29/08/21 - Ivy House - Heron

Weight - 131lb 10oz

Catch - 86 Carp, 40 F1s, 5 Chub, 1 Roach

Weather - Cloudy and cool

Match - Open (12 fished)

I haven’t fished this lake since the spring and to be honest I just wanted to catch a few fish after a tough couple of matches. 

I had some spare (vacuum packed) casters that needed using, so decided on a caster shallow approach and was happy with p8. 

I started at on paste at 2+1 whilst priming the caster line, thinking I might catch a few decent fish to start, but the fish I was catching were 8-12oz fish. I persevered and caught a few better fish, but it didn’t feel right. A switch to 6mm pellet was better and after an hour I had 12 carp, but had too many tiny fish, whilst Martin and Dave to my left had the same number of fish, but they were much bigger F1’s and carp on pellet shallow.

There were fish swirling over the caster and I started catching straight away on banded caster, but it soon became obvious it wasn’t going to be as easy as I hoped it would be. They would come really shallow for the caster, but as soon the pole came over their heads they went deeper. I tried catching at 12-18in but caught most at 6-8in so had to work really hard to keep the bites coming. 

I had also started feeding 4s and corn (with Baninion Boost) down my right margin on the top kit. At times I was catching really quickly on corn and ended up alternating with the shallow line when it faded. 

I was pleased to weigh 131-10 and I know I should have caught more, as fishing paste at the start was a mistake and the shallow line wasn’t quite right. However, it was nice to put a few fish in the net and I am looking forward to returning.

1.  233-14 – Ryan Shipp – p23

2. 220-  4 – Joe McMahon – p17

3.  169-12 – Dave Willmott – p11

4.  162-  6 – Mick O'Brien – p4

5.  140-  8 – Vince Shipp – p21

6.  131-10 – Ken Rayner – p8

28/08/21 - Ivy House - Old Match Lake

Weight - 56lb 8oz (silvers - 10lb)

Catch - 13 Carp, 11 Skimmers

Weather - Cloudy start, brighter later. Light breeze.

Match - Open (12 fished)

After coming 2^nd on this lake 2 weeks ago I was looking forward to returning and putting what I learnt into action.

Drawing peg 16 was a good start, as it’s a peg with form. Decided to start at 16m fishing a 6mm killer pellet over 4mm fishery pellet flavoured with sludge. I was soon attached to an 8lber which I promptly lost at the net and unfortunately that set the tone for my match. I only caught a couple of carp at 16m and in hindsight probably overfed it.

After an hour I tried my skimmer line at 14.5m to my left fed with corn and micros, which again produced a few fish, but it was really slow.

Casting a small method loaded with micros & rocks with a 6mm yellow gofter cast to the island was my best swim, but for some reason I struggled to keep the fish on the hook, losing 1 in some reeds on the island and 4 under the rod tip. It was really frustrating.

With 2 hours to go I hoped my margins would come to my rescue, but again it was slow and frustrating. I had 1 carp to my right on kriller paste over micros & 4s and another on corn down my left, but the fish just didn’t seem to settle losing a couple of foul hookers.

I also tried a 5m paste line, which produced a 10lber and I thought here we go, but after that only had a small carp and a skimmer.

Really not happy with my match, just felt I was trying to force the swim too much, which wasn’t helped by losing fish. In all honesty I felt I should have had at least 80lb had I fished a better match, so was disappointed when only 78lb was needed for 2^nd. At least there is plenty of room for improvement!

1. 132-10 – Steve – p2

2.    78- 0 – Jeff – p10

3.    71-14 – Mick – p18

4.     69- 8 – Vince – p12

Silvers

1.    26- 8 – Pete – p1

2.    20- 2 – Steve – p2

3.    11- 8 – Paul – p4

4.    10- 8 – Mark – p8

21/08/21 - Glebe - Pool 7

Weight - 5lb 12oz

Catch - 1 Carp

Weather - Cloudy and showery. Light breeze

Match - Angling Trust Master (36 fished)

The header is not a misprint. I did only catch 1 carp and was left disappointed and angry for a couple of reasons.

This was supposed to be the Angling Trust Masters, however only 6 teams of 6 had entered, which is extremely disappointing and to be honest takes the shine of the event. When I first fished over 10 years ago, there where 16 teams, including many household names. As time has gone by the number of teams has dwindled and is now largely made up of local teams, so calling it the Angling Trust masters is misleading. For me and some others the prestige of entering a team has been diminished. In all the years I’ve fished this event in the name of the Angling Trust I have yet to see a presentative in attendance and they don’t appear to do anything to promote the event, which begs the question why I had to pay for membership?

