Lower Avon Champs Bristol Avon Newbridge

 The title of this match could be changed to “bream bingo” as Shaun Townsend said to me when he asked if I was fishing. The end of season matches are more often than not the time when the bream have a feed, I’m sure it’s all about them feeding up before spawning. The clearer the river the bigger the weight generally as they shoal up. Well the Avon is gin clear so maybe a big weight would transpire, or maybe it would be rubbish! I’d received some Sonubaits clothes on Saturday and decided to wear some of it on the match, might be lucky lol.

I’d been nice and sensible the day before and was up bright and early for the draw. However, when I got to the draw I was at the back of the queue. Forty people fishing today. When I finally got to the draw bucket I asked Dean Harvey said all the flyers had gone, disappointed I dipped in, pulled out peg 7 which equaled permanent peg 16. One above my favourite peg at Newbridge peg 18, I saw that fellow blogger Ivan Currie had drawn that. Dean and match organisers Ben Rendall then asked me to draw their pegs. Dean got the trees but I got Ben peg 14 next to me.

I drove to the river and parked up, and as I carried my gear bit by bit to my peg I chatted to the other lads. Derek Coles told me he had fished my peg the week before and had 2 bream in the first hour then not a bite, and eventually couldn’t fish as there were so many boats on the water. Peg 20 had 120lb peg 18 1 bream that day. This made me think about my approach today and I decided to cast just short of the middle and keep the rod tip low, I only set up one rod. My 12ft Preston Supera with 0.15 powerline to a 14 N30 with a 25g open ended feeder. 

The match started at 10:30 and I began trying bread on the feeder. After 30 minutes I hadn’t had a bite, but I had seen Ivan land a bream below me. After 50 minutes Ben rang to say he had his first bream, I was still waiting for a bite. The armada of boats had yet to materialise and so I adjusted my rod tip to higher of the water. The next two casts I saw two small pulls on the tip that made me think liners. Just as the hour passed I had a proper bite on triple red maggot and there was a nice thump on the rod. Finally got my first bream, 3lb. Next cast and a few tiny plucks then nothing but when I reeled in the bait was gone, so took 6 inches off the hook length. About now Darren Gilman was skylining me 😉 and he brought me some luck as gradually I put a few more 3lb bream in the net and then a 6lb lump. I was getting odd little taps on my tip which was obviously liners, and had to sit tight and wait for a positive indication. From 11:30 to 12:30 I put 10 bream in my keepnet all on triple red maggots.

Bites continued for me and also Ivan, Ben was catching bream too but was 4 fish behind. Walkers advised odd bream were coming out in certain areas but nothing like where I was. My third hour started well but slowed up, Darren had been replaced by Dave Micklewright (who had packed up as the trees was awful) and he saw me catch a few and both Ivan and myself put a second keepnet in. Ivan carried on catching whilst i suffered second net syndrome. I was getting obvious indications of bream still in the swim, but couldn’t get a proper bite, then I had a drop back bite and had a bream on but it felt fouled, and it was. I landed the fish which was hooked in the anal fin. I tried different hookbaits but to no avail and so put a bit of chopped worm in and put worm on the hook. I had a drop back, but no fish, next cast another bite and a nice bream.

I thought I had found the key, but after a few more casts with just little plucks all signs stopped. Sadly my last 90+ minutes were a complete non event as the bream decided to go elsewhere. I was sat watching Ivan continue to get bream right up to the whistle and Ben had managed to get the odd one including a last cast one. I was thinking I was gonna be chop shop sausage!!! I thought I had 17 or 18 bream, Ben about the same, Ivan had 32!

Chris “Gappy” Parr had packed up early and grabbed the scales to weigh us in. Ben first, and he had 85lb 8oz, which I was sure was a lot more than me. But once again I under estimated the size of some of the bream. My final tally was 91lb 9oz. The very last fish in the net was weighed alone and went 6lb 12oz, probably wasn’t the biggest either. Here’s a pic of one weigh.

