Saturday 16th September 2006


Where do I start. Well, for all you purists out there, I had originally planned on fishing an open match on the River Aire at Birkin. Let me explain.

A couple of weeks ago, I finished work early one Thursday and went to fish the mucky hole on the River Wharfe at Tadcaster. I was armed with a few worms and a pint or so of maggots. I took a bomb rod, float rod and my pike rod. To cut a long story short, I managed to catch 6 chublet’s of about 6oz apiece, half a dozen dace, same of roach and about 20 bleak or so. I re-hooked one of the small roach of about 2oz and put it out on the pike gear, consisting of 8lb maxima and a 15lb wire trace. After about 20 minutes, I got a run and ended with a pike of about 13lb on the bank. It was a long lean fish that would, over winter, probably go to 18lb+. If there is one thing that I must say and that was that I really enjoyed it. This wetted my appetite for a river match. Midweek, I rang The Legend that is known as John Allerton and asked him about the matches that take place on the River Calder around Brighouse, as I knew that The Legend at been attending them.

He told me that there wasn’t a match on the river this weekend, but that there was a match on, on the River Aire at Birkin. The Legend then told me how he had come 2nd on the weekend’s match just gone with over 14lb of roach. The winning weight and most of the backup weights had come on pole to hand, fishing between 7 and 9m. I didn’t fancy the pole to hand method as I didn’t have any floats heavy enough (6g) to be able to do the method. I asked The Legend if I could borrow one of his 20 footers, as the river varies in depths between 12 and 24ft. I asked The Legend, if he could book me on the match and I arranged to me John and follow him down to the draw.

This my friends, was all agreed on Wednesday. On Thursday, Leeds and the surrounding areas suffered some of the worst storms and rainfall all year. The weatherman estimated that we had had 10 days of rain in 30 minutes to an hour and the Harehills part of Leeds, had had a mini tornado rip through the place and damaged about 6 or 7 houses.

The local council, estimate that the damage bill will amount to about……..£8.00.

Anyway’s on the Friday, I went over the River Aire on my way to work. The river was carrying a bit and was very coloured. The river was no different on the way home. I rang The Legend and cancelled off. I didn’t fancy fishing a stretch of river that I had never fished before. I would rather go on the match, when the river is looking better and catch 6 or 7lb of roach and come nowhere, than go on the river carrying water, catch very little and go away thinking that it was crap. Do you get where I am coming from?

After all this, with a quid in my hand, I booked on the open match at Woodlands, Thirsk. I might as well pay my quid to Chappy before we start.

I arranged to pick up Panic, later on he rang me to say that he couldn’t make it. I don’t think that he likes my driving.

At the draw, there were 61 people booked on and the match organiser, Young Adolf, wanted a word with everyone, as 10 people had all booked off the match, with about 30 minutes to go before the start of the draw. The thing is, as a match organiser myself, what can you do about no shows. It is alright telling everyone that is there, but they’re not bothered, as they are already there. You can ban people for being a no-show, but sometimes there is a genuine reason, so in the end, you can only organise all those that turn up.

The obligatory quid was struck with Chappy. When I say obligatory, what I mean is that Chappy comes up to me and says ‘Mick, Quid?’, to which trembling with fear, I nod my head. I think that I must be getting my head nod’s and shake’s the wrong way around.

Whilst being in the draw, a few of the Oak’s Banter, http://oaksbanter.proboards19.com/index.cgi regulars were all on about the look-alike’s that we have recently been discussing. Des Southern is Punch out of Punch and Judy, Meathead and Macca are Shrek 1 and 2, courtesy of Young Bart Simpson (Connor Barlow), Pete Costello is Stone Cold Steve Austin and the best one yet. Andy Stoner turned up with what looked like a new hair style. It was all scruffy and greying, but in a trendy sort of way, just like Jim’s hair off Rosie and Jim. Boy, did I break out into song, all together now:

"Rosie and Jim, Rosie and Jim, what an effing mess you're in". It sounds better already.

As I arrived at the draw bucket, I put my hand in the bag and drew out Skylark peg 22. I fancied that for a few. Chappy had also drawn half decent, Partridge lake, somewhere around 27, 28.

For company I had Paul ‘Nightmare before Christmas’ Burton on corner peg 18, Meatcutter Bailey on 20 (19 empty), Rocket Ronnie Wilkinson on peg 21, and Ron Jeremy on peg 23.

