Sat 13th May - Stubpond - Polemania qualifier
Sunday 14th May - Leatherhead match at Willinghurst top
I'd been really looking forward to this weekend, a rare Sat & Sun outing - very rare considering I've only been fishing 7 times all year - so with the wife's good cheer ringing in me ears, it was back to Stubpond.
After 2 very poor showings - one fair enough, the other plain embarassing - I was determined bordering pathological to catch some fish down. This was a pole only affair, and due to the FA Cup Final, there were only a few attendees, which could be in my favour. I drew 11, 1 to the right of where i'd been 3 wks previous, so I had some idea of what to expect. I planned to fish banded pellet shallow at 14mt, feed a paste line down the shelf and feed both margins with corn - plenty of room this week and a good depth - 3' right up against the reeds. Heavy tackle for this line, there's some real dogs in here - 0.21 to a 12 Drennan Method hook.
Pinging 4mm pellets at 14 mtrs, soon brough a fish, after an hour I'd had 2. It wasnt thick & fast, just the odd one swimming through and taking a fancy. 3 more followed in the next hour. The guy to my right was starting to put a few together, also shallow, and a bank walker informed me we were the only ones with more than 1 fish, we were also the only ones fishing shallow. So far so good. The bank walker returned to his peg, went shallow and started catching a fish a bung. Hmm. Meanwhile I didnt have a sniff for 90 mins. Hmmmmm. A quick look in the edge and down the shelf brought nought so I decided to persevere long. A few more went in the net and with 2 hrs to go I had 10, but I was now well off the pace.
I finally had another look in the edge with 90 mins to go, missed an immediate bite but the next put resulted in a chunky 12lb fish. Great. Straight back in, within seconds the margin pole is bent to the butt, the red hydro is at full stretch, 5 mins later a real lump of 15lb or so joins his mates. Nothing down the shelf, but another double with 20 mins left brought a final tally of 98lb and 4th, but only by 3lb. The 3 fish in the edge went 40lb between them. At last, some fish from the bloody place, a few lessons learnt and I feel like I'm starting to work it out a bit. The man who returned to his peg won it with about 126lb I think, 1 or 2 fish ahead of 2nd - its never to late to rethink your match I guess.
So to Sunday, the first Leatherhead club match of the year and I'd been really looking forward to this one. I did crap in the same match last year, (which was the first time I'd been out with Leatherhead) so I was keen to see how much I'd improved in a year. I'd also persuaded me mate The Puffin to join, like me he'd fished as a nipper, but got into other stuff and had a good 10 years+ away from it. This was his first match in over 2yrs, and I suspected he'd've been awake at 4am with excitement. (He was). It fished it's nut off the day before - over 300lb won the lake, with 3 other 150-ish weights.
We both drew pretty well, me on 20, a nice peg on a corner facing into the middle giving you lots of open water to go at. I drew it in a winter league match, so knew there was good depth in the edges and a shelf about 6mtrs. Puffin had 25 in the backspit, so I knew he'd catch a few. I went for a pellet / corn line at 10mt, fed some catmeat down the shelf and potted corn in both sides. Again, it was slow going, with only Ross catching a few across the lake from me, but with only 2 fish after 90 mins a rethink was in order. The fish were up in the water, so out went the waggler but 2 or 3 spells on it only produced 1 fish, with another 1 pulled. A loooooong spell went by with no sign of a fish until bang on 3pm, with 3 fish in the net, I dropped 2 bits of corn down the edge to the right, 3 seconds later it buried and I proceeded to catch 5 in 5 puts, 1 nudging 10lb. Alternating between left & right margins brought a steady run of bites, and what was looking like a re-run of the previous years blow out became a great last 2 hours which finished way too soon. Its fished hard, but most have 50 or 60lb. I'm thinking I might nudge 70, which was spot on - 71lb 4oz, beaten into 5th by 3lb, and 10lb short of 3rd. As usual, I've learnt what not to do - that 10lb is 2 fish at most, I'm sure i couldnt nicked 2 fish if i'd've kept my head down on the pole instead of slinging the waggler or dropped it down the edge 15 minutes earlier. Nonetheless, I've won the setion and had a good net of fish, The Puffin has gone home reasonably happy; he's had 40lb+, but not had a bite in the last 2 hrs, so he'll have something to think about too. The match was won by the funny little man who seems to live in the cabin at Willinghurst, some people know him as Pikey. You can read about that here. Ross is 2nd with 100lb
All in all a great weekend, lots of fish, some good lessons and I'm starting to feel confident about nobbling these Southerners for a bit of their hard earned this season :))
Sunday 14th May - Leatherhead match at Willinghurst top
I'd been really looking forward to this weekend, a rare Sat & Sun outing - very rare considering I've only been fishing 7 times all year - so with the wife's good cheer ringing in me ears, it was back to Stubpond.
