After my decent performance last week I was picked to fish again this week, so back on the Avon at Melksham and Chippenham. I really didn’t need to do any preparation as everything was intact, though I did put some heavier rigs in as there was a lot of rain forecast. Well I was awoken at 5am by very heavy rain that just didn’t seem to stop, and the drive to Melksham was horrendous. Huge puddles, pitch black, driving rain as well as thunderstorms… I was glad when I arrived.
Andy Ottaway was entrusted to draw for the team today and not draw the same peg as last week! He managed to draw a different peg, and I was going to Chippenham this time, Riverside Drive. I was told my peg came second in the section last week with 4lb, and that I should focus on waggler for chublets and chub. The only thing I needed was to wade out a long way to be able to fish it.
I got to the peg with a pair of chest waders lent to me by Martin Barrett, and got advice from both Lee Trivett and Otter, basically telling me where to fish from lol. I assembled my platform and walked it out next to some weed, here I could fish without being troubled by the overhanging trees.
I set up a 4BB waggler with 0.13 powerline to a 16, a 3 no 4 stick float with 0.11 to 18, a blockend feeder and a bleak whip.
The river was picking up colour and pace but was still looking good when the match started at 11. I began on the waggler feeding maggots with double maggot on the hook. After a couple of minnows I had my first small chublet which I was able to swing in. I carried on getting bites fishing about 18” deep, the whole peg was only about 3 feet deep max. I had a nice steady first hour catching small chublets and roach, but no signs of any chub as yet. Derek Jarman below me didn’t seem to be bagging but Dan McDonald above me latched into a couple of chub on the pole, he could reach a big bush with 14m of pole. I then had a disaster losing my waggler in a bramble across, I tried the stick float and had a few nice roach, then it tangled! I was forced to walk back to the bank and set up again.
Maybe you can see the colour in the water in this picture, I had to cast the waggler tight to the bank to get bites.
At 12:40 on the waggler I connected with my first chub, it gave a good account of itself in the flow and was about 1 1/2lb. Over the next 20 minutes I landed 5 more chub mostly around the pound mark. They disappeared after this for a while and I switched between stick and waggler to tick over. But then Dan went into overdrive catching 3 bream and another chub. If I was going to beat Dan I would need more chub, so I focused on the waggler and upped the feed. I did catch more chub, biggest maybe 2lb, they would come in bursts, but not the lumps I needed to catch Dan.
About an hour to go the river ran faster than it had all day and with more rubbish coming down the river it was not going well. I had a couple of casts on the feeder but no bites, and then the river slowed up a bit again. Back out on the waggler and probably had another 3 chub in the last 30 mins. I’d had a really enjoyable match, I hoped I might have 20lb, but when I dragged my gear and net back to the bank I liked at my fish with Dan and thought maybe 17lb. Dan had at least 25lb he thought.
I had the scales and weighed from peg 6 up, Derek was best with 8lb 2oz up to me. My fish went exactly 23lb so I was way off my estimate! Dans bag went just over 30lb a lovely river bag of fish for him. My net of fish was my best for some time.
Back at the results our team had fared better and we came second behind DGL, we are now on 10 points, 2 behind GBV and 6 behind DGL.
Winner on the day was Michael Lichota with 33lb from the same peg at Chippenham that won the last two matches, more chub on the waggler. Dan was second and I was third and last in the frame, so happy days 😃
Team sheet below shows how we all fared, next week I’m at Newbridge on the teams of 4, could do with some bream.
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