Just a quick visit.

Well today promised to be a bit of fun as I was taking Dave, the owner of Maggotdrowning.com down to Monk Lakes for a few hours. Nothing strange in that you might say except for the fact that Dave lives in Leeds!!!!!

He’d actually brought his Wife and eldest daughter down to London as they had tickets to the Prince concert at the O2 arena, so we thought we would make the most of  the opportunity to sneak a few hours fishing while he was down. Word had got out however and it seemed like there may be a few more members of Maggotdrowning making the trip down to Monk Lakes to meet up with him.

So Dave finally rocked up at my place at around 12·30 and by the time we arrived at Monks it was close to 2pm. We went up to match lake 4 to find Vince, Dave Collier and Bill Gibbins already ensconced. Welcomes over Dave and I settled in, with Dave opting for the pole while I had travelled relatively light with just my new Shakespeare Pellet Waggler rod, a chair and a box of bits chucked into my carryall.

The others had been there since around noon and had built their swims up so that they were all catching well, mostly small stockie Carp and Tench, though a few of the better Tench had shown up including a near 5lb’er for Vince who had managed a decent bag from the lake a few days previously.

While Bill contented himself with taking the stockies at the rate of 1 a chuck………

I however was soon caught out as having made a schoolboy error .  Playing my 1st fish of the session, a small Carp, things didn’t feel quite right and a quick look soon revealed that I had missed out one of the eyes on the rod when I threaded the line through them while setting up , not that the lads got any pleasure from taking the mickey out of my mistake.

Dave Collier was getting a few, but soon went into “Butler” mode popping down to the snack wagon and returning with the burgers and the teas  so a halt was called as those were consumed. Behind us on match lake 1 a match had recently finished and I could see a few fish moving in the margins where the departing anglers had disposed of their unused bait. As I was finding sport slow in my own swim I took the decision to move over onto the closest swim to see what I could manage from the margins.

Dave meanwhile was sticking at it, even though he took a bit of convincing that his normal ”Yorkie” frugal feeding regime needed stepping up now that he was down south where the fish are hungry and need a decent feed, not pidgeons portions .

I’m sure he could be heard sobbing quietly to himself as he stepped up the feed from 1 pellet every 10 minutes to a hand full every couple of minutes, but it soon started to reap rewards as he found some better fish including a nice Tench……………

Meanwhile I had settled in and with the margins appearing to resemble fish soup I just needed to keep the pellet going in and  using either a GOT Baits  6mm expander or corn on the hook resulted on a fish  virtually every put in, a mixture of Carp, Tench and Barbel with even the occaisional Skimmer thrown in for good measure.

Chatting to Bill earlier he had mentioned that he had only ever caught 1 Barbel and that had only weighed a couple of ounces, and with the Barbel in Monks now going around the 2lb mark I invited him over to see if he could get one as I had had a dozen already. Well Bill sat there for a good ½hr with me feeding the swim for him, but try as he may all he could manage was a succession of Carp and Tench with me performing the Ghillies duties. It did at least give him a chance to try my rod out with which he was suitably impressed, but of course you don’t need me to tell you that as soon as he passed the rod back to me the 2nd fish I caught was………….. A Barbel.

Just to rub Bill’s nose in it Vince wandered over and dropped into a peg next to me and promptly had a Barbel as well.

With home time fast approaching Dave came over to try his hand with my gear………

………… and was soon into a fish, not the hoped for Barbel but the first of a few Carp that came in a hectic few minutes, topped off with a nice chunky little Mirror Carp……………….

So that was it, session over, short and sweet but a real fun session in good company and more than a few fish thrown into the mix as well, It would be greedy to ask for anything more really.

The JINX Series 2007

Match 5.

Well it’s the final match of this years Jinx Series today at Rolf’s Lake and for a change there’s no driving for me as a fellow Maggotdrowner Paul East aka NoMoreLongWalks had said that he would pick me up as he had managed to secure a guest spot on the match . A sunny morning held the promise of a good day and with Paul arriving in good time we had time to stop of in Battersea on the way for a hearty breakfast, and a smooth trouble free trip down saw us pulling into the car park at Rolf’s around 11am allowing us plenty of time before the supposed 12 noon draw. The one worry was that as we had driven down the sunshine had disappeared to be replaced with a heavily overcast grey sky.
A stroll round the lake soon revealed that the lake was almost back at it’s normal level with most of the platforms finally being above water and that John Bennett had been busy gardening, with a lot of work having been done on the swims.

At the draw there was plenty of discussion, Could Ant hang onto the lead in the series or could a permutation of results today see the long time leader lose out to either Royst, Mark, Brian or Nick and could Dave(yorkie)Moore and Eric maintain their narrow 6 point lead in The Pairs over Mark C and Paul Roberts. The actual draw was a little late (as usual ) which meant that we would be fishing from 2pm till 7pm.
Into the draw bag and I draw peg34 on the little lake, a peg widely regarded as a flyer. I’ve only fished it once before on the Saturday of the MD’s Pairs weekend, when the lake was still a fair way above it’s normal level and had managed 73¼lbs from the peg . With plenty of time before the start I set up a feeder and a new Shakespeare Mach3 11ft pellet waggler rod that I’ve just brought as well as a couple of top kits for the pole. I was hoping to nick a couple of early fish on the feeder or waggler before concentrating later on the right hand margin.

Looking across I could see Clive who must have run to peg8 as he had drawn it on Bank Holiday Monday and had 202lb 4oz , while the previous Saturday John Walker had 530lbs from the peg, so no pressure there. For company on peg7 Clive had Nick Jones (Polepot) and on 6 Dirk(The Dangler)Williams, with Royst further down on peg 4 and Steve Wilson on 2. While to my left I had Colin on peg36 and Nick(Neo1)Williams on 38 while Mark C was on 40.

So 2pm and the All-in, a big handfull of pellet into the bush to my right and another couple in front of it then out to the lily pads with hair rigged meat on the feeder. Looking up I could see that Clive was already in to his 1st Carp, swiftly followed by a Skimmer.

My tip didn’t as much as flicker, normally you would expect lots of little twitches as silvers attacked the bait or even a couple of liners if Carp were present somewhere in the swim, but nothing moved it at all.
Polepot appeared to have snared one on the feeder………

while Mark C had had one and Steve Wilson had had a couple of fish………..

but looking down, the bank to my left resembled a still life as both Colin and Nick were in the same predicament as me……….

I’d been religiously feeding my margin swim, but it it was far to early to take a look and as I had seen a couple of fish topping I decided to take a look with the pellet waggler after 40 minutes of inactivity on the feeder. A couple of pouch fulls of pellet and first cast out the rod is nearly ripped from my hand!!!
The fish put up a spirited fight but the rod dealt with it all, despite the fish at one stage tangling itself in the line giving the appearance to some of it being foulhooked and was soon safely in the net. An obvious weigher, it tipped the scales at 14½lbs, a lovely way to get off the mark and christen a new rod at the same time . In the next 30 mins I managed another couple of 6lb’ers and then it died on me.

All the time it had been getting cooler, so much so that I went back to the car for my bib & brace and a fleece. Having a chat with a few of the lads on the car park bank on the way back revealed that it was hard graft for everyone with only the odd fish being caught.

As the afternoon drew on Colin had finally got a Carp of about 5lbs while Neo1 had got one as well along with a couple of Skimmers. Poor Steve had had a bit of a disaster however, while playing a decent Carp his no4 section of his pole had snapped clean in two and he could only watch helplessly as the top 3½ sections of his pole slid below the surface of the lake like Excaliber……….

things had picked up however for Dirk and Royst with them both appearing to be walking away with the match and matching each other fish for fish, although Dirk appeared to have the edge with more of his fish being weighers and including a clonking Golden Orfe that tipped the scales at 6lbs 4ozs.