Down to Ivan on peg 18 and I helped to pull his nets out, Andy Powell did the maths and tallied up 159lb 10oz. Wow a hug weight and his best ever, congrats Ivan. Well it was actually my best ever river weight too, and also my biggest next peg battering 😂😂.

One of Ivan’s nets.

Back at the Globe for the results, and I guess you might know the top three..

1st Ivan Currie 159 10oz

2nd Tim Ford 91lb 9oz

3rd Ben Rendall 85lb 8oz

4th Shane Robinson 43lb (peg below Ivan)

5th Paul Purchase 34lb 10z

6th Andy Britt 34lb

All the weights were bream. Not sure a single roach was caught. Only 2 anglers out of 15 down in the trees caught, with Dave Lewis top with 2lb 7oz.

Well that’s a nice way to probably end my river season, business travel will probably prevent me getting out again.  Bloody shame that the stupid close season still exists 😢.

Lower Avon Teams of 4 - Newbridge

 Originally this league was 6 matches and it seems a very long time ago that we fished round 4 in November.  However, with two rounds cancelled it was decided that there would only be 5 rounds and so today was the final round. If you’ve read any of my previous posts then you’ll know Newbridge has been fishing pants, so today was potentially going to be a bit of a lottery. My team were in second place just behind Bathampton Blue by 1 point, so all to play for.

Mark Harper gave me the team pools and sheet and told me to draw for us, not sure that’s a good idea 😆. To be fair I thought the pegs we got were ok, Lee Trivett on 3,  Mark on 20, Rob Manns 46 and I was on 63 which was end peg. Would the fish feed this time?

Got to my peg and saw I would have to fish about 5 feet off the water. No big deal am used to that.

Set up the usual groundbait feeder with a 14 N30 to 0.15, a 4g bolo and two pole rigs; a 2g pencil float with 20 N10 to 0.08 and a 3g rig with 16 N20 to 0.12.

I had a section of good anglers to compete with, Kev Dicks on 61, Mat Challenger 59, Derek Coles 56 and Lee Gregory on 54.

We started at 10:30 and I spent the first 15 minutes on a bread feeder, didn’t get a bite. I then cupped in 7 balls of Sonubaits black lake and soil which contained some joker and a small amount of pinkie and caster. I went straight in on the 2g rig with a single red maggot on the hook, had a roach first run through and another third run. No more bites so put a pinkie on and caught another roach, and had in total 10 roach here after the first hour but then it died. I got 1 tiny roach on bloodworm but nothing else.

Back on the feeder but now putting some casters in the mix and trying red maggots on the hook. I had a small rattle on the tip first cast, but bait was untouched. About thirty minutes later had another bite but missed it, maggots were nipped, roach i guessed. My section was fishing poor, and I was winning it at this stage.Couldn’t get another sign after this. Kept trying the pole and the bolo but never got another bite here all day. About 80 minutes to go I had a roach on the feeder out of the blue. That was my last bite, but around the same time Mat had a 2lb chub on the feeder. Match over.

I had the scales and had to weigh two sections so started with myself. My roach weighed exactly 2lb.

Kev had 3 roach for 9oz, then Mat’s chub and 3 roach went 2lb 10oz, Derek 3oz and Lee never had a bite. In the next section Craig Pinker had a great last 90 minutes catching 12 bream for 51lb but would he win the match!

It was all very tight on the team front on the day with four teams on 12 points and one on 11. Unfortunately for my team tying on 12 points was not enough for us to catch Bathampton, Mats Chub proved costly. We came second overall, congratulations to Bathampton Blue on winning the league.

On the individual front today Paul Isaacs drew the sexiest peg at Newbridge recently, 18, and he fished a great match on the feeder with bread to catch 59lb of bream and 1 chub. Craig Pinker was second, and Ben Matthews 3rd with 13lb of chub. 

