Hartleylands Farm Fishery. Nick’s Lake. February 16th, 2008.

Today’s little jaunt started off when Pete Midgley posted up on the Maggotdrowning Forum at the start of the week “Hi all. Have just spoken to Ryan and we are going down to Hartleylands this Saturday. If anyone else is interested in meeting up let me know and if there is enough we could even have a little friendly match“

Now while the day ticket is £7 a day at Hartleylands, peg fees for a small match are £6 and you can use keepnets, so with 6 of us committing to the day a ‘Match’ was booked.

An easy drive down saw me pulling into the car park at around 9·20am to be greeted by Pete, Ryan and Ryan’s dad Keith. Shortly after we were joined by Dave who had collected Alan on the way. A clear blue sky promised a decent day weather-wise though a heavy frost gave it away that the temperature was only 1°C.

Paul the Bailiff arrived to collect the peg fees and I managed to negotiate a £1 discount, which we put into a winner takes all pot. We had pegs 20-25 allowing everyone a feature to fish to, and after a quick draw made our way to our pegs.

I found myself with peg24 for the day.

I would have preferred 25 or 23 which would have given me some open water to have dropped a feeder into, but decided to set up a Drennan 2½AA peacock insert waggler and fish double red maggot to keep busy and warm, though I did set up a small Drennan maggot feeder as a back up, leaving the pole in the rod bag. Pete had kindly picked up a couple of pints of red maggots for me, however I had a bit of a shock to find that they’d sweated up rather badly, but half a bag of GOT Baits worm flavoured Atomic Cloud added to them just about managed to salvage the situation, and this little fella kept popping back all day to sample them.

To my left I had Keith (Ryan’s dad) for company, and having only recently returned to fishing, he contented himself to just set up the pole, while to my right on 23 Alan had set up a groundbait feeder and his pole. to his right Pete (peg22) had set up pole and feeder as well, while Dave (peg21) and Ryan (peg20) just set up feeders.

We got started around 11am and Keith was off the mark straight away with a small Carp.

A pouch full of maggots out to the island followed by my float soon saw me getting regular bites from small Roach and Rudd, nothing big, but regularly enough to keep me warm and interested. Alan was dropping his feeder just off the point of the island and was soon into his 1st Carp of the day.

Indeed everyone seemed to be getting a few and the banter was soon flowing. Pete was alternating between the feeder and the pole and it was while he was on the pole that he became the focus of a fair bit of stick.

He hooked into what most of us assumed was a ‘lump’ and with yards of elastic streaming from his top kit he soon reached the point where it appeared that he could do nothing with it, despite standing up, top kit reaching for the sky it wouldn’t come to the net and despite us exhorting him to stand on his seat, he steadfastly refused on the grounds that “I’m not going to get my new seat dirty” What a Tart. Finally the leviathan of the deep was netted, a Carp that might have weighed 4lbs on a good day!!!!!!!!!!!

 Obviously Preston 11 hollo set loose was not quite what the doctor ordered leading to a quick change of top kit.

Dave meanwhile was quietly putting together a few small Carp on the feeder, nothing large, averaging around the 1½-2lb mark, but regularly enough to put him out in front.

 Ryan was getting a few as well, though he couldn’t match Dave’s catch rate on the day.

I just kept plugging away with the waggler mostly keeping the silvers going with the odd small Carp. A couple of looks with the feeder had produced a couple of small Carp but the gaps between bites meant that the feeder was soon discarded in favour of the waggler.

All to soon 4pm rolled round and with the fishery closing at 5pm we had a quick weigh-in, with Dave taking the honours on the day and the £1′s with his level 28lbs, while I edged Alan out of 2nd with my 20lbs 4ozs to his level 20lbs, then Ryan and Pete with Keith bringing up the rear.

A good day all round, a few fish, great company with plenty of banter and laughs, a typical Maggotdrowning day really. Thanks to Pete for organising it, I’m sure it won’t be to long before we’re doing it all again.

Position	Angler	Weight
1st	Dave Collier	28lbs 00ozs
2nd	Peter Morton	20lbs 04ozs
3rd	Alan Loader	20lbs 00ozs
4th	Ryan Wells	14lbs 12ozs
5th	Pete Midgley	14lbs 02ozs
6th	Keith Wells	5lbs 00ozs

Private Lake, East Sussex. February 9th, 2008.

