Catch Up

Well its been a few weeks since my last post and i have to admit a couple of frustrating weeks. so much so I'm currently on a self enforced break from fishing matches
First of all i decided to head to a new venue to me, Hillview just outside Tewkesbury. A fairly local venue,  25 minutes down the road, and a venue i regularly hear great reports about on Talk Angling. I fancied a change so gave it a go. On arriving i had a walk around and the venue looks really nice with 2 pools and 4 'canals' in a fairly compact site. The talk was that the 2 bigger pools were the places to be and with only 10 on the match the canals weren't going to be included.

a nice club house got a great sandwich inside me and the draw quickly came around and i really didn't have a clue where i wanted to be. peg 26 stuck to my hand which put me on the right hand bank of the right hand pool as you look at them from the club house. the peg looked nice with plenty of margin cover, but to be fair every peg on the complex looks nice! it was tight behind me with an elevated walkway 2 metres behind me and a good metre above the lakeside bank. Shipping would be slightly awkward but not too bad.

my homework told me margins to the next pallets, a shortish on the deck pellet line, then a long meat line with a view to catching shallow over it. i had bait suit.

my favourite aspect had joined me today and the wind was blowing, hard at times, diagonally towards me from right to left! and it was bloody freezing!!!! my bank was easily the worst affected as the other pool was protected by some very tall trees. then to cap things off even more, my number 5 collapsed on me as i was setting up. I've used my Maver 401 for 3 years with fantastic results, and this the first issue I've ever had with it so i cant complain too much! i did notice a crack in it the previous week and forgot to get it sorted so its my own fault really! anyway lots of glue and tape got it secured and i was reasonably happy.

i got off to a good start with a carp first chuck on the short pellet line, but that was the only bite in the first 30 minutes. the wind was creating quite a bad tow and i wasn't happy with it. going out long i had a 2lb tench first chuck on the meat on the deck. the wind was again causing trouble and i couldn't feed it with any form of reasonable accuracy to create a decent shallow line. after an hour with the carp, tench and a couple of skimmers in the net my head started switching off. the short line was only producing the odd bite, same as the long meat line, and the margins seemed barren. i did start a long pellet line and managed a few more carp off it. they weren't really responding to cad potting bait in regularly so i was dumping it when the few bites i was getting tailed off then resting it.

the remainder of the match went by fairly slowly with only the odd fish making an appearance. i wasn't coping with the wind and my decision making tailed completely off. i finished with 36lb in the net finishing well in the bottom half with venue regular Neville Groves taking the match win with 93lb 3 pegs down from me, and second place directly opposite me! well and truly spanked.

next match was to be at Cob House, and a match arranged through Match Fishing Scene. 26 guys were coming from all over the country to fish Laugherne Island. it was going to be tight but i still confident plenty of fish would be caught. i had been really looking forward to this match and put loads of prep in with plenty of hook lengths and fresh rigs all round.

peg 17 stuck to my hand which put me off the island at the far end of the pool. my usual cob house attack was set up with a long long pellet line, shorter paste line and margin set up, although i didn't think the margins would work with so many on the pool. i started on the long pellet line, and couldn't get it to go under. there were loads of fish moving and the weather although nice and warm in the day was still going cold at night!

Most people were struggling and it was obvious the pool wasn't coping all that well with 26 on it and very changeable temperatures. after 90 minutes i finally put a fish in the net on the long pellet. i had lost 3 fish before this though, but that was to be the story of most peoples match.

With the pellet not really getting me bites and the shorter paste line not working i decided to put the paste over my long line and see what happened. there was a breeze again which wasn't making things overly easy, but the paste anchored in place nicely started getting me a few bites (but only a few). it also made things easy from a tactical point of view as i was pretty much going to stay on it for the rest of the match. physically paste at 16 meters is hard work.

i finished with 6 fish in the net for 24lb, extremely disappointing, but I'd lost 10 fish over the course of the match. some definitely foul hooked, but some I'm positive were properly hooked. i was also disappointed for Cob House as i love the place and happily tell all that ask about it, but it hadn't performed on the day. fortunately plenty of the guys realised it really is a good fishery, but had an off day! (lots of venues all over the country weren't fishing to their best at all. lots of theories going around, but in my mind  the really hard winter, and big temperature changes from night to day meant the fish didn't know where they were! winter or spawning time!)

so 2 matches I'd looked forward to and fancied a good result from, I'd come away with nothing. On form I'm sure i would have worked harder and earned a result if only a section, but on both occasions my head had switched off and I'd let myself down. So a break is in order, get my kit sorted (new or repaired number 5) and have a couple of pleasure sessions to start to enjoy my fishing again.

