Peg 5
We should have been on Lou’s Lake, which has 15 pegs, but 16
of us turned up to fish this Spratts match. Now one of my best subjects at
school was Maths, so it took me only a few minutes to realise that 16 into 15
won’t go! I’m quick like that. It’s similar to Fermat’s theorem, which proves that
something-or-other is impossible (I can’t remember what). Anyway, although Diane
at the fishery had intended to rest some of the strips after a big Maver match
the previous day she offered us Yew as an alternative. Many thanks,Di.
I would have liked any peg down at the far end, from about
peg 9 to 15 on the West bank, which had back wind, and from corner peg 16 back to 22 on the East bank, with the
East bank preferred. Failing that, any peg on the East bank. We were to fish
the odd numbers 1 to 15 and the evens 16 back to 30, so I wanted to avoid 1
(which Ted was fishing anyway), 3, 5 and 7. I drew out peg 5...
Of course any peg can produce at any time, and apparently
there was a 300 lb-plus catch on peg 15 the previous day - but my immediate
thought was that I would probably be fishing to beat the anglers either side,
and hopefully the three anglers to my right on the opposite bank, in other
words just the anglers nearest the car park.
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| By the end of the match the wind was blowing left to right. |
A quick fish on feeder
I started on a Method feeder and within 5 minutes had landed
a 3 lb common. A few minutes later I had another wrap-round which somehow I
missed. Then 20 minutes without a bite and |I had a quick look down in the
margin where I had been dropping some pellet and corn. I quickly had one bite
which I hooked into for about two seconds before it came off, but no more bites for
almost half an hour. The wind by now had strengthened and the anglers on the far bank must have been shivering.
With no joy in the margin, it was out to about 8 metres with corn on a half-gram Drennan Tuff-Eye float, and I quickly had
a 3 lb F1. It was enjoyable fishing, with a big tow right to left against the wind. Up
to this point not much had been caught that I could see, but Martin and Trevor
on the opposite bank had certainly had a fish or two fishing in the margins. I
stuck at the 8-metre line for an hour and managed four more fish, best about 5
lb. But I had lost several, mainly foulhooked. If I came off bottom I couldn’t
get a bite. Two hours gone and John on my right said he had just four fish to
my six. Trevor had definitely caught more than that on peg 24.
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| Ted (91) was on nearest Peg 1. |
My margins did not produce a fish
I kept having a look in the margins to my left and right, mainly
with cat meat, but never had another bite there, although I did get liners from
fish swimming just under the surface. So I tried shallow fishing out at 8
metres, as the wind was so strong I could throw casters there by hand. But I
never had a touch. However I did decide to use my casters up by potting them in
with hemp at 8 metres, and I think this definitely attracted some fish. I had
to trail the bait, mainly corn with the odd 4mm and 6mm expander, along the bottom, holding the float back a
little against the flow, but had to keep altering the amount of line on the
bottom.
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| Bob Barrett was on 7, to my left. |
I would fish for 20 minutes and be about to pick up the
feeder rod, when suddenly I would get a bite, usually from an F1 but with the
occasional ‘proper’ carp. That went on until the last hour, at which point I
had about 40 lb in my first net and about 15 lb in my second net.
I'm doomed...
With an hour to go the bites started to increase in
frequency, and I was catching an F1 every 5 minutes, and included a 6 lb carp.
But by this time eight anglers had gone for a third net, with Trevor the first
to go, so I knew I was doomed, and I had made beating the anglers at my end of
the lake my sole target. Martin opposite
seemed to be landing a lot of really big fish and had three nets and I thought
he had me well beat. The wind by now had turned to almost come straight down the
lake from the North and I wondered whether I should put on a thicker-tipped
float, which would pick up the tow better.
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| One of two 15 lb-plus mirrors caught by Terry Tribe, former National Division Four National Champion. |
A super-charged carp
The decision was made for me. With 20 minutes to go I hit a
carp which was obviously practicing for an appearance on Top Gear. It went from
Zero to 60 mph in 0.28 of a second and by the time it had zoomed past Bob
Barrett on peg 7 it had probably equalled the UK Waterspeed record.
The float tip broke off and hurtled back past the end of my pole like a
javelin, followed by my float doing a passable impression of a high-speed skier
across the surface of the water, trailing a useless piece of nylon behind it.
So that fish would have been foulhooked then?
 |
| Former National Vets Champion Martin Parker totalled 76 lb 14 oz. |
Unusually for me I employed a piece of commonsense, and just
lay the top down and picked up another rig with a thicker-tipped float, which,
annoyingly, worked better than the Tuff-Eye, which is my favourite float because you can change the colour of the tip. In that last 20 minutes I managed four or five more fish, including an
eight-pounder which I landed several minutes after the whistle. I decided to
put that into my first net, which again was a good decision.
The weigh-in
Ted did well in the corner Peg 1, and weighed 63 lb. and
John on my right had 79 lb, which I though I could beat. I weighed my second
net first, which had 42 lb on the clicker, and it weighed 52 lb 4 oz! The
second was better – 48 lb 13 oz. Total 98 lb 13 oz.
 |
| Peter 'The Paste' Spriggs, equal fifth. |
But as I had expected, there were bigger catches towards the
far end, though Terry Tribe commented that he thought my catch was very good
from that peg, which was nice of him. Peter Harrison weighed 121 lb 6 oz, which
turned out to be second. I didn’t ask him how he fished but whenever I looked
up he was fishing out the same length as I had been.
Terry Tribe had 119 lb 2 oz for fourth, and included a
mirror we weighed at 15 lb 3 oz.
Rob Allen’s third catch of the day was a keepnet, which he
sportingly decided not to weight in. I asked him whether there was anything in
it. “Yes, Water” he said without so much as a smile. Oooh, he is awful...but I
like him! He was followed by John Garner, who caught most of his fish on a
feeder and beat Terry by just 13 oz with 119 lb 15 oz.
Trevor was the winner on 133 lb 3 oz, caught in the margins.
And surprisingly Martin’s three nets totalled just 76 lb 14 oz – he had only
one fish in his last net, so I beat him and was the best in the six pegs nearest the car park. Fifth spot was shared between Peter Spriggs and Mick
Linnell, both on 115 lb 1 oz.
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| Mick Linnell, former Oundle and Fletton Ex-Service team-man, checks his weight... |
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| ...and poses with his catch, which included some barbel. |
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| Mick Ramm with a 12 lb 5 oz common. |
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| Wendy with a 12 lb 4 oz mirror from Peg 30. |
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| SECOND, Peter Harrison |
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| THE WINNER, Trevor Cousins |
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| THIRD, John Garner. |
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| NOWHERE, Bob Allen (but he would have won if he could have weighed in the keepnet full of water that he caught on Peg 16). |
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| Six weights over 100 lb in difficult conditions. A good day overall. |
That left me in seventh place, and to be honest I was quite
pleased about that result from my peg. Only 23 lb off second place – and I’d
lost that amount of fish which I was sure were properly hooked. One of them, a
big one, was not obviously foulhooked –
I had it in the side for ages, but it wouldn’t come to the net. I suspect it might have been hooked on the outside of the lip. It eventually pulled off. But I'd had a good day's fishing.
Next match on Willows, where I don't really mind which peg I get. If I had a pick it would be 23, 24 or 25.
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