Wetlands Workout

Well, a night out with Tom and ‘Big Matt’ left us a bit jagged round the edges at the Wetlands bank holiday Monday Match. An attempt at the breakfast sorted us out a little, and it was off to my peg, which was in a good area according to a few people. The wind was still blowing, but I decided to have a proper go on the pole, fishing worms and casters at 13m. I set up a tip rod with a bomb and tea bag to start on while the pole line settled.

I set up two rigs for the pole, both on 0.12 lines to 18 B911 hooks, one a 0.3g Tamas Walter, and the other a 0.6g version. I fed the pole line with a good pot of chopped worms and casters, and started on the bomb and tea bag with hair rigged corn. I was pleasantly surprised wit a good wrap round after 20 minutes, as a dogged 4lb mirror came to the net. Another bite next cast saw me hook up with what felt like a better fish, but the hook pulled at close quarters.

After45 minutes I had a look on the pole, and blooming ‘eck, it was like fishing the Trent!!! I straight away set up a heavier rig to lie on and hold, but realistically I could have done wit a lollypop float!!! There was no way I could fish long properly with the tow, and I had a reassuring phone call of Sir Tom who appeared to have similar problems….“It’s Going through a bit mucker!”

I decided that I had to put some bait somewhere on the pole line, and couldn’t rely just on the tip, so I plumbed a 4×18 rig up in 4ft of water at 5 sections, where the tow was steadier. I put a small pot of worms in and started to loosefeed caster every few minutes.

I had another half hour on a tea bag and corn, which resulted in another similar sized carp to before. At the half way stage it was time to have a ‘proper go on he pole. Fishing well over depth with a proper piece of worm over the short line, I had a bite!!! It resulted in a nice bream around 4lb, I was bouncing up and down, but not for long, I missed a bite and it was back to stage 1.

Another good try on the tip saw no response, so I decided to try something different. I mixed up some fishmeal groundbait, and scaled down to an 0.14 hooklength with double maggot, casting past my long pole line to around 20m. I had a few quick chucks wit a small groundbait feeder to get some bait in, before sitting on it. Tom had started catching after he scaled down, and it had definitely made a difference, as another 4 decent carp came to the net for me in the last 2 hours, all on double red maggot, when I couldn’t get a sniff on the ‘proper’ gear.

I had one more small stocky on that short pole line, and although I hadn’t pulled up any trees, I was pleased to catch doing something a bit different, and I’ll definitely have a better go next time. My 5 carp and a bream went 28lb odd. I might have caught a few more fish if I’d have only set that one tip line up, but it’s easy to say afterwards! It was the other way round the day before…but that’s fishing!