Each year, I hear it will be better next year, but it hasn’t and 9 years ago I wrote about this very subject. Fishing-Ken's Angling Log: 11/08/12 - Glebe - Foundation Lake (kenrayner-fishing.blogspot.com)

Back to the match I was fishing under the ‘The Pellet Guys’ banner, with Mark Poppleton, Tom Thick, Chris Telling, Mark Wynne and Lee ‘Mushy’ Farmer. The sides we felt we needed to beat were Daiwa and Mallory Pink, which including Andy Findlay and Andy Kinder.

My draw put me on pool 7, p104 which was OK, but with only 6 anglers on the lake we all had plenty of space and I was looking forward to it. On arrival it became obvious there was an issue, as there were a number of dead fish on the surface, mostly bream up to 4lb and a number of carp gasping on the surface.

It appears the lake was suffering from an oxygen crash with an oxygen reading of only 30 or so, the ideal reading should be 80-120. These things happen, however there was an issue with the lake yesterday.

I expected a hard match but hoped it would improve as the match progressed.

I fished at 10m, firstly with paste, but after 30mins, no had caught, so set up a lighter rig to fish maggot or expander just to get a bite, but nothing. I periodically tried this line, plus a new shorter line with corn throughout the match, but never had a bite.

It was the same story in the margins and a 25m line (waggler/lead) fed with 8mm pellet. There were also a few fish cruising about, but they weren’t interested in feeding.

Realising it was going to be difficult, decided to fish a small cage feeder to the far bank, filled with So Simple Kriller and Blue Ice groundbait, kriller micros and hemp with dead maggot on the hook.

I lost 1 fish after 2hrs, which I thought was hooked properly, but it fell off halfway across. In the meantime, the 1^st 2 pegs (98 & 100) where the main aerator was now on, were catching a few fish whilst the rest of us were still blanking. Fortunately, the tip went round again after 3.5hr and I played the fish very gingerly setting the clutch quite light and it was a relief to land the fish. I never had another bite.

My 1 carp was good enough for 3^rd in section, with 3 blanks and the team finished 3^rd overall behind the 2 fancied team.

I don’t wish to be overly critical of the Glebe management team as running a fishery isn’t easy, however myself and a number of others don’t understand why the aerators weren’t switched on overnight and my section wasn’t switched to another lake, either Pool 3 or 9. After a 200 mile round trip, paying for bait etc, I was understandably not happy.

1st - 264- 12 - Tom Edwards (Team Daiwa) - peg 86, lake 6.

2nd - 208-  6 - Lee Farmer (The Pellet Guys/Tom Thick Baits) - peg 82, lake 5.

3rd - 192-  4 - Pete Caton (Team Daiwa) - peg 85, lake 5.

4th - 190-  0 - Jimmy Fowkes (Team Daiwa) - peg 70, lake 4.

5th - 184-  6 - Simon Skelton (Team Daiwa) - peg 22, lake 1.

6th - 184-  4 - Andrew Williams (Mallory Team Pink) - peg 24, lake 1.

1st - Team Daiwa - 10pts

2nd - Mallory Pink - 11pts

3rd - Pellet Guys/Tom Thick baits - 16pts

4th - Mallory Blue - 25pts

5th - Franky's Friends - 31pts

6th - Team Gosling - 36pts

15/08/21 - Shiplate - Hawthorns

Weight - 49lb 13oz

Catch - 13 Carp, 1 Skimmer

Weather - Cloudy and showery

Match - Haines Summer Series - rd 5

Its difficult to write about this match, as I drew well in the shape of p1 on Hawthorns, but struggled to catch and ultimately finished well down.

I started well enough catching an 8lber carp down the left margin on paste, which did its best to bury itself in the reeds.

I tried to catch across on pellet, which produced 1 on pellet and few lost fish. Meat brought the same response and paste brought 3 carp, but it was a struggle. In the end I caught a few more fish down the left margin on paste or at 16m towards the far corner.

To be honest I am at a bit of a loss as to why I struggled. The lake generally didn’t fish well and appeared to switch off during the second half of the match.

14/08/21 - Ivy House - Old Match Lake

Weight - 60lb 6oz (4lb 4oz - silvers)

Catch - 14 Carp, 5 Skimmers

Weather - Warm and mostly sunny

Match - Kidney Research Charity Match (18 fished)

Today’s match was a charity run my Louise Robins for Kidney Research and when I booked in had the choice of fishing either the Old Match Lake or Heron. I decided on the Old Match Lake with all 18 pegs in, drew p3, which is an average peg, but in the right area currently.

