Boyd Valley Lake Open

After last weekend I was happy to be back fishing a commercial, Martyn Reyatt ran this match and it suited me as I didn't want to travel far this weekend. Once again I sampled the £3 breakfast at Wetherspoons in Hanham and it was more than enough for me, just a shame they had no mushrooms or black pudding left!

Arriving at the lake Dave Micklewright mentioned he had seen a couple of cormorants when he arrived, the black death seem to have taken a liking to this place as up to 11 are rumoured to have been seen. The draw was done with Leighton Palmer's little orange balls, and I offered my Preston cap as the container. So it was I was left with the last peg in the cap, which was 7. Last time out this peg blanked, but with a couple of no shows I had nobody in pegs 6 and 5 giving me an end peg. I had come to the match with carp in mind and had brought gbait, micros, 4mm pellet, corn and dead maggots for bait. First thing set up was a 15grm Preston in line method feeder, with a 16 to 0.18 with a quickstop. Two pole rigs one for the deep water 0.6grm pencil float (never had a bite on it) and a 4x12 for the 2.5ft margins with 16B911 to 0.14.

I Fed the margin to my left next to the reeds, and to my right at 11mtrs, pointless mentioning the long pole lines! Grabbed the method feeder and attached a piece of corn and cast it to the island, well actually onto the island! I had clipped up but had forgot to allow for the stretch in line once the feeder was loaded, doh. I had a few casts before I got a liner and then had 5 carp in 5 casts. One hour and 45 mins in and I had 8 carp for an estimated 30lb. This line then went very iffy and I only had 1 liner in the next 30 mins so I gave it a rest. At this stage I was well ahead of everyone else, Bob Price next to me had 3 carp which was as good as anyone else, and Leighton Palmer was moaning.

The next 3 hours were deadly in that I never caught a fish, I had 1 liner on the method and no bites on the pole. Martyn Reyatt on peg 3 had gone to his car for a sleep and Leighton was still moaning. I fed some dead maggots as a change at 3mtrs to my right next to a bit of reed. I dropped in on it and got roach bites, so I stuck a 6mm expander on and bugger me I had a small carp, and then another. I noticed the odd carp topping in the empty pegs below me (the wind was blowing to my end of the lake) so I decided to pot in a good amount of corn and micros on my two original margin lines. This was a good move as the margin to my right came alive in the last hour with 6 carp on corn. Match over and I had only lost 1 carp all day and landed only 1 fouler, that's a bit unusual but at the same time very satisfying.

I suppose in a way I had a bit of a typical summer carp match, carp early and late, but the weather was far from summery today, bitter in the wind! In my mind I thought I had 48lb but the scales recorded 62lb and that was enough to win, in fact I'd won the match in the first 2 hours, not that I had realised that of course.

1st me 62lb peg 7
2nd Lee Waller 20lb peg 1
3rd Martyn Reyatt 18lb (including 90 mins of sleeping) peg 3

Top Silvers Dave Tippett 12lb peg 5


Well that is it for a while, Cluckers Peg will be a bit quiet for the next few weeks as I am having another operation on Thursday. This one is to plumb my arse back in and get rid of the bag, and so I may change this blog to Dysons peg (get it, bagless!). If you can keep your fingers crossed for me. I will see you on the bank when it is warmer, in the mean time I look forward to reading other people's blogs to keep me informed and I'll do an "old days" blog once I feel up to it.