The Gypsy Returns!

Heyup folks, back in the fold after a couple of trips to the caravan with Mandy during the week, catching some ridiculously easy to fool carp from the on site lake! Seriously, they are that easy I often make up different ways to catch them, just to keep it interesting! They sit under your feet (literally!) eating any bait that spills from your pot or catapult, and you just have to lower a baited hook in and it’s one a bung! One good thing about them though is that it gives me the opportunity to try out new rigs and hooking arrangements, such as different ways to hair rig certain baits, so it’s always time well spent down there. Anyway, I’ve not been down there at weekends, obviously, that’s match time, so here’s how I’ve been doing since last time I was on the site.

The less said about the Green’Un semi final, the better as far as I’m concerned, peg 67 on Island Lake saw me right at the far end away from the Hayfield pub, not a very inspiring draw at all, and five hours and two bites later I was tipping two hand-sized skimmers back and mooching off home, the only bit of entertainment coming at my expense, when I wound back into a real monster, which promptly set off on an unstoppable run across the lake, snagging my pellet waggler on the floating line down the middle, and smashing me all ends up. As I was re-tackling, the wind swung round ever so slightly, resulting in my next cast landing right on the said line. As I was pulling for the inevitable break, who should turn up but Photographer Bob Roberts, adding to the barrage of abuse I was already getting from the anglers both around me and across! “I’ll report you to Robin and Noelie for littering their lakes up Wraggy!” came the less than welcome call as the line parted, and I trooped off back to the car more than a little dejected. My worst draw of the season had come on the biggest match of the year so far, not a happy bunny!

My good mate Mick Turton won the match overall with91lb from little Adams peg 31, and anyone who thinks nice blokes never get on in life should meet Mick, and dad Fred and brother Russ for that matter, they really are top lads, always with a smile on their faces and never a wrong word to say about anyone. Good anglers they all are too, never too far away from the frame on any water.

Rather than sit sulking till the weekend, I decided to go to Barlborough on the Wednesday. I used to be a regular framer there a couple of years ago, but since I started going back at the turn of the year results have seemed to elude me, possibly due to some poor draws, but in my own mind I hadn’t got to grips with the place. I decided that a bit of reverse psychology was in order; a bad match on the Monday could perhaps be cancelled out by a trip to a less than favourable venue (is that reverse psychology, or just the voices in my head at it again?) The draw put me on peg 23 on the wood side, no real recent form but I fancied it for a few, the area was always reasonable when I used to go, so off I went. Barney had fished the open on Saturday, and rang to say all the carp were getting ready to spawn, so I set a couple of silver fish rigs up as well as the usual carp top kits. I decided to fish chop & caster across, with pellet down the middle, while loose feeding casters close in with a view to catching shallow later in the match.

This proved to be a master stroke, as first drop saw me into a carp of 2lb or so, second drop a foul-hooked fish that came straight off, leaving me with a tangle and a scale for my efforts, then third drop another foul-hooker, that I played all the way back to the net. The fish was hooked in the root of the pectoral fin, which usually results in it being landed, not this one though, it dived down in front of my keepnet, and managed to find some unseen snag just beyond landing net range, and my attempts to free it only served to break the hooklength! Not the best of starts, I’d have to admit! While this fiasco was unfolding, Mark Hardwick next door already had five carp in the net, but was also experiencing problems with foul-hooked fish. After re-rigging, I went back across, only to be pestered (!) with 6-8oz roach and rudd.

Not wanting to sound lary saying that, it’s just that it takes a lot of them to catch up when your next-door neighbour is catching 2lb carp! Altering the worm to caster ratios didn’t make any difference, so it was looking like a silver fish day for the little fat lad! I’d been feeding the casters short from the start, and was starting to notice the odd swirl on the surface, so out went the shallow rig. I was straight into roach, rudd and ide from 2-6oz, smaller on average than across, but coming much quicker, and I was starting to enjoy it. I’d occasionally take a section off and nick a few, then they’d back away so I had to chase them around, the usual cat and mouse game with silvers. Mark was still picking up odd carp, and I noticed him shipping out with a lump of bread on the hook, ‘dapping’ it on the surface. An immediate take for him saw me try the same tactic, but I had to wait much longer for a bite. The carp seemed to be more towards that end of the lake, which eventually was borne out by the results, more of which later.

