Battered at Barston!

I was really pleased to be asked to fish with 4 other of my Barnsley team mates in the International Rules league at Barston Lakes near Birmingham. Its one of my favourite venues and I just wish it was a bit nearer home! The matches are four hours long and fished to full international rules with a 13m pole limit and feeder fishing strictly prohibited!!!

Lee Kerry had told us about how the venue was fishing and how he thought we should approach it on the way down. However, the thermometer never went above 2 degrees all the way down there, and there were talks of blanks the previous week. It’s a fantastic bloodworm league to fish, with absolutely loads of names fishing from all over the country, so its hard competition too!

I drew peg 42 on the river bank, and was told that it was a fair section and I should get some bites. In my 12 peg section alone there was Darren Davies, Mick Barlow, Chris Jenkinson, Ben Leach, Kian Wardle, Paul Holland, to name just a few!

On arriving at my peg I mixed up a conventional groundbait and leam mix for the pole, and a fishmeal mix for the wag, although a didn’t really plan on picking it up unless there were skimmers being caught.

I set up several pole rigs, as you really have to cover your options at Barston. My man two rigs were 0.4 and 0.6g bloodworm patterns on 0.10 mainlines to 0.07 hook links and 22 barbless fine wire hooks with a three elastic. I also set up some heavier rigs in case the wing got up, and a skimmer rig just in case. My wagglers were 4g and 8g, with a simple bulk rig set over depth with soft actioned Tomas Walter Rods.

At 10:55 the 5 minute pre baiting session starts. I balled in 10 fairly soft balls at the 13m limit, containing joker and a few casters, before feeding my waggler with 20 sausages of fishmeal with casters and a bit of joker in.

I started on my 0.4g rig just off deck with bloodworm. After 5 minutes I was into a dumpy roach, but things were slow. I caught two or three then they would spook in the shallow 3 ½ feet of water. The fish were o decent stamp of 2oz or more though, so it was worth while getting the presentation right to catch one at a time. After an hour I had 15 fish for about 2lb. I tried a bunch of bloodworm for a few minutes but only a small roach showed. Everyone was catching the odd fish, so I tried to keep plodding away.

At the half way stage I had 28 roach, before things went really quiet. I tried the proper rig in case a bonus fish had moved in, before coming off the deck with the light rig. I think had a proper bite and struck into a proper fish on my light rig…sods law! I thought it was a big skimmer or bream, but when it came up it was a scraggy old thing with stripes, a perch about 10oz! Still, it was a bonus and explained why the roach had backed off.

I was still catching the roach in patches, and every time I was about to top up, I would catch a few more. With an hour to go I had 35 roach and the perch for about 7lb, and decided to top up with a single small ball.

The fish initially backed of. I thought I had killed it proper, but in the last half hour I caught really well, and took my tally to 49 fish. By now the mist had really come down, you couldn’t see the other side of the lake, and I had to take a shot off to see my float properly! Chris Jenkinson on the next peg had caught well all match, and there was talk of some skimmers further up in the section.

When the scales arrived my catch went 8lb 12oz. I ended up 6th in the 12 peg section with that. Kian Wardle won the match with 15lb 07, then there were two 13lbs in my section, and two 10lbs! It had fished its nuts off all around!!! I was a bit disappointed with my result, and felt I should have topped up earlier, but I couldn’t see much of my section, and thought that my steady catch rate would be good in the freezing conditions!!

The team had a poor result, but we had two terrible draws, with Steve Baraclough on the peg where blanks had been the week before. Lee Kerry did awesome for his draw, catching 7lb 08 while either side him had 1 lb, but there had been some good weights further up in the section with skimmers that pushed him to 8th. Alan Scothorne and Tommy Pickering were both 6th in there sections too, so all in all, a bad day results wise, but still a brilliant days fishing, with the venue showing its usual fantastic form from most areas.