the 2 days fishing the team with the lowest points gets the bragging rights for the next year.

Both myself and the usual travelling partner Mark set off for the Longshoot Hotel nr Nuneaton(our base for the next couple of days) Thursday afternoon after work after a couple of very shakey moments which included Mark having to get his seatbox frame wielded up at the last minute and then Mark driving off only to see his wallet shoot of the roof of the car. Anyway with those events behind us we arrived safely at the hotel, unloaded the kit and headed to the bar for some drinks and food followed by a few of us trying our hand at a pub quiz and not doing so well and finally to bed late.

The following day dawned and promised to be very hot, so much so that I stopped at the local supermarket to get some sun cream.

We all met at the Glebe fishery where the usual pre draw banter was flowing, with this being a team event our captain Ricky Baxter drew one of 3 envelopes with the teams pegs in then we had to draw our peg from those in the envelopes. I did my usual and drew a crap peg. Peg 104 on pool 7, oddly enough I have had the pleasure of this peg twice before and both times previously I have struggled to catch anything from the peg.

My plan was to be to start on the feeder, while feeding pellet on the waggler line hoping to catch the carp shallow, all the while feeding down the edge looking to catch on the long rod.
At the all in I chucked my loaded feeder across to the far bank, and started to feed pellet on the waggler line. Almost immediately I could see fish milling around feeding on the pellet line, but decided to keep on the feeder and let the fish get a bit more confident. After an hour of fishing all I had managed on the feeder were a handful of skimmers and a perch, so I decided to have a crack on the pellet waggler, first cast and I was straight into a carp. Unfortunately that was all I managed on the pellet waggler and the feeder failed to produce any fish other than the odd skimmer.
All the while the Northern monkey who I was pitted against was catching the odd carp by fishing paste on the waggler just beyond the rod tip, seeing as I was not catching on either of my other lines and no fish were showing down the edge so I decided to follow suit and try to catch some fish on the paste. I quickly set the rig up and and within minutes I was into my second carp with several more following in the next hour before the bites went off and I was struggling again. As we were getting into the final hour I decided to lash some bait in down the edge to try and get a few fish to finish off with, and it worked. 10 mins after throwing in 2 pints of hemp some pellets, corn and caster there were tails and vortex's in the margins. This resulted in me managing to put a couple more fish in the net before the all out.

Unfortunately my efforts were not enough to win my section (of 2) and I ended the day pretty hacked off that I had been limited to fishing a rod and line when I know I could have got more out of the peg with the pole. But what really mattered was the Shandies managed to win day 1 by just 1 point so it would all hinge on the following days result.

Friday 9th May - Rood Ashton evening match

2008-05-10T00:06:00.000-07:00

Summer is finally here!! With temperatures hitting 24deg and light winds for the last few days, prospects of a good days fishing were looking good.

This was to be my first outing with a new club, as well as my first visit to Rood Ashton lake just outside Trowbridge. A venue that I had heard loads about but never got round to visiting.

With the draw set to be done a 5pm with fishing from 5.45 to 8.45 I had to get away from work early and be on the road in time to get to Wests Tackle in Trowbridge to sort my licence and meet up with Mark. I left home at about 3.20thinking that would give me more than enough time, but it was one of those afternoons where every moron was out trundling along at 40mph on a main road, also with the A36 being closed at Bath much of the through traffic was now being re-directed through Westbury and Trowbridge, I only just managed to get there in time.

After meeting with Mark we shot off to get to the venue, arriving with enough time to get our kit out and pay our pools. While waiting for the draw Mark and I went for a walk to look at the pegging, Mark pointed out the pegs that he would and wouldn't like to draw.

At the draw Mark was quite happy with his draw (Peg 9) this put him in the area where a match the evening before had been won from but I had drawn my usual duff peg (peg 1) No-one it appears wanted to draw my peg and I got various comments about not being in with a chance.

The peg itself was the nearest to the carpark, which is great when you have limited time to set up. As I was tackling up I could see plenty of fish moving around so felt quite confident of putting a few fish in the net.

There was one main feature of the peg that appealed to me, and that was the end of a large reed bed that stretched from in front of me right across to the other side of the lake, I decided on a main line at 14m against the reeds, the rig consisted of .20 main line to a 14 barbless carp feeder hook and a korum blob float attached to some tightened 14s elastic to give me half a chance of getting the fish out. I also fed 2 margin lines as a backup to rest my main lines both were long at about 13/14m one either side, these had a little more space to control the fish and were rigged up with a 4x10 dura float size 14 hook again to a purple hydro.

On the whistle I deposited a pot of Carp Vader 4mm pellets on each margin line before putting some paste on the hook and shipping it out to the reed bed. Almost straight away I had indications on the float but it took a few minutes to hook my first fish which bolted straight into the reed bed before I could react, by keeping the pole above the fishes head I eventually extracted a fish of about 2lb. With that first fish it became apparent some extreme measures were required for me to stop the fish getting into the reeds.

The next cast saw me hitting the bite by quickly dragging the pole to my left, this worked a treat and I soon had the carp going in the keep net rather than the reeds. After about an hour the fish backed off a little and the bites became hard to hit, so I decided to rest the line and try my left hand margin. This produced a couple of very quick fish then it went quiet so I re-fed and went back out against the reeds, this produced a couple of very quick fish before I snagged up on some line that looked thick enough to tow a truck. I pulled for a break, and unfortunately my elastic broke, this really put me off my stride, I set up another rig quickly enough on another top kit but I didn't have any more kits with a strong enough solid elastic and even though I was using tightened red drennan bungee it still had a little more stretch which meant that the fish were making it into reeds and my hooked to landed ratio went down but I kept enough fish going in the net till the last to keep me in contention.

Drawing peg 1 also meant that I had the honour of scales duty as well, seeing as there was another set of scales round the other side of the lake it seemed obvious that I should start with myself and work round, I got the angler on peg 2 weigh me in and was reasonably pleased to put 59lb 9oz which was the best weight out of those I weighed in and as it turned out enough for me to win the match, second place weighed in 53lb and Mark was 3rd with 50lb, as it turned out the lake had fished poorly and that had let me make the most out of a difficult peg.

Todber Manor Wadmill lake.

2008-05-04T11:58:00.000-07:00

Today's plan was to put in some practice on the pellet waggler ready for an upcoming float only league being fished on a variety of venues. But as with everything I seem to do at the moment it all went a little wrong, well a complete waste of time TBH.

