Saturday morning arrived and a sleepy Hathers picked me up for the journey to Winwhistle fishery for breakfast, minus his petrol cap which he had inadvertantly left at the garage on the way !
Following breakfast we arrived at Broadlands, parked in the Lower Lake car park and after a quick walk around the lake, I was just glad that I didn't have to peg it. With 23 of 31 pegs to put in, there were going to be lots of pegs in corners with them all facing the same bit of island !
I had been really really looking forward to this match as not only would it give me a chance to meet up with a few mates that I hadn't seen for a while and meet a few people that I had chatted to on-line, but it also looked like being a waggler match for bream which is one of my favourite methods.
I didn't see Andy peg the lake so when I drew Peg 15 I had no idea where it was, however, as I walked round the lake with my gear I was a little disappointed to find it at the far end of the lake opposite the point of the island. Although it looked a decent carp peg, I really wanted to fish a waggler for bream which I didn't think would come into this narrow bit of the lake. I did set up a pole to fish at 12 metres but when the anglers either side (Ricky Baxter and Andy Hayden) shipped out, our floats were all about 6 metres apart. Andy had amazed me whist setting up by adding section after section to his pole until it reached the island (about 19 metres away), although it didn't do him a lot of good as he finished with 20lb of skimmers but this may have been partly due to the fact that he shared his island peg with John Millington and Nick White !
After a biteless 20 minutes I went for a quick wander and got a quick pep talk from Hathers before returning to my peg and deciding to just chuck a lead to the island for the rest of the match. Fishing a hair rigged pellet wrapped with paste (a conker) I had my first carp, a fish of about 3lb after 30 minutes. Half an hour later I had added a 2lb skimmer to my net when just as I was glancing around the lake my rod headed towards the island and I just managed to grab the butt in time. "You weren't watching then were you" said the pleasure angler standing behind me. "No mate" was my reply, "You don't have to when fishing a hair rig as the fish hook themselves anyway !". This one was about 7lb and now put me level with Andy at the next peg.
I had placed a tray of my box on the bank to my right when tackling up and when I heard some rustling in the rushes I threw some pellets by the tray. Imagine my suprise when suddenly a little head appeared from under the tray grabbed a pellet and scampered off to the rushes. This happened a couple of times before I was interupted by carp number three as a little vole or shrew type animal did it's best to keep me amused. I was now more interested in the little fury chap than the fishing but think I must have over fed him / her as after my final lot of feed, they disappeared for the rest of the match - I did however make a mental note for next time to only feed a couple of pellets and 2 grains of corn for the wildlife !
With an hour to go another quick walk revealed that apart from Nick White on Peg 18, my section wasn't fishing too well and I thought if I could just nick another couple of carp then I might just pinch the section money by default. In the final 45 minutes I had a couple of casts that must have been within inches of the island and both times I had a carp of about 4 pounds to finish the match with 5 carp and a skimmer that went 25-6-0.
Whilst I was disappointed not to have been able to fish a waggler match or fish for bream, I think I would probably have been better fishing a small method feeder rather than a bomb and pinging 8mm pelletts over it as I think I could probably have framed if I had or at least won the section. With a method feeder you can often get tighter to islands as there is no "Loose" hook to catch the overhanging vegetation and I think it would probably have been better.
Young Myles Levy had a lovely match from Peg 7, winning convincingly with 39lb of method feeder carp and 38lb of pole caught skimmers for a total weight of 78-12-0, followed by Nick White with 46-11-0 of skimmers and carp from peg 18. Dwayne Seed and Kev Downer had a good little battle either side of Myles with Dwaynes two carp and skimmers just edging him ahead of Kev's all skimmer bag with 46-0-0 to 44-4-0.
Result
Myles Levy..........Peg 7............. 78-12-0
Nick White .........Peg 18........... 46-11-0
Dwayne Seed ......Peg 6............. 46-0-0
Sections
Kev Downer .........Peg 8.......... 44-4-0
John Millington....... Peg 17 ............26-7-0
Gareth Boycott .........Peg 26......... 36-10-0
Despite not fishing as well as we had all hoped (it was apparently minus 2 the night before) I think Fordy filled 20th place with 18-11-0 so it hasn't fished too bad and judging by the comments on the websites, it looks like eveyone is keen to return for another go. Hopefully next time I'll draw an open water peg and can have a spot of waggler chucking.
I'm on holiday this week with Mrs Pikey so have no fishing planned for wednesday and although I haven't yet sorted out a match for next weekend, I will certainly be fishing one day so pop back next Monday to see where I end up.