 

With just an hour to go I noticed that Clive had started to finally find a few fish, to little to late, but at least he was catching which was more than the majority of us were doing………

Finally 7pm rolled round putting most of us out of our misery. While my 3 Carp only weighed 26½lbs, amazingly it was enough to give me a section win!!!!!!  Due to the low weights the weigh-in didn’t take as long as usual and it was soon confirmed that Dirk had won the day with his 1st ever Jinx Ton  and Royst just missing out due to losing a number of fish, costing him not only the match but the overall win in the Jinx Series  as well

Ant despite the horror of a DNW on the day hung on to win the Jinx Series  with Royst taking 2nd overall, while the Pairs was won by Dave Moore and Eric Robathan in a close finish with Mark Causer and Paul Roberts.

So another Jinx Series survived.

A big THANK YOU to Malc for organising what still remains the friendliest series of matches that I’ve ever had the pleasure to fish in, and the reason for that is the anglers that compete in the Series. Thank you all for making it the event it is.

Highlight for me was seeing the look on Nick Jones’s face when he picked up his 1st ever Jinx section at Holly Farm and then repeated it again at Stockton. Well Done Nick, couldn’t have happened to a nicer bloke.
Can’t wait to do it all again next year . Nurse, Time for my medication.

Overall  Series Result.

So Bank Holiday Monday and Maria is working today, so after dropping her at work at 6am I popped back home to load my kit up and set off towards Dorking, having decided to take the opportunity to reacquaint myself with The Old Estate Lake at Bury Hill Fisheries . Surprisingly for a Bank Holiday the traffic was very light and in just under an hour I was pulling into an already busy car park at the fishery.

Stopping off at the Boathouse to get my day ticket I notice that things have moved on since I last visited with a much better stocked tackle and bait section now in place and a quick glance along the Front Bank reveals that most of those swims are already taken. I really want to get among a few of the Bream that the lake is known for, so set off along the Long Bank in the hope of getting one of the swims amongst the lily pads .
Carpers, carpers everywhere, but just as it looks like I’ll be unlucky I find a swim 2 shy of the culvert that will do nicely for the day, allowing me to reach the pads on both sides at 14½mtrs and with a decent amount of open water in front should I hook a Carp.

The rig was simplicity itself, a top2 rigged with black Hydro with a 4×12 KC Carpa Tricky float rigged up on 0·17 Carptec line straight through to a barbless 18 fox series2 hook to fish on the bottom in about 4ft of water. Bait was to be GOT Baits  6mm expanders, with a few of these being fed along with their 4mm hard pellets.

It wasn’t hard fishing really just a question of feeding the 2 opposite lines and alternating between them till a bite came along, which it finally did after about 30mins. A little dip and it just slid away and within a minute there in the net was one of OBH’s smaller Bream going around 3lbs ………….

The promise of another bright hot sunny day looked as if it may have an adverse effect on sport but by sticking at it I’d had 10 between 3 – 4½lbs by 11am.

Next put in and a similar bite sees a lot of Hydro heading through the pads, cranking the pressure onto my Super PowerLite a tug of war ensued, slowly and surely the pressure told and the fish (still attached ) came out into open water. The commotion had brought the angler from the next swim round to watch and within a couple of minutes there in the net is a nice Common Carp of around 10lbs……..

The chap in the next swim is called Paul, fishing more conventional Carp gear of matched rods and baitrunners on a pod, and soon he’s into a Carp that has taken a hair rigged Halibut pellet. It’s soon netted and weighs in at 12lbs. He’s only got a basic camera so I capture it on my digital to e-mail to him later………

Another couple of Bream for me and then I’m into another tug of war, this time in the other set of pads!!!!!!! Once again the constant pressure tells and the fish pops out into the open water and after 3-4 minutes of dogged plodding it slides over the net, a much chunkier fish this time coming in at just over 12lbs , with Paul snapping a picture for me………..

A quick phone call to Malc to find out how he’s doing on a pole only match at Drayton reveals he isn’t!!!!!!!!! Yep, the Peugeot has let him down once again and he’s waiting for the recovery truck……………… Somethings never change. Another quick call to Dave reveals that he and Stu are on a Barbel hunt on a river somewhere in deepest Yorkshire, but at that point in time they hadn’t had one.

Paul meanwhile has had another nice Common while I’ve had 3 more Bream in successive put in’s followed by another Carp, a Mirror this time, which thankfully charges out into open water allowing me to bring it to the net relatively easily. In the net it looks a little weird as it appears to have a massively underslung mouth, hasn’t affected it’s appetite though as it appears otherwise fit and well at around the 10lb mark…………

Yet more Bream put in an appearance and around 3pm I’m thinking of packing up to avoid catching the Bank Holiday traffic on the way home the float slides away and I’m attached to another Carp, yet another Common and with Paul doing the honours it proves to be my best of the day at 14lbs . As I start to pack my gear away Paul is in again once more, and after a spirited fight I find myself doing the honours again, this time it’s another lovely Common tipping the scales at 17lbs……….

So that’s it for me, a very pleasant days fishing with some good company and a final tally of 17 Bream and 4 Carp. Paul was stopping on for a few more hours so I bade him farewell having made sure I had his E-mail address to forward the pictures on to him.
Next up it’s the final round of The Jinx Series at Rolf’s Lake next Saturday, Hopefully Malc will get there but with his car you wouldn’t bet on it .

Marsh AC club match.

Well, it’s out with the members of Marsh AC today for a club match on The Reservoir at Harleylands Farm, Cranbrook, Kent.
A quick look out of the window reveals a dull grey day with the rain falling, so after a spot of breakfast it’s time to load the car up, not forgetting the waterproofs as it looks like being a wet old day. Harleylands is about 40 miles away from home and a relaxed run down takes about an hour meaning that I arrived just after 8am as it stopped raining, in plenty of time for the 8·30am draw.

Holidays, weather and a number of other factors mean that there are only 12 of us present for this match, meaning that there is plenty of room for us as we have the whole of the Reservoir booked. Into the hat and I find that I’ve drawn peg 25, not a draw that particularly excites me, but as with most pegs on the water it should be good for a few fish.

Today is really going to be a day for me to try a few things out. I’ve become more and more disenchanted with the Hydrolastic that I’ve been using over the past 18 months/2years. I really don’t feel that it gives me the control especially when it comes to decent sized carp. With this in mind I’ve stripped the red hydro out of the power kits of my main pole and my margin pole. I’ve replace these with solid yellow Vespe (22+) in 2 of the kits for my main pole and solid orange Vespe (25+) in the margin pole kits, all set as soft as possible.
I also had a bucket of unbranded feed pellets that my local tackle dealer had asked me to try out and give him my thoughts on. They’re green 4mm with a strong fishmeal smell, lighter than swimstim ones though and when they’re dampened the colour doesn’t leach out of them. Bait was to be paste made up with bait-tech Special G Green groundbait, though I did have some Dedra’s with me as a back up.

Setting up didn’t take long with just 3 top kits, a margin rig, another for 4mtrs in front and another for 7mtrs.
Looking across I could see Colin and Terry discussing their prospects for the day ahead…….


………….. and Dave making sure he had everything with him as he settled into peg 17, which had set a new fishery record of 288lbs the month before…………….


Tony, my partner on the recent MD’s pairs weekend was just up from me on peg 21, while Paul, my guest on the day settled into peg 29 close to the car park.

10am and the all in and I fed 3 large handfulls of pellets into both margins along with a handfull at 4 and 7 mtrs. Straight out to 7mtrs with a large knob of paste and after a minute the float buries and after a short but spirited scrap the 1st fish of the day is in the net, a scale perfect Common of around 4lbs. Straight back out with the paste and a few pellets over the top and a minute later I’m in again resulting in a similar sized Mirror resting safely in the net. Back out and within a minute the elastic streams out and a 5lb Mirror slides over the net, Happy Days!!!!!

