Sat 21st April 2007

Jasper called me mid-week asking me if we wanted to go to Woodlands, Thirsk, but that I would have to pick him up as his car was in for it's MOT and he wasn't sure what needed doing to it?
I had to make a little detour (work related) so agreed to pick up Jasper at about 7:15, then got to Moggies for a brekkie then head of to Woodlands.

I made a call to Purverted mid week and managed to persuade him to come along and join us.

upon arrival, I saw my nemesis, Rigsby, in the car park, because wherever he is, I tend to do crap and end up owing him a quid. The quid was hastily renewed as was the quid with my travelling partner for today, Jasper.

Chappy was away on the Whiteacres Festival, so I was gonna be safe one quid at least. Following a telecon with pretty boy Haircut, it was decided that either a meat or a pellet approach was the order of the day, dependant upon which lake you draw.

I put my hand in the bag and managed to snare Partridge peg 32. Purverted ended up with the best peg on the complex, Partridge 15 and Jasper was on Skylark 18, a corner peg. A meat and hemp approach it was going to be. Partridge 32 was indifferent to me, due to not going to Woodlands for a while. All the locals had told me that I had drawn out of it as the fish are at the other end. The lake itself has been fishing well of late, with over 220lb winning the 'old gimmers' match that takes place every Monday.

For company I had someone Scott on peg 30, Dave Owens on peg 33, Granddad was on peg 36 and Mick Lodge was on peg 29. All of these have been fishing the venue regularly, I had my work cut out.

For bait I had 2.5 tins of 6mm meat. 1 tin of Frenzied Hemp, 1 pt of 6mm expander pellets (already soaked) and about 1/2 pt of 4mm hard pellets.

I got to my peg and set up the following rigs:

Inside rig:

was a .2g Garbolino DC 6 float on .17 Preston Powerline tied direct to a size 14 Colmic B500 barbless hook.

My 2nd rig was a .3g Garbolino DC6 float on .15 Preston Powerline tied direct to a size 16 Colmic B500 barbless hook.

I also set up the following rigs for fishing at 14m.

The first of my rigs for 14m, was a .4g Garbolino DC2 set to fish at full depth (about 5ft deep). This was set up on .15 Preston Powerline tied direct to a size 16 Colmic B500 barbless hook.

My last rig was a little dibber float taking a couple of no.8 Preston Stotz, set to fish up in the water about 1ft deep. My rig line was again, .15 Preston Powerline straight through to a size 14 Colmic B500 hook. I also had a Korum Baitspike at the business end.

Hook choice, where big fish are concerned, my favoured choice of hook is the Colmic B500. They are quite heavy in the wire, but tend to stay sharp for a long time and if a fish straightens one of these hooks, you didn't want it on the bank with you.

When the all in went, I potted in some meat and hemp at 3m down the boards, a small pot of meat and hemp at 14m. I put the 6m rig on and shipped out with a Fox Tosspot full of hemp and about 10 pieces of cubed meat, with a piece of meat on the hook.

I tipped the bait in and sat back and waited. Before I even had chance to sit back, the black hydro was out doing laps of the lake. After a brief tussle, a mirror carp of about 4lb was soon in the net. Mick 1, Fish 0. Wonder if I should have a quid with the fish, then again, I might even lose that.

Next drop in resulted in a skimmer of about 10oz. Then nothing else. After 30 minutes of the match, I decided to go down the boards after I had lovingly prepared it for the past 30 minutes. I dropped in and the float hadn't even settled. The fish that you get down the boards are usually 'doubles' or not far off. I struck into said fish (elastic for this rig was the Drennan pink hollow) and a little tench of about 10oz came flying out of the water. A bit over zealous on the strike me thinks!!!

I dropped in again and after a 5 minute wait, the float proper shot under. I struck and the float stood still and the elastic came out, before the 'snag' decided to move. It was a bit like 'Jaws' at this stage. After plodding around my peg for about 5 minutes, I managed to fold a 10lb common carp into my butterfly net.

I decided to see if another one was present. After a further 5 minute wait, the float dipped. I struck. Solid resistance again. Don't you just love it when a plan comes together!!!. Another carp of about 9lb joined it's bigger brother. 2 carp for about 20lb. Not bad.

I decided to pot in some more bait and go out to the 6m line again. Whilst I had been fishing both down the inside and at 6m, I was constantly flicking a few bits of meat out to the 14m line.

Back on the 6m line and after about 10 minutes, no more bites, just a couple of liners.

I got out my deep rig and went out to the 14m line. Again, I baited up with meat on the hook. I tipped in some meat and help via the Tosspot and dropped the bait in. I waited a couple of minutes and got a sail away indication - were they up in the water? I waited a bit longer on the deep rig, the float dipped, then sailed away. A skimmer bream of about 1lb, thought that it was a trout, it must of leaped out of the water about 5 times, was soon in the net.

I persevered on the deep rig and managed to snare a couple of pastie carp. Dave Owen (nickname to follow, I have one in mind, but I can't think of the guys name at the moment) had by this time managed a couple of carp and a couple of tench.

I was still getting linered on the deep rig and I had been feeding a few bits and pieces over the top of the float. I got the shallow rig out and baited up with meat again, on the baitspike.

After some 20 minutes 'up in the water', I had 1 carp and a chub to show for my efforts, I am sure that I will catch more on the bottom.

With about 2 hours of the match remaining, I decided to get my head down on te 14m rig at full depth and change my feeding to try to keep them on the bottom. This meant cupping in meat and not loose feeding at all. After about 10 minutes, I caught a carp of about 4lb. A couple more skimmers and tench followed, then I was into a steady procession of carp to about 3lb or so.

With about 30 minutes of the match remaining, I decided it was time to have another look down the side for another submarine. I dropped in and got a couple of liners and managed to snare a couple of little tench. I looked at my watch, there was about 2 minutes to go. My float moved sideways. Go on, Go Under, I thought. I looked at my watch anxiously, there was about 30 seconds left.

