Not only did I lose a nugget last time out to Mick, I fished like an absolute idiot, in hindsight. I got it all wrong right from the off and never looked like catching a few. Still today is another day.
Last Tuesday's match was on Oaks Lake and today was no different. Ten hardy souls braved the cool winter weather but at least the rain would hold off. It was fresh but not too bad for the time of year.
With monies paid, and the peg numbers sorted I was hoping for a repeat of last weeks dr aw where peg 1 was my home if not a draw from 6 to 9 would be good. However, peg 3 was to be my home for the next five hours. I had Dennis on 4 and Del Smith on 2 with Charlie Lancaster on the flyer peg 1. John Hewison was on 5 with Terry Lancaster on 6, Madd (7) Ken on peg 8 and Lee Taylor on 9. Trevor had end peg 10 and would be hard to beat from his favourite peg on the complex.
I decided to forget about margin fishing and catch what was in front of me for five hours. I pulled a deep rig from my box and found that at 11m it would sit nicely. A similar approach found 9m to my left hand line and with 4ft on my right hand swim I was set. I opted to fish expander to my left and corn to the right leaving me to fish maggot or expander on the long 11m line.
I fed both the right and 11m line with micros with a few grains of corn or expander in the mix, whilst the left hand swim was fed with ground bait and expanders.
Starting off on the 11m line I was soon into a steady procession of small carp. Nothing over a pound but I was catching a few. I was feeding a tosspot every put in with 4 maggots and a pinch of micros and this seemed to be working as after an hour I reckoned on around 15lb. I could hear Charlie catching well down the edge and proper fish too. Lee Taylor was getting a few fish from the island on the tip. Madd had snared a good carp and was getting a few fish but not regularly. It was head down time. Hours two and three were steady apart from a spell in the middle where I only had two fish in around half an hour's fishing.
I re-fed this line with a half pot of micros and maggot/expander mix and tried both the side lines, with only 2 fish to show for 20 minutes. Still nothing over a pound came to the net but the float was going under. Back to 11m and a switch to expander brought a few skimmers before again the small carp returned and pushed them out. Going into the last hour I had 50lb and hoped a few of the larger fish would come in over this line, I had fed it religiously every put in and placed a grain of corn on the hook, but still the small carp came. Maggot was probably best bait on the day with Almond Expanders a close second.
Overall
1st Trevor Price 159-15
2nd Charlie Lancaster 146-05
3rd Lee Taylor 84-03
4th Keith Ashby 61-11
5th Del Smith 49-05
6th Phil "Madd" Young 47-01
Personally I think I fished it right today and walked away thinking I could not have done anything different. I caught what was in front of me which was my aim. It would have been nice if a few of the larger specimens had come out to play but you cannot have everything. Shame Mick is never here when I fish well.
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