Hillview Fishery - Philtone Teams of Three

 Hope you all had a good Christmas and enjoyed some good times, I had a very nice time and received some very nice gifts. On Monday 27th the only gift I wanted was a good draw at Hillview lol.

It was a tad tricky waking up early on Monday as I had finished work on the 22nd so have had a few late wake up calls, I didn't drink a lot on Boxing Day as I didn't want to have any issues the next day driving. I was at the fishery just after 8am and my pools paid and breakfast consumed all in good time. The captain of my team Joe McMahon selected an envelope and got set of pegs "C", and this meant I could not be on the same peg I have drawn on this match the last 2 years (peg 56). Unfortunately my team was a man down, as Dave Haines had a problem with his van on the motorway and had to drive home in limp mode. The organiser of the match Neil Mercer said that as the match is decided on weight each of the other 2 teams would drop their worst weight, that was very fair. My team and pegs were:-

Joe McMahon canal 2 peg 60

Shaun Townsend canal 2 peg 66

Me - canal 3 peg 75

John Fuidge canal 1 peg 45

Ron Hardiman canal 3 peg 70

Lee Massey canal 3 peg 81

With three of the team on canal 3 we needed it to fish well, last year it was not good. The team I was in last year won of f set of pegs B and that was Tony Rixon's team who had 3 anglers on lake 2.

It was a bit muddy getting to the peg as there has been some work going on to landscape the venue it seemed and wooden platforms had been replaced with tough plastic bases. The bases are certainly sturdy, but mine was not built level, and I had to adjust my box legs a fair bit to get myself level and not looking at the sky. My peg is right in the middle of the canal, and the last match on here the right hand end was the best (where team mate Lee was). There were no mugs on my canal, Ron was on end peg 70, Martin Rayet peg 71, Tony Rixon 73, Leon Hubbard 77, Neil Mercer 79 and then Lee on 81. It was not going to be easy.

I didn't get the phone out today as it was raining most of the day and so I have no pictures to brighted this blog sorry, well just one of Tony Rixon on my left, a picture of him looking at his best.

Setting up is never a long affair here, and all I needed was 3 rigs, a dobbing rig with 16 GPM to 0.13 powerline, a 4x12 rig with 0.11 to 18 SFL for fishing maggots down the track and across to a aerator, and a similar rig bit shallower for fishing right across and in the margins.

We started at at 10am and I along with everyone else went searching the far bank with bread on our dobbing rigs. After 30 minutes only Ron had caught a fish, I had not had a liner and thought this was not going to be good! I changed rigs, fed a few maggots by the aerator, and a small amount of micros across. No bites or indications for me at all, but Tony managed to catch an F1 and a small carp. Finally 1 hour and 15 minutes in and my float went under fishing a soft pellet right across, but I never connected. Back out, this one and after a little wait another bite and this time I was in, but I soon realised it was fouled. Well I really took my time and finally I landed a small carp hooked in the anal fin. Back out and after a bit of time had another carp on, this one was bigger but also fouled, unfortunately it managed to swim into the reeds in close and that led to the hook pulling out.

Sadly there is not much more I can report on after this, as everyone on our canal just could not get any indications, even the slayers were sat there motionless and pretty hacked off. Leon waited 3 1/2 hours for his first fish then had another straight away and no more. I had my next indication on maggots down the track 15 minutes to go, hooked the fish which went off towards Tony and then the hook pulled out. A shite end to a shite day for me, and I have never known the canal fish so bad! It was very different behind me on canal 2 where the guys there had a fish a bung for 3 hours!

My 1 carp weighed 2lb 9oz, which beat Neil and Lee, Leon's 2 fish went 3lb 2oz, and Tony battered me with 5lb 6oz lol. In fact Ron won the canal with just 12lb, my only hope of coin was on the team front now, and it was looking very close on that front, and the top individuals would decide it probably:-

1st Joe McMahon 81lb 11oz

2nd Shaun Townsend 76lb 11oz

3rd Clint Wjotyla  60lb 3oz

4th Ricky Mills 58lb 2oz

All of those guys were on canal 2.