The float dipped, I struck. The float stood still and the elastic came out. Job Done. Or so I thought. I the last fish on when all of a sudden the all out was given. I now have 15 minutes to get the fish out for it to count. A quick 'Fish On' shout was given.

After a brief tussle, a small 8lb'er was in the net. Now it was Job Done!!

I would estimate that I had about 45lb - 50lb in weight, with the inclusion of the last fish. I hadn't really seen anyone catch apart from Mick Lodge, and the lad next to him. How had I done.

Haircut was admitting to about 55lb. Dave Owen tipped back his 5 or 6 fish. By the time that the scales had arrived, 'Sir' Tossa Taylor was leading with just short of 70lb. Lodgey, put 67lb on the scales and Haircut had 64lb. The lad next to me had 45lb. I managed 56lb 13oz. If Lodgey gets in the money, will I win my section.

Meatcutter Bailey came up to me after the match with a fistful of dollars (well pounds to be precise). I had managed to win my section.

I quickly accosted both Jasper and Rigsby for my quids. Where's Chappy, I would have won his quid today, wouldn't I?

S Bell 77lb.
M Bailey 71lb
D Taylor 69lb
M Lodge 67lb
?
A Bridge 64lb

I was about 8th overall and came 3rd on my lake. If I had persevered on the deep rig rather than trying to get them up in the water, would I have faired any better? Lodgey and Haircut both caught the majority of their fish up in the water, whilst I really struggled.

If you look closely, you can see the CNN tower - but you will have to look hard!!

If you 'click' on the picture, you can zoom in should you need to!!

I'm back, well the blog is atleast.

I have been so, so, so busy over the past few weeks. Had staff issues (had to dismiss one of the new staff for Gross Misconduct) so I have been busy re-recruiting and training, then there has been the month end accounts to complete and also get time in for my fishing.

As you can see below, I took my kids fishing to The Oaks, Sessay. They really enjoyed it. I will take them a bit more as the summer arrives.

Well, back to the fishing. In a nutshell 'Loopyhead' has lost his loop and my head is now in a noose!! I have been getting blown off the bank and struggling to hold onto 14m of carbon in a side on wind, nigh on every week.

I am still going every weekend (Sunday's in particular), but just finding it so hard to do anything at the moment. Worm fishing has been taking The Oaks apart of late. Lee Harrison (VDE Scunthorpe) has been winning or framing in the majority of matches with half a dozen weights over 100lb. Big Mark 'Cali' Calvert has set the best weight of the year so far with over 145lb.

My best weight of late has been 72lb and that was only good enough for 15th, but the saving grace was that I beat the River Legend known as John Allerton of the next peg. He fished the little boys method down the side and ended up with 61lb odd. I fished across to the farside all match. I had an enjoyable day and really thought that I would have atleast won something, but alas NO. Jonny Kenning won my section with 83lb. I was second in the section. Lee Harrison won with one of his 'tons - 119lb odd.

Woody Baron is continuously complaining about is inability to draw. Take the weekend just gone for instance, he drew peg 55, which if anyone knows the venue, will tell you, it is a good peg. Darryll 'Sir Tossa' Taylor (I am allowed to call him that, provided that I call him Sir first) was next to him on peg 56, with peg 57 empty. Woody came upto me after the match and asked me 'Oi, Loopyhead, why did you leave peg 57 out. The reason being that Sir Tossa Taylor had 45lb compared to Woody's 20lb.

I drew peg 9, which was in the right area and managed to plonk 38lb odd on the scales which would have put me about top 15 again as 67lb won, and 48lb was last in the money.

At the end of the match last week, John 'Plonker McG' McGarrell was walking up to telling me that I had to nominate Cali for the numpty of the week competition on The Oaks Banter website. Just as he approached my peg, he had a snapping sound and abruptly stopped, the snapping sound was quickly followed by a crunching sound. I looked down at his size 10's in horror. He had only managed to stand on one of my power top kits snapping the kit in half then crunched the bottom of the number one section when he stopped. We instantly had a new winner of the numpty of the week award. In his defence he managed to get me a new (well second hand) topkit of Cali.

My quids are being fired from a scatter gun at the moment. Byron the Full Stop is managing to get a leg up onto his box and is proving that he can catch a few by taking my quid occassionally, but the soon bounce back. Rumpole has finally set up a direct debit to pay me my shiny ones. On one of my matches, I drew peg 61 and had Rumpole at the side of me on peg 63, with Shrek Middleton on peg 65. It was a bleeeeeedddddinnnggg cold day and I was wrapped up nice and warm. Rumpole had somehow managed to leave all of his external clobber at home. I would have lent him my jacket, but he might have stretched it a little, so thought better of it (anyway, there was a quid at stake). Shrek lent him his outer jacket (Basket!!), which was a little baggy on Rumpole. Anyway, by the end of the match Rumpole was a quid down. His mate, Homer Simpson was on peg 67, which was at the back of me. I managed to drag him into our quid bet and promptly took that, which I felt a little guilty about as he never manages to take a quid off Rumpole, who has never managed to take a quid of moi!!

The Chappy quid is on one way ticket at the moment, with no return in sight. Chappy has finally found a bit of form and has even managed to frame (including a couple of wins) on a few occasions, but ask him how many Kamasan points he ended up with and you will get a Chappy slap, whilst I ended up with double figures atleast.

This week back in the pub was the safest that Xman has felt in ages. Of late, Chappy has been lining up a couple of slaps with Xman on a weekly basis and due to Chappy being in sunnier climes (Whiteacres is sunnier than North Yorkshire), Xman is actually relaxing in the local- for now.

