Sunday 21 July 2013

Tony Rixon Float Only League, Shiplate Fishery

You may recall how last week I had a rather tricky day with things going wrong, it didn't get any better when I went home as my bag leaked in bed at 5am, and I left the freezer door open and everything defrosted! What an effing weekend that was!

No travel difficulties this week as Glenn was doing the honours on the driving front and I bought him brekkie at Shipham. That was about the best thing the day had in store for me! After being reminded by Mat Toomes that I had once again left without paying a £1 (a few matches ago) we struck double or quits. Bob Gullick was also keen on getting his £1 back from the Huntspill so another side bet was struck. In the draw today were pegs on all three lakes and the general consensus was the main lake would be best with Hawthorn 2nd best and West pool best avoided. This fishery is a tad peggy, but that's not a complaint just an observation, and the wind does tend to move the fish around. I went into draw queue and was stood along side Des Shipp who was a chirpy and down to earth as ever after his stint on Sky last Sunday. I drew peg 12 on West Pool, which was not really what I wanted as I felt the end peg 15 with the pipe and pegs up the other end in the wind would be better. However, on getting to the peg 13 was empty and gave me some extra room which had to be helpful. On 15 was Chris Davis, 14 was Shaun Townsend, Mike West was on 11 and my section was completed by young Scott Puddy on 10.

There were plenty of carp up on the surface all over the lake, so I set up a mugging rig (though I don't really like this style of "fishing"), a shallow rig for pellet right across and at 6m, a depth rig (4x10 Durafloat) for right across, a paste rig, and another 4x10 durafloat for the margin. On the whistle a fish swirled in the margin so I dropped the mugging rig on top and a 12oz carp was in the net in seconds! I then fed a pot of 6mm pellet off to my left at 8m for paste, some caster and meat in the margin, and started by feeding 6mm pellet by hand at 6m as well as feeding by catty across. The 6m line had fish swimming in and around, but nothing was feeding it appeared and after 30 minutes I hadn't had a bite. I kept feeding this but then tried mugging as Shaun had a few, I think I had 1! So after an hour and 15 mins I went across with the deep rig and had a carp first drop. I then had another on 8mm banded pellet, it then took about 10 mins to get another but this was at least proper fishing. Unfortunately that was the end and I never had another bite across all match either deep or shallow. The 6m line never produced a fish and after 3 hours of loose feeding itI gave it up.

I basically spent the rest of the match trying all my lines with out any signs except for the odd fish I mugged, I never had a bite on my paste line at all! The margin had shown no signs of life but with 10 mins to go I saw a vortex and tried a piece of meat for the umpteenth time, I had a bite and missed it, I then had 2 carp on the last two drop ins landing the last one on the whistle. I caught another after the whistle just to prove they had turned up, barstewards!!!

I was thoroughly drained, I think the heat and waving around long lengths of pole had really took its toll on me. The scales came up and Chris has struggled for 13lb (he spent the last 30 mins just stood up not fishing), Shaun won the section with 39lb of mugged fish, I weighed 20lb 6oz and, Mike West who had struggled had 1 small carp and 1lb 10oz of silvers (top silvers on our lake!). Scott then weighed 26lb to keep more poor efforts in this league going. The other section on this lake was much better and it provided the match winner in Tom Magnall who caught a fantastic 140lb shallow on pellet at 6m (well I did try to catch like that!!). O should mention the £1 bets, it was funny that Mat and Bob were both on the main lake and just opposite me, Mat said he was looking for Golf Clubs and so we ended quits, but Bob after a poor first half had 40lb of carp and so we are quits too! Jo McMahon had a Sturgeon and Alan Oram landed to large grass carp, so the main lake did through up a few decent fish. Glenn had 50lb from peg 10 on .... paste.

Glad to be home now and enjoying an ice cool magners, that's it for me now for at least 3 weeks and the next blog won't be until 18th August. Hope you all continue to bag up where ever you fish.

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