In the end my team weight came from 1st and 2nd and John Fuidge who did well to win canal 1 with 42lb. We just had enough to overcome Tony's team (despite them having 3 pegs on canal 2 lol) and so I had a pick up to cover the day out, a little consolation for the poor days fishing that we on canal 3 endured. After the match slices of bread were thrown over the 4 canals, and all bar canal 3 had fishing slurping on them, many felt there were simply no fish in our canal, but maybe there was another reason the fish refused to feed, or even move about?

Not sure if there is any matches on Sunday 2nd January, I'd like to have a fish if I can and try and get a better draw. Here's wishing everyone a Happy New Year!

2003

 As I wrote last week, no fishing for me this weekend and my next trip out assuming the rules don't change will be just after Boxing Day. Had a few beers and a curry with some of the lads Saturday night, as expected the pubs and the Indian restaurant weren't that busy as some folk are avoiding social contact before Xmas, quite understandable. We had a great time, and some got in rather late. I managed to leave my glasses at the Indian, so I ran back to get them before the place closed. Got there in time, but running was a bad idea, as after that I basically had heartburn an couldn't drink my pint. A couple of Gaviscon tablets at home sorted it.

Back to 2003 and it was a Superleague double header fishing Saturday and Sunday at Porth reservoir for my team at the time Avon Angling. Digs in Newquay of course and a couple of good nights out were had. My first day saw me on the deep section on peg 67, and I made a very bad mistake that was to cost me big time. I fished a groundbait feeder and had 6 skimmers in the first 2 hours, after this I struggled, and either missed bites or didn't see the bites. My mistake was the set up on the feeder rig, I was using my old trusted loop to loops and clearly this was creating a bad angle on the line, but I didn't suss it till after the match. What a disaster, 1lb 10oz and only beat 1 person the section. The rest of the team didn't do that well and we had quite a debate about what we should do the following day, in the end we decided to feed positive with worm if we drew the pegs where skimmers showed well, but feed very little on the poor areas to start.

Day 2 and I was much further up the venue on peg 94, this had fished hard the day before so I was going with the negative approach. I cast a small gbait feeder out 30 yards, with a 20 to 0.10 and fished a single maggot as hookbait. In the feeder all I put in were 10 squatts and 3 casters every cast. The bites were tiny, and a marker was a necessity (I used a bank stick) to see the little taps. I knew I was doing OK in the section as there were a few bank runners, and I remember Eddie Wynne sitting behind me for a while telling me I had it sussed and was doing well as many were struggling for bites. In the end I had 1 perch, 2 roach and 22 skimmers for 6lb 5oz, this was 2nd in the section and worth a little pick up. I was delighted that after the previous disaster I had turned things around and got it right.

Two weeks later on June 7th I was at Viaduct Fishery for an open match, this was actually being used as a practice match for the following weeks Superleague round at the venue. I drew out peg 62 on Lodge lake, and noses were turned up when I asked for info on the peg. My then team mate Tony Rixon had already given me tips on the pellet approach here, feed 4mm's on pole and 6mm on waggler and have deep and shallow rigs set up. There was really no need for the waggler on 62, not enough room I thought, so I went down the pole route. I had a very slow start, but everyone around me did, but eventually I started to get bites from skimmers and carp. It was a case of mixing up the feed, cupping or catapulting, and trying both deep and shallow. Then joint fishery owner Ian Parsons came for a walk round and watched me, he said the lakes were having an off day and as a result it was a bit of a leveller, he said I was doing well and could spring a surprise. He was right, as I my 63lb 12oz was good enough to come second overall. It was a good positive result to take me into the Superleague.

The following week and the team draw done put Tony Rixon on about 115 on Campbell I think and people were saying he would break the match record again! I was given 126 on Campbell which I was happy with as I wanted to have a crack at Campbell again. I caught a few early carp and couple of skimmers on the pole but the fish just went. I had been feeding 6mm pellets on the waggler line all the time and switched to this, it wasn't good though and I was not getting many indications but Tony had told me to keep the feed going in! Tony was bagging on the pole and the fish seemed to more that side of the lake as my bank was really struggling. Eventually the carp came into my waggler line and it just got better and better, I started on 0.14 to a 14, and ended up fishing my 4lb reel line direct. If you wonder how did I band the pellet like this, I didn't, back then we were super gluing rubber bands to the pellets and hooking the rubber band. Team captain Mark Jefferies was running the bank on this day, and he commented that myself and Tony were the only 2 anglers on the whole lake feeding decent amounts of bait, and he couldn't believe others had not cottoned on. I had a nice day ending with 87lb 3oz which was 3rd and a good payout, beaten by Tony (who did break the record, and the guy next to him). Can't remember how the team did as I didn't write it in my diary.

