Monk Lakes. Match Lake 4. April 2nd, 2011.

Marsh AC club match.

Down to Monk Lakes today for the first Marsh AC club match of the year. It’s always good to be back out with the lads and lasses who make up the club membership for these matches, they’re nice light hearted affairs, more like a days pleasure fishing with a weigh-in at the end than a serious match. That’s not to say that there aren’t a few personal rivalries and scores to settle, but at the end it’s all about a good day out with mates. The forecast for today was looking good and with the cats fed and a couple of cups of coffee to wake me up the kit was soon loaded into the car I was off by 7am. It’s around 40 miles down to Monk Lakes and a steady run down saw me pulling into the car park around 8am.

Most of the usual suspects were gathered round the food bar with tea’s, coffee’s and various breakfast concoctions being demolished ahead of the draw. A jumbo sausage stick took care of my needs as the banter flowed back and forth, Dave soon had the monies collected and with 19 of us in attendance the draw got under way. I quite fancied a peg in the 160′s today as these pegs frequently produce good bags, however my drawing hand had other ideas and presented me with peg 142 when it emerged from the hat.

So off to our respective pegs and I found that I had Al for company to my left on peg 143 which is tailor made for his long up in the water approach against the reed lined island, while Mick Wright, Keith's guest and travelling companion had Peg 145. Peg 142 had a very shallow area at the end of the island which the lakes waterfowl, especially the geese love to occupy. Down to my right on peg 140 was Keith on the same peg as he had for last years match and yielded a 2nd place for him, so I was going to have my work cut out for a result today. Next to Keith was Kev on peg 139 and with Jean keeping him company I should be OK for a couple of cups of coffee throughout the match.

Settling into the peg it looked like the wind could make fishing long awkward so I decided on a line at 8 mtrs as the depth was pretty consistent all the way across and a couple of margin lines. I just set up 3 rigs, all Sackup CX 4×12 pencils on 0·16 Ultima Power Match finishing with size 16 Guru MWG’s. I find that they’re nice stable but sensitive floats and one was set to fish at dead depth at 8mtrs where I had around 4 feet of water while the other two were set for the margins where I had between 18 inches – 2 feet and could also cover if I needed to fish shallow. Bait for today would be a mix of maggot, corn and pellet, with feed taken care of by 6mm pellet.

With everything set a few of the lads were discussing the prospects for the day ahead……

 While Paul East could be found wandering around, probably looking for tips as it’s been 6 months since he last picked up his kit ……

So at 10am Dave sounded the All-In and Marsh AC’s season was underway. A pot of mixed pellet, maggot and corn was shipped out to 8mtrs while the left hand margin received a handful of maggots and the right hand one pellets. Out to 8 mtrs with double red maggot and the float soon buried, a 4oz Roach becoming the first resident of the keepnet today. It was soon joined by a pair of small Tench, a small skimmer and a plump Gudgeon. Al had started with a feeder to the island, but soon reverted to the pole across which produced a Carp for him. Keith had got off the mark after around 10 minutes with a Carp as well, and soon seemed to be putting a few together. Kev had a couple to get him off the mark as well……

Meanwhile Jean appeared with a welcome cup of coffee, but I was beginning to feel that I was getting left behind as Al started to get among the Carp. I managed just 3 small Carp in the hour, but didn’t feel as if I was getting anywhere. A look in both margins produced just a solitary Orfe to my efforts.

I felt that Al was already over the hill and far away unless his swim dried up, but thankfully he wasn’t in my section. It’s funny how you can put yourself under pressure, it seemed that every time I looked Keith was playing a fish and I convinced myself he was walking the section. I decided to add another section and fish out past my fed area to see if the fish had backed off. Sure enough I started to get a few bites and started to get a few small Carp. With this change of fortune I started to feel a bit better but I was still struggling to put a run of fish together.

Dave appeared having a stroll and judging by his comments nobody was really taking the place apart. Jean had been kind enough to get me a cheeseburger from the food bar and as I consumed it I mulled over my next move. One of my fall-backs that’s served me well when I’ve been struggling has been to fish what I feed so I decided for the rest of the session to fish banded 6mm hard pellet and just feed those as well.

It seemed to have the desired effect as slowly but surely I started to put a run of fish together, mostly small Carp but they kept coming at a steady rate. Jean had supplied another welcome cup of coffee while Kevin had gone out on the feeder with a couple of hours to go, a sure sign that he was struggling. Al was still catching and wasn’t going to be caught . It was just a question of whether I could make up the deficit that I thought I had to Keith.

 Sport stayed strong for me and with 5 minutes to go I had my best fish of the day, a nice Common of around 8lbs (a definite Mugger moment©) and managed a further 3 Carp before Dave sounded the All-Out at 4pm. I felt sure that Al had close to the ‘Ton’ and wouldn’t be caught, but Keith felt that I may have edged him. I really couldn’t call it as I had been so focused on catching that I had no real idea as to what was in my nets.

The club has purchased a second set of scales this year and the Weigh-In for our part of the lake started from Al’s peg. Two weighs and 94lbs was a fine effort by Al on a day where the wind hadn’t made it easy to fish at 16mtrs. I was next to weigh and a figure of 71½lbs was to prove good enough for a section win as Keith’s fish weighed 57½lbs, meaning that he had at least secured the bragging rights over his guest Mick today.

So with the kit packed away everyone assembled back at the food bar for the full results. Over a refreshing cuppa it soon became obvious once the weight sheets were totted up that the lake as a whole hadn’t fished up to expectations.  Al’s weight had indeed been good enough for 1st on the day while I took 2nd place and Keith finished 3rd. Clive had managed top weight on the roadside bank with 56¾lbs , while Paul finally remembered how to catch a few fish after his lay off. The backing weights however weren’t quite what we’d hoped for although everyone had a few fish and we’re off and running for another year.

Position	Peg	Angler	Weight
1st	Peg 143	Al Loader	94lbs 00ozs
2nd	Peg 142	Peter Morton	71lbs 00ozs
3rd	Peg 140	Keith Ashby	57lbs 08ozs
4th	Peg 163	Clive Pritchard	56lbs 12ozs
5th	Peg 145	Mick Wright      (guest)	56lbs 00ozs
6th	Peg 164	Paul East	35lbs 00ozs
7th	Peg 152	Mick Pearson     (guest)	33lbs 08ozs
8th	Peg 146	Terry Goff	27lbs 12ozs
9th	Peg 149	Graham Manning	26lbs 08ozs
10th	Peg 139	Kevin Loveland	22lbs 08ozs
11th	Peg 158	Jim Boase	20lbs 12ozs
12th	Peg 154	Dave Collier	19lbs 00ozs
13th	Peg 136	John Holdsworth	16lbs 08ozs
14th	Peg 137	Ken Walker	15lbs 00ozs
15th	Peg 161	Simon Watkins	14lbs 10ozs
16th	Peg 157	Chris Withall	14lbs 00ozs
17th	Peg 151	Judy Hermite	11lbs 08ozs
18th	Peg 148	Zak Johnson     (guest)	5lbs 00ozs
19th	Peg 155	Rod Turner	4lbs 04ozs