Sumners Pond - 17th November 2007

I had a really difficult decision to make at the weekend !

Should I go back to Sumners pond on the Saturday, where the weather was supposed to be cloudy but dry or fish a round of the Surrey Winter League on Sunday against Dorking etc on the Wey Navigation Canal which was likely to be full of leaves and the weather forecast said heavy rain and strong winds !

Yes, you guessed it, I arrived at Sumners Pond for a nice breakfast at 7.30am –although the weather forecast was once again incorrect as we’d already had a drop of the wet stuff on the way down.

With 18 anglers booked in it meant that we could again spread the pegs out and give everyone a bit of room. Having drawn Peg 10 on Wednesday, I moved one peg further down the lake to peg 11 this time. Although it wasn’t supposed to be in the “Flier” category, I quite liked the look of it as I had the end of an island to fish to at 14.5 metres – although I had brought my G10 with me just incase I needed to fish 16 metres, and I also had a lot of room either side of me. John Clifford had caught 48lb from it on Wednesday so I just hoped that the recent cold weather hadn’t driven all the fish up to the deeper water at the other end of the lake.

The water tight to the island was very shallow so I came back until it dropped down the shelf at about 12 metres and also set up rigs to fish 14 metres to the left of the point of the island – once again in the deeper water. My final rig was “Sort of down the middle” at about 10 o’clock so I wasn’t playing any fish I’d hooked by the island on this line.

I decided to fish corn on two of the lines and to try paste on one of them as I had caught on it before on some fisheries in winter, I began by cupping in some corn and hemp on the corn lines and some dampened 3mm Swim stim pellets on the paste line.

Changing the subject completely, I’d tried to make my usual paste with the pellets the previous evening but despite pouring boiling water on them and trying to mash them up with a fork, they wouldn’t break down at all – infact they looked more like expander pellets ! Luckily I had some swim stim micro pellets as well so made the paste out of them instead. Not wanting to waste any bait I let the “expanders” cool down and bagged them up for feed.

Anyway, back to the match – my rigs consisted of two “hook in the Loop” rigs for the corn lines and a 4x12 Maver paste float for across – I still haven’t found any 0.18 G Line so once again had to use 0.16 ! Starting down the middle, I sat biteless for the first ten minutes then just noticed the float move a fraction, a gentle lift of the pole tip saw a couple of feet of black hydro emerge and soon I had a 4lber in the net. Feeding a few grains of corn and some hemp each cast I had another 3 fish in quick succession before it went a bit quiet. I then fed a bigger pot and left it to settle. My paste line was really a “throw away line” where I didn’t really expect to catch but nevertheless, it could produce, so out went the paste rig over where I’d fed the “expanders”. My first couple of drop ins on paste are usually just to set the rig up properly as even though you have plumbed up, it is very rarely correct when you first try the paste due to silt on the bottom etc. Sure enough, the float sat far too high in the water which meant I would have to shallow up by an inch or so to set the float correctly. I was just about to ship back when the two inches of float that were sticking out of the water suddenly were there no longer !!!!! A gentle lift resulted in more black hydro and this happened again for the next 5 casts. I was now mentally calculating how much I was going to weigh in at the final whistle. Ten carp an hour for 5 hours = 50 carp x on average 4lb that would be about 200lb then !

WRONG ! I fed the paste line again and then quickly set up another paste rig to fish down the middle – if the fish were having it at 12 metres then I’d empty it at 7 metres on paste wouldn’t I ?

Well, I didn’t, infact I never had a bite on it, nor could I now catch on corn ! It was as though every fish in the peg had disappeared as I now couldn’t buy a bite……and the wind had got up and the rain started, LOVELY !

Tony West on Peg 12 in the corner on the opposite bank had caught a couple of fish – including a small “hippopotamus” – which later turned out to weigh 15lb, but he was also struggling now. Having only just started fishing the lake, nobody knows what happens after the good start as both times the fish have died off until the last hour – except for those who have drawn the fliers. I kept trying all three lines but for two hours never had a sign of a fish. I then decided to start another line at 14 metres to my left and managed to nick 4 fish from there before that too dried up completely.
I thought I might just sneak the section but Tony caught 4 fish in the last hour and I just knew that he would finish in front of me.

I had expected to catch in the last hour, but I never had another fish and ended the match with 13 carp and a skimmer for 56-6-0 which was 6 ounces less that I had caught on the Wednesday – although to be fair, the match had fished a lot harder due to the much colder weather that we’d had over he past few days.

Tony’s fish – including his Hippo went 69-4-0 as he did take the section as the first three all came within 3 pegs up the deeper end of the lake.

Next time if I draw an open water peg I think I’ll set up a waggler and / or a lead as it may just be that the fish move away from the pole line once you’ve caught a few.

Top 10

Terry Molloy Peg 5 90-0-0
Tony Kent Peg 6 89-6-0
Tony Yianni Peg 4 83-14-0
Tony West Peg 12 69-4-0
Bob Poulton Peg 16 68-6-0
Don Garnish Peg 9 64-0-0
Dave Johnson Peg 15 61-0-0
Ross Nursey Peg 7 60-8-0
Steve Gardener Peg 3 57-6-0
Dave Pearson Peg 11 56-6-0

Guess where we are Wednesday ?