The Orc made his return this week to the Oaks and continued his good form from last year by promptly handing me a quid in a peg to peg battle. He was next to me and managed to plonk a respectable 29lb odd on the scales (G2E was next to him on peg 7 and was joint 2nd with 61lb 15).

A couple of weeks back, I was nigh on suicidal. I had drawn a decent peg and just couldn't get a bite. I hardly spoke to anyone after the match, I didn't go to the pub afterwards, I just sloped off home. I'm taking this fishing mullarkey too seriously!!!

Gonna go now, keep coming back and I will update more frequently, staff issues permitting.

Alwin Ingham Testimonial Match.

The Wind, The Wind, The Wind.

Since my last entry from a match, the weather seems to have done nothing but be windy, especially at the weekends. You know how it is. You work in a nice warm office all week, the sun is beating down on the glass, and you are baking hot. The trees are not moving an inch. You throw a blade of grass in the air to check for wind and it hits you on the head. You book on a match. You arrive, you pay on, you get to your peg and set up – still no wind. The match organiser shouts time, then the wind goes mental!!!

Anyway, going back to one of my earlier matches. We held a ‘Testimonial Match’ for Alwin Ingham, who is suffering from 2 tumours on his brain. Alwin is a true gent in every sense of the word. In the time that I have known Alwin, I have never heard a bad word from him. You ask him how he fished and he tells no lies. He makes his own floats and if you ask him nicely enough, he would make you a couple of floats. Alwin did a recent article Match Fishing magazine, titled ‘Make Mine A Pint’ due to his liking for fishing maggot all year round.

Apologies if I upset anyone here, but we decided to hold a match for him now whilst he has got time to spend it as things are not looking good and if we did a match for him at a later stage, he may not be around to enjoy our efforts and hard work. Alwin doesn’t smoke or drink, so we are sure that the money raised will be put to good use.

By the time of the draw, there were 96 anglers in attendance, sadly, Alwin wasn’t feeling too well so didn’t attend. I pegged the match across Alders Lake and Cedar Lake, with 70 pegs on Cedar and 34 pegs on Alders lakes. Everyone was hoping for a Cedar Lake draw, but as I explained, the match wasn’t about winning a large amount of money; it was about raising funds for Alwin. With this in mind, the only prizes on offer were 5 man section prizes of £50. The pond owners had provided the lakes for free and raffle prizes were donated by Bob-Co angling centre, Oaks Tackle, Mal Bailey meat cutters and the local Moor & Pheasant pub to name but a few.

I put my hand in the bag and managed to end up with Alders 34. I really (really, really) didn’t want this peg. It is about 19m to the island, so was out of reach as I only had 16m with me. I had Fullstop within earshot on peg 30, Pat Bailey on peg 31 (he could also reach the island with 16m), someone else on peg 33 and Kev ‘Penfold’ Grainger on peg 34. Rumpole was a couple of pegs further away and Sorry Moran was on peg 38 in’t corner. Dynamite Dave Newman was on peg 41, with Magnum the Porno star on peg 40.

Chappy was on Cedar Lake as was my travelling partner, Bram.

My £50 quid section ran from pegs 32 – 36, which as far as the pegs are concerned, no one has a real advantage, so was reasonably fair. Alders Lake holds a lot of ide from ounces to 3lb or so, with carp, skimmers, roach rudd and gudgeon.

My plan of attack was to fish for the ide up in the water, as was most of the anglers on the lake.

For bait I had casters and maggots and a bit of corn for fishing over to the island on either the bomb or the waggler.

I borrowed Bram’s waggler rod – he wouldn’t be needing it. Whilst setting up, I had a few chucks with the waggler rod to ‘get my eye in’. I was getting the waggler to land on a dustbin lid. Penfold commented that ‘I had done that a few times before’. I also had the bomb rod ready set up, so all I had left was to set up the pole. I set up 3 rigs, 2 shallow and 1 deep.

The deep rig was set up hook in the loop style. The rig was a 4x14 Drennan Roach on .10 Silkshock line direct to a size 18 Kamasan B911 eyed hook.

My 2 shallow rigs both incorporated .2g Garbolino DC6 floats. One was set up on .10 Silkshock line and the other was set up on .12 Fox Match Plus line. The .10 rig was set to fish at 1ft deep, with a short line and the .12 was set to fish at 2 – 2.5 ft deep. White hydro on all of the rigs completed the set ups.

At the start of the match an ‘air horn’ sounded from another match. People on my lake started fishing. Let me ask a question, since when have I used an Air Horn to start the matches. Never, so why have people started now? Byron ‘Fullstop’ Dell was one of the said culprits.

When I officially started, I baited up the waggler rod with double maggot and cast over to the island in the hope of catching an early easy carp. First chuck and I managed to cast onto the one single branch that was just touching the water. I pulled and pulled and the rig snapped. No more waggler fishing for me then. Ho Hum!!!

I catapulted a few casters out to 9m and went over the top on the shallow rig, baited up with double red maggot. After about 5 minutes of drip-feeding maggots, the float buried and a 1oz rudd was soon in the net.

I managed to snare a couple more ide and more roach. One thing that I did realise was that whilst fishing the hook in the loop for the roach, I hardly missed a bite, and most of them were lift bites.

When the Air Horn sounded for the match to finish, I told Fullstop that he had to stop fishing, or he will have had more time than those around him. He told me to go forth and multiply.

Marco won the match outright with 77lb from Cedar Lake peg 28 and Lee ‘The Legend’ Barrett won our lake from peg 4 with 60lb. Unfortunately, Pimmy ended up about 4th or 5th and didn’t win a penny as his section was won by Marco, but at the end of the day, the match was about raising funds for Alwin, hence paying section prizes only.

