I fish like an idiot!

Cedar Lake, Decoy, peg 10

This was a 16-entry club match and I was pretty pleased with peg 10, because as a general rule of thumb the swims about three-quarters of the way down the lakes have a slight tendency to fish better than the rest. Pegs 1 to 13 are down the West bank and 14 to 26 back along the East bank. But today a really strong East-South-Easterly was always going to make fishing difficult everywhere.

The wind was into my bank, just a little from the right, but at the start I thought it was possible to fish five sections out, at about 8 metres, so put on a 1 gm rig for that with a Tuff Eye float, as well as a half-gram rig for top-two-plus-one, and a shorter Maver Invincible, with yellow top, for an inside line.

At the start I used a bit of commonsense and put the spare rigs on the grass beside me rather than use a roost, because the wind was certain to blow them off; and I also decided to fish the three-section swim first, putting in a bait dropper of dead maggots. In these big winds I know the bait can go anywhere, especially where the water is being blown into one bank, because it probably takes the bait out from the bank as the bait sinks, and a bait dropper gives me confidence to know excatly where the bait is. And I decided to leave the longer swim in case the wind got even worse – another good decision in the circumstances.

So far, so good, and I started with corn on the inside, where the second shelf was about four feet, slowly curving down to five feet. I used corn because it would be less likely to be swirled about than expander, and after about 15 minutes a 2 lb F1 came in. After another ten minutes all I had had were a few small knocks, and occasionally the float dipped right under the surface but there was nothing there! So I put out another bait dropper of maggot in the three-section swim and came off the bottom with the corn. Nothing! Back on the bottom and after a few more liners in came a 3 lb F1.

After about 90 minutes I had five fish, for about 14 lb, and had to see a man about a dog, so walked past Mel, on my left, who had one fish, and Will in the corner, who had two. On the way back Les, on my right, told me he had five. After another fish or two I tried the maggot swim, with a bunch of five live and dead maggots, and again got bites which I missed. I was surprised, as I fully expected barbel to be here, but then a roach took the bait, but it was blown off by the wind, which by now had really got up, so much that virtually everyone, both sides of the lake, was fishing close in or fishing a tip.

The forecast had been for ‘blustery,’ not near-gale-force winds. And by now I was also shivering, though I got a bit of excercise when I saw something moving on the bank to my right and turned to see Les’ trolley being blown along the bank at a fair speed towards by gear; I got to it before it smashed my tips, wheeled it back, and turned it on its side. Then my maggot tin of cat meat blew off the side tray, spilling its contents on the grass, so I got a bit of exercise picking it up, though I never found the plastic tin, only the top. That was when Les sihnalled to me that he had lost his cap, which was nowhere to be seen.

At this point I decided to put out a piece of hair-rigged sweetcorn on a straight leger, and within 30 seconds the tip had ripped round and a 2 lb F1 was on its way in. Next cast saw a liner, which I stupidly struck at, and the next one in came a 1 lb F1 which I had a job to net because the wind kept blowing the landing net about, even with the fish in it! Then there was a lull and I had to see another man about the same dog – only to learn that Mel still had just one fish! I came back and decided to stick inside, with cat meat, which produced a 6 lb carp which came to the surface when I gently struck it, and stayed there wallowing so I was able to gently steer it to the net within 20 seconds, where it thrashed about so much I had a job to get the hook out!

Next drop in had a completely different result - this fish shot off to the right, towards Les, and the purple Hydro, which normally comes out about four feet when playing carp, kept on streaming out so that within seconds the fish was almost in Les’ swim, which was peg 9, only one swim away. I gritted my teeth, pushed the pole down as far as I could, and uttered a little prayer. Sure enough the fish turned and five hectic minutes later a 5 lb barbel lay in the landing net. Believe me, light elastic with a puller would have been worse than useless in those circumstances. And anyway a strong wind can play havoc with light elastic.

For the next hour I had odd fish on corn and meat in four or five feet of water, close in, and tried the three-foot deep swim right in against the bank, with nothing there at all. With 75 minutes left Les really started to catch – three or four around 4 lb or 5 lb on a cage feeder with corn and then another three or four close in on the pole on meat, while I languished with just one fish in that last 75 minutes.

Up to the right I kept seeing fish being played on poles, but had no idea, really, how the rest of the match had fished. But afterwards I realised I should have done what I normally always do in strong winds here – I should have put on a big 2 gm or even 3 gm rig to get stability! They are in my box, ready to use. Why I didn’t try that I will never know, except that being cold seems to numb my brain, and believe me it was cold – I fervently wished I had put both pairs of thermals on instead of just one. That massive wind into my face all match must had disorientated me. That’s my (pathetic) excuse. I also should have checked the swim on my right, though it meant facing more into the wind, but I never thought about it.

There’s also the possibility that changing the lead weight for a feeder would have worked because I got the feeling that fish were being attracted to my loose feed even though they were not taking the bait very well. It’s likely that instinct would have brought them close when the feeder went in and increased my chances of a bite.

The shout went up to end the match and the wind promptly decreased in force, so we were left with a beautiful ripple all along the lake! Anyway my 67 lb was enough for sixth, but there was a silver lining, which warmed the cockles of my heart, because after all in any match, and especially a club match, everyone is a mate.

The silver lining

The match was won by Dick, who had 50 lb-plus in each of his three nets, for his best-ever match weight of 150 lb, on peg 23 on the opposite bank, taken all close in on cat meat. He was well chuffed, as well he should be, especially as his true weight was almost 160 lb. Opposite, on peg 3 was Callum, who weighed 108 lb, his first 100-plus match catch, and he was even more chuffed! That was good enough for third, with John next to him on peg 4 weighing 110 lb for runner-up. And fourth place went to Les, who has not had a good last season or two, but came second in the previous match (which I did not fish). He weighed 79 lb today, and must now be full of confidence, which is what framing does for you after a bad spell when you wonder whether you will ever have a really good day again....

It’s interesting that the best three weights came from the car park end, and I remember Ken Wade, our Peterborough angling correspondent and former captain of the Peterborough teams, saying that Cedar is the one strip lake out of the four which often fishes best towards the car park end. It certainly did today. Our one lady member, Wendy, was up there and weighed in 58 lb (from memory) so there was plenty to smile about. The good thing about club match fishing is that if weall catch fish everyone is a winner at the end of the day!

NOTE: The five lakes at this end of decoy spell out DECOY in order – Damson (not a strip), Elm, Cedar, Oak, Yew. Elm has 24 pegs, Cedar 26, and Oak and Yew 30 each.

My next match will probably be the Over 60s on Magpie at Pidley, then two days later a club event on Kingsland on the small carp lake, where there are some real brutes and I will probably fish just my 35-year-old margin pole with two tips, using cat meat, but will also have a pellet waggler rigged up for possible shallow and surface fishing early on. Then two days later another match on the same lake. I just hope the wind dies down a little.