Weight - 65lb 6oz (10lb 2oz - silvers)
Catch - 10 Carp, 6 Skimmers, 2 Roach, 1 Chub
Weather - Cold north westerly wind. Showery, but mostly bright
Match - Winter League rd 1 - 3rd out of 33, 2nd in section
Today was the first round of the Lands End Winter League which was fully booked with 36 anglers. However, 3 no shows, 1 of which had a family emergency, meant I was down to 33. Fortunately the way the draw went the 3 non attendees where spread across the 3 lakes. Who would be a match organiser?
It was becoming obvious that the recent cold snap has hit many fisheries hard, with weights a long way below what is expected. With a strong north westerly forecast, I fancied a draw out of the wind. However I drew p32 which would be in the wind and I was a little embarrassed about drawing the peg, because I drew twice in last years league and there were shouts of fix. Oh well, nevermind.
Despite the forecast wind and the very clear water I still fancied it for a few fish, expecting to catch mostly carp. As such I set up a couple of rigs with nothing lighter than .12 bottom.
On the all I wanted to take advantage of the fact the island provided some shelter from the increasingly strong wind and fish 16m down the right hand bank for as long as possible. By regularly toss potting a few 4s & micros and fishing a 6mm expander (ackoo carrat 0.3g > .14 > 16 B911) my first 2 fish where foul hooked, losing them both. Fortunately, by lifting and dropping the next 2hrs resulted in 6 carp.
I had to switch to my 14m open water swim (SM chimp 0.4g > .12 > 18 silverfish pellet), which I kept topped up with 4s & micros, since the wind had switched round a little, making it difficult to get any presentation down the right hand bank. A skimmer and another carp soon followed, before the wind made life difficult again.
Dan White to my left on p31, who was a little more sheltered from the wind started to catch carp and skimmers at 14m and was slowly catching me.
An exploratory cast with the lead and corn towards to the aerator, didn't produce a proper bite. I also tried to fish at 10m down the right hand bank with caster, expecting a few perch, but nothing.
So I decided to concentrate on the open water swim and in between the gusts of wind managed to catch a couple more skimmers and carp, mostly on 4mm expander.
With an hour to go Dan decided to move across to the island, dobbing a 6mm expander and caught 5 carp in 5 puts in, which now put him ahead of me, whilst I was struggling to a get a bite.
The carp had completely backed off the right hand bank, so decided to fed some caster, but this only resulted in a chub. With 10mins to go I tried the lead/corn towards the aerator again and the tip pulled round within a couple minutes, but couldn't repeat the trick before the all out, much to Dan's relief. Although in the end it wasn't quite as close as we both thought, mainly thanks to some bigger carp for Dan. It was a good battle though. Trigger on p29 wasn't happy, he's not used to being on a poor peg.
Adrian's weight on p34 came as surprise, because he spent more time attached to the island than fishing. Apparently he lost 9 rigs fishing across and having the wind blowing him into the island bushes, so I know what he will be spending his section winning money on!
For most it was a relief to pack up and it really was a case you should have been here last week.
1st 89- 7 Dan White - p31
2nd 77-10 Adrian Clark - p34
3rd 65- 6 Ken Rayner - p32
4th 53- 7 Glenn Calvert - p13
5th 39- 7 Ian Brownsey - p7
6th 37- 0 Paul Elmes - p70
Silvers
1st 19-10 Andy Hembrow - p68
2nd 17-10 Chris Fox - p36
3rd 16- 1 Dan White - p31
4th 12-10 Paul Faires - p3
5th 10- 2 Ken Rayner - p32
6th 7-12 Tony Rixon - p39
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