Which brings me to last Friday. as i finish work at midday on Fridays, and wait for Mrs P to finish her work at around 4-5pm, i have time to myself. after a long week at work i fancied Arrow Valley for something. i was thinking about a long range feeder session as casting practise i never a bad thing! but a lovely warm afternoon after a week of hot weather meant the fish had spawned and i fancied catching some silvers in the form of roach. so a proper wag and mag session was in order. 1 pint of whites, half of reds, my old trusty MAP matchtek 13ft waggler, TD-R2508 and a small 2.5AA insert and i was away.

i chose the small shallower bay behind the sailing club as it always holds roach and is usually fairly sheltered. wind was minimal wit the odd swirl here and there. i could comfortably get my feed out to around 25 metres and it only took 2 chucks and 5 minutes for the first roach to find my net. and at 10oz a great start. so for the next 3 hours i pretty much put either a roach, perch or hand sized skimmer in the net most casts.

I was sat there totally enjoying myself, no pressure to catch bigger fish, catch faster and make sure i was keeping ahead of those around me! my only problem was making sure some feed found its way around it way around my float to make sure it went under again! i did play about with the shotting (i'd built 6 number 10's into the bulk around the float) to see if anything made a difference, and found 3 of the number 10's spread out give me a nice drop and a bite well within a minute. my smallest fish was around 3oz with a couple pushing a pound and everything in between.

i don't think there is anything much better in fishing than watching a waggler settle to a dimple, a few maggots drop around it and then the float vanish from view! the rod tip shudders as a roach realises its been fooled and then shimmers as it emerges in front of you! brilliant! 20lb later and the weeks hassles at work and previous poor fishing was gone, i was a very happy man! a couple more sessions like this (bream next time i think, then some carp) and I'll put another match in.

The weather has got noticeably warmer in the day and at night and most venues have spawned so the next few weeks should show a great weights being recorded.

One last note - there is every chance there will be an open at Arrow Valley in the next month or two. look out on the various fishing web sites for any advertisements!!
Happy dangling, all, catch you next time!!
Scott

Cob House Bank Holiday Monday

Back to Cob House this week for the May Day bank holiday open. this match was run by one of the lads from Talk Angling (Bob Baker) and usually attracts a very good crowd. Bob runs a great match and with 35 anglers turnng up, everyone was to be spread around Oak, Laugherne and Wyatts. With 2 section on each pool and overall prizes the money was well spread and certainly worth the effort.


The weather was forcast to be the best day of the weekend, but Mr weather man got it totally wrong and it was wet, very windy and very cold!!!! cold enough for a couple of proper hail storms during the day!! what happened to a nice fresh warm spring period! (and i really really hate wind! it really does my nut in! hot, cold and wet i can handle, but i just cant cope with wind!)


Anyway the draw bag looked after me and put me on Oak 15, nicely out of the wind in a bay, with lots of margin to attack! Happy Days!


Then the dream shatters. Somehow someone had managed to turn up, loiter, chat, mingle and actually forget to pay his entries! that left the draw bag a peg short, so a re-draw was called! i was not a happy bunny, and initially thought that the silly individual who forgot the most basic of requirments to enter a match should not be included in the match at all!


but this is a sociable event amongst friends, so it wasnt an option to plonk the extra peg on an end somewhere or all of a sudden include a peg in the bag for the last few people who hadnt drawn yet to chose from, so the only option left was to call a re-draw!


So second time round my drawing arm put me on Laugherne 26, an area i fished last time. not a bad draw as laugherne is my favourite pool, but it put me right in the grips of the wind! Great! after a few minutes mumbling, grumbling and whining i got to my peg and started to gear up.

as you can see from the picture above, i had an earator in front of me at 14.5 meters and a couple of short margin lines left and right (i managed to take the picture during a short calm spell, but it was blowing through for the majority of the day)

so i set the following gear up: -

Pole

1 - Light Pellet - 0.15 Ultima Power Silk mainline to 0.14 Power Silk hooklength with an 18 G point pellet hook. 4x18 Garbolino DC13 with an olivette and number 10 droppers.

2 - Heavy Pellet - 0.18 PI Exceed mainline to 0.16 Exceed Hooklength with a 16 B911. 1g SP fat pencil with 2mm tip with an olivette and number 8 droppers.