Back at the local pub, the raffle took place and, following on from the stunt that I pulled at Christmas, Woody Baron decided to hide his raffle tickets, but alas, not before Chappy had seen them and informed me of one of his ticket numbers. I needed a yellow ticket to come out first. Middy put his and in the bucket and pulled out a yellow ticket. Right, here goes. Yellow 419, I shouted. Everyone looked at their tickets in anticipation. Woody suddenly stood up and started dancing around. In view of his ticket (?) being the first drawn, he had a choice of raffle prizes. He was calling everyone names, until I told him to sit down. He had me pinned against the wall by my throat. Everyone was falling about laughing. I had got him again!!!!
I was laughing so much, I can’t even remember who won the first prize.

With about 10 raffle prizes to go, Tom asked me, where was the Mal Bailey Meatcutter. I said that Marco had brought it with him. Macro had forgotten that he had it, or did he????

Anyway, in view of the Meatcutter not being available for all the prior raffle winners to pick it, it was decided that the Meatcutter would be the last raffle prize and would go to the winner of that lucky ticket. After all of the raffle prizes had gone, with just the Meatcutter to go, Middy put his hand in the bucket and pulled out none other than………


My ticket!!!! One Meatcutter in the bag, so it wasn’t a bad day after all.

The total amount raised was £1685.00 for Alwin, which is staggering, considering the timescale involved in pulling this event together.

I would personally like to extend a warm welcome to all concerned. I received a telephone call from Alwin, that same night thanking me for everything that we had done. But to be fair, we did it because in Alwin, you couldn’t meet a nicer bloke.

Took my two youngest boys fishing on Good Friday to The Oaks, Sessay.

Joshua with one he caught earlier!!!


















Thomas looking like he knows what he is doing.

Joshua used a his new 2nd hand pole that I got off one of the lads from the Total Fishing website (www.total-fishing.com). It is a 14.5m Maver Deliverance pole, which came with 5 top kits. I removed the No.1's from the pole and re-elasticated the No. 2 & 3 Sections. I re-elasticated it with some grey hydro and it seems to be bang on!!





They both fished maggot over Pallatrax Groundbait to start with until the carp showed, then they both switched to pellet over groundbait.










Joshua finished with this fine net of fish, for an estimated 25lb. He caught Ide, Roach, Skimmers, Tench and Carp (Crucians, Mirrors and F1's).








Included in his net was this fine sample. A common carp of about 4lb.

Thomas ended up with about 15lb of carp and tench. His biggest tench was pushing 3lb and his biggest carp was the mirror carp below, which nearly dragged him in.







I didn't fish, I just observed and assisted.

Looks like they had a cool day.

I had a couple of hours to spare, so went to Garry Parr's place at Weeton, near Pool in Leeds.

I caught this little net of fish using the new Dynamite Baits 'Sinking Expander Pellets' fished over some Pallatrax groundbait. I had an estimated 60lb or so, with the fish averaging 2lb. I got 'done' a couple of times, one of the fish that I hooked ran straight through the reeds and was about 10 pegs away, and that was on black hydro.

I'm going to have a knock up at Garry's next Saturday - 7th April if anyone is interested.

Saturday 10th March 2007.

It’s amazing how much Saturday fishing I am getting in at the moment. I think that it is because I am taking some envelopes home, so the kids are able to eat and I give a few pennies to our lass. It is reminiscent of Al Bundy off Married With Children, they form an orderly queue next to the door when they hear me reversing my car onto our drive. I open the door and they are stood there, 4 of them in a line. Our lass starts with ‘Well’, the next one ‘Have’, the next one ‘You’ and the last one ‘Won’, all with their hands out.

The Saturday matches are currently nearly sell-outs with in excess of 70 on nearly every match and this week was no exception. By the time that I had put my hand in the bag, there were 71 anglers in attendance. Today was also being run as another optional super-pool and following my result from last week, I had to give it another go.

I put my hand in the bag and peg 26 was stuck to my hand. Not bad, could have been better. Pegs 24 & 25 have been the form pegs around this area to date. When I arrived at my peg, I found that I didn’t have any empty pegs around me. Lee ‘Cueball’ Harrison was on peg 22, can’t remember who was on 23, Graham ‘Wolfman’ Skirrey was on peg 24 and I had a Boroughbridge angler on 25. One of the Manchester Mosella lads was on peg 27. Chappy was in shouting distance (and in sight, so I would be able to keep an eye on my quid) on peg 30, with Marco next to him on peg 31.

The wind was blowing all over the place, coming from both left and right as it came down the arms of the lake. I set up 4 rigs, 2 for across and 2 for down the deeps.

My across rigs and deep rigs incorporated the usual Drennan Roach’s’ (4x14 & .5g) and Garbolino DC6’s in .3g and .2g. Due to the swirling wind, one of the shallow rigs was set up with a .3g float and the other shallow rig was set up using the ‘normal’ .2g float. All of my rigs were set up HITL style.

For bait, I mixed up some ‘Pallatrax’ groundbait, to which I added a liberal amount of micro-pellets. I had some 4mm and 6mm pellets as hookbait. That was it. I was either going to catch on pellet or not at all.

At the start of the match, I baited up the .2g shallow rig then I put some ‘Pallatrax’ groundbait into the fruitshoot top and went across to the far side. After about 3 minutes, I hadn’t had a bite. I came back put some more bait in the fruitshoot, then went back to the same spot. By this time, Wolfman had caught a fish off the aerator by fishing at full depth. I waited a further 3 or 4 minutes, and repeated the process.

Some 15 minutes into the match, I got my first indication and a mirror carp of about 1lb was soon in the landing net. I continued to follow this routine of feeding a little bit of Pallatrax every 3 or 4 minutes or so for the first hour. The sole intention of this is to keep putting something in, whilst having minimal food content.

After the first hour, I would estimate that I had managed to snare about 7 fish for approximately 10lb. Wolfman was getting the odd fish, but the blokes either side of me on pegs 25 & 27 seemed to be struggling and I would estimate that they had about 3 fish apiece.