I got down to the lake early to try and get a couple of decent pegs for Mark and myself, I chose a couple of swims in the middle of the lake and while waiting for Mark decided to set my kit up in a swim looking out over open water, the intention was to start fishing the waggler on the deck and come up in the water. Just as I was getting set up Mark arrived and settled into the next peg to my right looking at the point of an island, his plan was the same as mine but he would fish over to the point of the island again starting on the deck but aiming to get them on the pellet waggler a bit later on.

We started fishing and as expected Mark was getting indications straight away and 5 Min's in hooked and lost his first fish, a further 5 min after that he hooked and this time landed a big F1 about 2lb. All the while I was playing around with depths etc.. trying to get presentation right, surprisingly the weather forecast was wrong again and we had quite strong winds and later in the sessions thunder, lightning and heavy rain, which made presentation particularly difficult.
An hour went by and apart for a couple of quick knocks I had yet to have a bite, Mark mean while had managed to put a couple more fish in the net but was missing bite indicating that the fish had come up in the water. A switch to a dumpy waggler saw him catch another couple of fish fairly quickly

2 hours in and I had yet to get a bite Mark had about 6 fish and things were not looking good. I decided to switch to the pole and see if I could catch some on the paste. It took me about half an hour before I got my first indication which provided me with my first fish, a bream of about 5lb , next drop in I hooked another one, but the hook pulled, then another drop in and I hooked what felt like a carp but again the hook pulled. That went up the bank for a while and out went the waggler again, for the next couple of hours I switched between the pole and the waggler and put in a stunning display of catching nothing. Finally the float on the paste rig shot away and I was again rewarded with a bream, that I suspected was the same fish as they were both missing most of their tail.

Well, that was it for me. I had successfully managed to visit a lake solid with carp and avoid every one of them, Mark finished up with 11 fish up to about 8lb and we both set off for home soaking wet and totally fed up.

Todber manor park lake 27th April

2008-04-27T12:39:00.000-07:00

Will this summer ever get started? Well yesterday (saturday) wasn't bad but I was busy doing some gardening, which left me with today. The forecast was breezy and wet and the only reason I was looking forward to it was because it was on the Park Lake at Todber Manor. I venue I enjoy fishing and usually do quite well on.

Well the day started with me cooking breakfast for Mark and myself, its always better to go fishing on a full stomach, while I cooked Mark loaded my kit ready to get down to the lake. With breakie eaten we make the 5 min trip from my house down to todber and arrived to find quite a few already there keen to get going. Very quickly we were mugged for our pools money before taking a walk with Tim Suttle who was running the match to work out the pegging, although when the draw was made, there was obviously a mistake because several people including myself ended up on pegs that weren't going to be put in.

I found myself for a change on a reasonable draw, Peg 30. As everyone started to get settled I discovered that I had 2 spare pegs to my left and the pleasure of Ian Hornby (Herbie for those who know him from TF fame.) on my right.

Looking at my peg I was pleased to see a couple of nice holes in the far bank grasses which on this venue is usually a bonus. My plan of attack was initially based on 3 lines, 1 against the far bank, 1 at 11m down the middle and a 3rd line in my left hand margin. And for me on this venue the chief bait is paste for all three lines. I had 2 pastes with me that I make at home, the first is my trusty basic paste made with ground pellets and the second was a paste I had made with some carp vader predator+ pellets ground up with water added. This produced a really nice vivid red paste with an interesting odour.... And as it turned out very effective texture.

On to the match then, on the all it I potted my usual mixture of hemp and pellets onto the margin and track lines, then popped some paste on the hook and shipped out to far bank. Fairly quickly I had a couple of fish but it was obvious that the fish were mooching around off the deck rather than getting their heads down due to lots of missed bites. I spent the next hour switching between rigs trying to put a few fish together but struggled with lots of missed bites and foul hooked fish and with a tricky wind I also kept hooking up in the far bank grass.

By now I had hoped that my track paste line would be solid with fish, first drop in and I was getting indications many of which I was missing, eventually I managed to hit one of these iffy bites which turned out to be a small F1 not the proper carp that I usually manage on the 11m line. It soon became apparent that the lake wasn't fishing as well as normal and some changes needed to be made.
I felt that I had overfed the paste line, so the only thing I could do was to decide on a different line and start again. This turned out to be an inspired move as after feeding a small amount of pellets and letting it settle for 30min I went over it and started to pick up the odd fish, by letting the paste feed the swim it started to get stronger and stronger and this time I was catching proper carp averaging 3lb. By resting the swim occasionally and going down the edge I managed to get into a steady rhythm, that was until I trashed my main paste rig after snagging up. Even though I put an identical rig on it just didn't sit right and I couldn't get back fully into my catching rhythm for the last hour.

On the final whistle I felt I'd done a reasonable weight but not enough to win anything, those drawn further down the section to my right had appeared to be sacking all day and looked set to weigh in some big weights. First to weigh in was eventual match winner Kev Abigail on end peg 37 one of the ones that appeared to be sacking from beginning to end. Kev put 112lb on the scales, then the weights dropped to 70lb followed by 66lb until they got to me, I was quite surprised to put 90lb 08oz on the scales which was second until Guy Manton on peg 25 put 92lb exactly to push me back to 3rd.

Ultimately an interesting match in which I had to really work to get the best out of the peg.

Wednesday 2nd April - Viaduct

2008-04-22T11:51:00.000-07:00

Well, I have got a bit behind lately with this blog due to work and home commitments. Anyway I have now started to catch up and I begin with the wednesday open I fished at Viaduct in Somerton to try and get up to speed before the Fish-o-mania qualifier that I had managed a ticket for.

This time rather than my usual travelling partner Mark Poppleton, I was being picked up by a good friend from work Mark Brennan who fishes for Thatchers. He collected me nice and early to give us plenty of time to get there and get the kit out the van before the draw, I prefer it that way because I can get straight off to my peg and give myself as much time as I can to set up.

At the draw I was first in the Que and hoping for peg 85 or 86 on Cary, but as per usual I managed to NOT draw either of those pegs and pulled out Peg 102 on Cary. Having never fished the peg, I spoke to Matt Parsons (Son of one of the lakes owners.) about the peg I had drawn, and he confirmed my fears that it wasn't too good a draw. But after my last session at Willinghurst I left for my peg hoping that the fish had decided to move about a bit.

As it turned out I was pleased to find that I had an end peg with no-one any closer to the carpark that was off to my left, and a spare peg between me and the next angler so felt that I had a reasonable chance to catch a few fish with the space I had.

