Weight - 59lb 7oz (10lb 2oz - silvers)
Catch - 12 Carp, 8 Perch, 2 Skimmers, 2 Roach, 1 Ide, 1 F1, 1 Crucian, 1 Chub, 1 Rudd
Weather - Warm, mostly sunny. Late short shower.
Water Temp - 25.2c - 26.6c
Match - Avon Angling Open - 4th out of 15
I managed to get a day off to practice for Sundays 2nd round of the float only, although looking at the weather forecast for Sunday, conditions will be completely different with low temperatures and heavy rains.
The local match circuit is delighted to see Des (Shipp) has given up full time work to concentrate on his fishing and his midweek mugging sessions! Peg 15 was my destination for the day, which can have its good days, however Tony turned up on 13 and I knew he wouldn't let me have the island to myself. With Des on 5 and Tom Thick on 19 (don't think I've seen him on a bad peg) a challenging day was ahead.
When I arrived there was plenty of carp sat on the surface, basking in the sun recovering from the riggers of spawning and with no ripple I fully expected they would disappear as soon as the pole was waved above their heads and that's what happened.
I only set up 1 rig to fish the deck with meat and despite feeding for 5hrs at 6m never had a bite, although I did manage 1 big skimmer by the tree to my right late on. So all other rigs revolved around fishing caster, 8mm pellet and meat on top of the far shelf or in the margin.
On the all-in I went out the shallow pellet rig to mug an early carp, but nothing although Tony had 1 straight away. After 5mins the fish disappeared, so switched to my caster rig, originally cupping in caster and a little meat on the far shelf. But unlike the last couple times I've tried this the fish weren't playing ball and actually found it better to toss pot the bait in. After a 2hrs I had 4 carp and about 5lb of silvers, but it really was a case of waiting for a bite, even from the silvers.
All the while I had been flicking pellet to my left on the island, to try and take some of Tony's fish away from him and also give me somewhere else to go. I had a few carp mostly by resting the 8mm pellet rig on a patch of bare bank.
With 2hrs to go, the polish angler on 16 started to pack up and although I could see Tony and Tom catching I got the impression most were struggling. The rest of match was a case of rotating swims, because I couldn't catch more than 2 fish before needing to swap. My main caster swim seemed to have completely died, so set up a new swim to the right on the island with meat/caster. I had 1 fish on meat, but more on double caster.
As for the margin. Really frustrated since I had fed from the start, yet only had 1 crucian whilst Tony managed to get a few from his margin.
I was pleasantly surprised to finish 4th and today it was always going to be difficult to beat Des, Tony and Tom from their pegs.
1st 124-8 - Des Shipp - peg 5 (incl 75lb silvers - awesome)
2nd 106-2 - Tom Thick - peg 19
3rd 86-8 - Tony Rixon - peg 13
4th 59-7 - Ken Rayner - peg 15
5th 58-15 - Chris Davis - peg 24
6th 49-13 - Ed Wynne - peg 3
No comments:
Post a Comment