Sunday 22 January 2012

21/01/12 - Lands End - Match Lake

Weight – 27lb 14oz (21lb 12oz – silvers)
Catch – 31 Roach, 20 Perch, 2 Carp, 2 Chub, 1 Skimmer
Weather – Mild, mostly cloudy and very windy
Water Temp – 7.6c – 8.3c
Match – Open – 1st out of 4

Disappointingly there were only 4 of us today, with the forecast wind keeping many people away. Must be honest I did question whether to go, but Saturday was the only days fishing this weekend, so I packed a lead rod just in case.

With only being the 4 of us we decided to do a rover and it was no surprise we all selected to seek shelter at the bottom end of Match Lake. Jim Jenner took p8, Dave Wescott (p11), Mike West (p13) and myself on p15.

Usually with so few anglers on the lake in winter, the carp tend to disappear so I wasn’t expecting many to show, although 1 did top in p17.

Started on corn, searching the peg for any lost carp, focusing on the area to my right, but fishing long was difficult in the gusting wind and with no bites it only got 15 minutes.

I had deposited some caster on top of the far shelf, as well as the bottom of the shelf, which I kept topped up as I tried the top of the shelf, more in hope than expectation due to the clear water, however I had a good 30min spell catching a 2lb chub, with some roach and good perch.

A move down the shelf resulted in more roach and perch on caster. I also started catapulting caster to my right by the p16 platform. I decided to ignore the small bush simply because it’s a bit of snag pit and fishing .10 bottoms didn’t fancy my chances against any decent fish.

I had also been feeding micro pellet 14m to my right, but with no fish coming from here, decided to make this my throw away swim feeding 4mms by catapult to the bottom of the shelf. As the match progressed I kept switching between the 13m line and under p16 platform, catching some nice perch from under the platform on double caster. I also hooked a carp from under the platform, which dived between my nets and under my platform, breaking me. Mike thought this was very amusing, until I cast out my lead rod with double corn, whilst I sorting out my damaged rig and promptly had a 3½lb carp. A further cast didn’t produce and I could have stayed on the lead fishing down the lake, but it’s not my favourite way of catching and it appeared I was leading the way so I didn’t need to go chasing carp.

Over the 13m line I had been using a 4x14 jolly, but felt I needed a heavier float in the tow, so tried a 4x16 jolly which sat better in the water, but switched back after 30mins, because the fish appeared to prefer a more natural movement.

With 45mins hour to go, all my swims started to dry up and was hoping some fish had moved over my pellet, but all I had was a small carp, a skimmer, and lost a carp when the hooked pulled.

Although there was only the 4 of us, I did at least have a very enjoyable day, feeding nearly all of my pint of caster.

1st 27-14 – Ken Rayner – p15 (21-12 silvers)
2nd 13- 8 – Jim Jennet – p8 (all silvers)
3rd 11-10 – Dave Wescott – p11
4th 9-12 – Mike West – p13

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