After plumbing around I decided on 3 pole lines the first was to be long at 14.5m fishing pellet for the carp, the second was at 6m for the skimmers if the carp were not playing ball. (Viaduct usually pays top 2 silvers weights as well as top 3 overall.) and the 3rd was long down the margins to my left in front of the next pallet. With the wind blowing in against the bank I really fancied it for a few fish. The finally I set up my trusty lead rod to fish out towards the middle of the lake, this was to be my opening line while the pole lines settled.

I spent the first hour fishing the lead trying to snare a few carp on the lead with double Carp Vader halibut crab pellets on the hair. Feeding hard pellets over the top via the catapult, to say it was rather slow would be exaggerating. It took me 40min to get my first bite which resulted in a tench, then a further 20min before I put my first carp in the net. This was about the time the wheels really fell off.
My plan had been to spend the first hour or so fishing for the carp, and unless I was catching well switch to the skimmers for the following 4 hours before switching back to the carp. While setting up the wind was stiff but manageable, but as the match started the wind began to get stronger to the point that I couldn't fish my 14.5m pole line, which was OK because I'd fed at 6m for the skimmers or so I thought.
First put in on my skimmer line and it was obvious that it was solid, as the float just settled then disappeared. Most of the fish I was catching were about 4 to 6oz but I felt confident that if I kept the bait going in the bigger fish would move in. But the problem of the wind was getting worse and had started to cause me to loose fish, as I was hooking the fish and the wind would catch the pole and tear the hook out of their mouths. I gave it about half an hour before giving up as to do a weight you need to be putting fish steadily in the net and I was losing fish after fish due to the wind.
This left me with 1 choice, and that was to go back out on the tip for the carp, the thing is it can be boring fishing when your not getting many bites, and bites were hard to come by and there appeared to be no pattern to it except that I'd get a couple of carp then nothing for ages and no matter what I did I just couldn't keep the coming.
After a while the wind calmed down enough for me to try my margin line, and although I was convinced that I'd catch a few down the edge, I didn't even have a bite. It was one of those matches where I was glad to hear the final whistle and wasn't surprised when I weighed in 46lb and I would guess last in the section the match was won by Martin Preston off of peg 85 with 207lb. I was apperent at the end of the match that the fish were still shoaled quite tight as Dave Britten 2 pegs away on peg 87 had struggled for just a handfull of fish.

Willinghurst Top Lake

2008-03-24T01:23:00.000-07:00

Have you ever had one of those days where you've arrived at the fishery looked at the weather conditions and decided that you must be a complete lunatic and should have stayed in bed? Well this was one of those days.

Due to taking my daughter to stay with her grandparents in Crawley over Easter, I found myself at a loose end so decided to make the most of the journey and take in a match at a different venue for a change. Through the winter I tend to stay fairly local sticking mainly to venues that I know will produce a few fish no matter what the conditions, but come the spring I like to spread my wings a bit and try places further afield.

Anyway, I arrived at the cabin where I discovered the 6 other blokes who were fishing the match sheltering from the howling wind. A discussion was going on about which pegs would be used on top lake, the aim being to put people on the fish but also where they would have the wind off their backs to make life a little comfortable. With peg decided upon the draw was made, the favored pegs were 7 or 8 either side of the aerator but my drawing arm failed again as is usual and pulled out peg 10, I was almost immediately told that I was the wrong end of the lake and that the fish had been showing around the aerator.

I decided to feed and fish 3 lines, my main line and the one I expected to catch the most fish on was the lead cast toward the centre of the lake, the second line was the long pole at 13m and finally a line in the margin toward my right, tight in against a nice fishy looking bed of reeds.

On the all in I fed a small amount of micro pellet and corn on the pole lines then cast the lead out. Within minutes I could see that the chap to my right on peg 9 was playing a fish, as was Ian Summers on peg 7 this set the tone for the first half of the match and it soon became obvious that I was fishing for second.

After about 15Min's I had my first indication of fish with a quick liner, then a few moments later the tip wrapped round and I had my first fish a common that I estimated went about 5lb. 10 Min's later the same thing happened and I put a second fish in the net. That was it for the next 2 hours, I came off the lead for a while and tried the pole to no avail, what didn't help was the lake was towing hard in the opposite direction to the wind and made it impossible to present a bait on the pole. 2 1/2 hours into the match and the tip finally went round again out of the blue and a smaller mirror of about 2lb went into the net. Why is it that those little fish go off like rockets and cause more problems when you try and net them than fish 4 times their size?

At this stage the cold wind and the shock of catching a fish forced me off my box down to the cabin to get a cup of tea and a hot pie, that is one of the best bits of fishing commercials in the winter. I returned to my peg and chucked out the lead again with double hair rigged corn and proceeded to eat my pie which warmed me up considerably, the fish were kind enough to let me finish the pie but didn't wait for me to finish drinking my cuppa. A pattern started to emerge in the second half of the match, by catapulting a few pellets over the lead I found I was getting a fish on average every 10 Min's this continued right through to the end of the match.

I was the first to be weighed in, before pulling my net out I estimated I had maybe 40lb and for those that don't know Willinghurst they have a 65lb per net rule. As I pulled my net out I realised that I had too much in the 1 net, it took 2 weighs to find that my actual weight was 74lb but due to the rules at Willinghurst this was capped at 65lb. To say I wasn't impressed by myself is an understatement and being first to weigh in wasn't sure what it could cost me. I was pretty sure that Ian Summers on peg 7 had won the match as every time I looked up he was playing a fish. Following the scales along I discovered that I had beaten everyone up to Ian,and waited to see what he weighed. A couple of weighs later and I discovered it was close with Ian putting 79lb on the scales to take top spot, I breathed a sigh of relief that my error in estimating the fish in my net hadn't cost me the match and I still managed to hang on to 2nd spot and a brown envelope. Not a bad days work really on a lake I have never fished before and from a peg that I was told was the wrong end of the lake, goes to show you never know.

Kennet and Avon canal, Devizes

2008-03-23T01:02:00.000-07:00

This was another session that didn't go quite as planned or hoped. Mark and myself had arranged to meet Ken Rayner and Tim Suttle at the canal for a little friendly knock up and a chance to see if the big fish had woken up from their winter slumber yet.
We had hoped to fish a pound at the top of the Cain hill locks called Curries but during the week preceding we discovered that the pound had been virtually drained out, probably for maintenance. The decision was made to head to the bottom of Cain hill and fish one of the last pounds called fox hangers.

