Marsh AC club match.
An early start for me today as it’s a return to The Reservoir at Mill Barn Coarse Fishery for the 3rd Marsh AC match of the year. A glance out of the window confirmed that it looked like a pretty changeable day would lie ahead, so with the cats fed and a couple of coffees drunk the car was loaded up and the waterproofs included along with the rest of the kit. I met up with Chris at Dave’s house just after 6am, the reason for the early start being that the first stop today would be a stop at the Castle pub in Little Wakering for breakfast. A steady trip down saw us pulling into the pub car park just after 7·15am to find Kev, Jean and Keith already waiting. I have to say the Full English was Top Quality and well worth the £6, and having satisfied the inner angler we made our way down to the fishery about 5 minutes down the road.
On arrival we found a number of carpers bivvied up on the car park bank, despite notices posted on the fishery gate reserving this and the left hand bank for our match, but rather than have confrontation we decided to just use 17 pegs down the left hand bank. Waiting for the draw the banter flowed, though I’m not sure that Tony was impressed when he enquired ” Where’s the sunken island” and I helpfully informed him that “It’s under the water“.
Time for the draw and when I went up for mine there were no pegs left in the hat !!!! Somehow only 16 numbers had gone in the hat. I agreed to take number 17 to avoid the aggro of a redraw, but John quite fancied fishing next to Martin who was on peg 16, so it was agreed that I would take John’s draw (peg 9).
I made my way round to my peg and got down to settling in, the water was well down, well below the swims and with steeply sloping clay there was no way I could get my box down to water level. I elected to stake my nets and fish sitting on the sleeper, a little awkward, but better than being perched high above the water.
Last years visit to the fishery saw a lot of members caught out by the speed and power of the fish there, so it was a fair bet that most peoples rigs and gear had been uprated for todays visit in an attempt to avoid a repeat this time. I was just going to use my Rolf’s rigs which should be more than up to it. I just picked a line at around 7mtrs which I could comfortably feed by hand and a couple of margin lines to fish. the rigs were an NG 0·4 XT Open Water on 0·20 Ultima Power Match straight through to a size 14 Guru QM1 for 7 mtrs where I had around 6ft of water, while the 2 margin rigs were NG 0·3 XT Sampson margins on 0·20 Ultima Power Match finished off with size 14 Guru QM1′s. Bait was simply 6mm hard pellet for feed with some 8mm’s that would be banded onto the hook.
A couple of the lads seemed a bit surprised how I’d set up, but with a steep bank behind the peg along with the track to the car park I didn’t want loads of pole to ship back and forth. Keith caught Paul and Kev chatting away to me about the prospects for the day after Paul had got some 8mm pellet from me and Kev had brought a cup of coffee down to me from Jean prior to the off, though we may just have been taking the micky out of each other……
I had Graham for company today to my right on peg 10, while to my left were Simon on peg 8 with Paul on peg 7. Keith was on peg 6, the peg he’d fished last year. He smashed countless rigs and hook lengths on it then, but was determined to have a better outcome from it today.
So 10am and Dave called the All-In, what would the day bring? A couple of large handfuls of pellet into both margins, then a banded 8mm was shipped out to 7mtrs followed by a hand full of pellet. A couple of lift and drops of the rig and the float buried, Carp on and a spirited tussle ensued before a common of around 3½lbs was placed safely into the keepnet. The next put in was virtually a carbon copy, but this time it was a mirror of a similar size that found itself in the landing net, a good start to the match.
However it changed all to soon, my next couple of fish were small skimmers, then a lull and a couple roach, the carp appeared to have vanished. There’s supposed to be a good head of carp present, but from what I could see nobody was storming away with it. I decided to up the feed, feeding every put in, reasoning that if I could get enough bait down and get the skimmers interested and feeding well it might pull the carp back in. It was changing from sunny to overcast and a breeze kept springing up from left to right, and I couldn’t help wondering if the fish would follow the breeze up to the high numbers?
I was getting the skimmers reasonably regularly and had managed another carp after a couple of hours when the swim died once more.
I re-fed heavily and down the margins and decided to take my cup back to Jean and have a stroll with the camera at the same time. Jean had the kettle on so I took the opportunity to get a refill. Kev was restricted to fishing the feeder as he cracked his number 4 on his pole at Rolfs last week and was waiting for a replacement to arrive. He reported that he’d had a couple of carp, but that was about it ……
Chris was happy to just rack up the bites and was fishing maggot in the margins for silvers as the carp didn’t want to play for him, and he had just landed a nice perch as I passed by ……
Tony seemed to be having a bit of a struggle as well and having failed to get anything going on his pole lines and had gone out on the feeder looking for the sunken island that he knew was out there somewhere under the water ……
Judy was her usual smiling self despite struggling to get to grips today as it became increasingly obvious that most were struggling, at least in the early pegs……
Keith was fairing no better, he’s a good angler and well capable of sussing things out, but it looked like this peg was destined to provide him with another frustrating day, but he was hoping that things would improve later on in the day ……
Paul had started on the pellet waggler, but after managing just a solitary carp that he’d hooked in the posterior that had gone up the bank and he’d reverted to the pole. Simon meanwhile was having a bit of a frustrating time as he was getting bites but was having quite a few fish, mostly skimmers slip the hook before he could get them to the net……
Graham was another struggling to get his head round the apparent lack of sport, He’s joined the fishery as a member this year as it’s local to him and he knows probably better than most the potential for a decent bag so he was sticking at it ……
A little further up I found Terry taking an early look down the edge with his pole and he reckoned that the boys to beat today would be Al and Dave on the next couple of pegs ……
Now Dave and Al are both masters of miss-information and you have to take anything they tell you with a pinch of salt. The rumour was that Dave already had 3 carp for around 20lbs, but he was adamant that they weighed closer to 10lbs. Al was fishing the pellet waggler half way across, feeding 8mm pellet to get the distance and trying to avoid the ducks, and while admitting to 7 or 8 carp but being rather cagey about what they weighed……
Back to my peg and the skimmers were still in residence, however the heavens decided to open for around 10 minutes and give us all a refreshing shower.