At this point the day takes a turn for the worst, the bites just stopped!!!! Despite rotating through all the lines nothing!!!!
I can see that others are still managing the occasional fish. Just after 11·30 I get a bite down my left hand margin and after a spirited fight manage to put the net under a nice mirror around the 8lb mark, but then things go quiet for me again. Just after 12noon Vince puts in an appearance, he had hoped to be fishing today but family commitments scuppered that , however he found the time to pop down for a brief chat just as Dave came round with a hot steak slice from the farm shop, always very civilised affairs the matches Dave runs.

A change to double Dedra’s on the hook resulted in a couple of bites to which I was only briefly connected, hard to imagine that the worms had covered the hook point to prevent a proper hook up, so maybe they were foul hookers? However I did manage to land a couple of smaller Carp before Vince left, but felt I was dropping behind in the match as I could see Tony further up still sneaking a few out from the margins though a couple of better fish had managed to get the better of him as revealed by his comments.

Young Zack, the club Junior was nicking the odd fish on the feeder…….

and Chris on the opposite side to me was starting to put together a run of decent fish.

With an hour to go I decided to concentrate on the 4mtr line but all it produced was a couple of Skimmers while Tony appeared to be getting a fish a chuck now. Finally with 10 minutes to go I got another Carp, another decent Mirror around the 8lb mark swiftly followed by another of a similar stamp just before the all out.

Weigh in time and all was revealed, Colin, Terry, Dave and Chris had all been amongst the fish with Chris’s good late run earning him 2nd on the day with 88lbs 8ozs. Graham Manning on peg 15 managed 81lbs 8ozs for 3rd on the day, but everyone was eclipsed by Tony’s level 116lbs for a fine win on the day.

1st	Tony Roberts	116lbs 00ozs
2nd	Chris Withall	88lbs 08ozs
3rd	Graham Manning	81lbs 08ozs
4th	Terry Goff	69lbs 12ozs
5th	Dave Collier	69lbs 08ozs
6th	Colin Sharrard	54lbs 08ozs
7th	Peter Morton	43lbs 00ozs
8th	Jim Boase	33lbs 12ozs
9th	Zack Johnson	28lbs 08ozs
10th	Paul East	28lbs 00ozs
11th	Kevin Loveland	24lbs 04ozs
12th	Martin Hucker	17lbs 00ozs

So to sum up, a decent days fishing in good company as it always is with the gang from Marsh AC. Maybe not the best of days for me personally, but far from the worst. Nice to get out and catch a few fish after my nightmare at Stockton the previous week, and it didn’t rain at all until I got into the car to start the drive home.

Where to next? Well it’s back to Rolf’s in 2 weeks time for the last round of the Jinx Series, unless of course I manage to get out over the Bank Holiday Weekend.

 

The JINX Series 2007

Match 4.

Well, off to Stockton today for the 4th round of the Jinx Series. A nice trouble free drive up saw me arrive in plenty of time enabling me to take a leisurely stroll round what I consider to be one of BW’s most scenic waters and to have a look at the pegs we would be fishing today.

 In previous Jinx matches I’ve fished on the venue we have fished “The Boards” pegs, but for this match we were on those to the right as you enter from the car park including those known as The Animal pegs due to them being surrounded by masses of rushes which can make extracting any of the resident Carp something of a challenge. They are also home to plenty of bird life too…………………

Most of us arrived in good time allowing for a pre match drink in The Blue Lias Inn and the chance of a chin-wag and a chance to catch up.
As usual Malc had forgotten a number of things including the weigh sling and draw sheets so the draw was a little delayed, meaning that we would be fishing from 1·30 – 6·30pm.

The draw bag had dealt me peg 41, right on the end of the Animal Pegs so that I had relatively open water with just the end of the reeds reachable with a short cast on the feeder. To my left I had Paul Roberts accompanied by his good lady Jayne (Though rumour has it that she’s really his community care worker ) on peg 42. While to my rightt on peg 40 was young Ant Haywood, current leader of this years Jinx Series, and only needing another section win to tie up the series with one match to go.

My plan of attack was going to be simple, just setting up a feeder rod  for the chuck to the edge of the reeds alternating baits between meat, catmeat, corn, pellet or worm until I could find what they wanted. Initially I didn’t set up my pole intent on sticking with the feeder.

All in and most started on the feeder but Ant fed heavily at both 16mtrs and 8mtrs before spending a short time on the pole. Paul soon discovered that with Colin to his left and myself to his right he was surrounded by “Cockneys” and it would be fair to say that it set the tone for a sustained 5hrs of light hearted banter and mickey taking.

Sport was so slow that it was almost none existent, even this fella didn’t seem to be having any luck…………..

………………though Ant managed to foul hook a Carp and played it patiently to the net with plenty of encouragement from yours truly and a short while later this was followed by another similar fish………….

………… Me? I couldn’t buy a bite and after 2½hrs out came the pole.

Dave Collier came up for a chat and almost right on cue the float dipped up up popped a foul hooked Perch, straight into the net and at least a DNW had been avoided, this was soon followed by a Rudd that swallowed a worm twice it’s size, I was positively baggin……….NOT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Paul was getting a few bites on the paste by now but was having trouble keeping them out of the reeds, but at least he was getting some fish into the net. I sat the final hour out on the paste over pellet and was briefly attached to a couple of Carp before they vanished into the distance, but the reality was that the final whistle was a blessing, as I had the feeling that I could have sat there for another 5 hours and progressed no further.

So yet another £1 coin handed over to young Gemma due to her MINXING me as I weighed in an incredibly generous 4ozs from the scales-man.(The cheque’s in the post Malc.)
Paul edged out Ant for the section, but he’s still in pole position for the series. Matt Nutt won on the day with 6 Carp all caught on the pellet for 48lbs.

I still love the venue but it can be incredibly frustrating and it beat me today but I will return as it’s one of those venues that I really enjoy.
Next weekend I’m out with the members of Marsh AC at Hartleylands Farm where we’re fishing the Reservoir, hopefully I’ll manage a few more fish than today, but who knows? I’ll let you know the outcome. 

The Southern Intersite Match.

Well today saw me making the relatively short trip down to Willow Park Fishery at Ash Vale for the Southern Intersite match and within an hour of leaving home I was pulling into the car park to see many of the participants already there, ready and eager for hopefully a good days fishing, despite the fact that it was obviously going to be a scorchingly hot day.

Breakfast taken care of, most of the anglers were eager for the draw and while we waited many took the opportunity to catch up with old friends and meet some new ones that they had only spoken to on the various forums before. In that respect it was nice to meet up with bad.boy bagger and baging up art, two lads from Bath who use the TalkAngling forum and had told me how much they had enjoyed reading this blog, Cheers Lads.

A quick phone call meanwhile revealed that unfortunately Dai Thomas wouldn’t be joining us as an electrical problem with his car had forced him to return home to Wales. However a local stepped in to make up the numbers for us ensuring that we would not be short on the day.

Vince’s team meeting was short and to the point, with just 1 instruction…….DON’T WIN!!!!!!!!.
I should probably explain at this point that Maggotdrowning.com team members don’t take the Intersite Team matches too seriously, indeed when the series started, it was designed to be light hearted, and an opportunity for anglers from other sites to meet each other, put faces to names and have a bit of fun. We have just carried on with that ethos despite a competitive edge creeping in for some other teams.

So with the draw over it was time to make our way to our pegs. I already knew that I would be fishing the Big Lake and peg 73 on the culvert bank was going to be “home” for the next 5 hours.

