Following two second places in recent Silvers matches at Sumners pond (albeit mostly due to the draw) I was really looking forward to saturdays open on the match lake. The weather forecast said it was getting mild for the weekend with saturday being a tropical 4 degrees !
However, when I woke saturday morning everywhere was completely white following the biggest air frost I had seen for ages and it was still minus 5 when Don picked me up. Arriving at the lake, with 11 anglers booked in, me and Terry Harrison went off pegging and agreed to put all the anglers on the better left hand bank. The pegs I fancied were numbers 5-11 and especially 5-9 as those had been fished on wednesday and the ice in those pegs was only about 2 inches thick.
Unfortuntely with 2 pegs left in the hat, I drew Peg 2 leaving Peg 10 for Bag Up Bob, who having talked his mate Gedge Cooper in to fishing, didn't turn up himself ! The first three pegs hadn't been fished for a while and the were a nightmare to clear of ice as it was at least three inches thick on them, I was however in for an entertaining day as Gedge was on Peg 1 and when you draw near Mr Cooper you always have a fun day.
After about 2 hours of ice breaking, we were all ready to fish. I wasn't that enthusiastic about my chances of framing as I'd only managed to break out as far as 5 metres and felt that wasn't really far enough to be able to fish two lines as they would be too close together. At this point I must apologies to Mark Harrington as he lent me his big ice breaking weight and when the clip on my chain broke it managed to leave it on the bottom of the lake about 5 metres out - Sorry Mate !
What followed was probably the coldest days fishing I have ever had, the freezing fog stayed all day and according to Terry Harrison's thermometer, the temperature didn't rise above zero all day. To make matters worse, the pegs all kept refreezing, everyones elastic froze either in or out of their poles and when you shipped back you couldn't always break down at the section you wanted cos it was frozen. Why do we do this ?
Despite the cold, everyone caught a few fish although the pegs down the other end from me seemed to be the place to be. I caught a few fish up in the water but despite a little run of fish mid match, I knew I wasn't going to do any good and just needed to try and nick Gedge's pound.
With minutes to go I was confident that my bank balance was about to be swelled by another 100 pennies when disaster struck ! Gedge was chatting on the phone to Tony Kent when I suddenly heard him say "Hang on a minute Tone", I looked round to see a little pantomine being played out in his peg, so picture this if you will. Gedge, despite not concentrating on his float whilst on the phone had managed to hook a roach which was considerbly bigger than the tiny ones he had been catching all day. Having not shipped in for a while, the inside couple of metres of his peg had iced over again and the fish was now stuck under the ice, and to add to his problems all his pole was now iced together and he couldn't get any sections apart ! However, in true Gedge fashion, he gave the fish the big heave ho, lifted it up on the edge of the ice with about 8 metres of pole in the air and scooped the fish with his fully extended landing net.....I was gutted, and rightly so as the roach was about 9 ounces and he beat me for the pound by 8 ounces !
Result
Mark Harrington Peg 7 6-8-0
Donald Garnish Peg 9 5-13-8
Steve Gardener Peg 8 5-6-0
Terry Molloy Peg 11 5-1-0
Terry Harrison Peg 4 4-13-0
Gedge Cooper Peg 1 2-9-0
Dave Pearson Peg 2 2-1-0
Steve Collins Peg 3 1-14-0
Ian Covey Peg 5 1-11-0
Alan Harrington Peg 6 DNW
Bag Up Bob Peg 10 Did Not Arrive
On Wednesday it is Round 1 of Steve Gardener's Silver fish league at Sumners Pond silvers lake. I don't know how I ever got talked into fishing a silvers league against God, Steve Sanders, Terry Harrison etc etc but at least it's gone a bit milder and hopefully we'll all catch a few fish.
JPZ's from Marukyu - "The Dogs Danglies"
Jordan Whitby with a PB Carp of 18lb from Newdigate
Maggotdrowning.com
Exclusive Pictures
Fred Davis with his personal best chub of 7-2-0 from the River Lea
and his 6-8-0 tench !
Neil Humpage with part of his 89-10-0 match winning chub catch from the River Wye
Mike Spragg with his personal best Barbel from the The Wye, a whopping 10-1-0.
Davey P's Locker - Tackle I would recommend
Drennan Lake Floats - I used to use these floats for crucians and have recently started using them again for my silvers fishing, The cane bristle makes them especially sensitive.
I use this hook for nearly all my carp fishing from Size 10's with paste, 14's with the knotless knot on the lead and 18's for Hook in the loop rigs and they have never let me down.
How smart are this lot - Andy May and his wife with some of the motley Total fishing.com crew. There is a small pond just out of the picture and they fished a small sweepstake between the wedding ceremony and the reception ! Andy May won, Haisman was last - no change there then !
Myles Levy and his mate Chris with a 59lb catfish from France.
When I was writing in the Angling Times I promised some friends that I would try and get "Fish Cakes" mentioned in an article. However, as I was sacked before I could do so, I thought I'd put them on here ! So Mick and Karen Jones, here they are as promised !
At least one member of the Baxter clan can catch fish ! Young Dylan with a 4lb bream.
Hathers at Stafford Moor - Let this picture be a lesson to you all, those last couple of drinks the night before are never a good idea !
World Exclusive !!!!!!!
Andy Toplis playing a fish.
Ryan Hughes with part of an 80lb bag from White Springs Fishery in Wales
Mick Bull wont have received many points for this dive - but having just won the Fisho Final and £25k I don't think he really cared !
Another exclusive for Pikey's Progress - Terry Molloy not talking ! Oh yes and with a decent River Thames Pike.
OK Own up - who lent Mick The Bookie some fish to pose with ?
Martin Harper with a superb 8lb tench from Farlows Lake
Young match star Tony Curd with an 11lb barbel from the River Kennet - he didn't say where, these spessy hunters are so secretive !
Total Fishing's Justin Laundon with a fine net of fish from Lindholme Lakes
Fred Davis with 3 chub over 5lb and a small one from the River Lea.
http://www.carpvader.com/index.asp
Jeff Moors took part in the recent Catfish Challenge and caught this one - more of a "kitten" than a cat really !
And here are some proper ones that the winners had.
BNF - with part of a near 100lb haul from the Glebe
Scone - Angling writer, float maker and all round good egg !
"Hathers" with his 3-8-0 roach from Timsbury Manor - some claim it was really a hybrid, I couldn't possibly comment !
"Fordy on the Telly" with 40lb of prime River Kennet chub.
.........and this one weighed 5-2-0
Alan Dove with a small Skimmer Bream of 15-8-0 from Walthamstow Reservoir
Fred Davis plied Alan Dove with coffee all day then when he went to attend to a call of nature caught this one with his gear !
Colin Ormston (Billy no Fish) with the reason that some anglers still fish rivers !
Phil Stone (Pebs) with a fine net of roach and rudd from Witherington Farm
Total Fishing.com ventriloquist Gary Haisman with his two new dummies - Billy No Fish and Pebs.