At the end of June I went pleasure fishing to Plantation Carp Lake with Warren Bates. I wanted to use this as a practice at fishing pellets on the pole shallow and in the margins. It was stuffed with fish and I had 45 carp. I think this might have been the day when I went to pick up one of my rigs with a pellet on only to find the rig line was going into a hole and the pellet had been take off down there I guess by a mouse! It was stuck solid and I had to pull for a break lol!

The next match I fished (and last to mention today) was a Wednesday afternoon / evening match at Hillview Fishery in Tewksbury. Mark Jefferies had suggested we fish this as we could go to work and just take a half days holiday. The match was going to be on the lakes, and after my recent success of feeding heavy I was still in the same zone. I bought 3 bags of 4mm pellets from Keith who asked / joked if I was buying bait for another couple of matches? Well I got peg 17 on Moorhen so should be just right for fishing shallow, Mark told me to feed it at 13m for an hour before going in on it. However, 40 minutes into the match all I had short was a couple of silvers and I was getting battered by the local to my left. It was a bit windy so a chop on the water, and when I looked up once when I fed I saw a fish "porpoise". I saw the same again soon after and thought time to try this. I went shallow and never looked back as I my peg got better and the locals dried up. I am sure this was down to my heavy feeding. After the match the local moaned to me that I had fed way too much bait and it was not the right thing to do.. hmmm, well I weighed in 88lb and won the match lol! The grumpy local was soon to become more grumpy! At the result Keith paid me out and then said there was the draw for the golden peg, Keith held the bag up to the grumpy local who proceeded to pull my peg out!! An extra £250 thank you very much. You could have heard a pin drop, and Mark said he thought we ought to get in the car and get away pretty quick lol, we did laugh. Of course that feeding method didn't work for me again up there, but it was right on that day. It was a day I'll always remember.

All it remains is for me to  do now is wish those of you reading this a Happy Christmas. I hope you can have a very merry Christmas however you want to spend it, and fingers crossed we can all enjoy it.

2002 / 2003

 I was, as I often am without team matches, debating about if to fish this weekend and if so where. Well that decision became an easy one when I started to feel ill on Wednesday and got progressively worse till Friday, it wasn't covid (according to the LF tests) but I had a sore throat, sinuses blocked, chesty cough and my back muscles ached terribly. Feeling better today thankfully just the "tubes" need clearing now and again. That now means I won't be fishing before Christmas as I was not planning to go next weekend, and my next match will be Monday 27th December.

It's been a while that I have looked back on my diaries, and to be honest I took a while finding where I had put them, and when I last written about. It is now 1st December 2002, nothing to say other than fished a Bristol & West Xmas match and got drawn on a peg at Jack Whites where I think a tree or two reside on the bottom, snag pit and DNW...

My next match was Dec 15th, an ATWL round on the K&A Canal outside Bath, I was drawn at Diggers Yard (a stretch we don't really fish now due to lack of access). I really struggled to start with on the bread and was thinking this was going to be poor match, but luckily for me I caught small roach later on bloodworm & joker. I had two areas that I caught from, one next to a boat on the inside, and at 10m going up the shelf. I weighed in 3lb 12oz and that was enough to bag me a section win for the team.

29th December and the next ATWL again on the K&A canal but my draw this time placed me at Darlington which is just on the edge of Bath itself. I didn't have a problem getting bites on punch bread on this match, but they were all small roach taken from 10m out. I had 2 hours on this, and when it died I went onto my bonus fish lines (1 worm, 1 caster) and had nothing at all. In fact after I scraped a few more small fish out on bloodworm at 5m my peg died and I caught nothing the last hour or so. I was surprised to find I had won the section with just 3lb 3oz. It was a nice end to 2002 and November and December had been pretty good for me, was 2003 going to be the same or a different matter?

I don't have any pictures of back then, so here's a random picture of me and some carp a few years ago.

