Catch - 16 Skimmers, 7 Roach
Weather - Frosty start, mostly sunny with light easterly breeze
Match - Silverfish League - rd 3 - 1st out of 22
After my last round disaster I really needed a good day to put my myself back in contention. However with a cold frosty start I was fully expecting a difficult, low weight affair.
Peg 8 put me on gap between the islands. For company I had Ray White on p7 and Glyn Wickham on p9.
I hadn't intended on bring a feeder rod, but glad I had done so now and it gave me a chance to try my new Colmic Scrape 10ft 35g and this was the first thing I set up. I just had a feeling that with every peg in between p5 & p18, starting on the feeder fishing beyond everyone potting in bait over their pole lines may be the way to go instead of targeting the smaller fish early like I have done in the previous 2 matches.
I also set up a rig to fish shallow for the roach/rudd and another rig for down the margin. The rigs I expected to catch most on was a chimp 0.5g (.10 > 18 silverfish pellet) and if the wind picked up a bit an old preston long carbon stem pattern 0.75g (.10 > 18 silverfish pellet), fished double bulk.
On the all in 3 balls of groundbait with a pinch of micros and caster where cupped in at 13m, plus a ball of groundbait with more micros at 16m slightly to my right. I started on a small gripmesh feeder (.10 > 18 B911) and double dead maggot on the hook cast half way across. As I was waiting for the tip to go around I caught a whiff of what I thought was an agricultural smell. It was only on the 2nd cast it dawned on me what it was - my groundbait! My mix had been frozen, but for some reason had turned sour. So that was thrown away and a new batch of gonuts black hastily knocked up.
On the 3rd cast I had a little knock and a small 6oz skimmer was soon in the net. Over the next hour I had a 4 more skimmers up to 2lb before the swim died. So 6lb in the first hour was exactly the start I had hoped for.
I had been feeding caster at 5m hoping to catch a few roach or rudd shallow, but only gave it 10mins catching 4 transparent roach and didn't bother with it for the rest of the match. A couple of tries down my margin during the match didn't produce anything so I didn't waste too much time. A quick look over the short line with a full depth rig did produce a small skimmer and another small roach, but the majority of my time was spent fishing at 13m, toss potting a small nugget of groundbait with a pinch of micros and caster. When the wind picked up I switched to the heavier rig and stayed on it for the remainder of the match, gradually moving out to 16m to keep the fish coming.
As the match drew to a close, I knew I had done well, since those around had struggled and I felt I made all the right decisions, which hasn't been the case recently. More importantly I made up ground on the league leaders and now find myself in 3rd spot, so a really good day.
1st - 22- 9 - Ken Rayner (Colmic) - p8
2nd - 19- 4 - Vic Bush (Mosella) - p34
3rd - 14- 6 - Pete Neate (Trowbridge) - p40
4th - 13-13 - Ziggy (Garbolino) - p17
5th - 13- 8 - Nige Sanders (Trowbridge) - p15
6th - 12-13 - Derek Beard (Avalon) - p35
League Positions
1st - Vic Bush - 64- 8
2nd - Chris Fox - 58-1
3rd - Ken Rayner - 48-15
4th - Ziggy - 46- 6
5th - John Fuidge - 45-8
6th - Dave Chidzoy - 40- 2
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