I persevered across for the next hour and a half and managed to put together a steady run of F1’s and small mirrors, with my biggest fish going just over 2lb. I would estimate that I had about 20lb with half of the match gone. I had been steadily putting in the odd nugget of groundbait on the inside line at 3m down the slope. My far side swim was dying on me. It was time to drop in close and bag up. I recall that J D Illingworth had a weight from this area and caught most of his fish close in. Some 25 minutes later and only 2 fish (1 carp and 1 gudgeon) to show for it. I decided to sack this line.

Wolfman and Chappy were the only two anglers that I could see that were catching fish. My Chappy quid was seriously in the mire today!!

I went back over to the far side in the hope that the rest had brought the fish back into the peg. This was not the case. Although I managed to get the odd fish, I was waiting longer and longer for bites after each fish.

There was about 1 hour of the match remaining and I would estimate that I had about 27lb. I decided to come down the base of the far slope, with the .5g Drennan Roach rig.

I potted in a golf-ball sized nugget of groundbait, then baited up with a pellet on the hook. I dropped in and no sooner had the float settled, a barbel of about 1.5lb was fighting like mad, I would have said ‘and it was soon in the net’ but you know something, barbel are initially one of the most difficult fish to actually tell what you have got on the end of your line. You strike; they set off at 300mph. They turn and run towards you and straight away, you are thinking, is it foul-hooked, is it a ten-pounder. Your elastic nearly bottoms out and the fish has got bigger. You get it in the landing net and it is smaller than the gudgeon that you have been catching. Bugger!!!

The lad on peg 25 didn’t go across to the far side. Every time that he did, he soon shipped back as he couldn’t control his rig due to the wind. The lad on peg 27 was able to go across and hold his pole, but hadn’t/wasn’t feeding his peg regular enough.

I continued to fish down the middle and snared a few more barbel and carp. I started to foul-hook and lose fish, the carp had come off the bottom so I shallowed up my rig by about 6”. I was no longer foul-hooking (and losing) the fish that were in my peg. I had to wait slightly longer for my bite but when I got a bite, it was fish on and hooked in the mouth.

That was it time. End of the match.

Gandhi was doing the weighing of my section and he immediately asked me what weight I had. I asked him what he had weighed in. 36lb odd was the reply from the toothless one, with a big grin. I responded by saying that I didn’t have that and that I had about 33/34lb or so.

Cueball plonked 40lb 1 oz on the scales – I didn’t have that. Wolfman weighed in 38lb which consisted of 4 carp and the rest being barbel, nor did I have that. I lifted my net out and had completely underestimated my weight again. I managed to weigh in 42-10, which consisted of mainly carp with about 5 barbel. Next one to plonk a decent weight on the scales was my ‘protégé’ – Chappy. He managed to snare 39lb 4oz. And now the best bit, Chappy was another quid down!!!! Oh dear, what a shame.

I approached Nightie for my quid and his response was “we don’t have quid’s on Saturdays!!!” I think that I will have to do a bit of research from my blogs to check this out.

9 Kamasan points in 4 matches, made up of 3 (yes, three) second placings, two of which came on a Saturday, when there is an optional £4 superpool – which I obviously entered. Not too bad in anyone’s book, even if I say so myself.

Back to the pub and a few shandies all round for those in attendance.

Full results;

Sean Cameron (Spring Valley) 53-10-0, carp, pellet and maggot (peg 42)
Mick Herrington (Bob-Co Oaks) 42-10-0 (peg 26)
Kevin Worth (Castleford) 40-12-0 (peg 62)
Lee Harrison (Scunthorpe Blue) 40-7-0 (peg 22)
John Chapman (Garbolino Elton) 39-4-0 (peg 30)
Graham Skirrey (Turners Tackle) 38-11-0 (peg 24)

Sunday 4th March 2007.

Normal service has resumed!!!

Back to running the Sunday match and following my recent run of results, more people are coming up to me and asking me questions. I knew that I had joined the elite when Darryll ‘Tin Tin’ Taylor even started speaking to me.

I got everything underway and by the time of the draw there were 52 of us on the match. The wind was blowing from peg 1 diagonally across the lake towards peg 36, which meant that a lot of the lake was going to be out of it due to the wind. I put my hand in the bag and pulled out peg 38. I was not going to be a happy teddy bear. The wind would be blowing from right to left. Chappy the jammy so and so had drawn peg 45. The wind would be blowing straight of the top of the island, therefore allowing him to fish across –oh for a peg like that.

I arrived at my peg to find that I had Mick Sykes to my right on peg 39, peg 37 was empty, Rumpole was on peg 36 and Fullstop was on peg 35.

At the start of the match, I set up 4 rigs, 2 for the deeper water and 2 for across. The across rigs were made up using one of my usual .2g Garbolino DC6 floats, set up HITL style. The rig was attached to .10 Preston Powerline straight through to a size 18 Gamakatsu, pellet hook, eyed. I plumbed up across and straight away was hoping that either, I didn’t have to fish there or hoping even more so, for the wind to drop. My second rig for across was a 4x12 Colmic float with a thick plastic bristle. I set this up conventional with a spade end hook. I set the float to fish slightly overdepth, hoping that by dragging the line on the bottom, the float would slow down somewhat.

My two deep rigs included a HITL rig using a .5g Drennan Roach. This was attached to .11 Preston Powerline, straight through to a size 16 Gamakatsu, eyed, pellet hook. My backup deep rig was the same rig, but set up with the conventional spade end hook. For bait I had a few maggots, micro pellets and some 4mm expanders.

At the all in, the wind instantly got stronger and continued to get stronger as the match progressed.

I immediately decided to go across to the farside with the HITL rig on, dropped some micro pellets in, and dropped the rig in baited with a 4mm pellet on the hook.

After about 15 minutes and a couple more fruitshoots of micropellets, I went down the middle after having nothing to show for the foray across.

