Quiet Week!

I had only just sent last week’s blog saying I was going to slow down in preparation of the festivals and to make peace at home, when I had a text from John Forster telling me that a cancelled round of the Winter League had been resurrected for this coming Saturday. To add further to my troubles Steve Prouse called to say that he was running a match at Trewater’s on Sunday! I am normally in the mire with the long suffering Vivien it’s just the depth that varies. Well at the moment I just have my nostrils above the water line! I know that I can always say no but one is a team match and the other, well I just cannot get enough of it!

The Thursday open at Trewater’s was transferred to Wednesday this week and our numbers were depleted slightly by a few playing away in America! Never mind we were all pleased to be fishing despite the weather, it was one of those dreary grey days with constant drizzle, the kind that soaks through everything!

We decided to fish both banks of the bottom lake and pay the winner of each side in a continental style payout. At least this way if more fish were concentrated around one side of the lake there was something to fish for on the other! I walked around looking at the pegs before we started and the far end was a distinctly different colour, there were obviously a load of fish at that end of the lake. I secretly hoped that my ability of drawing the longest walk would continue but when it counted I drew the near end peg 54 Oh man why does that always happen!

At least I had an end peg and it was a peg that I have fancied fishing since the lake opened, so I was happy enough, a test of the water temperature showed it at 9.5C and that rose throughout the day to 10.5C so we are finally getting there let’s hope we have seen the last of the frosts. I had my now standard Trewater rigs of .4 gram Spro mid water floats and small hooks. Bait wise was YB Green Betaine and garlic pellets. I planned to fish at 5m as we had plenty of room hopefully the fish would be on that line or if not they would soon sniff out my pungent flavoured bait!

First ton at Trewater’s

This was a really good match I caught all day on the pellet on the deck, I had a few slow spells when nothing seemed to be going in the net, but thinking about it afterwards they were not that slow! I had a better stamp of fish than last week including some nice sized skimmers and some better F1’s that totalled 60lb which was good enough for second place. I was only 52lb behind the winner Harry Billing who had a brilliant 112lb!

Chatting to Harry after the match he told me the peg was absolutely solid and he had a bite within 10 seconds of the bait hitting the deck every put in! No fish were caught on the drop, all after the rig had settled. The fish were a mixture of sizes with a few two pounders thrown in. Harry actually walked back to the car park mid match to get a second net stopping for a chat on the way! I suppose if he had two nets with him in the first place he would have had in the region of 125lb what is this place is going to be like when the weather warms up! This is the first ton on the water but it will not be the last.

On the other bank Billy Arch was the victor in a close section he had 50lb with 46lb second. So Harry and Billy took the money and despite me having the second highest weight I had nothing to show for my efforts. Now, whose idea was it to do the payout like that? Last time I try to be fair, that’s for sure! The lowest weight was approaching 40lb which is a fantastic days fishing as the fish are not huge, the average size is in the region of 10 oz, the fishing just seems to be improving all the time.

I’ve seen the light!

The way our local waters have been fishing got me thinking about fishing in general, and I noticed that the countries commercials all seem to be waking up with good weights coming from all over the place, even the frozen north is throwing up much better weights all of a sudden! This has been achieved with no sudden rises in the water temperature (certainly in the SW) we even had a sharp dip of a couple of degrees a week or so ago. I think it has something to do with the light as we move into the spring period, the extra light and perhaps the intensity pulling a trigger that starts the fish feeding as they build up towards the rigours of spawning in a few months time. Light has an effect on nature in general, the trees start to bud and birds can be seen building nests despite the cold continuing, so perhaps it has a consequence on fishing? I’m no expert it’s just my thoughts but remembering back to those days when I used to fish on rivers, March was usually a brilliant month to fish, well at least the two weeks before the close season came in!

Winter League

It was time to pay a visit to Mawgan Porth for the Kernow Match Group league and I was looking forward to fishing here, judging by the phone calls from my two team mates Nigel ‘Tourettes’ Taylor and Manchester Mick Heacock I was not alone in wanting to visit this cracking little fishery. On arrival the draw was taking place in a slightly different location, it was nearer to the exit by the chalet. There was tea and coffee on sale along with great bacon and egg rolls a nice touch Janet, it went down well.

I decided to let Tourettes do the draw again as not only is he a draw bag the language is interesting to say the least when he realises he has the honour of drawing for the team. When he came back I must say that I had some concerns about his ability as he had a mixed bag. Mick was on peg 9 one of those he had been saying he didn’t want before the draw! It is a fantastic peg later in the year but today was in all probability a 2nd or 3rd. He handed me peg 55 on the specimen lake and again on paper this should be the same as Mick’s, for himself however he had drawn peg 38 and potentially a good one! The draw is all a bit of fun and I do like fuelling the banter, plus it’s nice to be able to blame someone else when you don’t fancy a peg!

With Mark Lazell and Pete Thomas on the two fancied corner end pegs I felt I was up against it today but you never know what is around the corner, so have to keep the confidence high. My peg is slightly over 17 ½ metres to the island and has a nice edge to the left and with some open water I fancied it for a good days fishing. My plan was to fish a line at 14 ½ metres potting some micros and pinging pellets hoping that the fish would come up in the water in the glorious sunshine, the water temperature was a dizzy 12.5C. I was also going to have a line at 6m and an edge. Rigs were Cralusso Capri’s in .2 gram for the edge and J12 for the open water swims, I was sticking with small hooks and .14 Xedion line.