On the all-in I started on a small method, using fishery micros flavoured with ‘Sludge’ and sprinkling of ‘Rocks’, hoping for an early fish, but had to wait 20mins before catching a 3lber on a 6mm orange gofter and then an 8lber a further 20mins later on a 6mm yellow.

In the meantime, I had fed some micros, 4s and corn at 14.5m, but only caught a small carp on worm. After 2hrs, I only had the 3 carp, but other than peg 1 no one was catching, and the lake was fishing harder than expected. I even tried slapping for a few of the cruisers, but they just didn’t seem interested.

Fortunately, the 14.5m line eventually produced a few skimmers and more carp on worm, followed by a couple more carp on the feeder, but it was slow going. Peg 1 was still catching and noticed Allan on peg 5 had a run of fish.

With 3hrs (halfway) to go, I started feeding both margins with pellet and corn, but only had 1 carp which was surprising. I had also started feeding micros and 4s at 6m, and by fishing paste (50:50 Kriller & Blue Ice) managed a further 6 carp and a skimmer.

Come the weigh in I was surprised my 60lb 6oz was good enough for 2^nd, fortunately those late paste fish were slightly bigger than the average stamp and it was nice to be the right side of a close result.

£1,400 was raised for Kidney Research so a great effort by everyone.

1.    69-  6 – Mark Baston – p1

2.    60-  6 – Ken Rayner – p3

3.    60-  2 – Allan Oram – p5

4.    56-  8 – Nic Baggott – p11

5.    52-  6 – Andy Dixey – p8

Silvers

1.  11-10 - Jason Crump - p14

2.  11-  8 - Mark Baston - p1

3.  11-  4 - Phil Godding - p13

08/08/21 - Todber - Whiteposts

Weight - 105lb 13oz

Catch - 31 Carp

Weather - Sunshine and showers

Match - Haines Summer Series (16 fished)

The 5^th round of the Haines Summer Series and I really needed a good result as this league has not gone well for me this year.

The day started well drawing p27 on the bottom lake at Whiteposts, which is the end peg and one I’ve always wanted to draw. Reports suggested this lake had been fishing hard and 100lb was likely to be a decent weight.
 
Starting on 8mm meat at 2+2 and I caught 4 carp, but then lost the next 6! Despite fishing 17 dura elastic the fish where in the lilies down the end bank or snagging in the reeds to my left. I lost my rhythm repairing rigs, replacing hooklength and trying to keep my temper under control. All this meant I caught next to nothing during the 2^nd hour and falling behind Matt and Si immediately to my right.
 
I managed to catch a few on paste, but the swim then just started fizzing and had to wait too long for a proper bite.
 
A switch down the margin, meant I had to fish at 10m, due to some reeds and a pipe. Initially, fed groundbait which like yesterday brought the fish in, but had to wait for a proper bite on worm. A further switch to fishing paste was much better and this was how I caught for most of the remainder of the match.

Using a short top kit and strong elastic meant I was able to keep most of the fish away from the various snags, but still ruined a couple of rigs and was glad when the match finished.
 
Both Matt and Si caught really well down their margins at 2+1 on maggot, so well done to them. I think even if I had brought maggot, I would have struggled to keep pace as I would have had to fish longer down my margin.
 
Come the weigh in I finished a very disappointing 5^th in section and effectively my league is now over. With 2 rounds left, I’m just hoping for a strong finish.
 
1. 180-11 - Matt Banks - p26    
2. 180-  3 - Si Davis - p24      
3. 135-  1 - Dave Martin - p22    
4. 131-  4 - Steve Musitano - p13 
5. 114-  8 - Steve Martin - p1     

07/08/21 - Ivy House - Old Match Lake

Weight - 92lb 6oz (11lb 14oz - silvers)

Catch - 19 Carp, 1 F1, 11 Skimmers, 2 Roach, 1 Perch

Weather - Cloudy, sunny periods and showers

Match - Open (23 fished)

With the Old Match Lake and Kingfisher in the draw bag, I fancied the Old Match Lake as I’m due to fish a charity match on the lake next Saturday.

I got my wish with peg 9, which was a noted flier before Andy divided the main lake in two. It’s the only peg with no island chuck and looking at past recent results, it has not featured that often, however with the wind blowing in I fancied it for a few.

Starting down the end bank, fishing a 50:50 Kriller : Blue Ice paste (its produces a very dark green colour) I’ve had a small carp straight away, with a second 20mins later, but it was a lot slower than expected.

A switch to the 2+2 line where I had been feeding 6mm fishery pellet flavoured with Sludge, with an 8mm on the band produced another 2 small carp and a skimmer. However, after 2hrs I wasn’t really going anywhere, but then again not much was being caught around me.

