When I drew peg 45 on the Old Lake at Westside I was reasonably happy with the draw, after all the peg has features and is not too deep but I just had a feeling that the day was going to be hard. I had no reason to expect it as the weather had been settled and conditions were good, it was just one of those feelings.
Rig-wise I had three put up. The first was fished towards the small island on the slope leading up to it. This was in just over 3ft of water. The float was a .2gr DC6 on .14 dia line to a 16B611 to a soft 14 latex (due to the remains of a big lilly bed in the swim). I also had a rig to fish next to the remains of the lillies, the hook and line for this rig was the same as the other rig but with a larger .3gr DC6 float in around 5ft of water. Last rig was in the margins where there were a few straggly reeds in the edge in 3ft of water, float for this was a 4x12 Preston Somo with the same hook and line as the other rigs, elastic was a soft black hydro. This rig would also double up for trying shallow over the other lines. Bait-wise I had caster, corn, hemp and a few red and white maggots for the hook.
Each line was fed at the start with a pinch of bait but with no casters on the deeper line to keep any fish down (as the hemp and corn sink fast) Starting on the far line and it was awkward to see my float in the mottled light but the first half an hour gave me just one liner before a bite on double white maggot gave me a small carp of about 2lb. Absolutely nothing followed in the next hour, even trickling casters on the far line via a toss-pot failed to get a response. The angler next peg had struck at odd bites fishing to the other side of the lilly bed, then had a fish there so I decided to drop in there. An instant bite on corn produced another 2lb common but nothing else, not even a liner. Odd fish had started to top by this point but the next hour produced nothing except one missed bite on the shallow rig next to the lillies. Out of the blue an hour after the first fish next to the lillies another 2lb common finds it's way to the net.
With an hour to go and nothing else was happening, but other anglers on the opposite bank had started to catch odd fish; all of those were sat with the sun on the water, I was in the shade. I decided to get the catty out to flick a few casters to the long line while I was fishing the deeper line, as this was were I thought I had the best chance of a few fish. I had one bite next to the lillies with half an hour left which stormed strait through the lillies and I lost, though I'm almost certain it was foul-hooked. This led to me going on the long line and an instant bite on maggot gave me another 2lb common. Next drop and I was strait in again but this fish stormed towards me and into the lillies, then pulled off. After that hoards of floating leaves came through and it was practically impossible to fish.
My four carp gave me just over 9lb which was good enough for 4th, 48lb had won, from peg 48 on the end of the island. This peg is shallow on the island (2ft) and had been in the sun all day. 21lb was second (5 fish) and 13lb was 3rd (4 fish). I was left a bit peeved with the day, I got home feeling that I hadn't fished well. I'm not sure if catapulting the bait over the long line had helped or if it was just that last 30min spell you get on commercials, but I should have tried it earlier, but even then my peg wasn't good for near 50lb but I really should have framed. Never mind, always next week!
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