Dawns Vale. Wethersfield. Essex. October 3rd, 2008

Well today promised to be a little different as Dawn, the owner of Dawns Vale had invited some of the lads from the Maggotdrowning.com forum down to her fishery for a small match. This had turned into a weekend event for some though, as anglers from as far afield as Scotland, Yorkshire and Wales had accepted Dawn’s invitation. Having met up with Dave and Colin at Dave’s house we made our way out to deepest Essex arriving at the fishery just after 9·30am.

Parking the cars up it was obvious that a couple of the lads had already arrived. Dai, who was staying for the whole weekend had already pitched his bivvy and Mick and Vince were already tucking into egg and bacon rolls and a cuppa that Dawn had cooked up in the little 2 berth caravan at the side of the pool. As Dave, Colin, Tony and I unloaded our tackle, Webbo (and his lunatic boxer dog Max) and Geoff pulled in, Geoff having travelled down from Scotland the previous day to meet up with Webbo in Leeds.

Dawn soon had us all fed and I took the opportunity to take a first look around. Dawns Vale as the fishery’s called is a small natural pool (about an acre I’d estimate) that’s fed by 7 springs set in woodland that’s situated on the side of a hill. Thankfully the trees shelter it to a degree from the wind, which was starting to get a bit of a blow on.
They’d had their 1st frost of Autumn overnight and a heavy grey sky held the promise of rain at some point. Today we were going to have a friendly little 6 hour Knock-up between the nine of us, and Dawn had even gone out and got a Trophy to present to the Winner………

Now the pool isn’t a venue that is match fished, it’s normally fished by carpers and pleasure anglers, and with only about 12 pegs we decided to draw and have a walk off picking our own swims. Most opted for the shortest walk possible, leaving Mick and I to stroll to the far side and I ended up opposite the caravan, allowing me to keep an eye on everyone except Mick.

Settling into the swim I was happy to realise that I was pretty sheltered and would have the wind off my back. Dave has fished the pool once before in the summer and had told me that the margins were deep at around 4-5 feet with depths up to 25 feet in parts of the pool. There were some decent Carp present, along with Crucians, Tench and thousands of small Rudd that would rob any bait they could. I’d already made my mind up based on what I’d heard to target the Carp, but the frost and conditions were making me wonder if I’d made the right choice.

 Plumbing up down the right hand margin there was 5 feet of water with a similar depth at 5mtrs straight out so I settled for those 2 lines with a simple rig incorporating a MW Diamond to 0·18 to size 16 Drennan Carp Match hook, and also set up the feeder as a back up. Bait wise it was going to be 6mm pellet for feed and 8 and 11mm hard banded pellet to deter the Rudd.

At 11·30am I called the All-in and dumped 2 big pots of pellet into both pole lines, then chucked the feeder with soaked 6mm pellets and a hair rigged banded 11mm on the hook. After 30 minutes without a flicker on the tip it was onto the pole but neither of the 2 lines produced a bite just tiny little knocks from Rudd attacking the pellet and from my vantage point I could see that nobody was doing any good apart from Geoff and Dai who were both happily taking a succession of small Rudd.

With 2 hours gone I re-fed the margin swim heavily and went for a stroll to see how everyone was doing. Webbo was on the pole trying to tempt a Carp with Max keeping a careful eye on proceedings and probably glad that he wasn’t relying on him to catch his dinner ………

Tony was ruing parting company with a decent fish earlier on the method feeder and was sticking at it hoping for another bite at the cherry ………

Geoff and Dai were still getting amongst the Rudd making the most of their foresight in bringing some maggots with them, It was good to see Geoff on the bankside and catching a few as he hadn’t been out since May and was quite content just catching and not bothered about the size of fish.

Vince was fishless, but concentrating on the job in hand (not losing a £1 to me in our usual side bet)………

Birthday boy Colin(66) was biteless but determined to stick at it and if possible sneak a Carp out on the paste, though with the wind howling into his chosen swim which was one of the shallower ones, it wasn’t looking to hopeful.

Dave was happily settled into the swim he’d fished before, and was taking it easy as his arthritis was playing him up in the cold and was only owning up to a couple of liners but nothing in the way of fish………

Finally I came to Mick, yet another Birthday Boy (50) who was getting a few Rudd on the waggler to christen his new rod ………

…………….Yes there is a fish there, as a close up proves ………

Back to my peg and I opened a tin of corn that Geoff and kindly let me have, and slipping a grain onto the hook I shipped it out to the margin line. After about 10 minutes of lifting and dropping the rig the float finally slid under and a firm lift met with a pleasing resistance as the elastic stretched from the top-kit. The fish stayed down but didn’t tear off (probably due to the depth of the venue?) but steady pressure soon saw me get the upper hand and a couple of minutes later a nice plump Mirror of around 6lbs was safely in the net.