 A nice comfy peg and with the pegging leaving every other peg out, plenty of room to operate. Given the good head of Bream present I set up 2 feeder rods and paced them both out to around 45yds and clipped them both up.
Groundbait was the new Bait-Tech Special’G’ Green with Casters and chopped worm added and worm, caster or a combination of both as hookbaits. I did set up a pole for a line at 8mtrs but this was very much a get out of jail option as I wanted to concentrate on the feeder.

All set up with 25 minutes to go I took a stroll round to see Vince who was on peg 59 over on the Bungalow Bank in what can be a good Bream swim with the wind blowing into it, though todays bright sunshine rather negated that. He had Perry Stone, one of the local experts for company on end peg 57 but seemed relaxed enough when I left him to get back for the start.

Maggotdrowning.com

 Rolf’s Pairs Tournament 2007.

So there i was 6·30am on Saturday with the car all loaded up and ready to get off to Rolf’s Lake for the 2nd Annual Maggotdrowning Pairs Tournament.
A quick stop off on route in Battersea for a spot of breakfast followed by a trouble free run down the M40 saw me pulling into the services just after 8am, closely followed by Paul East (NoMoreLongWalks) along with Dai and his good lady Anne and Vince (vg1037).
A short phone call soon revealed that Ady (BigLadWigan) was doing a passable impression of lost & confused driving around Holton trying to remember where the lake was, so he elected to return to the services and follow us down there.

Soon it was a case of back into the cars and down to Rolf’s, arriving just after 9am you can imagine my shock to find Malc and his daughter Gemma already there, indeed the car park was almost full as various Maggotdrowners arrived from all corners of the country.
Geoff P had taken the long distance award, having been chauffeured down from Scotland by his son for the weekend. While looking around you could see a mini Maggotville emerging as a number of bivvies went up.

Talk as usual was about just how many “tons” would come out over the weekend but as I took a walk round the lake, nagging away in the back of my head was a little voice telling me that things might prove to be a lot harder than many people thought owing to all the water that had been in and out of the venue during the preceding weeks.

It was good to see that pegs 16-18 had been reinstated opening up the choice of pegs available, indeed standing in the car park it was hard to believe that the lake had been bursting it’s banks the previous weekend and it was a tribute to the efforts of John and his helpers even going to the trouble of running a pump round the clock in order to make sure that the venue was eminently fishable, leading many to wonder why another website’s match due for the Friday had been canceled by them the previous Monday.

Finally Dave Webster (RedLeader) arrived, having collected Tony Prentice (teepee) on the way he’d obviously had a “Blonde” moment setting the Sat Nav so that the route from Yorkshire to Wheatly was via the M25??????

So finally we’re all assembled and the draw takes place for pairs, which finds me paired for the weekend with Tony Roberts (spamwham) a fellow Marsh AC member, and then the draw for pegs. Dave and I were the last to draw and I found myself holding Peg 34, considered by many to be a flyer, so no pressure. However on arriving I found that the rope that marks the far edge of the swim had been moved away from it’s usual position???? Tony. my partner had drawn peg 38 so at least we could keep an eye on each other.

Settling into the peg I set the box up on the submerged platform and elected to concentrate on the margins which were about 18″ deeper than usual, but also taking advantage of the new ruling that allows the use of rod and reel, set up a feeder rig to cover my options.

Next door on peg 35 I had Dave “Yorkie” Moore for company, a fellow competitor in The Jinx Series of matches, so if nothing else a good bit of banter was assured.

12noon and the all in sounds, and it would be nice to say that we all got off to flyers, but it was Gazmalman who had flown off his platform before the match had even started, Malman Floats? well it would appear he does, even if he is well dotted down due to consuming a few to many pies ………………

………….the crazy bit is that he did it again during the match, this time losing a weigher in the process that probably cost him the section.

For a lot of the anglers it proved to be a hard old day, most had fish in their swims at some point in the day but getting them to show an interest in a bait was another matter. Try as they might it proved to be a struggle, some like Dave grafted away for 5 hours and were only rewarded with a single fish proving once again that there is more to it than just turning up at Rolf’s to guarantee a ton-up bag.

I was lashing in the pellet on the margin line while fishing the feeder out by the rope but for no reward, while teepee opposite on peg 6 had landed 1 and lost a couple. However we all had to watch as Ian Ward (Chin) on peg 7 and Gemma on peg 8 caught steadily from the off and with the lake not fishing to it’s potential strolled away from the rest of us. Ian winning the day with 108lbs 8ozs, while Gemma was unfortunate enough to lose a good fish in the final minutes that could have pushed Ian all the way, but still finishing in overall 2nd place with 98lbs, a really top performance on the day allowing her to take more than a few £1 coins off of the assembled company.

I had been fortunate enough to nick a  few decent fish at the end with a final 12½lb’er with 5 mins to go, my 73¼lbs pushing up to 9th on the day while Tony had found out about the power of Rolf’s fish, putting 45lbs on the scales for 13th overall but losing many more. A lesson learned hopefully.

As most know Rolf’s health has not been the best so it was especially good to see him put in an appearance during the afternoon and have a gentle stroll round having a chat with those present.

The weigh-in proved just how hard it had been for most with only the 1 “ton” and more weights under 50lbs than above it, Rolf’s had indeed shown us it’s hard side, though hopefully with plenty of feed having gone in, things would improve on Sunday.

Soon the Barbecue was lit and the beers cracked open with Rolf stopping on for a bite to eat before returning home.
Around 9pm the rain stared to fall, but with Dave’s gazebo and countless brollies available the banter continued for some long into the night.

Sunday dawned dry and sunny and with breakfast cooked once more on the barbecue for most it was just a question of waiting for Pete Archer (Vespe) and Keith Arthur (Fishermans Blues) fresh from his morning radio show to join us for the draw. Both duly arrived and the draw was underway.

I found myself on peg 9 this time while Tony had draw sock on with peg 8, while I had Chin to my left on 10.
with the all in at 12noon, Ady on peg 31 was looking like Raison, Nudd & Wilson rolled into one as his paste attack brought immediate rewards, alas it was not to last, but he looked good while it lasted, unfortunately all to briefly.

I started off with an absolute nightmare , there were fish in front of me but regardless of what I put on the hook or the depth I fished at, all I got were foulhookers that proved to be unlandable. By the time that Ian walked past with his 5th weigher and yet another fish trashed another rig, my pole was thrown up the bank, to stop myself from smashing it in a fit of temper.
Once again I reverted to meat fished in conjunction with a feeder full of fishery pellet, which finally allowed me to put a few fish together.
Ian meanwhile was putting another decent net together but was losing a few under the submerged platform costing him several damaged top kits

Tony however was going along steadily and managed to beat his PB Chub 3 times during the course of the match, culminating in a glorious 5¾lb’er.

Tony (Teepee) had drawn peg 6 for the second day running and although he managed to improve on his day 1 weight, it wasn’t by enough to have any effect overall.

Throughout the match even though I couldn’t see him I could hear Malc (The Jinx) mostly as he traded banter and insults with young Ian ………

……… however he played a bit of a blinder edging to a win on the day with a level 143lbs, pushing Tony down to 2nd place with a creditable 136lbs. I managed 91lbs for 7th on the day and both days results gave us a total of 52points which proved to be enough for us to take the title of MD’s Rolf’s Pairs Champions for 2007 and receive our trophies from Fisherman’s Blues himself.

Finally I would like to add my thanks to Dave for organising the whole weekend. To John & Pauline Bennett & John Walker whose efforts to get the fishery ready for us were very much appreciated. To Keith Arthur for joining us on Sunday along with Pete Archer & his sponsor Vespe for providing some goodies for the winners. To Rolf, It was good to see you at your fishery once more and Finally to all The Maggotdrowners in attendance, it’s you that make the weekend the success it is. Let’s do it all again next year.

