Not a good day for me - Fraser's Fishery

I knew as soon as I drew peg 12 on Mark’s Lake out of the bag that I would be lucky to do well. It’s a corner peg and one of the few not to have a feature of some sort out in the open water. I remembered that a couple of years ago, when I fished a club match, Fraser had said it was a very good  Summer peg. All fifteen of us were on the 15 peg Mark’s Lake, and there was bright sun all day, the water was ice-cold (the temperature had dropped to near-freezing overnight) and the swims at our end of the lake were flat calm all day – horrible conditions.

My swim at the end. The island is out of bounds from this peg.

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I had a look down the margins with pellet at the start, then tried the deep water five sections out with pellet and then maggot, and then switched to fishing shallow with maggot – all without a sign of a bite. Eventually I managed to foulhook a 1 lb carp in the dorsal fin on pellet in the margins, but added only one three-pounder on maggot a little farther from the bank, on the down shelf.

Yet another win for Joanne.

Two more carp came on the last 45 minutes, to double fluoro pinkie fished a half depth in the margins, and that was my lot! I knew I was well down the field as I had seen Joanne Banks on Peg 8 catch fish early on, while two to my right, the angler on Peg 10 had occasional fish all day, fishing shallow to the island, using maggot towards the end of the match. I knew that Robert Edmondson, a regular here, was on Peg 2, which gave him the option of fishing to the island, and in fact he was second, although I couldn’t see him.

Joanne told me she fished long, towards the metal erections which Fraser has put in to give more features. She took fish on corn and pellet, catching some on the bottom and others a couple of feet off bottom, and weighed 39 lb 12 oz. A class act.

My 8 lb 6 oz was nowhere, but I wasn’t at all disheartened. The really annoying thing was that although we had no ripple, the wind was a nuisance, and blew floating debris into my swim all day. I had to keep lifting my rig out to avoid it. But that’s fishing, and one day I will draw a flier...

The result. Note that I wasn't last!