However, when Hathers texted me on Friday night to check on the condition of the River Mole, I began to feel sorry that I hadn't put my name down for the Leatherhead DAS club match on the river, just 5 minutes away from home.
Sunday morning saw me arrive at Wildlife Aid and as the promised snow hadn't arrived and the conditions actually weren't too bad, more volunteers had turned up than expected and to be honest I wasn't really needed. All I ended up doing was feeding three parakeets, helping Karen (another volunteer) prepare dinner for the Hedgehogs and doing a bit of washing up. Incidentely, we have about 70 Hedgehogs at Wildlife Aid that we have to keep there until the spring as they are too small to be released at the moment and wouldn't survive hibernation. I have therefore started a little appeal to help get money to buy dog / cat food to feed them. If you feel that you want to help out then email me at Pikeyp@btinternet.com and I will give you my address details.
Anyway after a quick family visit to make sure my parents were ok with all this snow and ice, and a spot of lunch we decided to pop down the river to watch the weigh in. Whilst there were loads of cars in the car park, the majority of them belonged to the sledgers and skiers that were taking advantage of the snowy slopes of the Mole valley and only 9 of them belonged to anglers.
A quick walk along the bottom section of the Leathehead DAS water brought back memories of many a club match in the past when we used to get turnouts of 45 anglers and some brilliant days fishing. Ray Smee had drawn the "Bottom Pool" and with 5 chub in the net (two on bread and 3 on maggot) I thought he might have had enough to win. The only others I heard had beeen catching were Martin Cooper who also had 5 chub and Gary Rose who had drawn one of the best winter roach pegs and had caught Dace on and off for most of the match.
Having reached Hathers in "Roger's Swim" (yes, all the pegs have names), he had alledgedly caught one MINNOW but having seen no evidence of said fish, then I cannot confirm or deny this. We hung around long enough chating to enable him to pack up and help him carry his gear back to the car park before watching Ray Smee weigh in.
Unfortunately we missed Gary Rose weigh in a brilliant winning net of 13lb of mainly dace but managed to see Ray weigh in his 2nd place 12-8-0. Martin Cooper finished third when his 5 chub weighed slightly less than Ray's whilst Pete Turnbull also matched Hathers one minnow and the others had all left for an early bath.
After a quick post match chat in the car park, we all left hoping that the snow doesn't all melt quickly and make the river unfishable next sunday when the joint Leatherhead/Dorking river matches switch to the Dorking water and I for one am quite looking forward to it.