I dropped in the HITL rig and foul-hooked a fish almost straight away. I re-baited with pellet, and dropped in again. The float settled, then started going against the wind. The lake was towing like mad. I let the float go until it tightlined itself against the pole tip, then I waited for it to go under. After about 5 minutes, the float buried and a carp of about 1lb was soon in the net. I managed to snare another 5 or 6 fish before the peg had all but died.

I came close in, using the same rig and managed to snare a couple of carp before the peg died again.

I was missing bites on the HITL rig, so I dropped in using the ‘normal’ rig. I had set the rig to fish slightly over depth and dropped in. I missed 4 indications/bites in a row, before I connected with a fish. It was foul-hooked and shot off towards safety in the direction of Rumpole.

From bad to worse – then the rain arrived. The rain was coming at me from the right to left and it was driving rain. It could have been worse, Rumpole had the wind and rain blowing straight into his clock.

I could see that Rumpole was starting to get a few fish on corn, close in. I didn’t have any with me. I shouted round to Rumpole to see if I could get a tin of corn off him. He told me to go round to him. I arrived and rummaged through his carryall and found a tin of Green Giants best. As I was walking away, he commented that it would cost me the quid that he was going to have to give to me today.

I tried corn and after 15 minutes, I hadn’t had an indication. I wanted to go home, but with so many quid’s at stake, I was going to have to make a go of it. But I oh so wanted to go home.

Over the next couple of hours, my maggots started to float, my pellets had become sloppy groundbait, my arse was wet, my glasses were smeared, my elbows got wet. I couldn’t wait until I shouted time.

That’s it, enough is enough. It was time. I put my topkits straight in my car, put my pole away wet and waited for the scales to arrive, whilst sat in the comfort and warmth of my car. By the time that the scales had arrived, Gandhi was winning the match with 38lb from peg 21 (wind & RAIN off his back, flat calm in front of him). Fullstop managed to plonk 20lb on the scales. I didn’t think that I had that. Rumpole DNW’d, but tipped back about a dozen carp.

I managed to plonk 21lb odd on the scales. Mick Sykes to my right weighed in 15lb. Peg 42 had 28lb, 43 – 24lb, 44 - ? 45 – 33lb and 46 – 22lb.

Chappy was walking back to his car and there was a funny squelching sound and I thought that it had something to do with the rain, well it did have something to do with the rain, it was to do with the amount of water that was in his trainers, that was squelching around when he walked. His travelling partner, Pimmy, was no better off. He had fished the match all day in a fleece and trainers as he had left his wet weather gear at home.

Ian 'Exman' Exley's New Hat.

It called an Anti-Chappyslap Hat.

It doesn't work though. Chappy waited until he took it off, then gave him a right slap.

The adventures of Loopyhead!!!

Well, well, well. I haven’t updated my blog for a couple of weeks now, so I think that it is about time that I enlightened you all.

I managed to get off for the open at The Oaks on Saturday 3rd March. ‘Shrek’ Middleton is currently running an experiment on the Saturday matches to see what people think. The experiment is to have the standard match fee of £16 but to do away with a £1 optional winner take all and replaced it with an option £4, making the total match entry fee £20 – all in.

I picked up Bram and had an uneventful drive, but it still only took just over half an hour to get there.

At the draw, there were 72 of us in attendance. I was near the front of the queue and put my hand in the bag and managed to snare peg 52, Bram was on peg 59. I arrived at my peg to find that Craig Lealand was on peg 49, Paul ‘Sweeney’ Todd on peg 50, peg 51 empty and Ian ‘Gargoyle’ Melton on peg 53. I really didn’t fancy my chances today, but saying that I was 4th off the same peg some 5 or 6 weeks ago, when it was a lot colder. On that day I weighed in 21lb odd and got pipped by Gandhi Hall by 2 or 3 oz. I caught most of my fish towards peg 53 on the 3ft line with corn as bait. Shaun ‘Sparkie’ Cameron was on peg 54, his dad was on peg 55 and big Mark Calvert was on peg 56. I was in good company with no chance of the section.

I set up 3 rigs:

Rig 1 was for the base of the far slope, which doubled up as my inside rig. This was a .5g Drennan Roach tied direct to a size 18 Kamasan B911 – eyed hook – Hook in the loop style.

My other 2 rigs were for across on top of the shelf. One of the rigs was set slightly deeper than the other one in order for me to fish in the deeper hole to the right of the peg number. Both of the rigs incorporated Garbolino DC 6’s in .2g. I set them both up on .10 Preston Powerline, again with a size 18 Kamasan B911 – eyed hook – HITL style.

The Chappy quid was set up as standard, I cajoled Sweeney Todd into a quid, Gargoyle wouldn’t partake – the miserable sod. Both Jasper and Gaz were also roped into the quid.

For bait, I had some 4mm pellets and some micro pellets for feed.

At the all in, I put a pinch of micro pellets in the fruitshoot cap attached to my pole tip, baited up the shallow rig with a 4mm pellet and went across to the far side. I tipped the bait in and dropped the rig over the top. After about 5 minutes, nothing had happened. I shipped the pole back, put some more bait in the little cup and went back across to the far side and dropped the bait in my 2nd swim. I placed my rig back in the first swim. The float had no sooner settled when 5ft of white hydro elastic was getting dragged from the end of the pole. After a brief tussle, an F1 of about 2lb was soon in the net. Not a bad start.

I proceeded to plunder this line and after about an hour, I had 6 fish in the net for approximately 10lb.

This line seemed to be going quiet now, time to move to my second line. I continued to fish the same on the second line, with the odd look on the first line. By now, I was also starting to feed a few micros by hand at 3m and to put the odd little cup of bait in at the base of the far slope – just covering my options.

