Willinghurst - 24th April 2008

About half of this appeared in the Angling Times today - so here is the full version.

It was back to Willinghurst for me at the weekend for the Sunday open on New and Old Lakes. Old Lake has not been match fished for a while and as pleasure anglers had been catching a few fish and with only 11 of the 30 pegs put in, I was actually hoping to draw on there. I got so side tracked with talking to the anglers drawing for the Molesey League match on the top lake that when I went to draw Amy told me I had Old 11 as it was the only peg left !

I really fancied the peg as it was the end peg on the causeway between New and Old Lakes and had loads of room and a few fish swimming about on the surface.
I set up a paste rig to fish at the base of the slope at 7 metres, a rig to fish corn and pellet along the end bank and one to try in front of the empty platform to my right. On the whistle, I cupped in some bait on all three lines then tried them all in rotation for the next hour and a half without a sign of a bite. However, I was still in with a chance, as by this time NOBODY had had a bite on the lake. John Radford on New Lake Peg 6 was catching one a chuck on the pole and it was already clear that we were only fishing for our section with everyone on New Lake catching a few fish…….except Perry Stone on Peg 8.

There were still a few fish swimming around on top, and although they weren’t at all interested in the pellets I was firing out, I decided to set up a waggler as I wasn’t exactly setting the world on fire on the pole. I didn’t have to chuck far to reach the fish and with the water so clear, I set up a 2AA Drennan Crystal Waggler rather than the usual Pellet wag. I set the float at 2 foot put a 6m pellet on the band which was hair rigged and lobbed it out where I’d been feeding a few pellets. The float sat there for a few seconds then sank from sight as I thought the pellet was too heavy for the float. A half hearted strike resulted in the rod arching round and I soon had my first fish in the net, a carp of about 5lb hooked firmly in the nose. No more fish followed in the next half hour but then as Mark Goddard at the next peg hooked a fish on the method feeder, I’d added another foot to the depth to try and find where the fish were and I hooked another fish which was clearly foulhooked. After a long and very tense battle with words of encouragement coming from all round the lake, I finally netted fish number two, an 8lber this one hooked in the left hand ! After another half hour without any indications at all, I decided to “Rest the Peg” and one of Amy’s cheeseburgers and a cuppa was too much to resist. Arriving back at my peg about 20 minutes later I still couldn’t catch but decided to try on the bottom where I had been feeding pellets to see if any feeding fish had settled over the pellets which I’m sure had all made it to the bottom. I added another couple of foot to the depth on the waggler rig and cast it out, once again. It wasn’t there for more than a few seconds and I was soon attached to what felt like quite a lump as it plodded about not wanting to come off the bottom. After what seemed like hours later but was probably more like 10 minutes, I netted a fish of about 15lb, this one firmly hooked in the mouth. Another fish of about 6lb soon followed and just as I was thinking that I might start to catch a few, the peg died and I sat biteless for the final hour whilst Steve “Grumpy” Collins stated to catch a fish a chuck on the method feeder two pegs to my left. To say I was a little disappointed would dhave been an understatement as Grumpies 7 carp went 33-8-0 to my 4 for 32-4-0 and a section win for him as all the top 4 came from New Lake. Mick Fitzpatrick on New 16 misjudged the weight of his fish and his 74lb was restricted to 65lb as he had them all in one net, whilst Paul “Tommy” Hiller gave his Dorking team mate Steve Gardener a beating off the next peg with 54-4-0 to 41-0-0, whilst John Radford on Peg 6 split the pair of them with 51-4-0.

Mick Seymour won the Molesey League match with 126-0-0 from Peg 26 on the top lake, the second time in a week that he had won from it with over 100lb. If you see him at Willinghurst don’t mention the cut on his head that was caused by a stray “Clay” whilst on the estate clay pigeon shooting. We didn’t laugh at all !