I’ve enjoyed this league, I’d managed two section wins and three seconds, decent enough. Not fishing next weekend, then back up Newbridge week after for the lower Avon champs. Bream or bust!

Westerleigh Lakes Open

 My decision on where to fish this weekend was made up on Tuesday. I had a quick walk around Bitterwell that day to watch the silvers match and chatted with Martin McMahon, he told me about the match and booked in with Mark Taylor who was also there.

I’ve only match fished the venue once, last year on canal lake, and was told this would be the lake being used this time. Martin always fishes hard pellet normally and so I thought I would try that too. A couple of hours Saturday afternoon got my rigs and hook lengths sorted, removing all my river stuff.

Sunday morning and breakfast at Wetherspoons Kingswood was very hot and set me up nicely. Arrived at the fishery to see a few old faces including Phil Coolham who I used to fish against on the commercial house many years ago. Mark Taylor, Martin McMahon and Mike Nicholls were deep in conversation. After what seemed an age and a few raised eyebrows they decided on the pegs, payout and start time. Both lakes were now in, to spread everyone around. I drew peg 11 on the canal lake, and was told it was a good one. 

The lake had been recently transformed by removing many trees and brambles and it was looking great. As I began to get things set up a mothers meeting started opposite me, turned out there was a peg number in twice on the other lake, well organised 😂😂. Lucky for me no redraw, Mike Nicholls stayed on the peg whilst Martin McMahon went to peg 4 on my lake.

I got set up quite quickly, a rig for dobbing with 16 GPM to 0.13, a 4x12 F1 with 18 KKMB for fishing hard pellet, and a 4x14 F1 maggot for fishing maggots at top set plus two.

Match started at 10:15, I was ready, and I started by dobbing bread across to the island to my left. I guess it took me no more than 5 minutes to get a bite and hook a carp, 5lb in the net. Another 20 minutes and no signs other than snotty roach which were messing up everyone’s bread dobbing. I put 3 red maggots on and managed to get another carp of about 3lb. The roach then took the maggots no matter where I tried, made me think there was no carp about. Nobody was catching and Mark Taylor and John Osbourne either side of the bush on pegs 1 and 2 were struggling, this has been a decent area. I fed the ends of my islands with very small amounts of micros to see what response I got. Trying the hard pellet rig I remained biteless and went a good hour plus with nothing.

I deepened off the dobbing rig and used this to try red maggots on the bottom as a change bait and also bread again, neither worked. Marcus on peg 9 landed an 8lb carp whilst fishing for silvers and other than that not a lot was being caught. I then managed to get a couple of F1’s and a 2lb carp from the RH island on 6mm pellet over micros. A few more bites but no fish and then nothing. I tried the LH island and it wasn’t showing any signs, I tried feeding maggots here instead now but nothing doing.

I felt the RH island was where I needed to concentrate, and I got another carp and an F1. With an hour to go I felt I was winning the lake, but then venue expert Martin started to get the odd carp. I started pinging 4mm pellets to make something happen, thinking the fish might be waking up. It didn’t harm it and I had a few more fish here. I did get 1 F1 on maggot at 5m but no more. As the match ended Martin had finished with a flurry, indeed he fished on and had 3 in 3 chucks. I had 22lb on my clicker, and hoped that was enough to win the lake.

It took a while for the scales to get to me as I was last to weigh in. On the other lake Ryan and Vince Shipp were at the right end of the lake and only 1lb separated them, Ryan just winning with 52lb 1oz. Back on my lake and Mart was top with 21lb till I weighed, my fish went 27lb, clicker malfunction, and so I won the lake which was handy as each lake was ran like a separate match.  Picture courtesy Mike Nicholls.

A tough day, the fish felt seriously cold, so I guess the ice melting a few days before caused the slow down. I enjoyed the match and had to work hard, a good peg helps. Back on Newbridge next week for the last round of the teams of 4, could do with some rain.

