Heyup folks, Wraggy here again, with another ‘tale from the commercial bank’. I know it use to be riverbank but times change, unlike the weather at the moment! Just been up to me brothers house & he’s got two or three inches of snow on his garden! Yet last week we were catching shallow over sprayed pellet! Its no wonder the fishing is a bit haphazard to say the least. Every Sunday at Bank End we say ‘we’ll be sitting in shirt sleeves next week’ and Monday into Tuesday it looks as though we’ll be right, only for the weather to take a downturn midweek, leading up to a rough weekend.
This week was no exception, and Saturday at Lodge farm with the Frecheville AC lads saw a strong wind ripping across the lake. The early numbers had the wind off their backs, and when I drew peg 2 I was more than a little pleased! A comfortable day’s fishing should be possible, and recent form showed the early pegs on both sides of the lake were the most consistent, with catches tapering away the further down the lake that you went.
My old mate from my KJS days, Carl Fairfax, had drawn the favourite peg 1, and although he’s taken a fair bit of time off of late due to moving house, Carl is no slouch on the bank, so I wrote off any chances of beating him. Good angler + good peg = only one result in my book, so I set my stall out for 2nd place, which I genuinely thought was possible from the peg. How wrong can you be! I decided on a line at 13m on the deck, in 9ft of water, feeding the venues pellets & rotating maggot, caster, pellet or corn as hookbaits.
The problem on these newer lakes at Lodge Farm is that the bottom is carpeted with Gudgeon, and they will eagerly take any baits that they can get in their mouths, so a ‘Gudgeon proof’ hookbait is the order of the day, providing the carp and skimmers find it to their liking, of course! I rigged up with 0.12 straight through to a B911 size 20 to allow me to try all the baits till I found the best one, under a 0.75g float. Carl was into carp straight away from the reeds on the end bank, and 45 minutes in all I had to show for my efforts were two small carp, a couple of skimmers and a dozen or so Gudgeon for just over a pound, while the lad on peg 3 had stuck to one line religiously at 9m, and was in front of me with 3-4lb. I was getting fishcaked, not part of the masterplan!
I’d been firing a few maggots out towards the middle all the time, and decided to have a look on the waggler. Our side of the lake was flat calm, while across there was a ripple, and I could see fish topping in this ruffled water but they were too far across to be an option. I just had to hope they would move across for the loose feed, but half an hour working the wag & mag proved fruitless except for a small skimmer and a run of 4-6oz Ide that departed as quickly as they had arrived.
All this time I was falling further behind the lad on peg 3, so it was back on the long pole to try and catch up. A couple of bigger carp pulled me back a little, one of which was foul-hooked in the pectoral fin, like I say, you’re better to be lucky than good, but I was still searching for the key to catching consistently from the swim. A chance conversation with an old mate of mine who fished for Daiwa Goldthorpe in the café before the match had revealed that two weeks previous they had been catching carp shallow with caster or pellet, but with the downturn in the weather I wasn’t too sure?
Nothing to lose now though, as the guy next door netted a 3lb barbel after a long scrap, pushing me further adrift. Time for the shallow gear! Two small pouches of casters, and as I laid my rig among them the elastic was already pouring out of the tip! An F1 of 2lb or so put a smile back on my face, and when I followed it up with a 1lb-plus chub a couple of minutes later, I was beginning to enjoy myself at last! Just as quick as the bites started they ground to a halt, as the wind changed direction slightly and left the peg flat calm.
The lads opposite had been catching well all day in the ripple, and after my abject failure to catch on the wag I’d worked out that the fish didn’t want to be up high in the water when there was no surface movement. So be it, out came the sections and it was 16m for the rest of the day, fishing as near as possible to the broken water. Every time the surface cut up I would get a run of bites, but the wind I was praying for to dapple the swim was also a hindrance, making feeding accurately an pole control a little awkward. No more carp followed the first one, but it was nice to get among the chub for a change, as well as a few Ide getting in on the act, and as the match drew to a close I felt it would be close between me & the lad on peg 3.
Carl on peg 1 by this time had disappeared over the horizon for a certain win, but our two pegs and the ones opposite were all pretty close. As the scales arrived, top weight on our bank was 9lb 4oz from Keith Holland, Frecheville AC match organiser. He’d had skimmers to 12oz, and was well in front of the rest of the field. When the lad on peg 3 lifted his net out he’d more than he thought with 18lb 12oz,and I was convinced he’d done me. We’d indulged in the old ‘you’ve got more than me’ game during and after the match, but I feared the worst.