The last round of the ATWL on the 5th Jan 2003 was moved from the river to the canal due to the fact the river had flooded badly, burst its banks and in Keynsham was in the marina car park, that's high! Just to make the fishing on the canal harder the temperatures dropped and minus 6 degrees greeted us Sunday, yuk! I was drawn at the George section, and the writing was on the wall when I had no bites on anything for 2 hours! I finally found a tiny pocket of tiny ruffe / perch and scratched out 12 of them for just 6oz. I beat the guys either side but the other end of the section had 3 and 4lb weights so I was well down the section. This was though a good day as my team won the day and we won the league overall, I got a bit of extra coin as I was runner up in the knockout and 6th individual overall.

I had my next match 26th Jan (snow and cold weather kept me off the bank in between) at Hill View in a team league where I had peg 75 on the 3rd canal handed to me. Feeding just 4 maggots at a time I had 18lb 13oz of small carp, 4th in section but somehow I recorded that I piced up some money, probably went halves with someone lol. Two weeks later the same result but this time on Heron lake with just 14lb, not going well here.

The last Commercial House round was held on Feb 16th (must have been postponed a few times) and was on the Bristol Avon at Chippenham. I was told I was pegged next to the Blue Bridge, that meant nothing as I had no experience of this part of the river. When I got to the Blue Bridge I could not find my peg, I had Kev Boltz above me and Pete Philips below me, and I said "they've left my peg out!" What I soon found out was that my peg was on the opposite bank to everyone else, hmmm that was a first for me lol. I was trepidatious setting up, being pegged right next to footbridge was bound to bring lots of pedestrians and who knows what. In the event I had a few idiots as you would expect, and a dog that nearly broke my rod, the owner threatened to fill me when I had a moan..... I set up a 6 no4 stick float to fish down the middle of the river and a maggot feeder. I had 2 hours of bites on the stick but only caught tiny fish, all went dead and the feeder was no good. I continued to run the float through, wearing a grove in the river bed, with 20 mins to go I struck into a bite and thought I had the bottom till it moved. With a 22 hook to 0.09 bottom on I had to let the fish run and it went off downstream, I grabbed my landing net and followed by walking along the bank under the bridge and out the other side. This was much to the annoyance / shock of Pete, but as I pointed out I was still well upstream of his peg. After a very nervy time my luck held out and I netted a lovely looking tench of near 4lb. Pete said well done or something not quite as nice lol. That fish was a real bonus and it got me a section win by a few ounces. My team ended up coming second overall in the league.

There's really not much point me writing about anything else until May in 2003, as I didn't fish that much (I had a young family to look after) and when I did fish I had an absolutely torrid time in the Hill View league getting an arse smacking and really being out of my depth with the place that year.

Some more diary memories next week then, with thankfully some better times ahead in 2003.

I cleaned out the bait fridge today, though in truth it was pretty clean as it only recently came into my possession, anyway it now serves a different purpose from Christmas until the New Year..

Commercial House Xmas Match - K&A Canal Out of Bath

 I don't seem to get the opportunity to fish as many Xmas matches as I did years ago, and this one was on my radar but I only committed to fish on Monday. I didn't think I would have any bloodworm and joker, but I had a call from Andy Pritchard who had ordered a pack and was happy to split it with me, thanks Andy. I had plenty of rigs already made up and just needed to tie some hooks to replace old ones and have some spares.

I had my booster vaccination on Saturday and I woke up a few times in the night with a sore left arm, it was still feeling sore when I got up but I was not feeling any other side affects. Got to the Crown in Keynsham for a brekky and paid mine and Glenn Bailey's pools and ticket money. Glenn wanted to avoid driving through Bath and getting a bill for entering the clean zone, luckily my van is cleaner and doesn't get charged. There was a good turnout of 30 people, including a lot of "pellet heads" such as Dave Willmott, Dave Haines, Neil Mercer, Andy Gard to name a few lol. It was nice to see these guys back on a natural venue. Pegging today.

 The draw began and I drew and announced to those around me my peg (11), and then Glenn's, I couldn't believe it when I drew Glenn peg 19 at Claverton with the scales. Obviously I couldn't get the scales to Glenn as he was already driving around Bath, and I had drawn at the George. I got a another angler at Claverton to take the scales instead.