Well having got back into the swing of things with last weeks Match at Holly Farm, I was keen to get back out onto the bank again to make up for some of the fishing I had missed out on in the preceding weeks.
A couple of jobs to do 1st thing in the morning meant that I didn’t arrive at the fishery till 10am, and with a match on Peartree and the Reservoir a comfy peg on Nick’s Lake would do nicely.

Unloading the car I could see there was an angler on peg 29 in the corner, so i took a short 20 yard stroll up to peg 32 that had plenty of cover in the margins which would be suitable as I was planning to try out a couple of paste baits and some solid 22 rated Vespe elastic that I had rigged up in my margin pole.

A couple of hand fulls of mixed pellet into both margins while i set my gear up was all the prep needed, and although it was cloudy, hopefully the wind would keep any rain at bay, after the torrential downpours we had experienced in London the day before.

Plumbing up revealed a comfy 3 ft in the margins allowing me to fis a simple dibber rig cocked with a single BB shot at just under half depth on 0·21 MAP Carptek straight through to an eyed size 10 barbless Raptor. The real object of the day was to see how soft a paste I could get away with using, so all the paste would be shipped out with the aid of a small paste pot made up to Teepee’s design.
I had made up plenty of paste (six pints) in 2 different varieties, as I would be relying on just the paste coming of the hook to feed the swims.

1st put in at 6mtrs down the left hand margin and the float just slid away after 30 seconds and a nice little Common Carp of about 2½ lbs was soon in the net to get me off the mark.
Bites continued to be almost instant, but a lot of them were from the hordes of small palm sized Skimmers that seemed to have invaded the swim, though doubling the size of the paste bait meant that the bait lasted long enough for yet more Carp to find it before the Skimmers polished it off.

By about 12·30 the sky had darkened ominously and the angler on peg 29 had packed up and left, and I made the decision to move down there despite the fact that I had landed 25 Carp by then.

Yet again a couple of hand fulls of mixed pellet into both margins as I sorted the gear out and went back to the car to get my umbrella. Plumbing up revealed another 6 inches on the depth of the previous swim so I tied up another rig to suit the extra depth.
Soon the threatened rain arrived and much as I hate fishing under an umbrella I was glad I had it with me, even though the shower only lasted for about ½ hour. Just as the rain eased off I glanced round to see the familiar face of Vince (vg1037) who had popped down to check on my progress. Whether it was his presence standing there behind me in a cream sweatshirt (Sky-lining me? ) or a change brought on by the rain, sport slowed as yet again the Skimmers put in an appearance, however with the return of the sun the Carp started to return as Vince left to take his other half shopping.

Soon I was into a nice rhythm taking 2 or 3 Carp from each margin before resting it and swapping to the other.
One of the nice features of Nick’s is the variety of Carp in there. Mostly Commons and Mirrors, there are also some Ghosties present along with some really dark Mirrors that are almost black. Another nice feature are the Tench. Normally I’ve found that Tench don’t fare well in waters where they have to compete with a large head of Carp, but through the session I caught a dozen Tench, and while not large they were all fit as fiddles and pleasantly plump.

Here’s a few photo’s showing the condition of the Carp present in the lake…………………

As the afternoon wore on a better stamp of Carp moved into both margin swims, taking both varieties of paste confidently, the best of them weighing maybe 9lbs. By 5pm they had noshed their way through 6 pints of paste and I called it a day having landed 93 Carp, 12 Tench and a few Skimmers. At a conservative estimate I would think I had 200lbs+ of fish making for a cracking days fishing.

Next weekend it’s the Maggotdrowning Pairs Event at Rolf’s Lake and if I can manage a similar sort of performance I’ll be well pleased.

The JINX Series 2007

Match 3.

Well after 6 weeks with no fishing due to work commitments it was just good to be getting out for a days fishing, especially as it was with the group of anglers who fish the Jinx Series.

Holly Farm at Ashby Magna in Leicestershire was todays venue, a complex with 3 lakes, Moby, Trotters & Gils, with us fishing on Gils today.

As usual I arrived with plenty of time to spare after a trip of around 100 miles and had a stroll round the venue, bumping into Nick W-P (another early bird) before retiring to the Cafe for a chat and a coffee with the others as they arrived.

Malc (The Jinx) had suffered yet more car trouble during the week (Total brake failure this time) so he and Gem (The Minx) travelled up with Nick & Brian, meaning that we at least started almost on time for once.

So into the draw bag to be rewarded with peg 7, at least one of the shorter walks from the car park. Now such was the weather today that the 1st 10 pegs had the wind howling from left to right while the rest were sheltered enough to be flat calm.

The peg looked decent enough with the reed fringed far bank being around 13mtrs away and a bit of cover on both sides. For company I had Nick W-P to my left on 8 and Geoff to my right on 6.

I sorted out 2 main lines of attack, 1 right over against the reeds and the other at 7mtrs down the track while I would also feed both margins during the course of the match, with a view to catching there later on.
Baitwise I had the options of meat, paste, corn and pellet with a bag of the fishery pellet to supplement the feed.

1·15pm and at the all-in I fed 2 pots with a mix of pellet, corn and meat at both 13 & 7 mtrs and with the wind gusting strongly opted to start at 7mts with a single grain of corn on the deck.
30 minutes in and without so much as a knock the float suddenly dipped and within 30secs a small Carp of around 12ozs was safely in the net . This was to be a bit of a false dawn however as another 1½hrs went by without another bite.

I decided to refeed heavily at 7mtrs and have a stroll to see how the rest were doing, before going to get a burger (which was looking as if it may be the best bite of the day )

Geoff was sorting out a feeder as despite sticking it out at 13mtrs on the pole he had only lost the 3 Carp he’d hooked  , while Nick could only report a couple of half hearted knocks on his float that hadn’t developed further.

Strolling round Brian was owning up to 7 small Carp while Clive was another with nothing to show for his efforts ………………… 

although Ant on the next peg was owning up to having around 20 fish in his net …………………..

All along it appeared that there were pockets of fish and if you were lucky enough to have them in front of you you would catch while others around you would struggle.

Matt managed 3 fish in the short time I watched while Malc could hardly buy a bite, and this seemed to be the story as you went down the pegs.

Returning from my walk I sat at my peg and finished my burger and pondered how to approach the final 2 hours. Geoff had managed a couple of Carp on the feeder in my absence, but Nick was still fishless as was Keith’s lad David, who was sweating on a £1 sidebet that he’d had with The Minx who was admitting to a small Roach & Perch in her net.

The deciding factor was that the wind appeared to have died down a bit, and I still had plenty of finely cubed meat, so over to 13 mtrs with a shallow rig and out with the catty to see if I could tempt anything up in the water. 5-6 bits of meat every 30 second, surely this would bring something?
40 minutes later and not a swirl, knock or bite.
Back over with a full depth rig, if nothing had intercepted my free offerings perhaps they might be attracted to them laying on the deck?
10 minutes in and the float slid away, but the white hydro couldn’t stop it from reaching the reeds in time!!!!!!!!!!!!

Back out with a Black Hydro’d kit and 10 minutes later the mearest dip of the float results in Carp number 2 in the net . In the final hour I managed another 4, nothing of any real size, but positively bagging compared with the rest of my match.  David managed to save his £1 from The Minx’s clutches when he had a little Carp on a pellet and his top2 in the last 5 minutes of the match as he started to pack his kit away, not that he rubbed The Minx’s nose in it………..MUCH!!!!!