3 - Shallow - 0.18 PI Exceed mainline to 0.16 Exceed Hooklength with a 16 B911. 4x12 preston tyson dibber shotted with a bulk at mid depth and the rig set at 2 foot deep.

4 - Paste - 0.18 Exceed mainline direct at a 12 B911. 4x14 KC Carpa Paste float with 5 number 10's spread over the last 4 foot.

5 - Margin - 0.18 Exceed Mainline, 0.18 Exceed hooklength to a 14 B911. 0.2g SP margin float with a 2mm tip and bulk of number 8's 10 inches for mthe hook.

Rods

1 - Maver powerlite feeder system @ 11ft, TD_R 3012, 6lb sensor wth a small PI inline method feeder

2 - Maver powerlite feeder system @11 ft, Daiwa Exceller plus 3000, 6lb sensor with a micro cage feeder.

3 - Daiwa SR3 12ft float rod, TD-R 3012, 0.20 maver genesis with a 6g middy popper and 0.18 hooklength.

i need to start playing with making myself some wire stemmed floats. i use the Garbolino's as they're great for windy conditiions, but they wont stand up to a days bagging session and i've got through quite a few of them over the last couple of years i've been using them.

the light and heavy pellet rigs were plumbed at 14.5 meters to the aerator and 6 meters to the right. the paste rig was at 11 meters at the bottom of the near shelf and the margin rigs 4m to my right and left in 3 foot of water. all the rods were clipped tight to the island.

Bait for the day was plenty of soaked 3mm feed pellets, a couple of pints of 6mm feed for pinging to the island, 4mm and 6mm expanders, a tin of corn and some Bait Tech Super G gold mixed into a very soft paste.

with the reliably unsettled weather still persisting (warm in the day, but with regular frosts in the morning) i didnt want to over do it at the start so the pellet lines got a 1/4 cup of pellets with some expanders mixed in, the paste line got 1/2 a pot of pellets with a couple of chunks of paste mixed in and the margins would get small amounts regularly fed by hand and the island would be pinged with pellets when the wind allowed.

I started on the aerator line and soon discovered the water was trolling through quicker than the river Severn, and i wasnt overly happy with my presentation, but i did get a couple of early bites and managed to lose a couple of early fish! Not a great start. The guy to my right managed 4 early fish on the method to point of the island so i was soon over to the island myself, but couldnt buy a wrap. with an hour gone i was losing 2-0 to the fish with nothing in the net and needed to make something happen.

i'd topped up my shorter paste line a couple of times and i decided anchoring some paste might get me a bite or two. it did the trick and put 3 fish in the net in the next half hour. this planted a seed in my head. i knew there were fish at the aerator but icouldnt present a decent bait to them with the pellet so decided a long paste attack might just turn the peg around. so i set up another paste rig with a 0.5g maver black ice paste float and plumbed it right next to the aerator. i then set the trap with a full pot of pellets and a couple of lumps of paste and left it for a couple of chucks on the shorter paste line.

A couple of touches but no bites made me move to the long paste line after a 15 minute rest and float shot under! decent carp number was on and i was a fairly happy man. the wind was still causing issues but a long line above the undershotted float meant it settled quite nicely in the tow and wind with a round an inch of bristle showing. I was showing my ametuerish paste skills off too as i was hooking a pellet and wrapping my paste around it so knew the paste would stay during shipping and setting the rig. but the fish didnt mind and i put some good fish in the net during the middle of the macth.

the long line did slow considerably going in to the last 90 minutes and i couldnt get a bite on the second long line. there were a few fish coming out of the margins but i couldnt get a bite there. i'd been pinging pellets to the island all match and had one wrap on the method but that was it.

the wind did calm slightly for the last hour and the tow slowed. i did run my light pellet rig through and it actually got me a couple of fish in the last hour amongst a final couple of paste fish before the whistle went. i ended up with around 20 fish, but the stamp wasnt amazing so i wasnt sure how i'd end up. i put 49lb on the scales and was actually quite suprised they went that heavy. i easily beaten those around me but the end pegs in the section did me so i walked away empty handed.

hindsight tells me to have some more heaveir rigs in my box, especially some wire stem patterns to give me some better stability and Laugherne will tow very easily! also i could have chucked the little cage feeder i had set up over the long line which might have got me a couple of extra fish.

But overall it was nice to catch some fish