In all, I had four on the bread, giving me five carp in total, plus a load of silvers. Top weight as the scales reached Mark was Phil Lakin on peg 16 with 56lb, all carp, with a drop to 34lb in second. I honestly had no idea what weight I had, it’s difficult to guess with a lot of silvers, and to be honest I’d become so engrossed in keeping them coming I’d completely lost track of what was going on! Mark weighed 34lb 6oz, less than me or him had thought, and I was amazed to weigh 35lb 9oz, a good 25lb of which was silvers, a top days fishing. I knew the end peg on the island had a big net of carp, so was wondering if I could cling on to third place.

Peg 35 duly won the match with 60lb, leaving me third behind Phil’s 56lb bag. I was really chuffed with this result, pegs 35 and 16 fish into roughly the same area of water, and Mark was next in line for a crack at the carp, so my silver fish approach was right for my peg on the day. More by luck than judgement I hasten to add!

I fancied a go at the Saturday open up there, but I’d arranged to drop Mandy and her mate off on a spa day, so it was garage time for me, sorting out elastics and such. Sunday saw me at Aston Ponds with the Turners Arms gang, on the Lily pond. I had one of those days when you seem to be looking down on yourself asking why you’ve just done such a daft thing! Like feeding more pellets even though the peg was fizzing and I was foul-hooking skimmers! And trying to catch short and shallow even though there was hardly any colour in the water. Despite all this, I managed to sneak the section by default (remember-better to be lucky than good!) with a level 10lb. I tried everything on the day, and got beat next door by a lad who just sat it out with maggot, had a nice steady day (and a couple of joints too!) and weighed 13lb 7oz! Taken in context this was quite a battering, which triggered our first dash to the caravan, to take solace in some tame, easy to fool carp!

Regular readers (or should that be reader? I’m sure Tom must read this drivel before it goes on the website!) may have noticed the lack of Bank End matches recently. This is due to the various club matches starting, but I was back there midweek for the Matchgroup 2000 match, and cursing at my peg 2 draw! These pegs are hopeless unless there is a warm wind blowing into them, which isn’t very often with the summers we have! These matches attract a very strong field, so it’s odds-on that good anglers will be on some fish, and today was no exception. I decided early on that a section win was all that was on offer, so set about the task with what I thought would be my secret weapon, the floating feeder. Not so secret as it turned out, the lads had done their homework, and several of them had got hem set up, in various guises. Mine were a little different however, developed back in the Drayton days, and they would sink initially, then float back up, due to a special type of plastic they are made from, which is not readily available, due to it’s use in the petro-chemical industry.

The feeders proved their worth, as I did win the section, in fact I never had a bite on anything else! To underline just how good these feeders are, I weighed 56lb, with 3lb one side and 8lb the other! All the leading weights came from the other end (as I’d predicted) with club champion Roy Hanson coming agonisingly close to the ton with 98lb 8oz, 40lb of which was made up of ide! My mate and travelling partner Ian Heywood was second next door with 87lb 8oz, again caught on the floating (and sinking!) feeder, but topped up with some bigger than average fish taken close in late on. I felt I’d done as well as I could from the draw, and looked forward to the weekend’s open. But first there was a trip to my old stomping ground, KJS Fisheries.

It’s difficult to get much type out of three bites! My first came two hours in, and was a roach on meat! This signalled a walk, and on finding that the anglers at the far end were bagging, it was looking like an early bath was on the cards. Wrong end again! I gave it another hour when I got back to my peg, and my reward was a three pound carp on pellet, that felt like a bream all the way back, laid on it’s side to let me net it, and just gave up basically! One of the lads had the cheek to say that with all the moaning I’d been doing, the carp didn’t fight because it had simply lost the will to live! I was in the house before the end of the match, which was a shame because I missed Russ Turton breaking the match record with 116lb, proof again that good guys can succeed in this world.

Right, that’s all for now folks, next time out I’ll tell you how the super-dooper feeders shaped up in the Bank End open, and my latest trip out with the Turners crew to Lewden Springs near Barnsley. See you then.