The weigh-in reflected just how patchy the venue had been on the day
with Nick (Neo) Williams taking the win with 52lb 5ozs. Ant managed a 3rd section win on the trot putting himself into pole for the overall series honours. Also it was great to see Nick (Polepot) finally pick up some coin for 2nd in his section, his 1st payout despite fishing the Jinx Series from it’s start 6 years ago.

My six Carp weighed a meager 6lbs 6ozs which amazingly enough was enough for 2nd in my section, bringing me a bit of coin to go with my pound that The Minx had to return to me on the day.

So a 200+mile round trip for not a lot of fish, but it was just good to be out on the bank again and end enjoying the crack.
The next Jinx match is at Stockton, but before that it is the Maggotdrowning.com Pairs Weekend at Rolf’s Lake which should be a blast if it’s anything like last year.

The JINX Series 2007

Match 1.

So here we were, back again for yet another Jinx Series.The banter was soon flowing as usual as most of the usual suspects were back again having been released back into the community along with a few new unsuspecting fools that had been attracted in the false hope of not being affected by The Jinx.

The weather in the week leading upto the match had not been kind with heavy rain almost leading the lake to overflowing into the surrounding fields. Thankfully a spot of swift action by John Bennett and a couple of the local lads had saved the day meaning that no fish had been lost. However with every peg was under water and with pegs 16-18 lost to the recent bankside collapse and 19-21 out of bounds as they had been fenced off to keep the fish in, a bit of repegging was nessessary to accomodate the 29 anglers present on the day.
Oh, and just to add to the problems the Carp had decided that today was the day for Lurvvvvvvve!!!!!  thrashing the margins to foam wherever you looked.

Well of course the planned 11·30am draw was never going to happen, This is The Jinx Series after all, as Malc’s car decided to self destruct yet again on the trip up from Wales, so it was more like 12·30pm once the draw was done with the fishing to be done from 1·30pm – 6·30pm.
I had drawn 15, which in reality was somewhere around peg 38 if you had been able to see it, to my right for company I had Monkey (Nick W-P) and Dai for company while Malc had ended up literaly in peg34 (stewards inquiry needed there i think )

How to approach it was going to be the question as the conditions were like nothing I had ever encountered before at Rolf’s. I settled for a margin approach just past a bush to my left which is normally on dry land surrounded by grass and also set up a feeder rod as i had plenty of space down into the corner on my left to throw to.

So 12·30am and all-in sees me put a bit of meat onto the feeder rig and a plug of over wetted feed pellet into the cage feeder and lob it down towards the corner + 3 good handfulls of feed pellet are deposited in front of the bush. A couple of minutes later and the tip wraps round and I’m into a Carp. It actually felt strange to be using a rod at Rolf’s, and despite some encouragement from Malc….”You won’t land it“….. it was soon in the net. Well you can imagine my amazement on lifting the net to find not 1 but 2 Carp safely nestling in the bottom of it!!!!!!!!
Apart from the weigher at 9½lbs with my hook in it’s mouth there was another of around 8lbs keeping it company!!!!! However I did the decent thing and put the 8lb’er straight back, a good start none the less.

Straight back out and another couple of minutes pass and the tip wraps round again but this time it’s just a solitary 7lb’er that’s in the bottom of the net. So 10 minutes in and 18lbs+ already, could this be a red letter day?
Unfortunately the next 40 minutes saw not so much as a flicker from the tip, so reluctantly it was out with the pole rig……………….

………………. Dropping it in to what is normally a shallow margin saw me being plagued by silvers that just whittled away the bait whether it was pellet, paste or meat with the occaisional one managing to hang itself just long enough to find itself on the hook.

Conditions were having an effect on most, I could see Eric on 39 fishing his “Margin” and giving what appeared to be some Prestons 19h or was it Purple Hydro? lacky a good work out

…………….who despite having spent countless hours over the last few months getting to know the venue by fishing in the various leagues was just having one of those days where it just wasn’t happening for him .

Dirk wandered along with his son who had come down to help him out with a tale of woe involving a 12lb’er and a landing net that split depositing said fish straight back in the water , while monkey having struggled for a bite finally hooked one only to have it strip his rig complete with his newly brought hydro straight out of his top kit!!!!!

Dai finally managed one but it did lead him a merry dance on what appeared to be black hydro, seeming to be ever so reluctant to get it’s head up……….

……………While Malc having finally reverted to the pole was starting to put a number of weighers on the scales.

I finally managed to get amongst a few fish by fishing tight up against the bush in about 12 inches of water over what is grass with a big lump of paste, a tactic which saw me put another 9 fish on the bank though only the last was a weigher, though I probably lost a similar number that just bolted straight through the bush.

Weigh-in time saw me end with 64lbs 8ozs for 3rd in my section and 12th on the day, not the best or worst result on a day that has frustrated many.

Taking the honours on the day was Dave “Yorkie” Moore with a new PB match weight of 150lbs……….

………..a very popular winner as Dave is one of the few originals left that has fished  The Jinx Series since the very 1st series of matches.

Unfortunately Rolf wasn’t present for the match today as a result of having had an operation the previous day,
However all our thoughts were with him for a full and speedy recovery and we look forward to seeing him fit and fully recovered on our next visit.    

So that’s it for this 1st match, hopefully The Minx will be in attendance on the next match at Tunnel Barn Farm so that a few of us can reclaim some £1 coins that we have merely lent her.
We’ll see when we do it all again on Saturday 30th June.

Polepot’s Rolf’s Rumble.

TalkAngling.co.uk Forum Match.

Well today was the day of Neil McMurran aka polepot’s TalkAngling match at Rolf’s Lake and by 9·30am the car-park had filled up as the 30 anglers booked in for the day arrived for the draw. With the sun beating out of a clear blue sky it promised to be a warm one and it was good to see Rolf himself in attendance as he had recently been into hospital .

As always these internet matches provide the opportunity to put faces to names normally only seen on computer screens, and invariably the banter flows and little side bets are made.

Malc’s daughter Gemma has recently got back into fishing and already beaten a few good anglers leading to her being christened “The Minx” and a Minxed list has been published on a couple of websites detailing those anglers she’s beaten. We had a £1 sidebet on the day, but I must admit to having an ominous feeling that this could be the day I was added to the list after all the banter that had been flowing in the past couple of weeks .

Into the drawbag and peg37 stuck to my hand, not a bad draw normally on the little lake and as i made my way down there I saw that Mark C had 34, a noted flyer in the corner. 35 was vacant, on 36 I had polebreaker for company and on 38 matt6900 while further round on 40 was andy222 who had the misfortune to have Malc(The Jinx)Doyle for company on peg 1.

Setting up I was a little disapointed to have anglers on pegs either side as the pegs are reasonably tight leaving me without an option of a margin peg as such as there is little or no cover on the bankside there. I set up for just 2 lines, 1 at 12mtrs and 1 at 7mtrs, both hard on the deck with a spare rig for up in the water should it be needed.

11·30am and the all in saw me feed a large pot of Rolf’s feed pellets on both lines and ithen went out at 12mtrs with a GOT 11mm soft hooker. The float just sailed away and I was obviously attached to one of the resident carp. However Malc and Rolf walked past and after a bit of encouragement for Malc the rig came sailing back with just a scale attached .

There then followed 3hrs of absolute frustration as I was plagued by hordes of silvers. It didn’t matter what I put on the hook, Corn, Meat, Paste or Pellet in either 6 or 11mm, I couldn’t buy a bite from a Carp .

Looking to my right I could see Mark C steadily putting a decent bag together from 34 alternating between the pole and feeder and even polebreaker was nicking a few………

Andy over on 40 was plugging on and sneaking the odd one or two out and looking forward to a better day than he’d had on a previous visit when is was unprepared for the strength and fighting power of the Rolf’s Carp……….