On arrival at the canal it actually looked in quite good shape with a nice bit of colour that left us all feeling confident of a few fish. A hastily arranged draw saw Ken sit himself down on the end peg nearest the upper lock gate, next in line was Tim with a jungle opposite then there was me and finally Mark had the downstream end peg, with a huge sum of £1 each thrown into the pot things could get interesting.

The pounds at the bottom of Cain hill are noted for the number of carp that reside in them, particularly the pound above where we were fishing so we were all aiming to target the carp in our approaches.

For me this meant fish the bomb and pellet or corn against the far bank for the Carp. On the pole I decided to fish 2 lines, the first at 9m where I was feeding groundbait and pinkie for the small silvers, and a longer line at 14.5m feeding pellet and corn mainly for the skimmers but hoping the odd carp may venture away from the far bank .
I started by cupping in a couple of balls of groundbait with pinkie and a pinch of caster at 9m, then a ball of fishmeal groundbait with some pellet in at 14.5m then left these to settle and cast the lead over to the far bank and sat back in anticipation.
The first sign that something wasn't quite right came from Tim who is an accomplished canal angler. He had started on a bread line at 3m, and after 5Min's hadn't had the slightest indication of any fish let alone a bite. As Tim put it, you know things are going to be rock hard when you can't get an immediate response on the bread.

During this time Mark had like me been fishing the lead near to the far bank and had been getting plenty of liners to show that there were fish in his peg but had failed to get and proper bites. After half an hour of this he decided to drop in on his long pole line to see if the liners were coming from fish over his pellet. And immediate response from a small skimmer made us think that the fish had moved over the pellet but alas it was just a solitary fish.

A couple of hours into the session it was evident that something wasn't right, the canal looked OK but we had caught about 10 fish between the 4 of us. I think we all knew that for some reason the fish didn't want to feed at all and that we had probably killed our swims dead with our initial feed. Meanwhile Mark latched into what appeared to be a carp on the pole and carefully played it for about 5 Min's before the fish made a last ditch bid for freedom going under his keepnet at his feet and breaking him. On such a hard day, I did find myself feeling slightly sorry for him but that only lasted a couple of seconds because the main task on any day's fishing is to batter Mark and it would have made that impossible if he'd landed that fish.

Another hour or so passed in which we all managed to put a couple of small fish in the net but then the next calamity struck.
Tim was only able to stay until about 1pm because he wanted to get back to watch the footie, so he packed up and left way before us. Shortly after he left Mark phone rang, it was Tim apparently our cars had been locked in by the landowner. As we understood it we were OK to park where we had met, but it turned out that it wasn't OK and the landowner had got the hump and decided to lock the gates and was threatening to get the cars towed away.

Luckily Mark is both a big chap and a very good diplomat, he trotted on down the towpath to have a chat with the landowner and after half an hour of discussions the chap relented and unlocked the gate giving us a reasonable amount of time to pack up our stuff and get going.
This was an unfortunate end to the day but it did save us the embarrassment of weighing in, Ken did weigh his net and had just over 3lb of bits. I would estimate that my net wasn't any better and Mark tipped back about 4 skimmers and a couple of small perch. Much to Kens disappointment we called the result void as we didn't get to finish fishing properly.

Clivey Fishery - Main lake

2008-03-14T14:40:00.000-07:00

Up until now Mark was having a bit of a mare when it came to catching fish, and his confidence was running low. We also wanted to spend some time playing around with some of their baits and flavours kindly supplied to us by our sponsers Carp Vader.

After much discussion through the week via email, we both decided that our best chance of catching a few fish and being able to play with baits was to head to Clivey Fishery and fish the main lake. We had arranged to meet up there as its somewhere between where we live, and I think Mark is really enjoying his new found freedom after getting back on the road.

I, as usual was late arriving and whilst waiting for me Mark had taken a stroll around the lake and ear marked a couple of pegs to try out. Mark decided to take the peg that offered him the point of two of the islands as well as some open water, while I took another peg that gave me the other point of the island as well as a little open water.

I set up 1 rig to fish against the island where I was pleased to find about 2.5ft of water, and a second rig to fish a line in the open water.
To start with, I fed a small amount of micro pellet and a few grains of corn into the open water swim and left that to settle whilst I started to target the the island feeding a little micro pellet and corn through a kinder pot. After half an hour of no bites, I changed and put a maggot on the hook and almost immediately had a bite which turned out to be from a small perch. Despite trying all my lines I failed to get anymore bites in the following hour and a half.
Now with two hours gone and only 3 fish between us (1 perch, 1 roach and 1 tiny carp) we decided that something was obviously not quite right, although there was evidence of fish moving all around the lake neither of us could get so much of a sniff. We decided that we would move around the other side of the lake where the sun has reaching the water in the hope that the fish had moved into the shallower water warmed by the sun.

It didn't take us long to move round the lake and we settled into the swims we fished last time we fished the lake, only this time we swapped over swims.

I plumbed up and fed two swims, the first was against the island in front of me, that I decided to feed sparingly through a kinder cup, the second swim is one that owner Chris Haines pointed out to Mark last time we were there. Off to the right at about 6 to 8m there is a lily bed that had died off through the winter -by using a heavy plummet you can feel the remains of the lily bed on the bottom, by fishing on the edge of this you find the fish. And so it proved on this day.

I kicked the second line off by feeding about a quarter of a large drennan pot of micro pellet and about 10 grains of corn. The fish responded almost immediately and I had the first decent fish of the day, a carp of 3lb. I went over it again and almost immediately had another couple of fish before it went quiet. I decided to rest the line and went over to the island but failed to get a bite in the following half hour. I switched back to the right hand line and caught another fish before things went quiet again, what eventually became apparent was that the fish would respond immediately I fed through the big pot and I would catch 3 or 4 fish before they backed off and I would have to feed again. I carried on catching like this for the rest of the day picking off the odd fish here and there and getting smashed by a very large fish. I guess I finished up with about 50lb of carp in the end, caught on a very hard day.

Judging by the mare of a day Mark, where he just couldn't get a bite whatever he did it-proved that the fish must have been shoaled up very tightly. Heres wishing for the warmer weather to come along, I'm now fed up with winter.

Clivey Fishery

2008-02-22T12:42:00.000-08:00

This session had to go down as one to forget.
With nowhere to go and funds running low, Mark and myself decided to meet up and have another go at Clivey fishery. Unfortunately we discovered during the week that the main (bigger lake) was booked for a match, so we decided to give the small lake behind the shop a go.
Now neither of us had ever seen this lake before, but a number of different people had told us the lake was solid and we would have a reasonable days fishing.

