Barnburgh - Bottom Lake

The club were booked on one of my least favourite venues so I decided to book on the open match at Barnburgh Lakes, Doncaster which was to be staged on the bottom pond (Pond 3).

Top Pond (1), Middle Pond (2) and Bottom Pond (3).

Frontrow Harrison was still on his jollies, so my travelling partner today was Chris 'Lurch' Moorhead.  He texted me to say that he was not fishing this weekend as the water pump had gone on his car, so I took pity on him and offered to take him for a session to Barnburgh.  His last 3 match results have been worse than disastrous with all of them being a DNW (I believe).  Stuart 'Swimming Donkey' Waterhouse and Craig 'Oddjob' Thompson were also booked on.  The club were mob-handed.

I picked up Lurch and we went for a breakfast with Oddjob and Donkey. Whilst waiting for our breakfast, the waitress and cook were on about serving someone breakfast and giving some black pudding that had not been paid for.  Intending to do the honourable thing, Lurch went to pay for the black pudding.  Following a few harsh words, Lurch got a refund of his breakfast and was escorted outside by the cafe bouncer. LOLOL.  He was stood outside licking the windows whilst we ate our full English breakfast.  To add further insult to injury, they had prepared Lurch's breakfast which was not going spare.  So Donkey had a second breakfast for free - with some free black pudding.

The Draw
By the time that we arrived and paid on there were 24 booked on the match.  I put my hand in the bag and snare peg 24.  On my very first trip, I was 5th off peg 23 with 105lb (peg 22 was empty) so was hopeful of a few fish.

I had venue expert - Les 'War and' Peace on peg 25, Lurch was on peg 20, Andy Stonner was on peg 21, Pete Gosney was on peg 3, Oddjob was on peg 5, Donkey was on peg 6, Paul Jenkinson was on peg 15, Rob Hitchens was on peg 16 and Mick Owen was on peg 17.  The obligatory £2 side bet was struck up with Lurch.

Resident Venue Expert - Les 'War and' Peace

Rigs
I set up 4 rigs as follows:

Left - Right - Jigga 1, Frenzee FD200, Jigga 2 and Teardrop

Rig 1 - was a yellow topped Jigga rig set to fish between 6 - 12" deep.  This had on a Trabucco T1 .12 hooklength with a size 18 Kamasan B911 hook and was attached to Preston Red 11h elastic.

Rig 2 - was a .2g Frenzee FD200 float set to fish about 18" deep.  This had on a .11 Preston Powerline Hooklength with a size 18 Kamasan B911 hook and was attached to Preston Red 11h elastic.

Rig 3 - was a black topped Jigga rig set to fish between 6" and 2ft deep.  This had on a .12 Trabucco T1 .12 hooklength to a size 18 Kamasan B911 hook and was also attached to Preston Red 11h elastic.

Rig 4 - was a .3g teardrop shaped float and was set at 3ft deep to fish in the margin.  This had on a .13 Preston Powerline hooklength and a size 16 B611 hook.  This rig was attached to Diawa white hydro elastic.

All of the shallow rigs (1 - 3) had a baitband on a hair-rig.

Bait
For bait, I had some 4mm pellets (you have to use the venues own pellets), some Bob-co 4mm pellets (for the baitband) and some 4mm BaitTech expander pellets.

Pellets, pellets and more pellets!!

Following a couple of chats with Rob Hitchens and Pet Gosney, I invested in a new Sensas landing net specifically for places similar to Barnburgh - banded pellet fishing for small fish.  The net was fine mesh to eliminate the pellet coming off in the landing net and I also tied the bottom off to make it a shallower net so that I was not reaching too far down into the net when unhooking fish.

I had also, courtesy of ebay, purchased a brand new unused Preston Innovations keepnet which was going to get it's first outing today.  Let us hope that it is not a bad omen on using a new keepnet for the first time.

The Match
Let banter battle commence. I threw a small handful of pellets down the margin and then baited up the black topped jigga rig with a 4mm pellet and shipped out to 10m.  I fed some 4mm pellets over the top and then proceeded to 'jig' the rig. Lifting and dropping the pellet all the while.  After about 20 minutes, I had about 10 fish in the net. It was a slow start by Barnburgh standards. I decided to swap over to the Frenzee rig to see if they wanted a static bait.  After about another 20 minutes, I had about 25/30 fish.  I asked War and Peace how many he had.  He said that he did not know.

I was constantly feeding 20(ish) pellets every fish at 10m.  I had seen one or two swirls.  I decided to have a go on the shallower of the two jigga rigs (rig 1).

