The last few weeks for me have all been about getting ready for this final and preparing for fishing on a commercial fishery called Rookery Waters. 25 teams of 10 were competing this year and the fishing was as ever in Cambridgeshire on the drains and lakes. 5 of my Preston Innovations Thatchers team would fish the drains and 5 the lakes. We were allowed to pick which commercial fishery we were going to and with my Welsh teammates Rob Jones and Luke Sorekin happy to go to Decoy Lakes, Shaun Townsend and myself went for Rookery, leaving Float Fish Farm for Andrew Mann.
Towner picked me up Friday morning and we started the 3 1/2 hour drive to Rookery to see the lakes. After the section draw in the week Towner knew he would be on Jay which is a snake lake, I could be on either Raven (snake) or Magpie an open lake with a central island where some pegs are on. Towner had drawn up a matrix of every pegs match weights and this allowed us to see the flyers. The recent mild weather had it appeared moved some of the fish around so nothing was guaranteed.
We stayed in March and it was great to have a night out with the boys a few beers and a curry. Next morning Andy Ottaway left early to draw our peg set, and soon after 8am I was going to Magpie 16. Looking at the matrix this had two good weights and two average but I was happy, Towner had missed the flyers but was on a peg which seemed better than average.
When I got to my peg I had lots of room to my left and a sunken boat creating an island at 16m. X marks my peg.
There was what appeared to be an island (later told it was a semi sunken boat) at 16m and the locals told me that would be where I would have to go for bites. Trouble was the wind was getting up and was blowing from left to right.
Off to my left on the point of the island was old team mate Geraint Powell who fishes with Starlets. I’d been told the day before that his peg and the one around the corner were the flyers.
I set up a dobbing rig but with the lake coloured wasn’t sure if I would try it. A 4x12 for the margins but never had a bite on these, a 4x14 for top set plus two which was 4 1/2 feet, a 4x12 would work but I thought it was too windy. I shipped out to the boat to find it was about 6”’deeper than the top set plus two line, so used a 4x14 here too. I left a fair bit of line above the float as my pole was being blown around. I did set up a maggot feeder to use by the boat in case the wind got worse but never picked it up.
We started at 11 and I shipped out to the boat and toss potted in a few maggots. I fished to the left edge as the middle had plants and twigs which I didn’t want to hook up on. After about 5 minutes I had a bite and hooked a fish which swam out nicely and then came off. Back over again fed a few more maggots and hooked another fish, landed a 2lb F1. Over the next hour I had a struggle getting odd bites with my pole being bent like a banana and hooking fish that were off the bottom. After hour 1 I had three F1’s, had lost about 5 and lost one rig which blew into the plants.
Hour 2 was just as frustrating and I had tried fishing off bottom, half depth and dobbing, a couple of Rudd a couple of F1’s and more foulers. Clearly lots of F1’s in the peg but I wasn’t working it out!
Mid match I rang Towner, I said I had 10lb and he said he didn’t have that. Everyone was losing foulers it seemed. I tried feeding a bit heavier to get fish to go down on the bottom it gave me a couple of F1,s but then died. I was really worried that I was cocking up a great peg as everyone I could see was catching the odd fish and Geraint especially doing well getting out fouled carp lol. My one thought was stay positive they might come on the feed late for me.
With two hours to go the wind dropped and I was able to fish to the middle of the boat, it was a tiny bit shallower here. It started slow but then I had a great hour catching F1’s and was clawing my way back into the match. All of a sudden it slowed and it was back to odd foulers, so weird! My last hour was OK but not as much as I hoped for, I took two F1 on the short line one in the mouth one in the tail, and a few from 16m. Match over and I hadn’t had a carp and don’t think I hooked one, it was all F1’s. Whatever I weighed I was sure I had lost the same off the hook, Geraint said he was the same.
My fish went 23 Kilo 925g about 53lb, this got me 5th in the section an ok result but I feel I should have done better. That said a local angler in my section told me he drew my peg last week and said he fished it the same had 70lb and lost at least that in foulers. Typical of winter fishing the fish were in certain areas, Will Raison in my section beat two anglers with 8 kilos, if he can’t catch there’s no fish in his peg. Here’s my section sheet.
Towner had a great last hour to end with 26 kilos also coming 5th in section so steady enough. Andrew Man on Float Fish was 5th, on Decoy Rob 3rd but Luke never had a bite and blanked. Having blanked there myself in the past I knew how he would be feeling, gutted for him. The lads on the drains had all done steady and our penalty points were 60. This put us 9th just 1 point off 8th which was the last team payout. Diawa Dorking and Barnsley both had 58 points and 55 points was 4th so it was very close. Congratulations to Geraint and his Starlets team who won convincingly, local team Tackle & Bates were second.
Weather permitting I will get one chance to get on the river next week for a bit of feeder chucking! 🤞