After 2 very poor showings - one fair enough, the other plain embarassing - I was determined bordering pathological to catch some fish down. This was a pole only affair, and due to the FA Cup Final, there were only a few attendees, which could be in my favour. I drew 11, 1 to the right of where i'd been 3 wks previous, so I had some idea of what to expect. I planned to fish banded pellet shallow at 14mt, feed a paste line down the shelf and feed both margins with corn - plenty of room this week and a good depth - 3' right up against the reeds. Heavy tackle for this line, there's some real dogs in here - 0.21 to a 12 Drennan Method hook.
Pinging 4mm pellets at 14 mtrs, soon brough a fish, after an hour I'd had 2. It wasnt thick & fast, just the odd one swimming through and taking a fancy. 3 more followed in the next hour. The guy to my right was starting to put a few together, also shallow, and a bank walker informed me we were the only ones with more than 1 fish, we were also the only ones fishing shallow. So far so good. The bank walker returned to his peg, went shallow and started catching a fish a bung. Hmm. Meanwhile I didnt have a sniff for 90 mins. Hmmmmm. A quick look in the edge and down the shelf brought nought so I decided to persevere long. A few more went in the net and with 2 hrs to go I had 10, but I was now well off the pace.
I finally had another look in the edge with 90 mins to go, missed an immediate bite but the next put resulted in a chunky 12lb fish. Great. Straight back in, within seconds the margin pole is bent to the butt, the red hydro is at full stretch, 5 mins later a real lump of 15lb or so joins his mates. Nothing down the shelf, but another double with 20 mins left brought a final tally of 98lb and 4th, but only by 3lb. The 3 fish in the edge went 40lb between them. At last, some fish from the bloody place, a few lessons learnt and I feel like I'm starting to work it out a bit. The man who returned to his peg won it with about 126lb I think, 1 or 2 fish ahead of 2nd - its never to late to rethink your match I guess.
So to Sunday, the first Leatherhead club match of the year and I'd been really looking forward to this one. I did crap in the same match last year, (which was the first time I'd been out with Leatherhead) so I was keen to see how much I'd improved in a year. I'd also persuaded me mate The Puffin to join, like me he'd fished as a nipper, but got into other stuff and had a good 10 years+ away from it. This was his first match in over 2yrs, and I suspected he'd've been awake at 4am with excitement. (He was). It fished it's nut off the day before - over 300lb won the lake, with 3 other 150-ish weights.
We both drew pretty well, me on 20, a nice peg on a corner facing into the middle giving you lots of open water to go at. I drew it in a winter league match, so knew there was good depth in the edges and a shelf about 6mtrs. Puffin had 25 in the backspit, so I knew he'd catch a few. I went for a pellet / corn line at 10mt, fed some catmeat down the shelf and potted corn in both sides. Again, it was slow going, with only Ross catching a few across the lake from me, but with only 2 fish after 90 mins a rethink was in order. The fish were up in the water, so out went the waggler but 2 or 3 spells on it only produced 1 fish, with another 1 pulled. A loooooong spell went by with no sign of a fish until bang on 3pm, with 3 fish in the net, I dropped 2 bits of corn down the edge to the right, 3 seconds later it buried and I proceeded to catch 5 in 5 puts, 1 nudging 10lb. Alternating between left & right margins brought a steady run of bites, and what was looking like a re-run of the previous years blow out became a great last 2 hours which finished way too soon. Its fished hard, but most have 50 or 60lb. I'm thinking I might nudge 70, which was spot on - 71lb 4oz, beaten into 5th by 3lb, and 10lb short of 3rd. As usual, I've learnt what not to do - that 10lb is 2 fish at most, I'm sure i couldnt nicked 2 fish if i'd've kept my head down on the pole instead of slinging the waggler or dropped it down the edge 15 minutes earlier. Nonetheless, I've won the setion and had a good net of fish, The Puffin has gone home reasonably happy; he's had 40lb+, but not had a bite in the last 2 hrs, so he'll have something to think about too. The match was won by the funny little man who seems to live in the cabin at Willinghurst, some people know him as Pikey. You can read about that here. Ross is 2nd with 100lb
All in all a great weekend, lots of fish, some good lessons and I'm starting to feel confident about nobbling these Southerners for a bit of their hard earned this season :))
posted by The Northerner at
Sunday, May 14, 2006
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