With so few carp showing I decided to feed baninion boosted corn and 4s at 13m, which produced some decent skimmers and few more small carp all on corn.

To give the 13m line a rest I tried the short pellet line with no success and the end bank failed to produce any further fish. So decided to knock up some groundbait and feed in slight shallower water at 16m by the reeds.

With 90mins to go I had about 40lb. Over the groundbait I caught 2 better carp, 1 on double corn and another on worm, but the fish didn’t settle for long and the swim wasn’t producing as expected. I had also been feeding micros and 4s down my left margin, which hadn’t produced earlier in the match, but they turned up catching 10 carp up to 9lb all on the paste. Lovely!

By the end I didn’t want the match to end and was pleased to weigh 92lb for 5^th on the lake, which was one of the better recent weights from the peg, however the bulk of the better weights came from the other end of the lake.

I felt that I didn’t get the first 2 hours right, waiting too long for the end bank swim to kick into life and fishing an 8mm pellet over 2 pellet lines, when I should have refined the rig and fished a 6mm pellet, rather than waiting for the better carp to turn up.

What I really like about this place is you are never truly out of it and there are enough bigger carp to turn around your match.

1. 122-12      Chris Timms - p1 (OML)

2. 118-  2      Ryan Shipp - p15 (OML)

3. 115-12      Elick Payne - p44 (KF)

4. 108-  2      Mark Poppleton - p37 (KF)

5. 105-  8      Chris Telling - p45 (KF)

6. 104-10      Nic Baggott - p2 (OML)

Silvers         

1.   45-  4      Ryan Shipp - p15 (OML)

2.   14-  8      Freddie Wotlyla - p38 (KF)    

2.   14-  8      Allan Oram - p13 (KF)

4.   13-  8      Tim Rust - p47 (KF)

5.   13-  4      Jim Butcher - p4 (OML)

01/08/21 - Orchard - Match Lake

Weight - 63lb 4oz (15lb 7oz - silvers)

Catch - 23 Carp, 5 F1, 13 Ide, 11 Crucians, 6 Barbel, 2 Roach

Weather - Dry start, showers later

Match - Haines Summer Series (rd 4) - 13 fished

This was the 4^th round of the Haines Summer Series and 13 of us made the trek down to New Milton in Hampshire. Having only fished the venue a couple of times, the last time being 2 years ago, I was reliant on trying to get some local information and went armed with 5pts of caster. In fact, there were a couple of us who had similar information, either taking maggot or caster.
 

I drew p24, which put me in the middle of the left-hand canal and felt I needed to beat the 2 end pegs to compete for the section.
 
On the all-in I started at 5m on pellet, but only caught 2 crucians. So, switched to fishing kriller paste on the far bank feeding a small ball of micros and started catching carp, crucians and even barbel.
 
Whilst fishing the far bank I primed the shallow caster swim, next to the aerator. After an hour I tried the caster line hoping for plenty of carp. Well, I had plenty of bites from Ide, but only 1 carp and there weren’t any signs to suggest carp were in the swim.
 
Back on the paste, I was catching well, but every time I went back to the caster line, I only caught silvers and an increasingly strong breeze meant I couldn’t group my caster tightly enough, so decided to concentrate on the far bank.
 
A brief look on the short pellet line didn’t produce, so I started feeding my margins with 90mins to go. Caster and corn down the right and micros down the left. Unfortunately, the right margin only produced more silvers regardless of what I put on the hook, whilst the left margin produced a number of better sized carp on paste, plus another couple of barbel.
 
I lost my biggest carp of 8lb when the hook pulled as I was putting the net under the fish and felt it might cost me and come the all out, I thought I had about 60lb. Martin on the end peg 18 was admitting to 80lb, Steve on the other end peg said he only had 19 carp and Andy on p22 had a late run down his margin.
 
Martin did win the section with 84lb, Andy weighed 69lb and I only weighed 63lb, but the real kicker was Steve’s carp were a much bigger stamp and he pushed me into 4^th in section.

No catch photo, as the rain was biblical when we finished.
 
To be honest I was a bit gutted as that lost carp at the net did indeed cost me 2^nd in section and 3^rd overall. I felt a little unlucky to have caught a smaller stamp of carp, but in hindsight I think I got pre-occupied with the idea of feeding caster. Once it wasn’t working as expected I should have stopped and not feed so much down the margin, as it only brought in more silvers. If I was to have my match again, I would have struck with paste and pellet.

1. 84-14 - Martin Pettifer - p18

2. 83-  5 - Allan Oram - p41

3. 69-13 - Andy Eagle - p22

4. 66-11 - Nick Veale - p43

5. 65-  5 - Steve Martin - p30

6. 63-  4 - Ken Rayner - p24