The carp are still waiting at platform 22...on Cedar

Peg 5, Sunday, Jan 14, Cedar
I've been trying to forget this match for a week, but I can't. So I must bare my breast, and grit my teeth, and accept the slings and arrows of outrageous criticism that I deserve. But of more interest is an update on Decoy.

Fish from the stock pond have been placed into Elm, and Oak has been drained down, the platforms removed, and fish transferred to the stock pond, including some around 20 lb. Lee Kendall and I had a look before this match and, with the water about three feet down, you couldn't see the bottom at the base of the slope. But from about peg 3 down to peg 10 there was a mound of silt, about a third of the way out, which rose to within a few inches of the surface. You could see the top quite clearly, pitted with little holes a few inches apart. I guessed that herons had been probing there. That mound will obviously be dredged out.

That great big arm, behind Danny Carman, will soon be at work on Oak lake.

I was told that sheeting will have to be placed somewhere around the base of the margins before they are layered with the blue clay which is impermeable to water. Owner Sean Reilly really has got a move on, though the actual timetable, and the exact procedures, will be governed by the weather and what they find. We did see the legs of a box, obviously upside down, sticking out! I hope the angler is not still attached...

Cedar and Six-Island (which has only five islands)
The banks either side of Oak were muddy after all the work and the rain, so JV put seven of us on the low-numbers side, and six on Six-Islands (having checked all the platforms because some were still under water). I knew that peg 5 on Cedar had had some fish recently, and Chris Saunders told me that the fish had come on a feeder from reeds on the far side. So I put a maggot feeder out there (attached to my shiny new Guru N-Guage rod).

What a start
Within two minutes, and before Sean Coaten on 6 had even started fishing, I was playing a 6 lb carp. What a start! Next cast I missed a bite, reeled in about eight turns, and sudenly realised I was attached to a fish that had already carried my feeder well down towards Sean. Eight turns later it came off - I'm sure it was foulhooked. The next two hours saw me plonking the feeder withnin a foot or two of the eeds, and getting big liners, but no fish.

I kept looking left to see Sean Coaten's yellow elastic stretching out...

On my left Sean then found carp on a pole on corn, and to my right on 3 Danny Carman found carp on a hybrid feeder - several of them. I changed to a hybrid with an orange wafter, and then a yellow one, but never had even a liner. I was being thrashed both sides.  A long look on the pole at 13 metres, with corn and then maggot, didn't get even bite, so it was back on to the maggot feeder, mainly with two pink maggots.

Danny Carman nets his last fish with literally one minute left.

Why?
Nothing when cast to the reeds - so why didn't I cast to platform 22, which was only a couple of metres away from where I had been fishing? Why? Why? Am I thick? I had been hitting the clip perfectly, so could easily have made the small adjustment. It had been cold, I admit, which freezes my brain, but halfway through the match, it wasn't too bad.

Anyway, back on the pole for the last hour saw two F1s and two bream come in on maggot, while Danny had a couple of carp on the pole and a final one when he went back on the feeder with no more than five minutes left. I had been well and truly banjoed.

                        

First to weigh - Danny Carman with one of Decoy's finest.

The weigh in
Confession time - I was last on the lake with 15 lb 1 oz, with 71 lb and 84 lb either side, and the lake was won by Lee Kendall on 12 with 147 lb 13 oz. These were beautiful big carp, all around double figures, taken on a hybrid feeder and 10mm wafter, cast right to, and almost under, the opposite platform. Lee said if he was much more than a foot short he couldn't get a bite.

Next to him Roy Whincup was second with 86 lb 9 oz, also on a feeder cast right over, and he had seven before Lee had his first fish. It was when Lee told me about how he had caught his fish that I realised I had completely ignored the platform opposite me, no more than a couople of metres away from where I had been casting. Back to the drawing board!!!

Winner Lee Kendall with two fish which weighed over 27 lb between them.
That's cracking fishing at this time of year.

My marks out of ten - a shame-faced two.

On Six-Island the car park pegs of 24 and 25, usually so reliable, produced two DNWs, with 6 and 7 having the weights. The big freeze layered Decoy with thick ice, so the fishery was closed this weekend, and the Winter League and all matches cancelled. Next JV match is due to be on Horseshoe. That melted ice won't have encouraged fish to feed, so I expect it will be very hard, though with so many F1s on Horseshoe there's always the chance of fish between 1 and 2 o'clock on any peg. After that time temperatures always seem to drop.

Cedar

Six-Island