Today saw a few of the lads from the Maggotdrowning website meeting up for a friendly little knock-up on a Private Lake in East Sussex. Loading up the car it had all the makings of a decent day ahead, Nice and mild  at 10°C with hardly a breathe of wind. I stopped off for a bit of breakfast in Bromley and was greeted by blue sky and the rising sun as I got back into the car, however as  I reached branched off the M25 onto the A21 I started to run into fog and the temperature started to drop.
By the time I reached the venue and turned into the fishery car park it said 2°C and everything was covered in a heavy frost.

It was soon obvious that Bill’s enquiry as to whether anyone fancied “a fun day out plenty of banter and hopefully some of Dave the Fish’s rum bottle” had received a good response with a dozen of us assembled in the car park. Now the attraction of this lake is that it has a bit of a reputation as a bagging water, especially in the summer, however it had recently suffered two heavy floods and a visit soon after by some of the lads was far from fruitful, however with another couple of weeks for it to settle down we were hoping for better things today.

Bill had put in an appropriate number of pegs using his experience of the fishery and after a quick draw we made our way to our pegs. Kevin dropped into the 1st corner swim through the gate, while Bill and Tony shared the next corner. Pete, Alan, Dave and Colin were on the far bank while Terry, Vince, Myself, Paul and Ryan had adjacent swims on the near bank.

Setting up it was obvious that there was going to be a fair bit of banter with Paul to my left and Vince to my right…

Vince had the gap between the two islands in front of him while I had a short chuck to it in front of me. I set up a feeder rod with a small maggot feeder and a waggler rod as well as the pole, though the last two were more as back up. Bill called the All-in at 9·45am and I potted some micro’s and corn onto my pole line at 10mtrs and then went straight out with the feeder allowing the pole line to settle.

Kevin was quickly off the mark with a small Carp, but it was a bit of a false start as virtually everyone struggled for a bite from anything other than tiny Roach.Vince had had a couple of wrap rounds that came to nothing before connecting with a decent Carp that proved to be a near double and Paul had nicked a Carp from his end of the island.

while both the feeder and the pole line remained dead for me. By 1pm with just a few small Roach from the pole line I went for a stroll round. first port of call was Colin who was struggling.

and Dave, where Dave was kind enough to offer me a warming nip from his bottle of Mount Gay Extra Old  Rum.

Pete and Alan had managed a couple of Carp apiece while Bill and Tony were having their own silvers contest. Working my way back I could see Ryan landing a Carp which was to prove to be the 1st of three that he had in quick succession.

Vince had managed another small Carp, but poor Terry just couldn’t buy a bite from anywhere. Looking across however we were treated to a bit of fun as Tony having finally hooked a Carp played it in only to discover that he’d forgotten to set up his landing net, however he managed to land it by scooping it with the net minus handle. Meanwhile Pete ensconced on his new Space Station TX seatbox managed to land another couple of Carp to edge away into the lead.

Around 2pm I finally had a bite on the feeder resulting in a very welcome Carp of around 3½lbs, but as the afternoon wore on our side of the lake got cooler and cooler till even the tiny Roach stopped feeding though a few late Carp did show for those on the far side. Frankly the All-out was music to our ears and the quick weigh-in revealed just how hard the lake had fished.Pete took the honours on the day with six Carp and a few bits for 34lbs 6ozs followed by Alan with 26lbs 4ozs and Bill taking the last place in the frame with 22lbs 8ozs.

Still despite the lack of fish it was still a decent day out in good company. Thanks to Bill for organising the day. I’m already looking forward to doing it all again once it’s warmed up a bit and the lake has had more of a chance to settle down after it’s recent double flooding.

Position	Angler	Weight
1st	Pete Midgley	34lbs 06ozs
2nd	Alan Loader	26lbs 04ozs
3rd	Bill Gibbins	22lbs 08ozs
4th	Tony Roberts	17lbs 09ozs
5th	Dave Collier	16lbs 10ozs
6th	Ryan Wells	13lbs 00ozs
7th	Vince Gould	11lbs 00ozs
8th	Paul East	7lbs 10ozs
9th	Colin Sharrard	6lbs 00ozs
10th	Peter Morton	4lbs 00ozs
11th	Kevin Loveland	3lbs 06ozs
12th	Terry Goff	DNW