My weekend was well and truly turned on its head on Thursday. I had been preparing to fish the River Tone Two day festival, bait ordered, groundbait sorted, whip rigs etc, and then we had a lot more rain than was forecasted and the river went right up high. Organiser Simon Garbutt reluctantly had to let everyone know the match was off, this was the third attempt to fish this and each time flooding has wrecked it. The only consolation for me was that I would be able to watch Bristol Rovers again on Saturday and see the lads. I had a great away day last weekend at Stevenage watching the 4-0 win with my eldest daughter and her friends, didn't get back home to about 11:40pm. lol. Anyway back to this weekend, and the late cancellation left me in a bit of a dilemma with a fair bit of bait and no idea of any matches to fish. I decided to go on the Avon but would decide Sunday.
I still was undecided of where to fish when I got in my van, I tried to ring Warren Bates who I thought might be at Newbridge, but I got no answer so I stopped at Swineford. I knew the river was going to be pacey so not float fishable, but was hoping the colour would be OK. I took a bit more gear this week, rod hodall, box, net/bait bag and my accessory bag, and I decided to carry it rather than dick around with the trolley being loaded and unloaded for the gates. That wasn't one of my better ideas, I'm not 25 anymore and the gear weighs a lot more than it used to! I got to the outfall and had a few minutes breather whilst looking at the river, as I resumed my walk I thought I might fish a peg in this field as wasn't sure I could get much further lol. Just my luck then that there were anglers in those pegs, I managed to huff and puff my way to peg 15 and was probably a 1lb lighter than when I started the walk.
It was certainly going through a bit and just a bit more coloured than I would have liked for chub, so I decided on a 2 pronged feeder attack. groundbait and caster at about 14m out and a maggot feeder further across. I went with a Sonubaits sweet skimmer and and some crushed hemp mix, a 14 N50 to 0.17 powerline. I kicked this off with a big feeder to get some bait in there but with three maggots on the hook, it took 30 mins to get a bite that didn't develop. Two casts later and a drop back bite and I nailed a chublet.
It was quiet after this and I gave my team mate Martin Barrett a call to see how he was doing up river at Melksham, he was having a struggle too. As we talked I had a really big drop back and felt a fish on but then it was off straight away. I gave it 90 minutes on this but didn't have another fish but did miss a couple of small bites. Warren then rang me back to tell me he had a couple of bream and roach up at newbridge and he had made the better choice of venue I felt. I switched over to the maggot feeder and needed 50g to hold further across the river with a bow in the line. This was a bit slow to begin with, but I really wasn't that worried, it was just lovely being on the bank today in wonderful sunshine.
Eventually I had a really good bite on the maggot feeder, but did not connect, and when I reeled in all three maggots were gone. Two casts later and another missed bite, this time maggots smashed. I wasn't fishing a long hook length so I was a bit surprised to not find a fish on the end. All went quiet after this, and then on one cast I caught the hook in my finger (I was casting underarm) and straighten the hook out, ouch. I decided to change down to a 16 hook and but stay on 0.17. First cast on this and I had a fish, but not a real one, see picture lol.
Eventually I had another bite and this time the fish was on, it felt quite decent in the flow and I was really pulling hard, but when it popped up it was only a 1 1/2lb chub. Next cast and I had another chublet about 12oz.
I had another couple of missed bites which was annoying, and then when I snagged and lost the hook decided to call it a day and get prepared for the walk back. Not a lot of fish action today, may have had some more had I stayed on later but I wanted to get back to watch the League Cup final.
My team competed in the Angling Trust Winter League Final yesterday, 5 anglers at Decoy Lakes and 5 on the drains. Unfortunately the draw bag was very unkind to the lads on the lakes and the drains were not great. Shaun Townsend had 1 carp and 4 roach, he had Tom Scholey next peg and he had 1 perch. Andy Ottoway had a 10g perch 90 seconds before the end of the match on the drain, and in his section there was 1 blank and 6 anglers with 10g!! Geraint Powell's peg had been pleasure fished the day before and he came last in his section with the lad next to him was next to last. The tale of woe would continue, and only Kev Bennet had a decent day it seemed. It was the team's worst final ever and they ended 25th out of 27 teams, with Barnsley winning again. Very peggy place (as I know only too well from a prior experience on the lakes) and I guess it says something about the venues when Browning Ossett came last on the day, they got to the final by winning their winter league and beating Barnsley....
I believe I am booked in to fish a match at Newbridge this Sunday, there seems to be a fair bit of rain in the forecast this week, hopefully only light, so it will probably be a feeder match looking for bream, I will need to hit more bites though lol!
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