Following a chat with Chappy, I had 3 tins of meat, 2 tins of hemp and a few pellets for today’s menu. I set up the following;

My trusty bomb rod, with 4lb maxima mainline and a .16 Maver Genesis hooklength with a size 14 Colmic WN501 hook attached. I also set up:

Rig 1 was a shallow rig, for fishing with meat up in the water. This set up included a .2g Garbolino DC6 float, shotted with a couple of No.8 Preston Stotz at halfway down. The line was .16 Maver Genesis straight through to a size 16 Colmic WN501 hook. I set this rig to fish about 18” deep; I could also shallow up if needed.

Rig 2 was a .2g Carp Devil. This was also set up on .16 Maver Genesis. To this I attached a size 14 Colmic WN501 hook. I plumbed up down both sides with this rig and found just over 2ft of depth next to the boards.

For rig three, I set up a .3g Garbolino DC6 float. This was on .15 Preston Powerline, straight through to a size 14 Colmic WN501 hook. I plumbed up at 6m to my left and found about 3.5ft of depth.

My fourth and final rig was set up to fish at 14m, the idea being that you feed the meat on your bomb and long pole line. For the long pole line, I set up a .5g Drennan Roach. This was also on .15 Preston Powerline straight through to which I attached a size 16 Colmic WN501 hook. I plumbed up at 14m and found about 5ft of depth.

At the all in, I threw some hemp and meat to my left and just put in hemp to my right, down the boards. I potted in a bit of bait at 14 and started to fish on my 6m line. I put a few grains of hemp in a toss pot and a couple of pieces of meat with meat on the hook. I shipped out to 6m, dropped my enticing bit of feed in and dropped my float over the top.

After about 15 minutes, I got my first indication. The float dipped, then shot under. A bottletop skimmer was the culprit. Well a fish is a fish, it’s a start.

I re-baited, dropped in again, put a few bits of hemp and meat over the top and waited, and waited. Nothing. When you are an hour into the match with a skimmer to show for your troubles, you do start to worry a tad. Rocket to my left was getting a few by fishing with pellet up in the water and dripping in the odd pellet now and again. Ron Jeremy had a couple of carp and Meatcutter Bailey had a couple, so all in all, I wasn’t that far behind.

I came up in the water, with meat on the hook. I fed a few pieces of meat, the float buried, followed by my black hydro screaming off at a rate of knots. A carp of 5lb was soon in the net. That’s it, they were up in the water, where they wanted to be.

After another fruitless 30 minutes, I managed to snare another carp of about 2lb. I decided that it was time to have a look down the side. I dropped in with meat on the hook, fed a few pieces of meat. The float buried, and a roach of about 2oz was soon in the net. I tried at the other side and caught a slightly bigger roach, this one was probably 3oz.

By now, Ron had 5 carp and was starting to get a few bites by feeding meat at full depth and fishing with meat over the top. He probably had about 6 carp. I had 2, Rocket had about 10, and Meatcutter had 3.

I continued to rotate all of my swims, trying to locate fish. I saw a fish swirl down to my right over where I had been feeding. They had turned up, or so I thought. I dropped in, the water was all cloudy. My float moved sideways, and that was it. My float moved sideways as the fish made a quick dash out of my peg.

Going into the last hour, I had managed to snare another carp up in the water. I had cut back on all feed up in the water and was only feeding 4 or 5 pieces of meat about every 5 minutes or so. It was as if the fish were already up in the water, but were backing off the feed. (Thinking about it afterwards, it was similar at Woodland View).

By the time the match had ended, the fish were just starting to get their heads down, so to speak and I think that I had finally got the feeding (or not) pattern right. I had managed to end up with 8 carp and a few bits and pieces for a total weight of 25lb 8oz. Ron Jeremy ended up with 44lb, Rocket Ronnie had 70lb+ (and got in the frame). Meatcutter Bailey tipped back an estimated 30lb (so he tells me).

Chappy came round to say that he’d had 23lb, and then he changed his mind and said that he’d had 38lb, then changed his mind again and said that he really had had 23lb. I still gave him a quid as I could see from the glint in his eye that he was telling porkies. He had weighed in 38lb and also managed to win his section. Paul Burton won our section with 50lb, most of which he had caught in the first 2 hours.

Dean Smith won the match with 120lb from Partridge Lake. Peg 23 or 24 I think all on meat up in the water.