As it eased I lifted into another bite, but this time it was a carp. Safely in the net as I transferred it to the keepnet I slipped and nearly ended up in the lake, as the rain had turned the clay I was standing on into something close to a greased slide. Thankfully I managed to avoid a ducking but decided that it was just to precarious to continue, so moved back to sit on my box for the rest of the match ……
A couple of looks down the margins yielded absolutely nothing, No doubt not helped by a tufted duck that took great delight throughout the day in filling its face with the pellets I’d fed down there. So it was the 7mtr line or nothing for the rest of the match. I still kept on picking up skimmers though and was beginning to think that they might make up a decent part of my final weight. Keith had gone for a walkabout , an indication that he was having a grueller as he rarely leaves his peg during a match and was obviously searching for a bit of inspiration. I’d managed another couple of carp around the 3-4lb mark in between the skimmers, but they seemed to be solitary fish that weren’t disturbing the skimmers. Rod appeared for a chat and seemed happy with his lot having managed a few carp on the feeder which was good to hear as he’s very much a pleasure angler.
Paul had been for a stroll as well toward the end of the match and reported that Dave had taken 3 decent carp from the margins while he’d watched. I just got my head down for the final part and in among the skimmers I managed another couple of carp in the last hour. 4 pm and Dave called the All-Out and as I packed away my kit I wondered what sort of weight I had. I thought the 8 carp would go around 30-35 pounds but had no idea what my silvers net would weigh. All would soon be revealed as the Weigh-in started at the top on peg 17.
By the time I got to the Weigh-In John had recorded 16¾lbs and Martin just 5¼lbs. Dave’s fish were being weighed and the final tale of the scales was 67lbs, which would prove to be good enough for 3rd overall. Next up was Al and his weight of 103lbs would prove to be unbeatable on the day. Terry managed a creditable 35¾lbs while Jim could only match Martin’s 5¼lbs followed by Rod’s weight of 24¼lbs. Graham managed just 15¾lbs before the scales got to my peg, My 8 carp registered 36lbs, but my silvers net came to a surprising 48lbs …
Which gave me a total of 84lbs for 2nd overall, Simon’s was a tale of to many lost fish recording 15½lbs while Paul could only manage 9¼lbs. Keith had finally caught late and weighed a level 40lbs, but felt the peg had got the better of him again. Judy put 14¾lbs on the scales but Tony weighed 48¼lbs only to lose out on the section by 12ozs when Ken put a level 49lbs on the scales. Chris had an all silvers bag that weighed 30¾lbs, while Kev finished off the Weigh-In with 22½lbs.
Back to the car park and Dave sorted the results and section pools while the rest of us analysed the days events. The fishing had been patchy at best, but the potential is obvious and I for one would be happy to fish it again next year. Anyway the next club match is at Colemans Cottage on Woods Lake on Sunday July 24th, with Al and I level on 85 points and Dave and Keith just behind on 79 points, so it’s still all to play for. The next match for me however is the 3rd Jinx Match of the series at Rolfs Lake next Saturday, so keep you eye out for that report.
Position
|
Peg
|
Angler
|
Weight
|
| 1st | Peg 14 | Al Loader | 103lbs 00ozs |
| 2nd | Peg 9 | Peter Morton | 84lbs 00ozs |
| 3rd | Peg 15 | Dave Collier | 67lbs 00ozs |
| 4th | Peg 3 | Ken Walker | 49lbs 00ozs |
| 5th | Peg 4 | Tony Roberts | 48lbs 08ozs |
| 6th | Peg 6 | Keith Ashby | 40lbs 00ozs |
| 7th | Peg 13 | Terry Goff | 35lbs 12ozs |
| 8th | Peg 2 | Chris Withall | 30lbs 12ozs |
| 9th | Peg 11 | Rod Turner | 24lbs 04ozs |
| 10th | Peg 1 | Kevin Loveland | 22lbs 08ozs |
| 11th | Peg 17 | John Holdsworth | 16lbs 12ozs |
| 12th | Peg 10 | Graham Manning | 15lbs 12ozs |
| 13th | Peg 8 | Simon Watkins | 15lbs 08ozs |
| 14th | Peg 5 | Judy Hermite | 14lbs 12ozs |
| 15th | Peg 7 | Paul East | 9lbs 04ozs |
| 16th= | Peg 12 | Jim Boase | 5lbs 04ozs |
| 16th= | Peg 16 | Martin Hucker | 5lbs 04ozs |
