As is my way with match venues that I haven't fished before, I like to have a practise session, this serves two purpose's, one, find the place and how long the journey takes so I'm not late for the match and secondly try and understand the venue, what works, what doesn,t.I'd found the place on Google Earth and it seems in the middle of nowhere, although it was surprisingly easy to find. Once you enter Marshland St. James and turn on to School Lane drive as far as the pub( nice pub by the way, anyone up for an after match pint, this might be a good way of relieving the winner of his winnings), this is the last building on your left or first building on your right depending on which direction your coming from, and turn right immediately opposite, down road which becomes a gravel track and before it becomes grass turn right into the car park.
Before I unload the car its time for a amble round the lake and get my bearings, only one fishing at the moment (8.00am). Peg 1 is the first peg on the right of the lake as you enter and goes anti-clockwise round to peg 25. Roughly, peg 19 round to peg 5 is a large bay and no features, the rest of the pegs have the island in front of you, although its 14 metres away (min), ok for all you young bucks, but bloody hard work for us oldies!! A quick chat with the bloke fishing on peg 20, he tells me he's already had a 18lb carp, when I ask him what he's fishing on he tells me he only uses maggot ( it may be true but I think he's talking cobblers so I move on and talk to the owner).The owner is a thoroughly nice bloke, very helpful, he said the Tuesday evening match that is held every week didn't fish too well as the lakes not really on form yet after spawning but he did win the match with 39lb off peg 24, this comprised of some carp and tench plus 3 bream to 6lb.I asked him where I should fish as we have a match here Sunday, he says he as a booking for 15 pegs Sunday for us, but we can choose which pegs we want if we let him know in advance ( I've e-mailed Jonty, I think he's on to it). So, I plump for peg 8 towards the end of the island, it had a tree there for a bit of shade as it looked like I was in for a glorious sunny day plus I tend to go for an average swim when match practising, chances are that's what you draw rather than the flyer.
So, am I going to tell you which method works best? Well I start of by plumbing the depth,as you do.First up to the island, try and find the shelf, well there isn't one, its straight off the eiger, except of course for the thick carpet of tree roots, well that's one plummet gone for a burton already!!once clear of the roots its straight down to 5ft in old money ( 1.7333 metres recurring or something like that).So, we pop a bit of catmeat, pellet and corn over there and follow with the rig and a piece of the trusty catmeat from the kid himself. The float cocks, gives me the two fingers and disappears, out goes the elastic, the fish goes into kamikaze mode but after a very spirited battle gives up to superior forces and a nice conditioned tench of 3lb is in the net, em nice start, will it last. Out again, the float settles, has some sort of orgasm and buries, I think this fish is having bets with its mates to see how far they can get an elastic to stretch as it tanks off down the island.After another epic battle a nice ghostie ( I think they are all on steroids) surrenders to the net greeted by a standing ovation from the crowd gathered behind me (only kidding, I'm on my own down here), this is followed by another tench.But fishing at this distance is doing me in and as the depth of water doesn't change much, 6ft tops, I drop a section and come in a bit and try again, I still catch, I try pellet, I try sweetcorn, they all work.I drop another couple of sections ( now we getting comfortable) and cup some bait in, in a short while we are in the action again, tench, F1's, quality roach and rudd, skimmers, mirror carp, you just don't know what's coming next. I even had skimmers and tench up in the water.
As you know, time flyes when your enjoying yourself, and as my stomach thought my throat had been cut, it was time for a spot of lunch under the shade of the tree as its a bit of a sun trap here and I am gently frying, also a good time to take stock of the session. As the egg mayo filing of my butty gently slips down the front of my T shirt (that will be a bollocking later) I contemplate the days findings so far, everything seems to work everywhere except the margin, time to give that a go next.
Cupping in a bit of feed to my left, can't go to the right as there's a tree stump blocking my way. First up we try a piece of catmeat, but other than it getting whittled away by the smaller fish sharpening up their teeth, the float just gave me the two fingers and decide to sulk,as I was having none of it I change to pellet, I gave the float the one finger, told it to swivel, it did and buried as a nice tench of 5lb towed it up the lake. Alternating hook baits in the margin saw fish regularly coming to the net, including some very nice roach ( I wonder how this fishery does in the winter?) So, at the end of the day how did I do, well my clicker says seventy one pounds, I tend to be conservative about weights when pleasure fishing, no forfeit for going over and I tend not to include anything under 8oz. Is there a particular tactic that works here better than others, well on the day I would say no.There are no bait bans here (very refreshing) and the general stamp of fish here is very good, if the fish are having it on the day its going to be an interesting match.
I've enjoyed it here today, I hope you do too. If this report helps you win the match on Sunday, mines a pint of Fosters.I was so impressed by the venue and the owner, I shall return for other pleasure session, I hope you can join me. As our old mate Arny said ' I'LL BE BACK'
Photos to follow.....
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