At the start I potted some bait on all three lines and started on the 6m line with double red maggot on the hook I expected a bite immediately but it didn’t come! Before long I was the only person in the section without and early fish. Pete Thomas was off to a flyer I couldn’t see him that well but could see his pole in the air and elastic out on a regular basis! After about 10 minutes or so I noticed my edge swim colour up and I had to have a look! A two pounder was soon in the net and I was down the edge again but there were no more bites, perhaps I had gone down the edge to soon. Looking around my other two lines produced a couple of fish but nothing to help me catch up. I had a concentrated effort on the 6m line and was rewarded with two small tench, a skimmer and two boot lace eels! After the second eel that line was discarded they were the last thing I needed.

Concentrating on the longer line I had half a dozen fish but they kept backing off, I followed them out to 16m for a couple more but it was hard work. But as the sun came around the island I noticed movement tight over, Getting another extension I had a go at 17 ½ m and immediately had a carp. It was difficult shipping back due to the stream behind me and had to break down twice but there were some fish there so it was worth it. I was now catching on a regular basis and pulling back up the section. I noticed the edge colouring up and had a couple there before they backed off. The rest of the match followed on that pattern two down the edge and some over long, the last two hours were really good, not big fish but worth having.

Special Branch

I had been using a tree as a pole roller and as I was shipping out with 10 minutes to go my four silver butt sections came undone and were now standing upright wedged on the branch in the middle of the stream over a barbed wire fence! I tried to get them back but it was clearly going to take some time. Mark reminded me that there wasn’t a great deal of time left so I spent the remainder down the edge for one fish, shame about that as the long line was solid!

When the scales arrived I was surprised to weigh 86lb but not quite as surprised as I was to win the section by 25lb! The match was won individually on the other lake by Roger Cannock from peg 46 with 96lb so it was another close match. Elsewhere Nigel came second in his section and Mick came third so with 6 points it was a good result and one that put us equal on points with Mark Lazell’s team but unfortunately we were relegated to second spot on weight. On a personal note I was pleased with the reams performance today I thought the guys fished well to get respectable points total.

Back on the Farm

Sunday saw us back at the farm for the open match and both lakes were in, all that was in my mind was a peg 49 where Harry was on Wednesday! In the end that didn’t happen and peg 19 on the top lake was my home for the day. This was another end peg and one that I would run to on a festival as when the lake is full you have extra room, today however there was generous pegging so it was not such an advantage. The weather was very spring like and the sun was shining in fact I fished shirt sleeves all day and even got slight sunburn! I did feel sorry for some of the lads who were on the shady side of the lake shivering! The water temperature was on the march and was showing at 11.5C.

Musical Pegs!

I had drawn the scales today and after I got to my peg I was looking at the weigh board and it was clear that something was wrong. We seemed to have more anglers than there should have been in the section. I’ll mention no names to spare their blushes but one angler sitting in my section was actually on the wrong lake! And another angler on the other lake was sitting in the first anglers peg! Both had inadvertently gone to the wrong peg, I had to point it out to them, no way could I let them fish the wrong pegs and end up getting disqualified.

Rigs and bait was the same and at the start I potted a ball of groundbait on my 6m line and went over it with maggot on the hook. No immediate bites came and I was a little surprised at that! A change to the soft garlic and I had a couple of slight indications but could not get a fish. I could see Andy Grey and John Waples to my right catching and opposite Harry was quickly into his rhythm with a fish a drop. But for me the first hour was slow with probably 10 fish or so.

Catching up.

The second hour built up and I started putting a few more in the net, it was noticeable how the fish were fighting much harder, that couple of degree change in the water temperature has really made a difference. I was getting a real mixture of fish including skimmers, tench, golden tench, Crucians, F1’s and small carp it looked like there was not a big shoal of anything in front of me. I seemed to have loads of quite spells when I was forced to switch between lines to try and keep fish coming. Nothing much changed until the last hour when it really did slow down and I had to wait for bites on whatever line I fished.

I used two nets today and started the second halfway through the match so it would be interesting to see what I caught in each half of the match. My first weigh went just over 21lb and the second just over 22lb giving me 43lb 12oz total. Roughly the same catch rate throughout the match! Fortunately it was enough to win the section and with a section only payout it was worth having, just goes to show that it is swings and roundabouts as on Wednesday I was second and won nothing and today individually was nowhere but picked up!

I really have enjoyed fishing down at the farm it is a brilliant fishery and rapidly becoming a favourite of quite a few anglers. Hopefully there will be plenty more matches throughout the summer season. I feel quite envious of those staying at White Acres who will get the chance to fish the resident matches on these lakes!

That is it from me for awhile as I am definitely not fishing next weekend and then its two weeks of festival madness at White Acres! I will post a report as soon as I can but in the meantime wish me luck, not for the fishing but for my health as I am staying with those young guns Adam Richards and Tom Scholey Oh Man, I must have gone mad when I agreed to this!