I, in my infinite wisdom, decided as the weather was still baking to be sensible and only go for short periods if at all! Now having made that decision I decided to use the time focusing on one method during any outing. So August 4th sees me head to High Penn with the intention of fishing a feeder with a wafter, however two things stopped that reaching fruition, first I forgot to put the wafters in and secondly I picked up the wrong rod! My intention was to fish the far corner- East bank peg 12 but when I walked around found it was already occupied so opted for peg 10. Setting up the rod I discovered the missing wafters so instead I used some 6mm pellets from the bag of mixed dampened pellets I had taken to use up!

Had a couple of casts before I had a couple of indications finally getting a bite off a rudd of 5oz. Now at this point something began to trouble me – the sound of the line on the retrieve sounded like it was braid. I checked the reel and it seemed to be braid (same colour as my mono line) and I was not sure but seemed to remember that braid was banned. At which point I decided to pack up rather than risk continuing.

Fast forward to the 10th and I arrive at Crookwood with the intention of fishing solely with paste and on the opposite bank to where I fished before. The lake had been closed for maintenance over the weekend and a n excavator was positioned to prevent cars driving up that side. I parked up went to the notice board next to the excavator to see if there was any pegs closed, no notice so I ad a walk and the work had been creating new platforms from iron sheeting and hard core with the sheeting in place but they had obviously run out of hardcore so there were only a couple of pegs fishable in the area I walked. I opted for peg 8 and set up, just about to start and someone came and put a note on the board closing the bank! I asked if they wanted me to move but was told I could stay and act as a guard to prevent anyone going past me! As it turned out the guy was Danny Williamson who had taken over from me as Head coach for the South West many years ago, he came up and had a chat saying more hard core was arriving on the Tuesday and the work would be completed by probably Thursday.

So I began with the paste (a Chinese paste combination that I will do a separate report on!) introducing two balls of crushed expander groundbait the half a dozen pellets every put in with the paste via a toss-pot. Elastic was a green hollow Chinese elastic in 2.0mm probably the equivalent to a 10-12, homemade Chianti style float with a bulk 18 inches from hook with a number 8 dropper six inches away from hook. At this point you are probably thinking that does not sound like a paste rig and you would be right in the conventional sense but I do not follow convention! The rig was in place as the paste used is not like the paste normally found in the bait boxes of others! However more of that at a later date!

The session started slow with none of the usual bubbling that I had experienced before but eventually I began to get some interest and although I only landed a tench of 1-04 and five skimmers I felt that I had learnt a bit. In hindsight I should have realised that the workings over the weekend with the shuttering being driven in would have affected the fish and would possibly account for the slowness of the session, still hindsight is great!