Over the next 1.5 hours I anticipate that I had about 25/30lb.  It was slow going.  War and Peace was pulling out of a few fish and was starting to get a little annoyed, especially seeing as I was smiling at him after every fish that he pulled out of.  I advised Lurch to fish shallow at 11m.  I looked down the lake and he had 14m of pole in front of him and was fishing to the island.  DOH!!!

Stonner decided to have a go down the edge at this point and dropped his rig in the margin and put the pole between his legs whilst he faffed about with his rigs.  Yep, you guessed it...WHOOOSH, his topkit was dragged into the lake, never to be seen again.

I proceeded to fish shallow swapping between the three shallow rigs.  The fish appeared to be at differing heights after every couple of fish or so.  I was now fishing about 11.5m out.  I would have a run of about 5 - 10 fish, then have to change a couple of minor things such as more bait, less bait, tap the water, don't tap the water, jig the rig, hold the rig.  Just little things caught a couple more fish.

I was now into the last hour and a half of the match and appeared to be doing OK.  I was beating War and Peace to my left and the angler to my right.  Pete Gosney was catching a few fish on peg 3 and I could also see that Oddjob Thompson and Donkey Waterhouse were getting one or two.  Lurch was now fishing down the bank and was catching a few fish as was Stonner.  Everyone seemed to be getting fish.

I decided to fish at 13m for the remainder of the match just up to some sedges that were over-hanging into my peg.  At this point, Pete Gosney struck into a fish, that also did a 'Stonner' and proceeded to pull his topkit off at 11m.  By some stroke of luck and fortune, the managed to get his topkit back - minus the fish.  There is a god after all.

I proceeded to catch one or two more fish before swapping lines and catching another couple of fish.  TIME!!! That was it match over.  How had I done??? I was not sure.  I had a slow start, good middle of match, then a slow end to the match.  Had I beaten War and Peace?  I said to him that I was about 40lb behind him, with a grin on my face.

As I was packing away my gear, Donkey walked round to me and decided to bet me £1 that he had more than me.  Another £1 was up for grabs.

The scales arrived at peg 18 and proceeded to weigh from there.  Not sure what weights they had.  Lurch was one of the first weights that I remembered and he put 74lb on the scales.  He was chuffed to bits.  I felt that I had £2 coming my way as I knew that I had more than that.  Stonner on peg 21 had 3 weighs and put 128lb odd on the scales.  Pegs 22 and 23 had 70 - 80lb each.  It was now my turn.  I lifted out my first net and plonked 52lb on the scales.  I think that I had an even split which would give me about 100lb.  I thought that I had more than that.  I then lifted out my 2nd net and had two weighs and put 82lb on the scales, giving me a total weight of 134lb.  I was currently leading with the big hitters yet to weigh.  Oh, I was up £2 already due to Lurch, thank you very much.  Les 'War and' Peace plonked 116lb on the scales (he probably lost about 20lb or so today).  Pete Gosney on peg 3 weighed in 154lb which pushed me into 2nd place.  Oddjob put 84lb on the scales.  Next to weigh was Donkey.  He had 2 weighs for a total of 112lb.  I was up another pound.  But I was also please for Donkey as he had had his first 100lb+ weight in a match.  He was really made up.  Good for him.  From pegs 7 - 14, there were a few 80 - 110lb weights.

The last 3 to weigh were Jenkinson, Hitchens and Owen in that order.  I was currently lying 2nd, where was I going to finally end up?  Jenkinson put 180lb odd on the scales, all caught on paste on the top 2.  I was in 3rd place.  Hitchens put 170lb on the scales, again all on paste on the top two. I was now in 4th place.  Owen put 117lb on the scales.  I was 4th.  I was very pleased with the result.

I went to get my £1 off Donkey, and he shook his empty pockets.  (The following day, I sent him a text asking for my quid and he texted me back to say double or quits next time we go, hmmmmm).

Lurch paid up - all £1.50 of it..  He still owes me 50p.  I will have to start up my own Wonga.com payday loan company to lend them the money so that I can get it back. :-)

Lurch needed a confidence booster and was very happy with catching a few (well a good few) fish today.  Stuart 'Donkey' Waterhouse was on cloud 9, having broke the 100lb barrier.  Well done fella's.  Glad you enjoyed it.

Full Result
1. Paul Jenkinson (peg 15) - 180lb odd
2. Rob Hitchens (Peg 16) - 170lb
3. Pete Gosney (Peg 3) - 154lb odd
4. Mike Herrington (Peg 24) - 135lb
5. Andy Stonner (Peg 21) - 128lb odd

When checking the results at the Anglers Mail website on the Monday, I have always had to email them to get the results right.  I have been called Nick Terrington, Mick Hammington, Mick Harris and god only knows what else.  Best have a word with the match organiser!!

Tightlines.

MICK HERRINGTON :-)