 Malc was having yet more trouble getting to grips with Red Hydro and was having to do his best “Matt Nutt” impression in order to land some of the Carp, but at least he was catching which was more than I was managing  ……….

While over towards pegs 8 and 9 Fred and Griffo could be seen having a right old ding dong, both obviously heading towards what would prove to be decent bags ……….

Next door on 38 matt6900 had managed to get a reasonable Tench from his margin peg to his left and finally managed to get amongst a few lumps during the final couple of hours despite loosing one landing net head and breaking another …………..

While tucked away over in the opposite corner on peg3 Halfounce was making hay and quietly slipping more than a few fish into the net……………

For my part, I finally managed an 11lb weigher and 3 smaller Carp, but it just didn’t happen, despite lashing the bait in I just couldn’t feed off the silvers and I finished the match with just 34lbs to show for my efforts .

Tony(Rive T)Walsh took the honours on the day with a fine Double Ton weighing 203lbs 11ozs, a bit of a change from his usual catches from canals .

 Halfounce ended up in 2nd place with 192lbs 09ozs while Fred came out just ahead in his peg to peg battle with Griffo with 187lbs 12ozs to 185lbs 09ozs.

Gemma managed 68lbs 06ozs to double my weight and take my £1 as well as add my scalp along with 9 others to “The Minxed List” .

So finally a big THANK YOU to Neil for organising a most enjoyable day in good company. Hopefully we’ll be able to do it again in the not to distant future.

I’m back at Rolf’s next Saturday on the 1st round of Malc’s Jinx Series, hopefully I’ll be able to avoid those silvers and find a few more carp then.

Here’s the results from the day

Disabled Angler.co.uk
Charities Championship Match.

Well today was the day for the 2nd qualifying match for the Disabled Angler.Co.Uk Charities Championship.
A nice smooth run down to Monk Lakes saw me pulling into the car park around 7·45am soon to be followed by Paul East (NoMoreLongWalks) A quick look at the lakes confirmed it would be windy as usual and with nothing more to be learnt we adjourned for breakfast .

After a while the usual suspects started to arrive, Vince armed with the reams of paperwork that accompany him when he organises a match. Dirk and Craig who he’d dragged along for company. Wayne Panting with his helper Rob Panding, who would also be fishing today. Young Sven for his annual outing onto the match circuit and Clive seeking some respite from his recent gruellers at Rolf’s. Dirk and Craig then set about parting the assembled anglers from a few more with the offer of raffle tickets and a chance in the quess the weight competition .

Draw time saw 39 anglers booked in, mostly lads hoping to get an insight on the venue before next weeks Fishomania qualifier, meaning every other peg was left out on the 2 lakes. Myself(peg24), Dirk(peg22), Paul (peg20)and Vince(peg16) drawn almost together on the causeway of Lake 1 with Sven opposite me on the far bank leading to a £1 side bet mini-match being hastily agreed.

Setting up I opted for the pole, finding a comfy 5ft at 11mtrs and a couple of feet in the margin on either side.
I’d taken a waggler rod with the intention of fishing the pellet waggler, but the wind from left to right made it a non starter IMO, though the angler on the peg to my right went with it, so i would be able to judge whether I had made the right decision .

11am and all-in with 2 large pots of GOT 4mm sinking pellet and a few grains of corn going in at 11mtrs and a big handfull going into both margins. Bait for the day was GOT 6mm expanders and their 6mm soft hookers in both catmeat and liver flavour.

A small Tench and an F1 in the 1st couple of put ins was a nice start but the wind was making presentation hard.
I stuck at it for about 30mins before having a look on the inside with a top2 which produced a Skimmer straight away .

Paul behind me was bemoaning the fact that he couldn’t catch up in the water regardless of what he tried, but it was probably due to the fact that he had come straight from a night shift and was cream crackered .

Dirk was enjoying himself as usual putting more than a few fish into the net and so he should have been, seeing as I had drawn his peg for him, his usual flyer of an end peg right next to the airators .

Over on the other side Sven seemed happy enough even though from what I could see sport appeared to be pretty slow …………………

…………. he wasn’t alone in this however as from what I could see nobody was exactly taking the place apart.

Vince appeared to be struggling with trying to decide which was his best line to fish, though he did have me worried for a while when he came over with a ball of paste for me to try, saying that he was starting to bag a few carp on it ( you have to have fished with Vince to know that “bagging” is a relative term where he’s concerned )

Around 1·30 Dave (The Fish) Collier put in an appearance and very kindly got the teas in for us allowing us to go through to the end at 4pm. I’d had a steady match catching pretty regularly with a real mixture of fish… F1′s, Carp, Barbel, Ide, Tench (both green and golden), Skimmers and even a solitary Perch making up my net that I guessed went over 50lbs but which I new wasn’t going to be good enough.

Packing up while we waited for the scales was when disaster struck!!!!!!  Leaning across my box to lift up the footplate the box tipped and three of my drawers went flying into the swim. Much hilarity ensued as my fellow anglers offered their symathy as I delved around up to my armpits retrieving spools of line, disgorgers and all the various bit’s and bobs that hade come to inhabit those draws over the years .

Scales time and Vince managed a mid thirties weight, while Paul tipped back for a DNW. Dirk took the coin with 72lbs with me only managing 66lbs and Sven a meagre 10lbs, not that he was gloating or anything when he got his hands on our coins ………

Finally just a word of Thanks to Vince for the bulk of the organisation, and a further word of thanks to all the Anglers that supported the day allowing us to add a further £391 to the total for the year .

Looking forward to next year already .

The full result is as below

Matt Nutt’s Charity Match
supporting
Disabled Angler.co.uk.

Well today was the day of Matt Nutt’s match at Alders Farm in support of The Disabled Angler.co.uk 2007 Charities Championship, which this year is aiming to raise funds for Macmillan Cancer Relief and Rainbows Children’s Hospice. It’s days like this that show just how the internet brings like minded individuals together for good causes, with members from Maggotdrowning, The Danglers, The GOT forum and Total-Fishing amongst those attending on the day .

A foggy trip down meant that I arrived at about 7·50, just in time to get my tackle together and head down to the fishery café for brekky and a chance to view one of the more off the wall fundraisers on the day. Trevor Price of GOT Baits had been persuaded to part with his old faithfull slippers after the lads on the GOT Forum pledged £200+ just to be allowed to burn them at the end of the match ……….

9am and the draw saw me with peg 33 for my match, with Gary Page of GOT Baits for company on 32, Nick Bryan on 34 and Dirk on 35…………..

Plumbing up saw me facing pretty much the same as the previous Sunday with just 2½ ft at 12mtrs and a shallow bramble lined bay with maybe 18 inches depth to my right for a margin swim.

The all-in was called at 10·15 and a couple of pots of GOT 4mm sinkers were potted out on the 12 mtr line and a handful into the margin. Straight out to 12 mtrs with a GOT 6mm soft hooker at dead depth and within 30 seconds I was playing my 1st fish of the day, a small Carp of about 2lbs . Indeed the 1st hour went well for me with 10 Carp finding their way to the keepnet all falling to pellet fished at dead depth allowing me to keep pace with Gary on 32.

Nick on 34 however was suffering one of those matches ……….

The Carp in his peg were obviously related to Harry Houdini, slipping the hook on numerous occasions, Indeed 1½hrs into the match all he had to show for his efforts were a couple of tiny Rudd .

Unfortunately after my good start things slowed down, I would get 2 or three bites allowing me to nick the odd fish and would then have to wait 15-20 minutes for another run of bites. Gary however was catching more regularly, although he appeared to be suffering from a few lost fish, probably foul hooked at least he was managing to keep the bites and fish coming.

Further round on 30 Matt was having a bit of a struggle and resorted to impersonating a Jap Sniper as he tried to winkle a few lumps out from under his marginal bush ……..

