Pleasure Day Alders Farm 28.05.2019 Ash Lake

All my plans were scuppered this week with cancelling a bream session at short notice due to a charity match on Black Horse Lake all over the Bank Holiday weekend and the regular Tuesday Openat Alders Farm moving to the Monday to cater for all those with the extra day off. Still it gave both Mick and I the chance of a practice session.

Arranging to meet at 0800 at the venue, we had a chat with Trevor Price in the shop and managed to put the world to rights. We decided on a couple of swims on Ash Lake pegs 5 and 6. Mick on 5 myself on 6. Mick wanted to play around with the pellet waggler and with the island in front of him he had the ideal opportunity.
I wanted to play around fishing shallow, something I have little confidence in. I am getting better with each session but practice, practice and more practice is needed.I also set up a corn line for two plus two, just in case.
I decided on a line at 12m, I could hold the pole in the breeze which was pushing right to left, and felt if the fish dropped off I could add another section if needed. I set up two rigs, one a Drennan Crystal dibber float, with a small bulk of number 8 stotz above a size 16 KKM hook.The other a Drennan Crystal bristle float. with the shot under the float and a single number 8 stotz dropper, this time to a hand tied banded hooklength and size 18 B911F1 hook. Both rigs were set up on white hydro.
The shorter 2+2 line was a MW Hi Viz Margin float .3g to a .15 hooklength, size 16 KKM hook. Coupled with .19 Guru NGuage  and green KND. elastic.
I fed a couple of small handfulls of corn onto the 5m line and left it alone. I pinged around a dozen 4mm fishery pellets out to 11m and placed my rig just past it. lifting and dropping saw my first bite after around 10 minutes, A small carp around the 1lb mark before a few better samples fishing at 2ft deep, however I was missing a lot of bites, chopping and changing the depth, worked with a plan of three missed bites and change the depth, by following this rule I was soon in a rhythm and catching well with fish to 3lb coming regularly.
Mick was getting a few fish on an 8mm pellet but did better with a 6mm pellet. feeding fishery 4mms. He was even getting a few from the margins on the pellet waggler, how he does it amazes me.
I spent around 30 minutes on the 2+2 line with corn feeding it quite heavily, with good results, fish to 5lb but suffered a few foul hookers along the way.
Going back out to 12m, I restarted the line, pinging around a dozen pellets every 30 seconds kept fish interested and I was catching well. Trevor had come down for a chat and one of the conversations centred around pole elastics and I was saying I had snapped one today, five minutes later another one had gone. two white hydros snapped during a single session for no apparent reason. I must admit though they had been in the pole for a while and caught plenty of fish along the way. I grabbed another top kit with the green KND and gave that a go for the remainder of the session with no ill effects. I even tried a grain of corn over the pellets with plenty of bites but only one fish. Something I perhaps would not have tried as I was busy catching well. A reminder that a practice session should not be a match against yourself, there is a need to try different things even though you are catching.
At the end of the day I had caught well, lots of fish and well over a ton from a good peg. Mick had fared not so well, he had caught and had a day's fishing, but he had tried something different and learnt a few things.
Next match is on Saturday at Hartleylands Farm Peartree Lake. Hopefully I will have learnt a few things from some recent errors of judgement.