Well, I have to say as the week pressed on the weather forecast for Sunday looked less and less promising! While there is always the hope they'd get it wrong (which we all know happens!), it delivered just as promised - the rain started at about the moment I first went out in to the back garden at 6.30am, and never really stopped until after I got home. Yes, that is a brolly in the picture, as even I didn't fancy a day in that cold rain!
Last week the pegs to draw on the old lake had been around the island, and when peg 66 stuck to my hand I was pretty pleased. It's a decent year round peg to be honest anyway. I did notice however that the water there was clearer than last week, plus the wind was a different direction pushing what leaves there was up to the car park end of the lake. Was it going to be a case of should have been here last week?
I decided on three areas to target in the swim - across to the island, fishing at about 15m which dropped me down the slope a touch in to not quite 3ft of water. I also had a line at 5m, and then plumbed up with the same rig until I found the same depth on the slope up to the other side, which was nicely at 13m. Depth here was not quite 5ft. Simple rigs too - a 4x12 Preston Chianti on the island rig, and a 4x14 of the same on the deep rig! Both had the cane tip removed and a plastic one put in. Line was .15 to a .14 hook-link and size 16 B611's, while lakky was Preston 13h. I did put up a third rig in case the wind made the light Chianti impossible to present in the deep water, using a NG Decker, but the peg was pretty well sheltered - thankfully! In the end, I never picked up stand-by rig.
At the off the deep lines had a pinch of hemp and corn fed on to them - a bit more on to the throwaway 5m line which I expect to not be a viable target line for much longer as the cold comes in. I then went across on a 4mm expander pellet, with a small cad-pot on the pole which contained a little crumb and a few 3mm pellets. I was off the mark pretty quick but only with small 1oz roach which produced more missed bites than anything else. Odd carp were getting caught, including one on the peg to my left which won last week.
A grain of corn proved harder for the roach to nab, and the bites slowed for long enough that about twenty-five minutes in my first carp fell, a small common of about 2lb. In the next half an hour I managed to add three more of the same size to the net, all to corn - steady, if not spectacular! However, as tends to happen from lines on the far bank here it died after the initial run of fish. I do feel the rain may not have helped as it went from just wet to an icy monsoon!
I left the far line after perhaps twenty minutes without a bite, having a few drops over the 13m line to see if they'd dropped down the shelf. I had a liner here which led to me plugging away there a bit longer than I may have. A missed bite was followed by a small roach on corn, so I topped it up and went back across.
The rain had eased a touch now, but the indications I could get from across seemed to be from small fish. A switch back to pellet put a roach in the net, before a change back to corn saw me nab a small 12oz mirror before the swim went quiet again
With no more knocks across I had a drop in again at 13m, and again an occasional liner led me to plug away there, hoping the drip fed corn via the small pot would encourage them to feed. I couldn't see the pegs nearer the car park in the open water, but from what others were saying I knew they were catching, and quite well by the sounds of it!
On the half-way mark of the match I decided it was worth a drop on the 5m line, and it was a worth while effort as the float slipped away pretty quickly and gave me a common of about 3lb, but unsurprisingly no more followed. A drop on to the 13m line also gave me a quick fish, again about 3lb.
The quick burst of fish was followed by a lull, so I gambled on re-feeding both lines in the deeper water with the pot. A quick drop across just led to knocks from roach again so I didn't give it too long before coming back in to the deeper water at 13m with perhaps ninety minutes to go.
Two missed bites led me to fiddle with the shotting, moving it all down in to a tighter bulk to make it more positive. I knew two pegs were catching well, but third place looked a wide open possibility. The change worked as three small carp all around 10oz fell - not quite what I wanted, but better than catching roach! With just under an hour left I gambled on feeding it again as the bites faded (rather than just drip feeding with a pole mounted pot).
Resting the 13m line I dropped in at 5m, and the throwaway line gave me a quick bonus in the form of a chunky common that perhaps nudged 5lb, but again no more followed. Back on the 13m line and I started to put a run of fish together - I wasn't bagging, but I was getting an odd bite and putting a steady run of carp in the net. I did lose exact count, but I finished the match with about eleven "proper" carp plus the pasties I'd had. With a few minutes to go bites were fading again so without the time to rest and re-feed I spent the last part at 5m looking for another bonus. I did get a liner, but no proper bite.
It was clear that pegs 42 and 70 would be first and second (42 is perhaps THE form peg at the moment, framing in the last four or five matches even when the island pegs have been good), but nobody else was admitting to more than seven or eight carp. The late flurry had indeed given me third place with 40-15, with peg 42 putting 75lb odd on the scales and peg 70 putting 69lb on. Not bad weights, or days fishing given the weather, but I do have the task of drying out nearly everything now during the week!
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