14/05/22 - Ivy House - Old Match Lake

Weight - 44lb 2oz

Catch - 9 Carp, 1 F1, 2 Skimmers

Weather - Warm and sunny

Match - Open (17 fished) - 10th overall, 4th in section

No fishing last weekend as I was at a wedding in Yorkshire. It was nice to get away in lovely surroundings, although the journey up on Friday afternoon was a nightmare taking 5.5hrs.

Today I decided on Ivy House, over the Old Match lake and Kingfisher, hoping to continue my good run of form at the venue, although conscious that it would come to an end at some point. Drawing p12 on the Old Match Lake was an area I didn’t want, as this side of the lake has struggled recently compared to the opposite bank, although yesterday’s evening match was won from p11 catching mostly down the margin.

Starting at 16m towards the left-hand island I found about 2.5ft of water as it shelves up. Starting on 6mm kriller pellet, tapping sludge boosted 4s I soon caught a skimmer and got a better response switching to a hair rigged 4mm kriller pellet adding 4 carp over the next hour for about 12lb.

The next fish hooked was a 5lber but lost it on the top kit when my hooklength (0.14) gave way which must have snagged on something. A switch to the method and 6mm yellow gofter soon resulted in a 3lber. Unfortunately, I wasn’t quick enough on the next bite, as I was sorting out a rig. The fish hit the clip snapping the hooklength and the wheels were starting to fall off.

I had set up 2 separate silvers line, 1 fed with BMGX and micros and the other with caster and few micros, but only caught 1 small skimmer!

Back out to the 16m line produced another carp, but it was very slow and not much was being caught on my bank. I even tried fishing shallow on pellet and later caster as there was a number of carp moving around, but just couldn’t get a bite.

In the meantime, I had been feeding micros into my right margin, fishing paste, but never had any signs of fish. To my left I fed 4s and a little corn at the bottom of the shelf about 2m off the bank and caught a couple of decent carp fishing 4mm hair rigged kriller. In the last hour I alternated between this swim and the 16m line, but lost fish which proved frustrating with fish either foul hooked or outside their mouth and it was obvious the fish just weren’t feeding properly.

My weight was the best on my bank and as expected the opposite bank proved to be better.

In hindsight I wish I hadn’t bothered taking 2pts of caster and concentrated on my normal approach. I don’t think it would have changed the result, but it would have simplified my match.

1.    96-2 – Jeff Rogers – p4 (OML)

2.    89-2 - Chris Timms – p50 (K)

3.    69-12 – Steve Waters – p2 (OML)

4.    69-10 – Ian Millichip – p48 (K)

5.    62-0 – Vince Shipp – p37 (K)

Silvers

1.    12-8 – Glynn Loveday – p39 (K)

2.    11-4 – Pete Ziminak – p42 (K)