Now, another reason we didn't look for a match was because Mark was constrained by time, he had to drop 'She who must be obeyed' off at work and pick her up afterwards. Because of this, we planned to meet up at the fishery about 8am. The first thing that didn't bode well, was when I arrived shortly before 8am and got my first look at the lake. To say it small would be over gunning it. My description to Mark via text was 'ITS TINY!'

The pond must have been about 30m wide by 40m long with 1 central island, and on this he has managed to fit 8 pegs. Mark arrived shortly after me and made much the same comment as me, after a short discussion we decided to give it a go as we were already there.

We set up on 2 pegs that meant we could both comfortably reach the island, plan of attack was quite simple really, 1 line tight in to the island for the carp and another rig in open water for the skimmers. Baits for the day were to be maggot, corn and pellet, a small amount of micro pellet was deposited on the skimmer line and left to settle while I started against the island.

I decided to feed a pinch of micro pellet and a couple of grains of corn through a kinder pot, first put in produced a bite and a fish within 30 seconds. Unfortunately Mark also managed a fish almost instantly but his fish was about 1.5lb whilst mine was about 4oz. This set the pattern for the next 40minutes, with Mark catching fewer but bigger fish but still storming ahead, at this point we both felt that as long as we continued to have the pond to ourselves it would be a good day.

Well, we shouldn't have opened our big mouths. Shortly after that, 2 young lads turned up and headed over to the other side of pond to set up, at this point the fishing noticeably slowed.
Not helped by one of the lads plumbing up against the island less than a metre from Marks' island swim and they promptly starting to feed with a catapult all over the place! That was the start of our troubles. As I have already said, the fishing slowed dramatically. Mark was still picking off the odd fish against the island, helped by the fact that he was able to get right up close without getting caught up in undergrowth. It was about this time I got my rig caught in the tree on the island and discovered just how strong .12 line is. Now why do we get those times when playing a fish and the line seems to go easily, but then when you snag up it appears to be the strongest line known to man. In this instance I ended up snapping the elastic rather than the line.

I set up again with a different top kit and continued to try and extract a few fish from the island, this time going as tight to the cover as I possibly can. I was just managing to get 1 or 2 fish going again when 2 young kids both about 9/10 years old turned up and started setting up opposite me with in interesting array of tackle that included carp rods, a beach tripod and most worryingly a spod! Luckily they didn't actually use it whilst we were there but they did both set up huge maggot feeders, the first landed about 1ft from the tree I was fishing near and the second landed almost right on top of my skimmer line.

Now, I have a little bit of an anger issue when things aren't exactly going my way. I think it would be fair to say I am a bad loser, and although I have decided to work hard at keeping my cool this was the last straw as I was being battered by Mark and now sharing my swim with 2 kids and their feeders that wouldn't look out of place being thrown across the Severn.

Well rather than go round the other side of the lake and throw these 2 kids and their tackle into the lake I decided to pack up and go home, and finally admit defeat to Mark.

Lavington AA Vs Airsprung AA, Merrits lake.

2008-02-18T12:22:00.000-08:00

All week both Mark and myself had been looking forward to this match, with the weather having being settled and quite mild at the start of the week. We both felt that the lakes would fish quite well, and with both lakes being used we thought that a draw on the top lake could be good and the fish might even come shallow. But as the weekend drew near the weather decided to get very cold at night which as it turned out made the match a real grueller for most.

When loading the car it was that cold that I decided it would be a good idea to put the ice breaker in the car for the first time in a couple of years. At the draw several people were commenting that their car thermometers were reading -7deg, even so I was surprised to find that both lakes were virtually free of ice.

After paying my pools I drew my peg to find I had drawn peg 7 on the top lake, from experience this is the wrong part of the lake to draw, the early pegs in particular peg 2 are usually the better pegs when its cold. I felt that Mark on peg 3 was in with a good chance and had a better peg than me, also in my section was young Nathaniel Johnson a promising young angler who this year has started to fish for Preston innovations Thatchers.

My plan of attack revolved round fishing maggot and corn long on the pole, and corn on the straight lead cast out to and around a distinct bar in the centre of the lake. I set up a .5gram Carpa Porth for the long pole and decided to feed 1 line at 14.5m with a couple of balls of black swimstim laced with pinkies and a few casters, then let this settle and spend the first hour or so fishing the straight lead.

After feeding the pole line I picked up my trusty bomb rod and cast out with double corn on a hair rig. Just as I was tightening up the peace was shattered by the guy on the next peg throwing out on of the largest method balls I have ever seen, the resulting waves nearly washed anglers from the bank. I sat there hoping, no WISHING that he would just leave it out there until he got a bite, but 5 minutes later he reeled in after striking at a bite. Most of the groundbait was still around the feeder, but he added more and out went the coconut again
During this time, I had my first fish followed quickly by the second. This prompted 'Method Man' to reel in again and swap his hook bait over from maggot to corn.

After taking those first couple of fish quite quickly things went fairly quiet, (well apart from the erruption everytime my neighbour cast out) with just the odd liner for the next 40min. I decided it was time to have a quick look on the pole line, and was surprised when the float settled and just disapeared but alas the culprit was a tiny perch rather than the hoped for carp. I gave it a further 15min before feeding another small ball of groundbait, the reaction was almost instant with me hooking my first carp on the pole, unfortunately this carp decided to take off through method mans line and it didn't take long for the hook length to go.

The next couple of hours were spent switching between pole and tip picking off the odd fish on both lines, going into the last hour I felt that a change was needed, looking around I could see the guy on peg 2 catching, and the 2 directly opposite me were starting to put a few in the net fishing a small feeder, I estimated that I would be fishing for a section at best. It appeared that the fish wanted a bit of feed but put too much in and they backed right off, I managed to keep a few fish coming quite steadily by chucking the feeder out once then switching to the lead until I had caught another couple of fish then switching back to the feeder.

On the whistle I was predicting that the lake winner would probably be peg 2, followed by either of the 2 opposite. Mark had gone for a walk 10 min before the end of the match as he'd managed just 3 roach, he now came along with the scales when he got to me the best weight was 11lb from peg 1 alot lower than I thought it would be, as every time I looked up he seemed to be landing a fish. As I pulled my net out it looked like I could steal the section, as it turned out I weighed 16lb 8oz to take the section. Happy with that I finished packing up and made my way back to the car, in the car park it became apparent that the lower lake had fished badly and I discoved that I had won the top lake and looked like I may have won the match. At the result I discovered I had been beaten to top spot by a guy on the bottom lake, but I was quite happy with 2nd off a peg that I really didn't fancy at the start of the match.