Them chub weigh heavy though, and the scales settled on 20lb 5oz, to just edge me in front. I’d not lost a fish all day, then had two Ide twist off the hook in the last five minutes that I was convinced would cost me dearly, but it wasn’t to be. Carl posted a steady 35lb 9oz to take pole position, and the scales moved across to the other bank. For some reason the two corner pegs didn’t fish well at all, but pegs 36 & 35 both looked to have decent weights, and so it proved as they registered 28lb and 24lb respectively.
After that the weights took a real nosedive, with sections being won with less than a pound! My 4th place saw me first out of the main frame, but picking up 25 quid for the defaulted section paid for the day out and softened the blow of my next-peg battering from Carl a bit!
Home Comforts!
I decided to try something different, and feed a pole line. A couple of years ago I drew in the area around the same time of year, and missed out on a lot of fish by going too far out with the pole, I fished 13m and while I caught well I was well beaten by the anglers around me who only went 10 or 11m, so I wasn’t about to make the same mistake again, especially as I had young Matt Grove next door on 18. Matt’s just started match fishing again and has quickly established himself as one of the men to beat up there, fishing the matches and practising a day in the week as well. He had put a pole up as well, saying that he’d caught well on it the day before when he’d stayed on after a match.
We both started on the tip, and first blood went to Matt after half an hour with two small carp in two chucks. The lad on peg 20 then had three in 10 minutes, leaving me wondering what I was doing wrong? Over an hour in, and with out an indication on the tip, I reached for the pole. I’d fed at 10m, anticipating the wind to make life difficult for us as it got up later, but by now the lake was flat calm, a rare sight at Bank End let me tell you!
Five minutes of lifting and dropping the pellet hookbait saw a slight dib turn into a full-blown ‘guzunder’, and a 1lb-plus carp opened my account. A similar sized fish five minutes later was followed by no more indications, so I re-fed & went back out on the tip. A bite as soon as the feeder hit bottom was another false dawn, as was a couple of quick fish on a shorter feeder line, and that set the tone for the day really, swapping and changing, picking odd fish off here and there, and a nip and tuck match saw the three of us in the corner have our own private little battle, all the while with a grandstand view of the anglers on the pegs opposite getting one a bung on pole, tip, even waggler!
Me and Matt played the almost obligatory ‘you’ve got more than me’ game as I’d done the day before with my neighbour, but this time I’d got a feeling that while he’d got me on the numbers, my fish were of a n much bigger stamp, as they usually are here. Pegs 11, 12, & 13 weighed 32lb, 46lb, and 28lb respectively, with that man Alan Barker coming out on top. Told you last week he’d be a force to be reckoned with, didn’t I? The lad on peg 20 surprisingly tipped back, saying he thought I’d more than him, and as he’d thrown 10lb or so back I began to think I might just sneak the section & keep my good run going. I got that sinking feeling though as I counted the pegs and realised the lad across on peg 14 would be in the same section.
He put 20lb on the scales to set the benchmark, and the two lads in the corner opposite us could only muster single figure weights. Matt weighed 12lb, a weight we both found surprising, as we were both of the opinion that we had mid-teen nets. My fish pulled the scales round to 17lb 12oz, not enough, and I couldn’t even take the consolation of best weight on that side, as a string of high teen & 20lb-plus weights was topped by Graham Webster, one of the most consistent anglers up there, with 30lb to secure 3rd place.
So, two matches, two proper tear-ups with good lads at the next peg, one of them paying off, but the other one seeing us beaten by the drawbag to some extent. I’ve been a right good lad & got all my jobs done & out of the way this last couple of weeks, so hopefully a bit more time on the bank will coincide with a bit better weather! I’m off to my local Woodlands Farm at Barlborough midweek, to try and break the jinx it seems to have over me lately. When I used to fish the venue regularly a couple of years ago I had a really good run, but the attendances dropped & anglers went elsewhere.
The matches started again just before Christmas & I was on em like a shot, but I never seem to get it right up there now, with only odd results for my efforts. I’ve not even been near anyone that has caught well on any of the matches, making me as welcome as a little fat cormorant sitting on the next peg! When I visit venues I can’t let go until I feel I’ve got to grips with them, and this place is really getting under my skin at the moment, so I’ll let you know how I get on. I might even make it a double header and go there Saturday yet, you never know! And of course, no prizes for guessing where I’m bound for Sunday! See you soon, Wraggy.
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Tom
