A difficult day in the wind at Butttonhole

Peg 19
Fenland Rods fish Buttonhole, near Wisbech, only once a year. I look forward to it, as I used to fish it a fair amount when I lived nearby, though this year recent results suggested that there wouldn't be a huge weight needed to win. My dodgy back had, after more than four weeks, made a recovery, and I was rarin' to go, complete with motorised trolley back in working order,  and a new, light, Matrix seatbox.

My peg 19, picked out for me, according to the Covid rules, was along one of the arms, while the favoured pegs seemed recently to have been in the main bay, from 1 to 4, and then 20 to 24. The very strong, gusty wind was over my left shoulder, theoretically, as it was a Westerly. But the high banks here meant that it was channeled down left to right.

End of the match, and of course the wind started to die down! 

I found I could reach well across on 14 metres of pole, but realised that while it was possible to present a bait properly for a minute or so, I couldn't take the chance of one of the big gusts thundering down and breaking the pole, so I started at top two plus two-and-a-bit with a 2gm Tipo float to hold steady in the wind. The water was very green with algae, and although the wind wasn't cold, things certainly didn't feel right for a big catch.

I put in some corn and a few 4mm pellets with a bait dropper, as it was impossible to say exactly where bait would end up in that wind, but for an hour I had not a bite. Deciding to change to maggot in the side, in the hope of some roach, I eventually realised that the dead maggots thawing in water were still on the bench in my garage. Stupid mistake!

John Garner, on my right did, in fact, catch about three small fish, and I suspect he was on maggot. But now I had to concentrate on bigger fish. Then John Smith, on my left, took a carp about 1 lb on a feeder cast to the far side, and I thought about going back to the van for my rods. But the next two cats he found himself snagged, and soon gave that up.

Joe Bedford, aged about 87, was on Golden Peg 4, and John Garner told me he had caught a carp early on. So at least I knew they were willing to feed. Then, at last, I caught a fish on corn - a 2 oz roach, and then another, and two carp about 6 oz. John Smith, to my left, then took a carp on a float on cat meat, so I made the change.

Twenty minutes to land my first carp!
Two hours after the start I hit a carp. But I couldn't do anything with it. It didn't feel as if it was foulhooked, but it was 20 minutes before I netted it, about 5 lb. And as I had suspected, it was hooked just on the outside of the lip - as I have written before, hooking a fish here or on the nose is the worst place to hook them, except for the tail (more of that later!).

Soon after I hooked another one, but it came off after about 15 seconds. Then it happened again!
and again! There was nothing the matter with the hook, and I am sure these fish weren't foulhooked by the way they swam. Then I had a liner or two, and eventually managed to land another carp, about 8 lb. Meanwhile John was also taking the occasional fish, but John Garner on my right had, I think, only one. Then I hit one closer to the bank - which came off. But two more followed and they stuck. I managed to avoid striking at several more liners, the float lifting slightly and moving to one side two or three feet.

Twenty minutes to go saw me with seven good carp, but with seven lost, none foulhooked I am sure. But as I was playing the last one I saw two or three others doing the same, so I guessed the fish were coming on feed.

I now felt I needed just one more to frame, as I hadn't seem many fish landed, and John to my right had just three, I thought (in fact he must have had more, which I hadn't seen).

I lose my last fish
Sure enough, I quickly managed to hook one more on the longer line...but immediately realised it was foulhooked in the tail. For ten minutes I tried to coax it towards the net, and inevitably had to resort to brute force, with the result that the hook pinged out.

That was the end for me. But John Smith  had had three or four in the last hour and I thought he had beaten me. John Garner said that Joe had had a good day (I couldn't see him),  so I thought I was probably out of the running.

The weigh in

A very difficult day in the wind...but there still has to be a winner. Note
that the peg numbers shown were numbered on the day. The
permanent numbers were 4, 3, 1, 24, 23, 22, 21, 20, 19, 18, 17.

In fact Joe, who was first to weigh, had 38 lb 9 oz, and I was sure that I had more. Mike Rawson kept up  a run of good results with 30 lb 9 oz, pipping John Garner, next to me, by five ounces. The net limit here at the moment is 40 lb, and when my best net went on to the scales I heard someone say "that's over." But it wasn't - for once I had gauged things reasonably and it went 38 lb 8 oz, and my total was 44 lb 13 oz.

But John on my left had, as I suspected, beaten me, and won the match with 47 lb 12 oz, while I was second. Big surprise was Club Champion Tony Nisbett struggling to 5 lb 9 oz, with three DNWs  - two of then in the corner where the wind was blowing.


My feelings
I was actually very happy. The winner had lost only one fish, and I had lost eight on a day when most were struggling for a bite.  But the way I look at it is that at least I got the bites, and you have to get a bite before you get a fish. I found that most fish came after I had put in several cubes of cat meat. If I didn't get a bite within five minutes it wasn't going to come. The fish were  obviously just swimming about but not really feeding.

No catch pictures as the rules are that anglers must not follow the scales. But the hospitality shown by owners Chris and Bev was again top drawer. They couldn't have been more welcoming.

Next match Friday on Damson at Decoy. It's a strange lake - shallow in the margins, but dropping to seven feet on a top two. However, there are lots of fish there, and I have a good record on it.