Clivey Fishery, nr Westbury 3rd February 2008

2008-02-07T04:31:00.000-08:00

I was planning to fish a match which was being run on Todber Manor's Park Lake this sunday, but with the prospect of some high winds and heavy rain looming I was a bit reluctant to attend as the lake can be quite exposed and you need to fish 14.5m over to the far bank of this snake lake.
So when a sunday evening meal with my sister and her husband and, my parents who had just got back from a week away was organised, I took the oppertunity to cancel as I was going to be doing the cooking.

This left me with a dilemma, I could be sensible and stay in, or meet up with my regular fishing buddie Mark Poppleton and go and fish somewhere with some shelter for a few hours in the morning. Well I don't need to tell you what my decision was.

After much debate we decided to try a little (and I mean little) lake called Clivey fisheries, there had been reports of some good nets of fish coming out despite the unsettled conditions and most of all it is quite sheltered so we could fish without being battered by the winds.

On arrival I was surprised to see just how small the lake was, but at the same time very well set out with a gravel path all the way round, well made pegs all with loads of features. There are 3 islands so even though its a small lake there wouldn't be arguments as to who's fishing where.

Mark went on ahead to select the swims we would fish, he had spoken to a couple of people that he knows that had recently fished the lake and found out which pegs to sit on.

I found myself on a peg that had stacks of features, I had the point of 2 islands in front of me the one on the left had plenty of overhanging grasses, and the one of the right had a tree overhanging the water that just screamed fish. These were to be my 2 lines, on the left hand swim I found about 2ft of water fairly tight in at the base of a very steep shelf coming off of the island. I set up a 4 x 10 Carpa tricky on .10xt7 for this line to fish the maggot, and a 4 x 12 Dura float 1 for fishing corn and pellet. On the right hand I found a simalar depth as the left hand swim, just 3in deeper, I decided to feed this line positively with micro pellet and corn (soaked in carp vader pineapple 360) so I set up a 4 x 14 dura float on .14 as I expected bigger fish and because it was in an area that was quite windy and I wanted a bit more contol on the float.

I kicked off by feeding a small pinch of mirco pellet on the left hand line, while the right hand line received a larger amount of pellet and about 10 grains of corn.

It took about 10 min before I had my first bite, that turned out to be a carp of about 4lb. Next put in saw my double maggot hookbait taken by a smaller carp of about 2lb. For the next 45mins I kept on picking off the odd fish from this line but wasn't convinced that I was making the most out of the peg. I decided to rest the swim for 10 mins and have a quick look on the right hand line, which failed to produce any evidence of fish present. I topped this line up and decided to try the lighter rig on the left hand swim. This seemed to produce a better response, partly because I had left the line between pole tip and float much longer. It appeared that the fish were easily spooked by the pole, feeding a pinch of micro pellet and a few maggots after each fish seemed to be doing the business as well as lifting and dropping the rig and I was starting to put a few fish in the net.

Meenwhile, Mark was not faring so well on the next peg, he had started against the island in front of him, and appart from a couple of small carp he had virtually nothing to show for his efforts, and to make matters worse he had lost one of his prize Sconezone floats in a tree. About this time the Fishery owner Chris Haines came walking round to relieve us of some money and find out how we were faring. He stayed and chatted to us for some time and told Mark to feed a line about 6 to 7m off to his right, apparently in the summer there is a large lilly bed there, although there was no evidence of it at this time of year. As it happened it was an inspired move, and Mark started to put some fish in the net very quickly just as my line started to fade again.

As Mark was starting to catch up with me quite quickly I decided to rest the left hand swim and have another look beside the tree to my right. Out went the rig with a grain of corn and 5 mins later a slight dip saw me lift into my best fish of the day at about 7lb. That proved to be my one and only fish from that line.

Mark, then chose this time to push me off my box so he could have a go with the Tourny Pro, while he sat down and had a play, I went over to his kit sat down and proceeded to go out and catch carp against the island just where Mark hadn't managed to tempt a bite all morning, much to his annoyance.

After 15 mins of playing with the Pro and catching a number of small carp, Mark and myself decided to call it a day as I had to get back to cook the dinner but I couldn't reasist one last cast. I dropped my float in on the left hand swim and almost instantly the float vanished and loads of elastic started streaming from the pole a short bust spirited fight saw a fish of about 5lb nearing the net when the line parted, never mind I thought, one more last cast with one of the other rigs I had set up. Out went this rig, and again the same thing happened the float settled and vanished. This time I found myself connected to something much bigger as I started to ship back a very large fish surfaced about 8m out, unfortunately this was the last we saw of the fish as it took off down to my left at such a rate I had no chance to add sections. It didn't take long to bottom out the white hydro and snap the line. With that I decided it was now time to pack up.

Anyway for such a small lake we had an interesting day, in a short morning session we hadn't done too badly, Mark had about 25 to 30lb in his net while I had around 10lb more than him. The main thing was that I had beaten him putting me 2 up on him over the year so far.

Todber Manor - Whitepost lakes Sun 27th Jan

2008-01-29T12:23:00.000-08:00

Living in North Dorset like I do, it can sometimes be a real pain trying to find a match to fish. After much searching I finally found a small match being fished on the top lake of Todber Manor's old carp lakes, also known as Whitepost lakes.

Now I haven't fished either of the lakes in a match for quite a long time and the stocking has changed quite dramaticly since that time. The top lake used to contain carp that averaged 5lb with quite a few reaching low doubles, the big carp have mostly been moved on to other lakes on the complex and the majority of fish are in the 1lb to 3lb range with 7lb being about as big as they get.

At the draw I was hoping to draw either pegs 1, 5, or 12 all pegs that make it possible to reach the far bank with the pole and all known as fliers. Peg 1 really appealed as the wind was pushing up into to top end of the lake, and under those conditions has always been known to throw up a good weight. Well my drawing arm didn't fail to produce the usual duff peg, when I put my hand in the bag out came peg 6. Of all the pegs that were in the bag it was one of the two that I really didn't want, peg 14 being the other.

For those that don't know the lakes, peg 5 is a flier, it sits almost on a point giving you 16m to get to the far bank, peg 6 sits back behind peg 5 by about 5m but it is still in the narrow part of the lake just before it opens out into the wider middle section of the lake, this means that even when fishing long you are still fishing well behind peg 5 and a long way off of the far bank. Anyway, I only get the chance to go fishing once a week on average so have to make the most of it, and miracles do happen.

