It was strange driving to a fishing match without a load of warm clothes on - no thermals, heated vest, sweat shirt, fleece and thick jacket. In fact Graham Welton echoed my thoughts when he said: "I felt half naked."
I fancied a peg on Magpie in this 41-entry Over 60s Open, but No - Raven 16 was allotted to me. Actually Raven fished the best of the two lakes, though I didn't fancy 16 because the sun is right in front of you along that stretch...and there was a lot of it! However with no ripple, the light in our eyes was bright, but bearable.
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| My home for the day. This was towards the end of the match, when the sun had moved round. |
I had 13 metres plus a half-butt to some reeds in front of me, but the first 20 minutes, on bread brought not even a liner. A switch to maggot, with some catapulted in, brought a 6 lb-plus carp, then two more similar ones plus a couple of F1s in the first two hours. To my right John Shearer from Saffron Walden was struggling with just a couple of fish.
There was a lot of detritus drifting about, and the bottom was also dirty - several times I came up with twigs and leaves even though I was fishing about 14 inches deep in 18 inches of water. I also hooked a long underwater reed twice, luckily being able to grab the elastic and pulling hard enough to free the rig, losing the hook only once. The tree on the far bank to my left looked fishy, but it was overhanging, and a quick look there saw me hit an overhanging twig and snag the rig, which amazingly came free when I flicked the pole. So I had to fish out from the tree, rather than under it, and never had a bite there.
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| Ex RAF angling star Graham Welton is usually to be found on the river and drains, but now they are out of season he turns to stillwaters. It was great to see him again. |
Then there was a lull and I took a 1 lb F1 on a top two in the deepest water first drop, on corn, but that was the only bite I had there. John then started catching fish right across, while I had a fishless spell.
Eventually a switch back to bread right across brought another decent carp, first drop, but no more. Then a move to maggot brought another two good fish plus a couple of F1s, and I lost about three, almost certainly foulhooked. I had to fish within about two feet of the reeds, otherwise I never even had liners.
John told me later he had put in lots of groundbait, plus pellets, corn and meat - almost every bait he had with him, and had been catching on meat, obviously on the bottom. I had lots with me but apart from trying cat meat in the deep water I never thought about using cat meat or luncheon meat across, and I didn't put in many maggots either. To my left I never saw anyone catch a fish all day.
I guessed that John had made up his early deficit on me, then two minutes from the end he hit a really nice fish, which he landed several minutes after the whistle - it looked to be about 10 lb. So the match ended and he and I agreed that it did indeed seem like Summer is just round the corner.
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| John Shearer, my neighbour on Peg 17, came from Saffron Walden to fish. He took that big fish on his last cast of the match. |
Chris Saunders had blitzed it round to us with 89 lb 10 oz from Peg 2, which has won or framed in several matches lately. That's the trouble when a good angler gets a good peg - and Chris doesn't let things like that slip though his fingers. I weighed 41 lb 2 oz and John next door 50 lb 2 oz - that last fish beat me. He finished fifth on the lake and I was ninth which I was pleased with from a peg I didn't fancy.
It's likely that we hadn't had enough sun to warm the water in Magpie, which is several feet deep, where top weight was 58 lb 8 oz, but it had warmed the shallows on Raven.
Next match on Damson at Decoy tomorrow (Friday). Damson has shallow margins, and then a steep drop-off to seven feet-plus, so it's anyone's guess whether the fish will feed in the deep water. Cat meat would normally be my choice in the deep water, but I half expect to be putting maggots in with a bait dropper. Watch this space...
THE RESULT
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| Magpie 1-22 |
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| Magpie 23-36 |
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Raven 1-22 |
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