Give Me Five!

All in all I haven’t had a bad weekend and have caught plenty of fish, and have picked up section money both days. Unfortunately, 5lb more on both days would probably have seen me jump from picking up £55 over the weekend to £155, as I missed out on a frame place twice. Still, you live and you learn!

There is a couple of weeks gap before the next round of the Ranskill league, so I decided to have a run up to Lindholme Lakes and fish the open match on Oasis. As always at Lindholme, there was a good turnout, with around 40 anglers queing up for the draw.

My mate, and fellow fishing4fun blogger Joe Carass has been having quite a lot of success lately using maggot, and I wanted to give this method a try at Lindholme, so I came eqipped with 5 pints!

I stuck my hand in the bag and pulled out peg 27, at the bottom end of the lake fishing into the corner. It looked gourgeous, with a steady breeze blowing down and keeping the temperature refreshingly cool, but not so strong as to hinder presentation on the long pole.

The only disadvantage with the corner pegs on here is that you generally have to go further than everyone else, it was around 16 metres up to the island on my peg, With me fishing just off it in two and a half feet of water at around 15 metres.

I also plumbed up two lines at an angle at either side of the corner in the same depth of water, which worked out about 14.5 metres. I put a line down the track at seven metres, in case the fish were in the deeper water. I decided to start the match on pellets, and then switch to maggots later on in the day when or if I felt I needed to make something happen, as this is what Joe seems to have been doing.

This was a relatively successful ploy, I took ten fish in the first half an hour before the line went quiet. I had only fed on one of the three lines I had plumbed up across, and so decided to trickle some maggots on one of the lines to my left. This worked, and I had a big ide and three F1s in four puts, but then two little roach suggested that the bigger fish had moved off; so I put a full pot in to try and draw some better fish back into the swim, but this didn’t work so it was back on the pellet line.

I was having to swap between lines to keep fish coming, but I was reluctant to attack any one line with the big pot for fear of spooking the fish off, which in hindsight was an unjustified fear to have, as when I eventually did this it worked a treat.

One problem I had all match was lost fish, and I couldn’t really work out why, as its not something I usually suffer with, but for some reason they just kept coming off! I was using B911’s to an 0.12 bottom, a set up I am comfortable with but for some reason they just wouldn’t stop on the hook, They weren’t breaking me, just pulling out, and while I know that some of them were foul hooked, I’m sure a lot of them were hooked ok.

I have decided not to beat myself up to much about this however, as I was using a set up I have had a fair bit of success with in the past, and sometimes the fish just aint having it right, speaking to a number of anglers after the match I wasn’t the only one to lose fish, quite a number of anglers suffered with it, so I think its just one of those things.

I caught well late on in the match by concentrating on one spot and feeding fairly heavily with maggots, both with the pole pot and the kinder pot, and finished off weighing in 54lb 10oz, this put me 5th in the match and was enough to sneak the section win by default. Those lost fish cost me though, another 5lb would have seen me third in the match, while 8lb would have put me second.

Darren Taylor won the match with 81lb taken on maggots, which reinforced to me that they are the ‘in’ bait at the venue at the moment.

Pastures New

On sunday I decided to try my hand at a bit of canal fishing in the run up to the start of the superleague and practice matches in a few weeks. I picked the brains of canal experts Matt Godfrey, Ian Littlewood, Paul Crossland and Brian Hawkes, who were all really helpful in letting me know what to expect and how to feed and fish in different situations, but from what they were saying I was daunted as it sounded like almost every stretch required a slightly different approach!

I was relieved though when I drew peg 45 on the willows length, and they told me that I was on a good peg that required a simple approach, worms and casters fished up to some willow trees at 16 metres. My mate Chris Greensides had drawn a harder section, and we hadn’t a clue where we were going but fortunately Brian drove first to Chris’s section then back round with me to mine to show me where to go.

When I saw the length of walk I had I was instantly regretting my decision not to take a trolley, its not like cosy parking behind your peg on commercials! So after probably a mile round trip encompassing two trips with my gear I arrived at my peg, and I have to say it looked sexy!

I was end peg, and first peg on the willow trees, with a little gap to fish into at 16 metres. As I say, I had picked the brains of Ian Littlewood who had fished the peg two weeks previous, and he advised me to target the skimmers on lighter tackle rather than get preoccupied with the chub, though he did advise setting up a beefed up rig for the chub just in case they were playing ball and the skimmers were not.

He also advised I feed a pellet line, which could be good for some skimmers. I set up three rigs for across, one with 0.14 line to an 0.12 bottom matched up to an 11h elastic. The other was 0.18 straight through matched up to a super tightened 15 elastic, and the third was a lighter 0.10 straight through rig matched up to an 8 elastic. Floats were 4X16 and 4X18 Tubertini Deltas.

I also plumbed up a line down the middle at thirteen metres, where I planned to feed pellets, but in hindsight it would probably have been a better bet to put groundbait here, as this may have held some beter bream and skimmers if any were moving about down the track. I decided not to feed this from the off however and just feel my way in across, again probably a mistake in hindsight.

I started the match on my light rig and took a perch first drop in, I must admit I was relieved- at least I hadn’t blanked! Next put in a 1lb skimmer came, then another, and my anxietys about canal fishing were relieved- albeit temporarily.

I took four skimmers and a big roach in the first hour, before I hooked a chub and it saw me off in the trees. I switched to the big rig and took a skimmer first drop in, which led me to think they weren’t as line shy as I thought! Then I hooked and landed a chub which still managed to pull out a couple of yards of the super tightend elastic!

A quiet spell followed, in which time Pete Kitwood on the peg to my left took two big bream and a chub to nudge in front of me. The canal was towing backwards and forwards at intervals throughout the day, which proved annoying as It was doing it for like five or ten minutes, so I would just be thinking about stepping up to a heavier rig then it would stop!

I took three bream in the afternoon, along with a big roach and a hybrid to finish with 14-13-0, which put me fourth in the match. I pulled out of a big chub which would have given me the 17-6-0 I needed for third, but first and second places were a fair way clear, with Andy Anderson and team captain Brian Hawkes catching 26-10-0 and 22-03-0 respectively.

All in all, I was glad I had a good draw on my first match on the canal, and catching a few fish has certainly helped build my confidence. If I was to fish the peg again, I would kit myself up with some lollipop floats for when it towed, as when I quizzed the other Triana lads in the pub after the match they told me a lollipop float would have eradicated this problem, and they all use some specially made for the job, and have duly equipped me with some!

My other mistake was not feeding a line down the track, although I plumbed one up at the start of the match I never actually fed it, concentrating instead under the bush. Not only would it have given me somewhere that may have held some bigger fish if any were moving down the track, but it would also have been somewhere where I could have fished while resting my bush line.

Still you live and you learn, and I will just have to put what I have learned to good use next weekend!