Dry January

 It has been some time since I fished and since I did my blog. The floods and general bad weather cancelled a couple of matches and I just couldn’t get the enthusiasm up to go. Dry January in the title refers to a couple of things, 1) my keepnets stayed dry as I actually did not fish at all in January and 2) The wife and I were not drinking any alcohol, except for when we went to Barbados for a nice holiday in the sun. 

We joined on the beach by a friend, think it was cluckers peg lol. Also came across a nice pub.

I got back from Barbados just over a week ago and stayed off the booze till yesterday as I was at Rovers in hospitality. Well although we lost the game it was a fantastic day out and the pints were going down very easily. Let’s just say I was rather worse for wear when I went to bed.

Woke up this morning at 8:15 which meant I had missed the draw, I was struggling a bit, quite a bit, and my wife told me to go back to sleep. However, I had promised Dean Harvey that I would be there and I didn’t want to let him down. He had already text me my peg and so I got myself ready. I rang Dean to let him know I would get there eventually, and I arrived at the bank and as I pushed my trolley from peg 18 the all in was called lol. By the time I got to peg 50 I had decided to only set up 1 rod for the gbait feeder. I was set up and fishing at 10:40.

The river was very clear and having a frost and now bright sunshine I wasn’t expecting a lot of action, also a match here last week was won by Mike Shellard on 18 with 30lb of bream, but half the anglers blanked and 1 chub was third. It took me an hour to get a bite and I missed it, and I missed the next. I can’t remember when exactly but Darren Gilman came walking along, and sat with me a while. I missed another bite and reduced the hook length I was using 0.13 to 16N30.

I then had real savage bite and when I picked up the rod  there was nothing there, couldn’t believe it, but then saw no hook, bitten off by a chub, damn. Went up to 0.15 after this. I also had 2 occasions where I never had a bite but reeled in to find 3 red maggots had been taken, even Darren was amazed. Darren decided he had seen enough and walked on to see the anglers above me. Not long after he went I had 1lb hybrid and a small roach.and was happy to have not blanked.

Darren returned and said Andy Ritchings on end peg 59 had 3lb and he was best by far. I managed to catch a couple more roach, then with about an hour left I had a chub of 1 1/2lb and another roach. I was hoping this was going to be the best time for bites, but far from it and catching the chub seemed to kill the peg. Then about 2 minutes before the match was ending I had another big chub bite, but I never hooked it and the bait was not touched. Not fished a great match but I was feeling substantially better than I did in the morning!

Andy weighed first and had a level 4lb, and that won him the match!

Mike Weston chucked back 2 roach, and the my efforts went 3lb 6oz which was second in the match.

In third place was Derek Coles who found a shoal of tiny roach and bleak on peg 3 and had 3lb. Next best weight was only 12oz. The river here continues to fish terribly, who knows why? However, there’s certainly a lot of plastic, sanitary towels all draped in the trees, so goodness knows what shite was in the river when it was  flooded. 

Not sure what’s on next weekend, and with more frosts forecast it’s not going to be great anywhere I guess, but I will be sober 😂

Hibernating

 My first match of 2023 was supposed to be the lower Avon teams of 4 at Newbridge. However, with the river out of its banks on New Year’s Day and more rain forecast the organisers made a decision early Wednesday to cancel the match. It was the right choice in my opinion as it gave anglers the opportunity to look for something else or make other plans, and was in the best interests of safety. Having myself seen how bad things were when out for a walk, I was not surprised.

I had intended to fish a lake instead on Sunday, but the weather forecast did not look good and I decided to make other plans. Glad I did looking at the local results. I’m quite happy not fishing this time of year, my mini close season, and look forward to seeing the river drop and temperatures rise eventually! I have plenty of interests outside of my fishing, but for those slogging it out right now good luck. 

I’m not going fishing now for 2 or 3 weeks, will depend on dates for the next teams of 4, and the weather.