NFA Regional National

This weekend saw me fishing the NFA regional national which was held on the Stainforth and Keedby canal through Thorne. The event always sees quite a good turn out of quality teams, Barnsley and Osset to name two. This year there were 14 teams of 12 competing. The canal has been very patchy, so I was hoping to draw on a few fish; certain sections have been devoid of them!I drew peg 176 on the Wikewell Bridge section. It’s normally a half decent area in quite a fair section. The wind was really gusting, which was going to make 16 metres hard work. Plumbing up, I decided on three main lines. a worm and caster swim at 14.5m, a squatt line at 11m, and I also planned to try and catch a few perch at my feet. The feeder rod also came out at the start in case the wind got any worse.

I fed a small amount of worm close in, and then balled in 7 balls over the 11m line, where I had around 7ft. I set up two rigs for this line, a 4×12 strung out, and a 0.6g bulked. My long line was fed with worms and casters in a small amount of groundbait, and I planned to try the pole lines before putting any bait beyond with the feeder. I set up a heavy 0.75g rig as well as a 0.3g rig for the long line. I had Diawa Dons Andrew Landelles to my right and a Sensas Thorne chap to my left.

I started short and had a couple of small perch on worm, but the guy next door had a decent skimmer on the long pole, urging me to have a dangle out there too. First drop in saw a perch take the worm hook bait. It was hard work holding the pole, so I pu a bit more line on the deck, which brought me a small run of fish over the next hour. I had a small chub around 6oz, as well as three skimmers and a small eel, which was smaller than some of the worms I had!

Two hours into the match I had around a pound ad a half, which was looking OK. I then suffered a quiet spell, where only the very odd Tommy Rough showed. This urged me to top up- FIRST MISTAKE. Very few bites followed after this, and the wind was getting really bad. I felt that I shouldn’t have balled it on my squatt line, as I had very little over that line too – SECOND MISTAKE. Tom Scholey arrived as bank runner, which brought me no luck at all; in fact, I didn’t catch a fish in the half hour he was with me! Employing him as bank runner – THIRD MISTAKE.

I caught a few more tiny wasp perch under the lily pads, but it was feeder time. I set up with a 0.10 hook link with an 18 hook and worm, plugging a small groundbait feeder with a few casters. I was casting tight to the boat opposite, and managed to catch a rope hanging from it, as well as the cover for the window which was hanging over the edge. There was someone living on it too!!! Thank got I didn’t crack of and send a groundbait feeder through the window!

Anyway, I spent most of the last hour on the tip, catching another small chub and two skimmers. it was worth while sitting on t, as everyone around me had very little in the last hour. I followed the scales along, which revealed that there were some skimmers caught at one end of the section, with several 2 kilo weights. When the scales arrived at me, I put 1 kilo 880grams on, placing me 5th in my 14 peg section. I managed to beat them either side of me, but I needed a bonus fish or some more skimmers to get in the top two. Denis White won the section with 3kilo odd on the end all on the feeder. Looking back, I think if I had only fished a feeder all day, I might have caught a few more.

Most people in the team had done OK, although we had a couple a bad uns’ on some hard pegs in hard sections. In the end we were 7th out of the 14 teams. Not brilliant but it could have been worse! We did beat The Barnsley Blacks!!! Hull and District did brilliant to win the event, with Thorne second and Osset third.

Next Week will see us fish the first round of our Drennan Superleage at Thorne, so hopefully we can do a bit better!