I decided to have 3 lines to cover my options and hopefully keep some fish going in the net throughout the match. The first line was going to be fishing the lead tight over, with either hair rigged pellets or corn soaked in carpvader pinapple 360 (Awesome stuff I can tell you.) the second was at 14.5m fishing corn and pellet, this consisted of a 4x12 preston durafloat 1 (I needed a thicker tip than I would have liked to use because of tricky light conditions) this was rigged up on .12 line to a size 20 b911 and coupled to a no.8 lacky. The final line was a backup line feeding maggot at 5m for silvers, I set up a 4x10 Carpa tricky on .10 XT7 and a size 20 gama black hook.

On the whistle I deposited 20 4ml xpander pellets and 3 grains of corn on the pole line, flicked half a dozon maggot onto the 5m line and cast out the lead with 2 grains of corn on the hair.
Only 10min passed before I had the first wrap round of the day from a lovely plump mirror of about 1.5lb, next cast resulted in the tip going round almost instantly with a slightly bigger fish of about 3lb. Excellent I thought to myself, keep this up and I will be looking at having a good day. Sadly it was not to be, 3 fish graced my net in the first half and hour then it all went quiet. Looking round I had only seen 2 others catch so was quite happy with my start. I gave it another half an hour before deciding to have a look on the pole line 20mins with no sign of a bite on the 14.5m line saw me have a look on the maggot line. This also failed to produce even a bite, so it was back on the bomb. After a further half hour with only 1 fish to show for my efforts a slight change in tack was in order, off came the bomb and hair rig and on went a maggot feeder to see if introducing a few maggots would spark things off as I had seen fish being caught by those that were putting a little feed in.

On the 3rd cast with the maggot feeder the tip flew round and a 3lb fish graced the net, next cast saw the tip hardly settle before it went round again. For the next hour I was catching fairly steadily and felt that I could start to build a weight, but then my neighbour on peg 7 went back out with his feeder and my fish stopped coming while he started catching a few fish.
The rest of the match was pretty uneventful, switching between lines picking off the odd fish but unable to put any number of fish together.

At the weigh in it was pretty obvious who had won, peg 1 had been solid as was expected and the winner had made no mistake putting 67lb of small carp on the scales, what was uncertain was who would fill the rest of the frame places, as it turned out peg 3 managed 39lb for 3rd and Pete Neate the match organiser just managed to pinch 2nd with 42lb off of peg 9. I scraped into 4th place putting exactly 27lb on the scales, just beating peg 7 who weighed 26lb 13oz.

Looking back at how I approached the peg, I don't think there was much I did wrong. The fish were quite obviously tight in against the far bank, as proved a couple of times when I cast right into the reeds and before I could start to retrive the rig the tip went round with a fish on, unfortunately they also snagged me in the reeds. And ultimately I couldn't get close enough or draw those fish out.

Merritts Lake, Silverfish Match 20th Jan (20 Fished)

2008-01-21T13:27:00.000-08:00

This last week I have been really looking forward to this match, for 2 reasons;

Firstly, I really thought that the fish would feed due to the mild weather-this club lake is guaranteed to produce a few fish no matter what the weather. And secondly because I had a new toy to play with! I have just bought myself a Tourney Pro and really wanted the opportunity to test this pole in a fishing situation.
As the week went on I had been chatting to my traveling/fishing partner Mark Poppleton, about the prospects for this match and what we expected to work. All our plans revolved around it being a normal match in which carp counted, and targeting everything that swims by feeding ground bait at 13m.

All these plans had to go out the window following a call from the club match secretary on friday night telling us that it was going to be a silver fish match. So after a bit of thought I decided to have to target the fish on 2 lines, 1 at 13m with groundbait hoping to get a few skimmers, and a short maggot line to target the roach.
Meanwhile Mark decided he would try to target the roach by fishing long and shallow-we both know from experience that it is possible to put together some huge weights of roach in this manner.

The morning of the match arrived, and I looked out of the window to see the tree behind my house being thrashed about by some pretty nasty gusts of wind. Anyway, I loaded the car and set off to collect Mark and get to the draw which was happening at 8am, for once I wasn't late collecting Mark and we arrived with time to get our kit unloaded ready for the draw.
This is essential when fishing the Lavington club matches, as they only give you 45mins to set up(it used to be 30min).
At the draw, I put my hand in and found peg 2 stuck to my hand. This turned out to be the last peg before the island on the car park side of the lake, not the best of draws and if I'm honest didn't fancy my chances. In the usual fashion Mark pulled out peg 14 which I would have been really pleased with, but that's match fishing and you have to make the best out of what you are stuck with.

Anyway, at the peg I discovered I had John Cooper our match secretary on my right on peg 1 and a spare peg to my left. Opposite me was former Fisho champ Kev Rolwes who was on the end peg.
As planned I set up 2 rigs on a no.6 elastic for a line at 5m, both were made up on .10 Ultima XT7 with a .8 XT7 hooklength and a Gamma black hook. The first rig featured a 4x14 Preston Dura float (the slim red one) with a bulk of no.10's and 3 no.11 droppers, the second was a fine 4x12 mossella pattern that was rigged with spread no.11s. I also set up a long rig to fish pinkie and maggot over groundbait for skimmers, this rig was a 1gram Ignesti float rigged up on .10 XT7 again to a .08XT7 with an 18 Gamma black this was attached to a no.8 rubber.

On the whistle 3 balls of Sensas Crazy Bait Black went in on the 13m line laced with a few pinkies and caster, and whilst I left this to settle I started on the 5m line with single maggot on the hook looking to put a few roach in the net.
In the first hour I estimated I had put about 1 1/2lb in the net of little roach, which were coming fairly steadily but I felt not really quick enough to really put a decent weight together. Looking around the lake I could see Mark playing the first of what turned out to be many carp caught fishing shallow (what really amazes me is that all summer we have been trying to catch these carp shallow and not managed it). Other than that of those I could see, I couldn't see much going on, so I decided to have a quick look on the groundbait to give the close in line a rest. This produced a couple of skimmers before I hooked and landed a carp of about 3lb. Another 5 min produced nothing, so I fed another ball and went back on the short line. TBH after that carp, the groundbait line produced very little so I spent most of the rest of the match plugging away on the short line. At halfway I could see Kev Rolwes netting a few skimmers opposite and Mark playing yet another carp, but very little other than that.
With about an an hour left to go, the maggot line slowed right down. I added an extra section and started to search around the feed for the fish, and spent the last part of the match just picking up the odd fish up here and there.