Along on 28 Wayne Panting was getting a fair few fishing meat up in the water (one of the few to catch up) along with Steve Wroe on 29 next door, while further along Keith aka Gandhi could be seen doing his best to sneak a few out of his margin ………

I finally managed to put a run of fish together in the last 40minutes, just a bit to little to late, and with the all-out called I knew Gary had battered me off the next peg . The weigh-in just confirmed it, my 25 Carp totaling just over 63lbs while Gary put 114lbs 11ozs onto the scales for a comfortable win .

Wayne from The Danglers had had a decent day on his 1st visit to the fishery, the scales recording his weight at 81lbs 7ozs for a very creditable 2nd overall…………..

Back to the café for the results and a raffle and I was pleasantly surprised to find that I had won my section thanks to Gary taking the win .

The really good news however was the presentation by Matt of the proceeds of the day…….
 £1417 !!!!! with the promise of more to come in, which was gratefully accepted by Dirk on behalf of Disabled-Angler.co.uk.

All that was left was to give the send off to Trev’s slippers which was done with some style …………..

So a great day all round, A Big Thank You to Matt for organising the match, and to all the anglers that took part. I can’t wait for next year .

TalkAngling.co.uk Forum Match.

At the back end of December last year Keith aka Gandhi had offered to organise a match for the members of the TalkAngling website who had expressed an interest in fishing at Alders Farm, and is often the way with these things the 20 places were soon filled. As with most of these type of events those with allegiances to more than one site ended up being involved, but that just adds to the banter and fun on the day.

A nice smooth journey from South London found me arriving in the car park by 7·30am, closely followed by MarkC, Royst and Eric.The biggest shock however was the arrival of Malc (The Jinx) and daughter Gemma (The Minx) a whole hour before the draw !!!!!!! Soon it was time to dip the nets and face “The Hill” down to the Match Lake and a waiting breakfast, and I have to say that it’s a top brekkie that really sets you up for the day.

9am and it’s draw time and a £1 side bet was agreed with The Minx before peg 3 stuck to my hand, a nice short walk. A quick chat with a couple of the GOT anglers saw my plan of attack formulated for the 5 hours ahead and I was soon settled in with Chris BT for company on peg 2 and Phil Young aka Madd on peg 4.

The plan was to be fishing on the deck at 12mtrs where it was about 3ft deep and to keep pinging a few pellets in to see if they would come up later while feeding a line under the bush to my left where hopefully a few lumps would show later. Bait wise I went with a mix of GOT expanders and soft hookers with 4mm hard feed pellets.

At the all in I put a handfull under the bush and 2 pots of pellet out on the 12mtr line before going straight out over it. Within a minute I’d bumped one but next put in came back with a nice chunky Mirror around the 2lb mark.

Looking over to the other side I could see Wilky taking in the sun in his shorts and Matt stripped to the waist while I was shielded from the sun by the bush to my left and with the wind blowing towards me sat shivering in bib & brace and fleece , even Malc remarked on it when he came down on one of his customary wanders.

Matchwise it proved to be a bit frustrating as I suffered runs of unhittable bites and a number of foulhookers . Laying a couple of inches of line on the deck, or moving up off the deck appeared to have no effect, with the fish only wanting it at dead depth and nothing showing under the bush. Numbers wise Chris and I probably had the same number of fish, but his appeared to be a better stamp.

Weigh in time rolled round at 3pm and it was noticable that the usual pegs hadn’t produced while normally unfancied ones had and this was put down to the fact that ours was the 3rd match on the venue in 3 days. Never the less with a total weight of 1184lbs 12ozs weighed in between 20 anglers averaging out at just under 60lbs per peg it goes to show what a good venue Alders is.

Winner on the day was Vic Nugent who had 47 carp making up his winning bag of 111lbs 12ozs.

Many Thanks to Keith for organising the day, I certainly enjoyed it and will be back next Saturday to fish Matt Nutt’s Charity Match in aid of Disabled Angler.Co.Uk .

Marsh AC club match.

Well my 1st outing of 2007 saw me loading up the car at 6·30 am, and things weren’t looking to promising, the sky was starting to lighten but it was looking ominously grey and the wind was gusting strongly. Driving down the M20 things showed no improvement and as I arrived at the fishery the 1st drops of rain were starting to fall.

A sausage bagette and a cuppa seemed like a good idea as opposed to a walk round the lake we were fishing, especially as I knew it would be windswept anyway. Soon the rest of the lads and lass (Judy ) who make up the membership of Marsh AC were arriving. I’ve fished with them as a guest on a few occaisions over the last few seasons, always enjoying the days out, and for this season have been invited to join up.

Once the breakfasts were over Dave collected the seasons subs’ and the day’s fees and the draw was made.
Tony had the numbers in the hat and passed it round and peg 45 stuck to my hand (a noted flyer) only for a false start to be called as a couple of pairs had to draw 1st. Back in and 48 came out this time, still a nice short walk from the car park and a real bonus as the copse of trees behind it offered some shelter from the wind that was blowing onto our backs, others on the causeway weren’t so fortunate, fishing into the teeth of it, though I fancied them to do better as the carp normally follow the wind on this venue.

To my left on 49 I had John for company with young Zack next to him on 50, while to my left was Martin on 47 then a spare peg leaving Judy alone on 45. Dave(The Fish) was tucked down in the corner to my left (right out of the wind) with his former Boss for company, while Tony (spamwham) was opposite me on 58 on the causeway and Terry (Wily Coyote) was on 64 towards the end with just Jim on the end peg 66.

The wind had at least blown the clouds away, leaving a sunny and clear blue sky, but the wind was destined to stay with us for the whole day.
I had just set up my pole to fish at a comfortable 10mtrs into the 7ft of water with a second rig for the margins that could double up as a shallow rig on the main line. Bait for the day was going to be a selection of the new GOT hook pellets that had been sent to me to try, with the back up of some catmeat that had in the past produced fish for me at the venue.

At the all in a big pot of 4mm sinking pellet went in at 10mtrs and a handfull into both margins.
Initially there was a fair bit of tow on the water, but laying about 4″ of line on the bottom soon cured this.
I spent the majority of the match aternating between the 3 different flavours of 6mm pellets (natural, Liver & Catmeat) and the most notable thing was that the F1′s and a lone Ghostie fell to the naturals, Liver produced nothing but Tench while the catmeat accounted for Barbel, Chub and a few skimmers. It was so noticable that I could actually predict what I would catch dependant on what I put on the hook.

Sport was never fast and furious, but steady throughout the match, the only downside being that I couldn’t really get them to have it in the margins, though John on the next peg caught the majority of his fish from the margins.

A trip down to see Dave mid match saw him catching a few, though he reckoned he’d been struggling to put a run of fish together.

The last hour was a bit of a struggle as a slight shift in the wind coupled with the sun dropping lower produced a dazzling ripple making things awkward, thankfully I had my Polaroids with me to save my eyesight.

The final whistle saw a pretty windswept collection of anglers packing up prior to the weigh-in.

Weigh-in time revealed that everyone had managed a few despite the conditions with my 53lbs 5ozs winning my section and putting me in with a chance of a frame place.
Tony was owning up to around the 50lb mark having fished into the teeth of the wind all day and wasn’t far out putting 49lbs 8ozs on the scales. Last but one to weigh was Terry (Wily Coyote) ouncing me out with a level 54lbs and taking the honours on the day was Jim Boase with a fine net weighing 67lbs 4ozs from the end peg.

All in all a really enjoyable days fishing in great company, despite the conditions. Looking forward to doing it all again soon.

Total weighed in by 15 anglers was 518lb 6oz an average of 34lb 8oz