No cigar, but a good day

Yew Lake, Decoy, peg 7

My ‘mates’ did their best to depress me before we even had the draw – I already knew that a match had ben won on peg 16 the week before I had a bit of a disaster on it. Now Terry Tribe informed me that the day after my debacle the match was won on that peg again! The only source of consolation was that, like mine, most of those fish were caught in the last two hours.

Still, I knew I wouldn’t get that peg today because all 11 of use were to fish the West bank, pegs 1 to 15, with the fierce wind behind us. And not only was it fierce – by the time we had got down to our pegs we realised it was very cold. The first touch of real Winter. So I wondered if the bigger carp and the barbel would feed as they are always the first to hunker down in cold weather. And early on, two flocks of swallows gathered and swooped and glided around, like sophisticated starlings, before heading off South, definitely signalling the end of Summer.

Wild, windy...and cold.

Cock-up round the corner

So to peg 7, and to be honest I would have preferred anywhere from 9 down to 15 as they have a slight tendency to produce more fish. But a job to do! First I potted out some pellet, corn and hemp to 8 metres, and put out a straight leger with a bunch of maggots to the middle. Mick on my right put out a Method feeder to the far bank and was into a fish before I had even tightened up my reel line. But he had only one more on the feeder and within 40 minutes were were both on long pole in five feet of water...with yet another cock-up to come.

After a few minutes I hit an F1 between 1 lb and 2 lb, went to net it, and realised to my horror I hadn’t put my landing net together. The handle was still in my holdall. What a Wally! I scrambled over to my holdall, bucking pole in left hand and unzipping the holdall with my right when Mick on peg 6 came over, grin on his face and his landing net in his hand. He netted the fish for me – club anglers are good blokes – and we settled down again.

No more fish, so I put a bait dropper of maggots down to my left in the deep water (there were no nearby margins to talk of and it was so cold I doubted whether the fish would come up even if there were). This quickly produced a 4 lb barbel, foulhooked in the pectoral fin, one missed bite, and a pricked fish. But I never had another touch there even though I kept trying it.

Adding a section worked again!

So it was out to 8 metres with pellet, but Mick had had several fish to 2 lb on his similar line on corn, including a cracking fish that looked about 10 lb. So I changed to corn and stuck with it for most of the rest of the match. Occasionally I had an F1, biggest just over 2 lb, and again – as I have done a time or two lately – added a section to fish past my baited swim, without baiting there. Amazingly this produced four fish in about half an hour before they appeared to go.

Mick in action - hoods were essential even with back wind.

So back to the 8 metres with my 1gm Drennan TuffEye float. I know this is considered very heavy by most anglers, but it works for me in high winds. Dropping the bulk down to 10 inches from the bait with a dropper five inches away produced a run of three or four fish. Then, after a long blank spell, I considered putting out a lighter rig to see if it made a difference. In the meantime I lost two fish around 4 lb each, both of which made it slowly to the net before darting off and pulling the hook out, and I had another very big fish unaccountably break me – something I am ashamed to admit to.

I considered putting on a different rig for about an hour (!) before actually doing it by picking up my 0.5 gm inside maggot rig with 20 minutes to go and adjusting the depth (it was deeper in the side than out at 8 metres, as is the case on most swims on the strips). This brought four fish for about 10 lb in the last 20 minutes! The difference was incredible, but you never know what the main difference is -  as the shotting was similar and the nylon the same 6 lb Silstar Match Team. Only the float was lighter. Anyway, it worked for me on the day.

Beaten by an 89-year-old

So to the weigh-in with 89-year-old Ted on 51 lb 8 oz from the corner peg which he now usually takes on the strips to cut down his walking. Peter fished his usual home-made paste for 84 lb 12 oz which showed that there were good numbers of fish willing to feed at that end of the lake. I estimated Mick next to me had at least 75 lb, but in fact they went just 60 lb 5 oz, as, like mine, his fish were small. Every other competitor had much bigger fish – lots around 10 lb. Bob Allan’s first four fish to be weighed went over 40 lb! I estimated I had about 20 fish and they weighed 51 lb 6 oz, two ounces behind Ted, who will be 90 this December. Beaten by an 89-year-old...but happy about it!

Ted - still going strong.

Peter with a double-figure mirror.
The fish here are very difficult
to hold for pictures.

Mick and I discussed why our fish – except his solitary 10-pounder -  were smaller than everyone else had, and could not offer any explanation. We both used mainly corn, and  it did seem that some of the bigger fish had come to cat meat or hard banded pellet, which surprised me as it was so cold I was shivering before the end and hadn’t realised the bigger fish would be willing to feed like they did. But obviously the water had not yet been cooled down. But I doubt that the choice of bait was the main reason.

Winner was Trevor, who wins more than anyone else, with  107 lb 1 oz on pole-fished banded pellet, while Terry was runner-up also taking most of his fish on pellet on both feeder and pole. These two fished next to each other – but it would be dangerous to assume that there were more fish there, because they are two cracking anglers.

Trevor our organiser with a fish
we weighed at 13 lb 6 oz. He
has the knack!

All-in-all I really enjoyed the day, having to fish for each fish by changing something – pushing out a foot, or lifting or dragging or stopping feeding – there was always something that eventually worked. Anf that final 20 minutes, when I was averaging 30 lb an hour, convinced me that I should have had more, and should certainly have been able to frame instead of coming 7th. There’s always something to learn.

The result.