Weight - 24lb 13oz (13lb 13oz - silvers)
Catch - 2 Carp, 20 Skimmers, 3 Roach, 1 Rudd
Weather - Mostly cloudy warm and no wind
Match - Avon Angling Pole Only - 1st out of 25 - silvers
Woodlands is one of those lakes I have
struggled to get to grips with. Speaking to Chris Fox in the shop on Friday he
said he was having a poor time there as well, due to drawing the “wrong” pegs
and I jokingly said I wanted to be well away from where ever he drew. Having drawn
his peg, Chris expressed his displeasure at another poor draw. As for me I
managed to stay well clear and ended up on p9. Speaking to Martin McMahon who framed
from it last week, told me how he caught, however today the lake was flat calm.
With 25 anglers on the lake, meant it would
be a pole only match to save any argument about peoples casting. For company I
had Adrian Jeffrey on p8 and Martin Lenaghan on p10, which was a little cozy.
As I was setting up, my gut feeling was we
would struggle. There were fish moving on the surface, but with no ripple I
didn’t expect any shallow fish to hang around, although I still set up a
shallow long line pellet rig just in case. 3 other rigs were set up as follows:-
- Preston classic 1 – 1.25g > .14 > 16
B911 – maggot/soft pellet – changed to .12 & 18 silverfish pellet
- HB dweezil .75g > .16 > 16 B911 –
soft pellet/meat at 6m
- HB dweezil .50g > .16 > 16 B911 –
meat bottom the marginal shelf
On the all out I cupped in 8s at 6m and
started pinging 8s at 14m. After swinging the shallow rig around for 15mins for
1 roach that dropped off, I never picked up the rig again. Adrian & Martin McMahon
opposite both had a carp shallow, but it was obvious unless the wind picked up
you were on a hiding to nothing. So a cup of soften 4s and 50:50 groundbait was
deposited at 14.5m with some 8s.
Whilst that settled I caught a skimmer on 6mm
expander at 6m. Going onto the long line with 6mm expander produced a couple
more skimmers and a 5lb carp. As the match progressed there was a definite lack
of carp action expect for the anglers to my right on the end bank. I caught a
few more skimmers on double red maggot, but also bumped a couple.
Since there didn’t seem to be many carp in
the area I switched to a lighter hooklength and elastic to target the skimmers
properly, because winning the silvers was the only way I could see myself
picking up today. As the match progressed I found it best to cup a small ball
of feed every 2nd fish, but had to wait for bites despite all the
fizzing in the peg. Whenever I fed the long line I would try for 5mins either the
6m line that I kept topped up with 8s or the bottom of the marginal shelf to my
left which I kept topped up with meat & corn. Neither swims produced much
other than a couple of skimmers or small roach.
Back on long line the swim seemed to have
died, but when I was looking towards the end bank watching Paul Elmes land
another fish, I felt the pole being pulled down as a 6lb carp accepted the
double maggot. I did hook another carp shortly afterwards, but the hook pulled.
With no more carp, some of the better skimmers
started to put in an appearance, but with 90mins left the swim just died
completely. There was obviously still fish in the area, because the swim was
still fizzing, but I couldn’t buy a bite. John Bradford opposite had a few
silvers and I was sure I was ahead of him, but I wasn’t sure how the anglers to
my left were doing and felt I needed to catch a few more skimmers to be safe. So
a new swim was set at 16m at an angle to my left with another cup of 4s and
groundbait, which produced another 5 skimmers. Most fish came to double dead
maggot, which seemed to be better than 4 or 6mm expander.
By the all out I felt I had at least 10lb,
John was admitting to 8-10lb and Fabio reckoned he had about 8lb. When I
plonked 13-13 on the scales Tony said I would win the silvers and that was the
way it ended.
As I was packing up, 4 sections of my pole
rolled into the lake and I had no choice but to go in after it. So I stripped
off and dived down 7ft finding the pole almost immediately. Thanks to Adrian
for grabbing the pole and Martin for pulling me out of the lake, which Tim Ford
very kindly took a photo! I was just pleased it was September and not January!
1st 106-12 – Paul Elmes – p3
2nd 90- 1 – Shaun Townsend – p2
3rd 88-12 – Craig Edmunds – p15
4th 81- 8 – Tony Rixon – p28
5th 74- 0 – Gordon Canning – p7
6th 63- 9 – Glen Bailey – p29
Silvers
1st 13-13 – Ken Rayner – p9
2nd 11- 9 – John Bradford – p30
3rd 11- 1 – Phil Harding – p25
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