I was surprised to find that this Sunday was back on the old lake, guess I should have asked really! Would have saved me carrying groundbait and micro pellet that I didn't need for a start.
Walking round I fancied a peg round the island, as last week, and like last week drew near as far away as I could get from the island! Peg 73 was in my hand, a great winter flier which I never managed to get anywhere near over the last winter. The reeds in both margins are great for holding fish in the winter but I tend to think that the fish aint in them when they're hungry.
I had to put a rig up for the reeds, which I prefer to fish shallow in. Before the match there wasn't a lot of movement in the reeds but I thought that fish may move in to them if they were feeling pressured. A 4x10 Preston pink on .20 line to a short .18 hook-link with an 18 Fox Series 2 hook and Preston 15h lakky was for the here. With a few fish cruising in the open it would also double as a shallow rig for out in the open water, along with a polyball rig I put up to fish very shallow. This was set up on the same terminal gear. Last up was a 5m deck rig, normal gear here, a .3gr diamond bodied float on .17 to .15 with an 18 Fox Series 2. Playing around with things again this was on a 14 latex.
On the whistle I fed the 5m line with half a pot of hemp and corn, and electing to leave the margins to see what happened there I went out to 13m shallow. I gave it about twenty minutes with no joy with the fish clearly staying clear of the feed. With odd fish showing in the margins I dropped in on the deeper rig but the only sign of anything was constant dobb's on the float from small fish. Dropping in the right margins instead I missed a quick bite but nothing else materialised. Figuring it was too early for the 5m line I went back on the shallow line with the deeper rig. Odd knocks from roach were the only sign for a while so approaching the hour mark I came back in to the edge where a group of carp were mooching. I had no proper bites but after topping up the 5m line I managed to mug a mirror of about 6lb in the left margin by lowering a pellet on it's head!
With nothing else doing in the margins after I did have a brief go on the 5m line but the only thing doing there was a few liners. I had another brief go on the shallow line but was roached out again. In the next half hour I rotated the two closer lines but apart from liners on the 5m line nothing was happening. The margins seemed very lifeless and I elected in the end to sit on the 5m line which made it a lot easier to feed the shallow line, which with the cruising fish seemed best bet to me. At this time nobody was really catching- the angler opposite had three small carp where as the next peg had four or five but they looked very small. I had about thirty minutes on the 5m line with nothing but liners so I went back on the shallow line.
The regular feeding while not fishing had seemed to have done the trick for the shallow line as the next hour or so gave me five more fish, not big fish, mostly about two and a half pound, but fish none the less! Predictably the swim slowed down after the flurry so I dropped back in on the 5m line. After lowering the rig in no sooner had the grain of corn touched the bottom than the elastic pulled out, it's just a shame that after a minute or so the the hook pulled out too! I did manage a carp on this line about five minutes later,but again it was small at about 3lb and no more followed.
The lack of bites here was a signal to go out shallow again, but nothing was happening. After about twenty minutes I decided try and force matters a bit and rather than just changing the rates of feed I upped the amount of bait considerably. This seemed to have the required effect with regards to drawing fish back as activity increased, but it was probably another quarter of an hour before a fish made a mistake, falling during a gap in the feeding when fish were swirling. The next half an hour two more fish fell, again all smallish fish averaging about 3lb. The fish after predictably got wary again and backed away. I had a quick drop on the 5m line and hooked a fish here but this stayed on for only a few seconds before coming off.
With the last hour approaching I more or less abandonded the closer lines and found that by having spells of feeding very regular and fiarly heavy followed by lulls seemed to trick some fish, and even had two slapping the water with the pole. Average size was small again with the exception of the twelth carp which was perhaps nudging 5lb. With half an hour to go again the fish went wary and I found that more regular and frugal feeding seemed better and I managed four fish in the last twenty minutes, again all in the two and a half to 3lb mark. The last was put in the net just three minutes before the end and I tried to starve one last fish out by hardly feeding and tapping the pole but it wasn't to be.
After packing away I joined the scales half way around the island and peg 53 (the furthest corner behind the island) was top weight with 56lb. I was pretty sure I wouldn't have that, guessing I'd just scrape 50lb. I definatly didn't have the 60lb and a few ounces that the other corner peg behind the island (62) had. When I eventually weighed in my fish went 51lb 6oz which was enough for third, although comfortably the best weight in the open water. I was happy enough with that as I felt I'd worked hard for what I had, but on the other hand had I gambled on forcing the swim a bit earlier I may have made up the difference. The two lost fish on the 5m line may have also have pushed me close, especially to second. Losing two from three here was dissapointing so I think I'll play with hollows again for the deeper lines. What was also noticable was the lack of bigger fish in the open water, where as those round the island had a few bigger fish. Unusually, even the fish I have very shallow were small, still, you can only catch whats infront of you!
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