The weigh in started up the top end far side of the lake, and by the time it got to me there was Tom Ince with 8.14 and Kev Rolwes with 8.10 plus a high 7lb. I really wasn't that confident of putting more than 4 to 5lb on the scales, so imagine my surprise when the scales registered a hard earned 8lb 1oz to put me 3rd overall behind 2 very good silverfish anglers, and from a peg that I really didn't fancy at the start of the match! Most importantly I beat Mark who put enough carp on the bank to walk the match easily if carp counted, and claim back another of the many £1 coins I lost to him last year.

Final Result

1st - Tom Ince - 8lb 14oz

2nd - Kev Rolwes - 8lb 10oz

3rd - Nick Merry - 8lb 1oz

Saturday 12th January - Witherington Farm

2008-01-12T13:20:00.000-08:00

Witherington Farm - 9 fished

For my first match of 2008 I was booked into a match organised by Nicky the Bricky (of Total Fishing Fame.) on Cottage Lake at Witherington Farm.

Now I haven't been to Withy for quite some time so even though I knew it would be quite hard due to the unsettled weather we have been having, it was still quite nice to get back on the venue again.

I arrived to find Nicky and most of the others booked into the match tucking into breakfast. Not feeling like I wanted any food I caught up with Nicky, paid my pools and waited for the draw.

At the draw I managed to avoid drawing a real duff peg for once when I put my hand in the bucket and drew out peg 10 on the riverside bank, a peg that I consider to be one of the better pegs on the lake. When I got to my peg I found I had Malcom on peg 9 and another angler on peg 12 - giving me a spare peg to my right. My plan revolved round targeting the skimmers and other silvers hoping to get a carp or 2 as a bonus.

After plumbing up I decided on 2 pole lines, 1 at 13m fishing pinkie and maggot over groundbait, the rig I set up consisted of a .3 gram Preston Classic 4 on .10 Ultima Power Match to a 20 gamma black hook. The second line was in front of the spare peg to my right, for this I set up a .2 gram Sconie float on .14 through to a .20 B911 for fishing corn, pellet or maggot. I also had my trusty bomb rod set up to cast towards the island in search of the odd carp.

On the whistle I potted a small ball of groundbait laced with pinkie on the 13m line, and about 20 pellets and a couple of grains of corn on down in front of the spare peg, then chucked out the lead with a couple of grains of hair rigged corn that had been soaked in Carp Vader pineapple liquid.

Almost immediately I was getting liners which after about 20 min finally resulted in the tip going round and a lively tench of about a 1lb came to the net, that was followed 15min later by a carp of about 8/9lb before everything went dead.

With an hour gone and about 10lb in the net I felt things were going quite well, the only other carp that had been caught was by Barry Robinson round the other side of the lake on peg 3. Well that was where the wheels fell off!

For once it wasn't because of some calamity that usually seems to befall be, it was just a case of being unable to build on the great start I'd had.

After about a half an hour with no further indications I decided to try the pole line. I was quite happy to start catching small roach and skimmers, thinking that if I could keep them coming and hopefully snare another carp I could end up with a reasonable weight at the end. Well pretty soon the bites tailed off and became few and far between, re-feeding made little difference and after 2 1/2 hours they disappeared completely. I spent the rest of the match switching between lines looking for fish that failed to materialize.

Mean while, Malcom on peg 9 started to catch a few skimmers and carp on the pellet after spending most of the early part of the match struggling for bites. At weigh in I managed to put 13lb 8oz for 4th, beaten by Malcom on peg 9, Lee Woodhouse on peg 14 and Barry Robinson on Peg 3.

Peg 10, Cottage Lake

1st January 2008 - River Test, Timsbury

2007-12-30T12:19:00.000-08:00

First light of the first day of the New Year, saw myself and 2 friends (Mark Poppleton and Ken Rayner) on the banks of the River Test at Timsbury near Romsey in search of big grayling and roach.

For those that don't know, this section of this beautiful Hampshire chalk river is through the summer an exclusive dry fly only water, but in the late autumn through the winter they open up for the coarse angler to target the massive grayling, roach and other coarse fish that inhabit the main river and the carriers.

This is a fantastic way to start the new year, all I take is a float rod a few bits and bobs, plenty of maggots some bread and a few grains of corn.

The day started overcast with a few showers, and on first inspection the river looked sock on for producing some fish. My plan for the day was to start on the fast carrier stream and put a fish or two on the bank before picking a swim on the main river and working it for most of the afternoon to try and pick out one of the big roach the venue is famed for.

The main river

I began as planned on the fast carrier hoping to put a few grayling and maniac trout on the bank. After trying a number of swims I had only managed one very small brown trout, so I decided to head onto the main river and try my luck there.

The first swim I tried eventually yielded a brown trout of about 2lb and a couple of graying at about 1oz each. These have to be the smallest grayling I have ever caught! I then preceded on down the river trying a couple of likely looking spots, before coming to a lovely looking swim which was about 3ft deep one rod length out with a clean gravel run straight down to a fallen tree branch the screamed fish. The 3rd trot down with double maggot saw the float vanish and I found myself connected to what felt like an express train, after 10 min I finally managed to net a lovely sea trout that must have gone the best part of 5lb. With the fish safely returned, I had another couple of runs down which resulted in one more bite and a grayling of about 8oz, and moved on down river again.

Now I had planned to fish a feeder for a few hours with liquidized bread and flake on the hook, but when I settled myself down I discovered what the 'Forgotten Something' feeling was. I'd left my loaf of bread. Well, I sat down for a while and tried to fish the feeder using maggot and corn on the hook. As it was it proved fruitless apart from a couple of minnows, so the feeder rod was put away and I decided to concentrate on fishing the float.
For the next hour or so I worked my way back up river trying a couple of swims and catching another sea trout of about 3lb, a rainbow trout, a brown trout and a smattering of grayling.

The last hour and a half saw me settle on a clear shallow run just above the island, Mark and Ken were both fishing a couple of swims upstream and had banked a couple of trout and grayling each. I decided to try feeding small balls of liquidized bread at the same time as the maggot and this proved to be the right decision as I started to catch a few roach, dace and chublets in amongst the inevitable trout and grayling-unfortunately none of those proved to be the leviathan's I was after, the biggest being about 12oz, although I did lose a large fish which looked like it was a roach but as with all these things, I can but wonder.

Unfortunately, none of us managed any real monsters, but all three of us managed to catch plenty of fish, and had a fantastic New Years day.

The beautiful lady of the stream, just a small one for Timsbury