Sunday 20th May.

Peg 16 on the match lake.

Milemead open.
Only 8 of used turned up for this one. What with a festival at Stafford moor on Monday & a couple of other regulars fishing elsewhere it was a bit of a disappointing turnout.At the draw I pulled out peg 16 again!!! However I was reasonably pleased as now the weather & more importantly the water has warmed, the fish are moving & feeding freely. I had the end of the island to fish to with the pellet waggler, or straight out in front with 16m of pole….Pellet waggler it was then.I decided to use Martins (pictured below) pellet wagglers today, as it was a chance to give them a real workout, as the wind was light I set up 2 rods, ! With a 1.5 ssg wag & the other with a 2 ssg wag. Both were tied to 3lb maxima & a .20 hook length of power plus & a size 14 fox eyed barbless series 2 hook, with a knotless knot & hair rigged 8mm pellet.First cast & I didn’t even have time to feed as the float buried, a firm strike & carp no.1 at about 1.5lb was on its way into the net. Then a pouch full of pellet went over the top again about a meter from the end of that Island. Instantly the float buried, only this time the carp snagged me in a weed bed at the bottom of that island shelf. I pulled for a break & the main line went at the knot.I then set up a new rig but with that snag there I couldn’t take any chances, so I used 8lb sensor main line & quickly tied up a hook length of the same line. It worked a treat as I was now able to apply plenty of pressure & stop those carp from snagging me.After the first hour I had about 8 carp & some stonking roach for about 15lb. That was pleasing, but I felt I needed to catch quicker, so I concentrated on my feeding & accuracy, to minamalise wasted time. It worked a treat as I now had the fish competing heavily & they were coming to the splash.The second hour saw my catch rate improve slightly, but that thick main line was causing problems with presentation, I was beginning to struggle with accuracy, I persevered however & continued to put fish into the net, by constantly casting & flicking the float to induce a take.I got broken up a couple more times as a few fish made it to those snags; there was little I could do really as when I tried to catch further away from the island, bites slowed up. The fish wanted to be fairly tight today & there was little I could do. I just had to persevere.At the weigh in I put 10lb of quality roach on the scales along with 84lb of carp to 3.5lb, totalling 94lb 1oz. This was comfortably enough for the win, with Paul carpenter coming second with 60lb+ of peg 5. That is my biggest weight so far from this fishery, slightly short of the ton, but I wasn’t complaining as it was a very enjoyable day.I’m not sure if there was anything I could have done really to improve, the crucial moment really was changing over to the much heavier gear. In open water I think you can get away with lighter gear, but with those snags I couldn’t take any chances.Martin’s wagglers performed admirably, I lost 2 of them but that was because I got snapped up, they are very boyant, therefore the smaller ones can be cast a fair distance because of their shotting capacity.Incidentally all fish were caught on the Mosella impact pre drilled 8mm pellet & Skrettings 8mm coarse pellet for feed.