I got to the George pub and parked in their car park, chatted to Chris Parr (not Gappy) and Paul Purchase who were on good pegs either side of the wires past Bathampton bend. I was on the start of the bend on a wide peg, and not one I would run to as a lack of featured to fish to. As I walked along the canal Nigel Wyatt and Dave Haines both told me they had pleasure fished the canal and caught 3 or 4 fish only! As I got nearer to my peg I saw Neil Mercer, and looked at his peg, it was then I saw for the first time the water properly. The canal was gin clear and I could see leaves on the bottom of the canal a couple of metres out. Oh dear, this is not how I expected the canal to look at all and it meant only one thing to me that the match would be incredibly hard.

Got to my peg and found I had Dave Haines on 10 and Darren Gilman on the other end of the bend on peg 12.  I took this picture later on after a few boats had gone through and added a tinge of colour.

I set up one 4x14 rig for breadpunch with 18 PR311 to 0.07, a positive rig for bloodworm with 18 to 0.08, a negative 4x12 rig for bloodworm with 22 PR311 to 0.07, and a chopped worm rig.

Whilst setting up Dave Haines came along to have a look at my bloodworm and joker (he didn't have any) and when he returned to his peg he realised some of his pole sections had blown into the canal. As the canal was clear we could see the sections and got them out, lucky boy.

I began the match fishing breadpunch at top set plus 3 sections. After 10 minutes I had not had a bite and the writing was on the wall already. Time to feed some other baits, a small ball of leamed up joker just to my right by a little boat, a big ball of joker at 10m off to the left and some minced worms 10m straight out. I gave the bread another 10 mins to let the other areas settle, but had nothing. Onto the chopped worm looking for an early perch, no bites here at all. Came down to the close line by the boat and with a single bloodworm on the float shot under, a very small perch saved the blank, and was soon followed by another 5 before bites ended. Back to the worm and again nothing at all, back to the boat nothing this time, out to the 10m joker line and fishing overdepth for a bonus I had a long wait for nothing, but when I lifted the rig up I had a tiny ruffe on. I shallowed the positive rig up and caught another 3 ruffe and a tiny perch here then nothing again. A pattern was clearly forming.

During the day a boat came up regularly and turned round in the bay, it was some bloke dressed as Santa, with a few decorations on the boat playing Xmas music. Not sure what the familes paid to go on it, but it looked a bit shite to me lol.

With no bites by the boat I refed some joker here, and then fed another ball of joker on a new line top set plus 4 sections just off to my right. I had a little run of ruffe again out long before an odd little perch by the boat. The new joker line also produced 5 or 6 fish quickly then nothing. With about 90 minutes to go I decided to feed a bit of joker over the chopped worm as this line was a waste. It did sort of work, it produced my best perch (about 1 1/2oz lol) and a few other tiny fish. My peg just got really really hard and I had just 4 tiny ruffe I think in the last hour. I had counted 29 fish, but what would they weigh, 12oz to 14oz I hoped. Dave had 10 fish and Darren 12, everyone had struggled from what we could tell, so I was hoping to win the section if possible.

Steve Skelton had the scales and started weighing from Darren, here's my section weights as I recall them..

Darren G 2 1/2oz

Me 11oz (those fish were smaller than I thought)

Hainer 5oz

Rich Scholar 4oz

Neil Mercer 7oz

Steve S 5 1/2oz

Yes that was a very hard section, but not the hardest of the match!

The top 3 were all in a line at Claverton (not the end Glenn was at) with Andy Britt winning with 3lb, he did get a few roach on bread, then perch on bloodworm. I've put the full weight sheet on here so you can see the weights, I was 6th overall with 11oz, so a decent prize! Shaun Townsend won the section at Dundas with 9oz, a flyer of an end peg potentially, but it was ruined by a boat that got stuck in the bottom twice. 23 anglers out of the 30 caught a fish.

Despite the shocking fishing everyone back at the pub had a good laugh, Dave Willmott made the most of his end peg at the George to come 4th, but got 3rd place money as one angler did not go in the main pool. He also won three prizes on the raffle, including one when he pulled his own ticket out, now that's magic!  Not sure when I will fish next or where, one thing for sure the fishing is proving tricky on many venues at present.