Gargoyle to the side of me was starting to put a few fish together by fishing on the 3ft deep line, just down the slope. Why o’ why hadn’t I put up a rig to fish the same line. Toddy in the corner (he was reminiscent of ‘Little Jack Horner’) seemed to be on plan ZK23421 already as he had tried all of his lines, with little success.

I started to catapult a few 4mm pellets in true ‘Giles’ fashion, hoping to kick start my peg for later on, onto the top of the shelf.

I got my deep rig out and dropped the rig down the inside. I managed to snare one or two fish, before that line seemed to get cagey. I was looking around me constantly, trying to gage how I was doing; no one seemed to be catching in any numbers. I seemed to be beating those around me, which is a start, I suppose.

I then went to the base of the far slope and managed to snare a couple before that line also seemed to be going on me. It was one of those days where you managed to get a couple of fish, then it would go quiet. Somebody somewhere will be emptying it.

I plodded on until the end of the match, continuing to take the odd fish off my 4 lines. In the last hour, I aimed for 8 fish and ended up with 3, all of which came off the shallow rig across in the last 15 minutes.

Where had the fish gone? Were they starting to come back? Had I fed enough? These are the general questions that were going round me head.

Bram came round at the end of the match, and I told him that I had about 34lb. The scales arrived at Craig in not time at all. When Craig lifted his net out I mentioned to Bram ‘I have got whatever he has got and more’. Craig plonked 37lb odd on the scales. Where did he get that from? I wish that I had kept my gob shut now as I hadn’t got that much. Toddy hadn’t weighed in and was gone, prior to me walking round to his peg and shaking him upside down until a shiny one dropped out of his pocket. I lifted my net out and thought that I had slightly more than I realised. I plonked 45lb odd on the scales. That put me 2nd overall at the moment. Marco Drury had weighed in 52lb off peg 24. There was still a few more to weigh in yet though. Gargoyle plonked 20 odd lb on the scales and pegs 54 – 56 weighed in an average of 32lb (ish), with big Mark having 33lb.

My luck might be in!!!

Nobody else plonked anything significant on the scales, when I say significant, I mean it in terms of ‘not enough to topple me from 2nd place’. That’s another quid in my pocket courtesy of Chappy.

Full result:

1. MARCOOOOOOO. 52lb odd. Peg 24
2. MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE 45lb odd. Peg 52
3. S Atkins 43lb, peg 57
4. S Medd 43lb
5. Andy Bennet 40lb
6. A Middleton 39lb.

Chappy has started to nickname me ‘Loopyhead’ in view of my new found success using the ‘Hook In The Loop’ that Giles has been using and perfecting for the past few years now.

All of my rigs that I used today were set up HITL style and I have come 2nd again. I can’t explain why I am catching more fish, I don’t know if I am hitting more bites or what. Maybe it is just a case of finally landing on a few fish, but so far I have used the rig 3 times and weighed in 35lb (6th), 60lb (2nd) and 45lb (2nd. Best of all is that Chappy is having to cough up some of the quid’s from last year. I just might have to have a word with Giles at Go-Fishing (over a pint – of Stella, Giles) and see if I can get any more top tips.

See you at Go Fishing and tight lines.

Sunday 25th February 2007

No travelling partner this week, so I decided to scare myself with my driving. I drove with my eyes closed. Most people probably think that I do already, especially following one of Chappy’s comments on the Oaks Banter website.

I arrived at The Oaks in plenty of time to have a breakfast followed by a quick visit to the onsite tackle shop to buy some more B911 eyed hooks for more Hook In The Loop fishing.

Come 9 o’clock, there were 52 anglers present and one angler who hadn’t arrived. I decided to peg the match as 2 pegs together, miss 1 peg all the way around the lake. The angler who hadn’t turned up WAS going to be responsible for one of the sets of scales. Tom, the pond owner’s son, asked if there were any volunteers. I volunteered Jasper Scarlett.

On the subject of Jasper, whilst I was round his house yesterday getting some stuff to elasticate his pole for him, I spotted a picture of some one holding a small carp on the cabinet in the living room. I asked Jasper, who was it. It transpires that it was Jasper in his leaner days, if he ever had them!!!!

Chappy rang me up on Friday night quizzing me about the hook in the loop method, seeing as I battered his travelling partner off the next peg last week. His questions ranged from what float, how deep, where do the shot go, why does the hook move in the loop to name but a few. He then informed me that he was going to make up a couple of rigs himself using the information gleaned from yours truly.

Chappy decided to make up some rigs for Saturday and Sunday. I received a call on Saturday night, asking if I could make up a rig for him as he had left his at home. Fearing a Chappy Slap, I decided it best to pull something together for him. My head was still thumping from last weeks slap (or was it 4, I can’t remember). Just imagine how many brain cells he has damaged.

Jasper pulled the jackpot peg out this week, which ended up in the hands of ‘Blue’ Cardiss. Well that is safe then isn’t it. My quid’s were there in the form of Fullstop, Rumpole, Chappy and Jasper.

I put my hand in the bag and snared peg 62. ‘Flier’ or words along those lines were fired at me by ‘Woody’ Baron (formerly known as ‘Lizard’) as the sun was out and he had obviously warmed up. To be fair, I was not a happy teddy bear. I was on the same peg a week ago Saturday and ended up with 22lb. Shaun Cameron was on peg 62 yesterday and had 40lb and Big Mark Calvert was on peg 61 yesterday and had mid teens.

My quids were going in the direction of pegs 15 (Fullstop), 80 (Rumpole), 36 (Chappy) and 59 (Jasper).

I arrived at my peg to find that I had Garry Parr on peg 63. Another quid side bet was struck. Looking to the peg to my left I spotted ‘Dino’ Drury, Marco’s brother. The last time we had a peg to peg tussle, I took his quid. I asked him if he wanted a chance to win it back. With the two fingered salute, he was either telling me that he wanted £2 quid or to go forth and multiply. We will probably find out later when the scales have arrived and whether or not he had ‘done me’.

