Thursday 20th May 2010.
Unfortunately after last weeks match whilst packing up I managed to stand on my last Preston Durafloat 5 paste float. So i went online to check out what else is available. In the end I opted for Nick Gilbert's hand made pasters. A brief email to nick was met with a speedy response and i settled on the .6 gram ones that would suit the match lake depths. I placed the order on Monday and they arrived on wednesday, hows that for fantastic service? I must say that they were very well packaged, beautifully prepared and finished to an amazing standard and i couldn't wait to give them a try. So I set off nice and early and sat myself down on peg 5. The idea is that I am practising the methods and baits required on the pegs that i am pretty sure are going to be put in come the match. Peg 5 has an island at 13m and a good margin as well as about 5-6 feet of water down the track. I set up a dibber for fishing tight across with hair rigged pellet and a paste rig down the track. In a nutshell I struggled to get the fish going across, I had a few but there isn't any cover there now so the fish are a bit shy. I had to fish into the stick ups to get the carp. So I settled on the paste line and basically caught tench, skimmers and the odd carp all day long. Nicks floats were absolutely brilliant. They are very robust but at the same time nice and sensitive, he has got the balance spot on. They sat beautifully in the water and were very stable and the shotting capacity was spot on. I really dont know why i waited so long to switch over but I am glad I did!!
Come the match and I was primarily prepared for the paste, but as you do I pulled out peg 19, a method feeder peg cast tight an island with stick ups. The stick ups were knocking frantically with fish so it was a bit of a no brainer really, although i did have to cast almost in them to get bites and this caused a major problem. You see what I had failed to do was th have any spare animal hook lengths tied up and just previously i had run out of heavy hook length trace. You can guess what happened next as when I didn't have a fish on i pretty much got snagged on the stick ups and had to pull for a break. In the last hour I finally stripped down the rig and tied up a hook length using 8lb reel line. This did the job and i had the majority of my weight in the last hour, but the damage had already been done and i ran out of time. I weighed in 44lb for 3rd but in all honesty i should have at least doubled that as the peg was solid. I was unprepared and paid the price. The next day it was off to The Tackle Barn to stock up and I'm now trying out the Guru NGuage line MWG hooks and PR36's. This should sort them, Ill let you know how they perform. Whilst in the shop I got one of the 10' mini garbolino rocket pellet waggler rods and a 10' mini Shimano force master feeder rod for the short chucks. The are obviously both budget models but they seem fine and will be ideal for the short chucks. Lets hope I can give them a work out next week.
Wednesday, 26 May 2010
Wednesday, 19 May 2010
Milemead summer series round 1.
Thursday 13th May 2010.
Today was the first round and to be honest i didn't even realise until after i arrived in the morning. I pitched up at 10.00am planning for a days pleasure fishing and to dust of the cobwebs a bit. But when Paul informed me of the match i duly paid my pools then set of for what turned out to be a bit of vital practice. Ive been working on my pellet fishing on the deck for a bit, specifically hair rigging them. so with this in mind i set up 2 rigs to fish 2 lines at 10.00 o'clock and 2 o'clock. The first with a hair rigged hard pellet and the second with a spade end and an expander, both were to be fished dead depth over loose fed pellets. The other difference was that i would initially feed one line with micros and the other with 6mm pellets. I also set up a paste rig for the bottom of the near shelf and a shallow rig for the 13m line. After cupping in the loose feed it was obvious that fish had moved over the micros as bubbles were showing instantly. Whereas there was only a few pin pricks coming up from the 6mm pellet line. First put in on the 6mm line and i missed a bite, by lifting and dropping i soon had another and connected with a decent tench. I then pinged out a few more 6mm's over this line then moved over to the micro pellet line, bites came quickly on this line with more tench and skimmers. Moving back over to the 6mm line i connected with my first carp. I then fed the paste line and continued to alternate between both of the pellet lines picking off fish from each one. It was clear that this tactic was going to be quite productive with a mixture of species but my problem come matchtime was that i was going to need the carp. With this in mind I switched over to the paste line and began catching straight away, proper lumps as well. What was noticeable however was how quickly the carp drifted off and the tench moving in unless I fed a fair amount. Every time i potted in some bait i would get a run of carp and then tench followed by big skimmers. I did have a brief spell shallow, but to be honest after half an hour i knew it would be a waste of time.
Come 6.00pm and the match I drew peg 9, i was reasonably pleased because it was an end peg and there was only 2 of us down this end of the lake, the wind had also been blowing down there all day. I plumbed up and decided to fish a paste line at 9m and a paste line down the edge. I also had the method rod set up to chuck to the island. At the all in i fed my lines with a mixture of 80% micros and 20% 6mm's. I then chucked the method towards the island. The rod had only been on the rest 30 seconds before the tip flew around with a chunky 3lb mirror on the end. 10 more bite less minutes and i quickly changed to the paste line. I caught steadily for the full 3 hours and ended up with 56lb for second. I never bothered with the edge line as i didnt see any movement and just flogged the one line to death.
Today was the first round and to be honest i didn't even realise until after i arrived in the morning. I pitched up at 10.00am planning for a days pleasure fishing and to dust of the cobwebs a bit. But when Paul informed me of the match i duly paid my pools then set of for what turned out to be a bit of vital practice. Ive been working on my pellet fishing on the deck for a bit, specifically hair rigging them. so with this in mind i set up 2 rigs to fish 2 lines at 10.00 o'clock and 2 o'clock. The first with a hair rigged hard pellet and the second with a spade end and an expander, both were to be fished dead depth over loose fed pellets. The other difference was that i would initially feed one line with micros and the other with 6mm pellets. I also set up a paste rig for the bottom of the near shelf and a shallow rig for the 13m line. After cupping in the loose feed it was obvious that fish had moved over the micros as bubbles were showing instantly. Whereas there was only a few pin pricks coming up from the 6mm pellet line. First put in on the 6mm line and i missed a bite, by lifting and dropping i soon had another and connected with a decent tench. I then pinged out a few more 6mm's over this line then moved over to the micro pellet line, bites came quickly on this line with more tench and skimmers. Moving back over to the 6mm line i connected with my first carp. I then fed the paste line and continued to alternate between both of the pellet lines picking off fish from each one. It was clear that this tactic was going to be quite productive with a mixture of species but my problem come matchtime was that i was going to need the carp. With this in mind I switched over to the paste line and began catching straight away, proper lumps as well. What was noticeable however was how quickly the carp drifted off and the tench moving in unless I fed a fair amount. Every time i potted in some bait i would get a run of carp and then tench followed by big skimmers. I did have a brief spell shallow, but to be honest after half an hour i knew it would be a waste of time.
Come 6.00pm and the match I drew peg 9, i was reasonably pleased because it was an end peg and there was only 2 of us down this end of the lake, the wind had also been blowing down there all day. I plumbed up and decided to fish a paste line at 9m and a paste line down the edge. I also had the method rod set up to chuck to the island. At the all in i fed my lines with a mixture of 80% micros and 20% 6mm's. I then chucked the method towards the island. The rod had only been on the rest 30 seconds before the tip flew around with a chunky 3lb mirror on the end. 10 more bite less minutes and i quickly changed to the paste line. I caught steadily for the full 3 hours and ended up with 56lb for second. I never bothered with the edge line as i didnt see any movement and just flogged the one line to death.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)