The last day of November saw me back at peg 12, this time I had a few bites, namely 1 rudd and 13 roach  all small for a 1-2 total, one run on the sardine was missed GRRR!

Two days later, same peg, gloomy conditions for 7 roach and 6 rudd for 1-6 but this time I had 4 runs, missed 3 and on the fourth hit a very large fish that I could do nothing with until the bait came flying back at me. I am now in a quandary, I moved to single hooks because of the constant snagging in the net but have yet to be confident in leaving the bait too long for fear of deep hooking. The evidence suggests I need to adopt a slightly more patient approach!

Another two days pass and I’m back at 12. This time 9 roach and a mini perch for a round 1lb. A pike snapped at the bait on the retrieve and 1 run that the pike mysteriously dropped ended the session. I made a visit to the local Tesco and saw that they had some sardines that were exactly the right size so I bought the entire stock of 16 and bagged them in pairs before depositing them in the freezer!.

Sunday saw me at Peatmoor for the annual Pike Match, it is a rover but I decided to sit put on peg 10 and put a sprat just over the marginal shelf and another out at 10m. After an hour and still biteless I put the 10m rod out to about 20m and had a run after 10minutes, this resulted in a fish of 6-10. While unhooking the fish I somehow managed to lose my grip, the pike flared and blood started coating the net from my thumb! Fortunately the bailiff lives close and went and got a first aid kit and patched me up. Two hours later another run resulted in another pike of exactly 6-10 and that was my lot! 13-4 was good enough for second.

The pike’s revenge three days later!

Silly really as I have an unhooking glove that for some reason I didn’t use – that will teach me. I used it for the second one!!

A week passes before I am back at peg 12, more colour in the water, no runs but 3 roach 0-4, 0-8 and 0-14 for 1-10 all on double maggot. Wednesday sees a change, I head off for Blacklands to check how it is fishing in preparation for the match I was running at the start of January.  I settled on the “Bench” peg and decided to use up what worm I had left while priming a micro swim and for fun a short swim with cheese. It proved a stark contrast to Bowood with plenty of bites on both the worm and micro swims plus a bonus 2-14 bream and 1lb perch off the cheese swim! I ended up with 35 roach and 45 skimmers and 2 perch, the other being 1oz! A total of 19lb left me satisfied as  I had spent some of the time trying out various rigs.

My last visit to Bowood before I have to head north for Christmas sees me at – yes, you guessed it- peg 12. This time the water was very coloured and I was not too hopeful but two pike from 2 runs of 4-8 and 10-0 plus bream of 1-7 and 1-10 coupled with roach gave me a pleasant day and a total of 19-2.  Christmas has come and gone and New Year looms. One final visit to peg 12 sees a very frustrating session with one bite on the pole from a 1/2 oz roach, 3 pike runs- the first released the bait just after striking (still not got this sorted), second run was from a fish about 8lb that I lost at the net when the hook pulled and the third was one I actually managed to land of 6lb!

Happy New Year to anyone who reads this and I hope the New Year brings some more consistent sport!