Month: September 2024

September 2024 Part 2 – Lessons unlearned!

jacksonb1 Uncategorized

Sunday 15th saw me arrive at Bowood to try and shake off the effects of the Glebe! Fishing from 9:45 to 12:15 on peg 10 saw me start with the bulk set about eight inches from the 16 hook under a home made teardrop float taking 0.6g over two balls of groundbait laced with a bit of wheat and corn. Things were not frantic fishing my usual 10m and I scratched out 9 rudd, 6 roach and a hybrid for a 4-02 which gives an indication of the size I was catching!

I returned on the Tuesday to peg 10 and fishing the same way managed 28 rudd and 6 roach for 3-15, emphasising the quality of the fish on the Sunday! There was a lot of pike activity with the odd blank period when I am sure one was lying in wait in the swim. As an aside I had bought some Chinese jelly “pellets” in a variety of flavours and I tried the honey flavoured one which was a sweetcorn colour and caught on it!

The flavours minus the Honey left to right are Herb, Fruit, Milk and Fish!

Nothing further was possible as the three day event at Monkhall drew close. I was a running the event but in all honesty I had/have no illusions of me being anything but pools fodder making up the numbers. The methods at the venue are usually fishing shallow with casters, a method I do not enjoy and cannot afford to do with a gallon needed over the 3 days! Given my comments about pools fodder I approach these matches as an opportunity to fish a different venue but use methods I am comfortable with- ie fishing to my strengths.

Day 1 sees me draw Swallow peg 17, on a positive note, the day stayed dry, but the wind we had once the match started was blowing down the other end the lake starting two pegs away, so I had no ripple at all.

Yes I was end peg with plenty of room! The four rigs I set up were a paste rig for 2+2, a pellet rig for on the deck, an on the drop full depth rig and a margin rig for both edges. Elastics were 2.2mm hybrid Chinese ones with rigs mainly 0.16 to 0.14mm with hooks 16 apart from the margin and paste which were 14 and 12 respectively. No groundbait allowed so corn, paste, micros, 4mm, expanders and three week old maggots were the baits of choice! Starting at 2+2 on paste and potting in some micros it took about 10 minutes before I had a bite that resulted ion a carp of about 4lb hooked in the tail- at this point the alarm bells should have been ringing! After the first hour I had clicked 11lb and then things went to pot (literally). To cut a long story short I weighed in 23-13 after long blank spells interspersed with 14 fish hooked- all foul hooked- and 14 fish lost! My worst day at the venue and last in four peg section ! I was not alone as Herbie was opposite me and suffered a similar fate getting only one carp and a few silvers.

On to day two everyone wanted to draw Buzzard rather than Hawk, so with two discs left in the bag, Buzzard was pulled out leaving me peg 3 on Hawk! The photos are deceiving as later in rained!

Setting up same as previously except I went down to the 2mm Chinese hybrid elastic I started fast with three carp in the net for 8lb before anyone else had a fish , then disaster I bumped a fish and they disappeared Fishing out at 10m, 2+2 or margins resulted in the same thing – frustration. I was getting bites, some may have been liners but some were definite bites all of which were missed in the next 3 hours. I did manage to get a couple of fish in the net for a 26-09 total which left me last again, but on the positive side I only lost 4 foul hookers!

So the final day I was scheduled to be on Owl as we had Swallow and Owl on the first and third day, so we always swap to fish the other lake from day 1. I drew Owl 9 which if you recall from a previous blog I had fished in a practice session earlier in the year! (no photos this time!) It was the worst of the three days with one carp in the net after an hour and at times I could not buy a bite. I lost 7 foul hookers and weighed in 20-07 for last again. The overall winner had a perfect score of three points but he did have an advantage- he was next to me on all three days!

Returning home I was convinced that I had made a major blunder with the addition of the micros as it seemed that too many fish were drawn in to the peg and rooting about causing the foul hookers and liners. Reading my blog from previous visits I gave myself a good telling off as I had made the point previously that 4mm were better at avoiding foul hookers although others were using micros at times and they complained of the same. I must remind myself to reread posts if visiting venues and learn from them!

Sunday sees me head to Bowood to start my pike campaign having picked up a kilo of sardines on the Friday .Peg 10 (of course) looked a bit rough as there was debris all over it. Obviously there had been flooding (the town had also suffered from flooding) but it seemed they had opened the sluice at the far end of the lake to run the excess water off and had not closed it soon enough as the level was about 18inches lower than I expected. I set up slightly differently after ten minutes as I felt the weed might now not be such an issue after the flooding so moved the bulk about two feet up the line leaving two sets of 2 x no9 droppers. Two balls of groundbait but I did not take any wheat with me, instead I had decided to use some of the left over 4mm pellet and also took the expanders. Starting on maggot it was about 20minutes before I had a roach, after 6 more I put on a 4mm expander and apart from one rudd on corn I stuck with the expander for the rest of the session between 9:30 and 12:15 on the pole. I had cast out the pike rod with my newly acquired sardine at 9:15(chimes ringing out from the clock tower) Nd after an hour reeled in to recast to find that the sardine was not there! New sardine attached to my standard two single barbless carp hook rig to 15lb wire and cast out to 12m. Thirty minutes later the pellet waggler I use on a sliding rig disappears, a strike and a feisty pike comes to the net, except the net gets caught on the reeds and an arm comes out, so I have a pike in front of me and no net to use! Slipping the anti-reverse on I put the rod between my legs and sorted the net, picking the rod up again and anti-reverse off I finally get the pike in the net! 8-08 the first of the autumn.