15 minutes later my 2nd bite of the day produced a similar result, though this time the fish was a little smaller at around 4lbs.

With another half hour gone and no further action I re-fed the margin and looked up to see Webbo with yards of pink Drennan bungee pouring out of his pole, so I grabbed the camera and strolled down to watch the action ………………

……..Webbo was getting nowhere fast with the fish and soon had quite a crowd watching and giving him helpful advise and encouragement. I even phoned Malc and put him on the loudspeaker to see if The Jinx effect would work long distance. Finally after what seemed like 10 minutes the fish was on the top and safely heading for the net………

and you could tell from the grin on Webbo’s face that all the micky taking had been worth it in the shape of a cracking Mirror what tipped the scales at 12lbs 4ozs.

Back to my swim, and the sky was getting darker and the wind was increasing. Back out to the margin and a change to double corn produced a 3rd bite after half an hour and resulted in a 3rd Carp, smaller again this time, a mint little Common of no more than 2lbs. Shortly after that Webbo popped round as he took Max for a stroll and he was soon followed by Dave and Colin, with Dave taking a few grains of corn away with him in an effort to get himself off the mark.

 No more fish followed for me, but Dawn appeared with a freshly cooked double cheeseburger and a hot cup of coffee to lift my spirits. Obviously the corn had the desired effect for Dave, for not long after I looked over and just caught him netting a decent fish……

With around 1½ hours to go I decided to go back onto the feeder as I had seen a couple of fish crash out to my right. After about 20 minutes I had a couple of tentative knocks followed by a 6 inch pull and the strike met with a firm resistance and I could feel the fish kite out into the centre and judging by the angle of the line to the water it had obviously sought the deeper part of the pool. A couple of minutes of steady pressure saw me gain the upper hand though and I soon had my best fish of the day, another Mirror around the 9lbs mark. I only had one further bit of action before the end of the match, and that was when Bill G phoned, we were chatting away as the rod tip wrapped violently round!!!!!!!!!  I wasn’t connected for long however and the hook returned embedded in a scale.

So 5·30pm and I called the All-out just as the 1st drops of rain threatened to fall. A quick weigh-in confirmed just how hard it had been on the day. Dai was 1st to weigh and put plenty of the pools small Rudd on the scales which weighed in at 20lbs………

……. and with Geoff weighing another 15lbs of them for 2nd and 3rd places respectively, they had kept themselves busy and warm, however bags of Rudd like that may be the last for sometime as Dawn told me that they’re being netted out at the end of this month. They’ll never get them all though, so it’s just a matter of time till they return.

My 4 Carp weighed 21lbs 8ozs to take the honours on the day and another £1 from Vince, and receiving the Trophy from Dawn was a nice end to the day.

Soon the kit was loaded up and farewells said. I have to say that I didn’t envy the lads that were staying on overnight (Webbo, Geoff, Dai and Mick) but it will be interesting to see how they did overnight and Sunday before heading home.

I’d just like to say a big THANK YOU to Dawn for putting up with the Maggotdrowning Mob and making us feel welcome, I’m sure we’ll be finding our way back sooner or later.

Position	Angler	Weight
1st	Peter(Mugger)Morton	21lbs 08ozs
2nd	Dai(daifish)Thomas	20lbs 00ozs
3rd	Geoff(Capt Birdseye)Palmer	15lbs 08ozs
4th	Dave(Webbo)Webster	12lbs 04ozs
5th	Tony(spamwham)Roberts	10lbs 08ozs
6th	Dave(TheFish)Collier	9lbs 04ozs
7th	Mick(TheChippy)Pearson	5lbs 00ozs
8th	Colin(ThePike)Sharrard	08ozs
9th	Vince(Vince G)Gould	04ozs

For anyone who fancies a trip to Dawns Vale, you can find the details of the fishery on their website at http://www.dawnsvale.co.uk/

The Pool at Dawns Vale is quiet and secluded, set in about 2·5 acres of woodland it’s the perfect place to get away from it all. While it doesn’t have the high stocking densities of a commercial pool, there’s a decent head of fish to target that are all in tip top condition, including Carp (Common. Mirror and Ghost) that run to 20lbs+, Crucians, Tench, Eels and the odd Bream.

Please note: you can’t just turn up to fish, you MUST phone or contact the fishery via E-mail 1st to book a day or nights fishing as swims are limited.

It’s a charming little fishery, and one that I have no hesitation in recommending as worth a visit if you get the chance and fancy a bit of peace and tranquillity.