19/07/15 - Ivy House - Willow

Weight - 25lb 0oz (8lb 2oz - silvers)
Catch - 2 Carp, 52 Roach, 5 Skimmers, 1 Perch
Weather - Mostly sunny and breezy
Match - Float Only rd 4 - 22nd out of 40 - 2nd in section

I was looking forward to this match and walking around the lakes there was the usual chat about where to draw and where to avoid. At the moment much of it is guess work until the lakes settles after being divided in 2. On paper the smaller lake (Match) nearer the café looked the best although today there would be 15 anglers on it, meaning only 5 space pegs. The far lake (Willow) would also have 15 anglers and a little more space and the new canal would have 10, which most people wanted to avoid.

Peg 28 put me on the far side of Willow, with the small lake behind, which meant plenty of room, however this area of the lake has been poor recently so a difficult day was likely. My section started at p21 (next to the causeway) drawn by Tim Ford who I expected to do the business, leaving the rest of us (Glenn Calvert, Kev Molton and Mike West) to slug it out for 2nd in section. Paul Elmes was to my left on p30, so I really did have plenty of room.


After Tuesday's match I had a plan of fishing long with pellet, 7m for skimmers and the margins for later. This plan now needed a little adapting, because the long line was a little deeper than expected and being a poor area of the lake decided to go down the route of trying to catch everything. The extra space also meant I could still have a pellet/corn line set up away from me for the carp/big skimmers. Well that was the plan.
Starting on expander over the pellet/corn I got dings on the float from little fish. A switch to corn meant no more dings but no fish either. Going over to 13m, where I fed 2 balls of groundbait with caster, chopped worm and pellet resulted in a 8oz skimmer straight away then nothing. On to the 7m line where I fed caster, corn and a small ball of groundbait produced 2 small skimmers on double dead maggot.

I was hoping for something a little bigger in the opening hour, but all attempts for a proper skimmer failed. Although with the wind blowing into the other end of the lake, meant it was mostly flat calm in front of me, which combined with the bright conditions wasn't ideal.

Since I had seen very little caught in my section I decided to swap my skimmer rig (SM chimp > .12 > 16 B911) for a more delicate roach rig (Jolly > .10 > 20 silverfish maggot) fishing caster which kept me occupied for a couple of hours whilst keeping an eye on everyone.
At the half way stage another attempt at catching a decent skimmer or even a carp over the pellet/corn line or the long line failed. There were a few carp cruising which I tried to mug, but as soon at the pole came towards them they bugger off.

So with 2.5hrs left it was decision time. I noticed Tim, Glenn and Kev catch a carp and felt I had to do the same in light of the absence of any decent skimmers.

Initially caster/corn was fed down the right margin and groundbait down the left. Just like Tuesday attracting the fish into the swim wasn't the problem, getting a bite was. I managed a roach and 6lb carp from the right margin on corn and a 2lb skimmer and a double figure common from the left on double corn.

In the end I was quite pleased with my efforts beating everyone between p21 and p37. As expected Tim won my section. Despite the difficult fishing I enjoyed the day. Even the forecast rain stayed away.

1st 317-11 - Chris Davis - p11 (M)

2nd 81-14 - Bela Bakos - p39 (W)

3rd 67-11 - Dick Bull - p20 (M)

4th 61- 4 - Steve Tucker - NC10

5th 55-14 - Craig Edmunds - p4 (M)

6th 51- 8 - Martin Lenaghan - p14 (M)

Silvers

1st 42-12 - Steve Tucker - NC10

2nd 40- 1 - Leon Hubbard - p17 (M)

3rd 26- 5 - Clint Wotlyla - p37 (W)