October will see a silvers match at Meadowlands and hopefully more pike action!

September 2024 Part 1 – All Change!

jacksonb1 Uncategorized , , , , , , ,

September 1st arrives and being a Sunday I decided to just grab the 10′ waggler and the seat bag and have an hour on the Pondtail. You may remember that the bridge at the start of the lake partly collapsed last winter and it has slowly been rebuilt with a compound formed for the plant and materials that cut off both pegs. During the summer peg 2 became available again but today the compound had been radically shortened and both were now available- except peg 1 was hidden behind a forest of 3 foot nettles that I will tackle at a later date, so peg 2 it was.

Fishing the waggler at about 15m with double maggot I managed 26 roach and 6 perch by loose feeding wheat after a single ball of groundbait was introduced. The fish pulled the scales down to 3-15. The other picture is looking down the Pondtail towards the main lake. As an aside I had bought a Chinese carbon extending landing net handle to go with a net head I had bought some time ago (the threads are smaller than in UK). It allows the user to set it at any distance from 60cm to 3m, it is on the heavy side compared to the more conventional handles but is very robust and ideal to stick in the pocket of a rucksack – it worked well on this outing.

Tuesday 3rd and I decided on peg 7, still weedy but I felt there was still a chance of bream and tench while the weed remained.Fishing 9:15 to 12, it was not hectic and despite the pike activity I managed 14 rudd, 3 roach a skimmer and a bream of 3-04 all on corn for a 5-06 total. I did lose a large unseen fish in the weed that I am sure was foul hooked from the way it fought.

My focus now shifted to preparing for the three day Pairs at the Glebe, although through a series of events the pairs became seeded teams of three. We had been lucky to negotiate pools 5,6, and 7 rather than 1 and 6 which was our original allocation so my preparation for pairs went out of the window and I drew up new sheets and lists for the Teams of 3! Monday 9th came, I collected in the pools and explained the rotation of lakes Group A (the superstars!) would fish 5 then 6 then 7, Group B, 6,7 and 5 while my group (C -the poolsfodder!) would fish 7,5,6.

So the last peg in the bag for me was 104 – not brilliant but hey-ho. Arriving at the peg it was very windy and I opted to set up a feeder for the far side,four pole rigs to cover 11m, 5m and two margin rigs. Line was mainly 0.18mm for out in front and 0.20mm for the margins. During a brief respite from the wind I managed to remember to take some pictures!

Starting on the feeder, in 20 minutes there were no indications so that went on the rack and the pole went out to 11m where I had fed 3 balls of groundbait, micros, 4mm pellets and corn. To say it was slow was an understatement, after 2 hours I had managed two skimmers. Tony on my right was fairing no better, the 5m line produced a solitary carp of 3lb and a skimmer so it was to the margins I looked. I had primed the left one with hemp and corn while the right had been given micros and corn with the odd 4mm. The last two hours saw me pinch a carp from either side and by rotating this I managed to get 37-10 of carp and 11-07 of skimmers for a 49-01 total, losing just 4 carp. Tony pipped me by a pound and an ounce weighing in 50-02 with fewer fish but of a better stamp, leaving me last in the group!

Next day sees me on pool 5 peg 78, however the weather had taken a turn for the worse and we had heavy rain and wind all day. I had unfortunately looked at my phones weather forecast which suggested the odd light shower so had put on my over-trousers (which have a hole in the crotch area- you can see what is coming!) rather than my bib and brace which is watertight but more awkward for calls of nature! Needless to say by the end I was absolutely soaked from the waist down.

I did manage one picture during a brief break in the weather before the start but it was all downhill from this point on. Setting up exactly the same rigs I decided I needed to attack the swim more late on so mixed up 1.5kg of groundbait which for me is a lot!First cast on the feeder sees a 4lb mirror carp in the net then nothing so after 40 minutes on to the 11m line for a couple of bream then nothing.Basically with an hour and a half to go I had clicked 25lb in my nets, at this point I but 5 full cups of groundbait with maggots into the right margin and put 6 maggots on my size 14 hook and went in on top. Three minutes later the float started to wobble and eventually went under with an angry carp attached. That is how it played out, for the last hour or so- catch a carp cup in a pot of groundbait and maggots, repeat.I had clicked 37lb in one net and I usually start another net if it is close to 40lb simply so that I can lift it (the net limit is 60lb) I had just put a couple of carp in the second carp net when I landed a lump of a fish that they reckoned was the largest caught on that pool that day, although not weighed a conservative estimate was 15lb. The all out called, the weigh in showed I had 5-11 of silvers, the first carp net that I clicked at 37lb was 37-03, the second net I had clicked at 39lb weighed 46-01, now I had given myself 12lb on the clicker for the lump so it could well have been closer to 20lb than 15lb! My weight of 88-15 put me 4th on the lake. I then spent the night drying off my clothes!

The final day sees me on peg 92. Now dry and in the bib and brace the continuing very heavy wind and rain (once the all in was called! ) saw me struggle as on day 1. Nothing on the feeder and mainly skimmers at 11m with the odd carp, going in to the margins late on fishing as on day 2 I had the frustration of hooking 7 carp and losing all seven, most I am sure were foul hooked by the way they went. I was glad when I called the all out! My paltry net of 22-02 of silvers and 20-09 of carp put me last with 42-11. My “team” did little better so we finished last as well!

The month finishes off with another 3 day event, this time at Monkhall near Bridgnorth.