Hawthorne AC club match.
It was off to Gold Valley to fish Syndicate Lake for todays club match. The complex consists of 5 lakes (old gravel workings) 3 of which are used for matches on a regular basis.
In summer weights of over 100lbs are a common occurrence, but this early in the year they are something of a rarity.
Arriving early, breakfast in the clubhouse (£4 for a full english ) was the order of the day, before dipping into the drawbag to find Peg 109 sticking to my hand.
Syndicate Lake…..
Now Syndicate Lake holds a good head of Tench, Bream, Crucians, Perch & Roach, but it is the Carp that are the main target once the weather starts to warm up. The Carp in here can be real creatures so 8lb reel lines and 6lb hook lengths are called for on the advice of Will Raison (The Co-Owner & England International).
Two rods were set up, 1 groundbait feeder and 1 waggler. The groundbait was 2 bags of Sensas Gold and 1 of crushed hemp mixed on the dry side so as to explode out of the mesh feeder that was finished off with a Drennan Carbon Carp hook in a size 14 fished with 3/4 red maggots.
The waggler was a 3aaa crystal fished about 3inches over depth in about 5 feet of water at 2 rodlengths. In this swim I laid down a large bed of hemp (about 3 pints) to try and stop anything in it’s tracks that happened upon it.
Starting off on the feeder, it was quite slow with only a skimmer of 1½lbs to show for the first hour, but a number of liners encouraged me to stay with it. The next proper bite nearly ripped the rod from my hand, and after 10 mins a lovely Common,well into double figures was heading for the net, BUT a last minute dive saw it dive towards my keepnet and neatly transfer the hook to said net. Back out with the feeder and soon 3 of its smaller brothers were safely IN the net. No more bites followed so with a couple of hours to go it was waggler time.
First cast and after 10secs the float buried, and the culprit a 5lb Mirror was joining it’s pals in the net, and in the next two hours I added another 7 to the total before the whistle went.
At the scales I weighed in 11 Carp and 1 skimmer for a total weight of 53lbs 4ozs, good enough for third on the day, and 8 more points toward the club championship and I also qualified for the next round of the club Knockout trophy, so quite a satisfying day all round.