Pimmy was on peg 65 and John Allerton was on peg 66. I was in good company for once!!!

I set up 1 rig for down the middle, a Gaz Malham special, which took 4 x 14 shot. I set this rig up to fish ‘hook in the loop’. I was going to have another go at this method following last weeks result. The rig was set up on .13 Preston Powerline straight through to a size 18 eyed Kamasan B911 hook.

Then the experimentation began. I set up 4 rigs for across on top of the shelf. A ‘standard’ rig that comprised a .2g Garbolino DC6 float set up on .10 Novotech line straight through to a size 20 Preston Pr 23 hook. I intended to fish either 4mm pellet or maggot on the hook.

A .2g Garbolino DC 6. My favoured choice of float.

My Hook In The Loop.

I then set up 3 ‘hook in the loop’ rigs for across all of which were set up on .13 Preston Powerline straight through to a size 18 Kamasan B911 eyed hook. Rigs 1 & 2 were the same float, a Garbolino DC6 taking .2g. One of the rigs was for one area of my peg and the other was for another area as the depth varied by about 4” between the two areas. My third and final rig was a .3g Garbolino DC3. Let me explain a little about my choice of floats. In order to get the best from the hook in the loop, it has been suggested that you should have 2 x No.8 shot (or equivalent) at the top of the loop. A .2g float cannot take this weight, if you also have a bulk at half depth. It has also been suggested that a float with a buoyant tip is preferable to a standard thin nylon bristled float, hence the reason for the .3 Garbolino DC 6. It can take 2xNo.8 Preston Stotz (with a small bulk mid-depth) and it is also reminiscent of a ‘caster’ type float.

The deep rig and one of the DC2 rigs were attached to Maver Yellow Dual Core elastic and the other two rigs were attached to White Hydro elastic. I tend to find that White Hydro elastic is softer than the dual core.

For bait I had 1pt of micro pellets (courtesy of Jasper, for doing his rigs), some 4mm ringer expander pellets, a small tin of corn and about ½ pt of groundbait mixed on the dry side.

At the all in, I baited up one of the DC2 rigs with pellet, put a pinch of micros in the fruitshoot top and went out to my first marker. I tipped the bait in, laid the rig in against the slope and manoeuvred the float around until I got it sitting spot on. After about 3 minutes, nothing. I brought the rig back, put some more bait in the fruitshoot and went back out. I tipped the bait in, let the rig settle. Some 2 minutes later the float buried. Carp number 1 was soon in the net. A little F1 weighing just over a pound.

I repeated this process again and to my amazement I didn’t have to weight half the time for the first fish. Over the next hour, I continued to fish to the same area. After about 1 hour, I felt as though the peg was starting to go on me, so I cupped in some bait to my next area in preparation. I would estimate that I had about 15lb in the first hour consisting of 12 fish.

I moved to my 2nd swim and continued in the same vein as above. Once I got into a steady rhythm, I decided to have a go with the .3 DC3. There was a slight chop on the water going from left to right. I went across to the far side, dropped in and for the next half hour or so, struggled to read the float in that it was bobbing with the rhythm of the water and I wasn’t able to read every little dimple. I still managed to snare a few, but I just wasn’t comfortable with the float, nor the indications/bites.

I changed back to my original float and set up. After 2 hours 15 minutes, I rang Chappy to see how he was getting on. He said that he was getting a few and had tried the hook in the loop rig and it worked! He almost sounded surprised. He asked me how I was getting on. I told him that I had an estimated 30lb. I wasn’t kidding this week following last weeks tap on the head. Did I tell you that he slapped me 4 times, but I hadn’t felt the last 3. Oh yeah, I did. My memory is suffering nowadays.

I then decided to go to my 3rd and final swim, which was further round to my left, which meant that with every fish hooked, I had to drag it back 90 degrees before I could ship my pole back. I could have just shoved it back behind me, Gaz is a tad bigger than I, so I thought better of it.

The next 4 fish, all of which came off my 3rd line put the icing on the cake for me. First drop in resulted in a mirror around the 4lb mark. The next 3 drop in’s resulted in a further 3 fish for about 8lb, so I had put 12lb in the net in next to no time.

I then went through a stage of foul-hooking fish and I managed to loose 6 fish in succession. It was all starting to go wrong.

My peg was starting to die, I was having to hunt around for bites and indications. The wind was starting to pick up which was having the effect of pulling the hook out of the fish whilst trying to ship back. What else could go wrong.

In the last 2 hours of the match, I managed to catch 9 fish, 6 of which came in the last 30 minutes or so. Where had they gone? That was it. TIME.

At the end of the match, I lifted my net out to get an idea of what I had and thought that I had somewhere between 40 & 45lb. Gaz confirmed this. Bram came trundling round and also backed up our estimated weights.

The moment of truth.

The scales arrived and I lowered a decent amount of fish into the weigh sling. This weighed in at 40lb 12oz. My first weigh. I put the remainder of the fish onto the scales and managed to force the scales round to 20lb 3oz, which was written down as 23lb due to the confusion between Jaspers voice Bob Harrison’s ears. This was quickly rectified and my total weight of 60lb 15oz was recorded.

To my surprise and amazement that put me 2nd overall, ‘where are all my quids’ quickly raced through my mind. Another thought was also going through my mind ‘where are the other quid’s that haven’t been attending, namely Orc, Pacifier, Macca, Nightie, Bedpan’. I’m on a roll and there is hardly any money flying through the air in my direction. I quickly accosted everyone as for my quid as they came to congratulate me (just because they say ‘well done Mick’ doesn’t mean that I am going to let them off a quid). Fullstop raided his missus’ purse whilst in the pub in order to pay up and Jasper only had 40 pence, yes, forty pence on his person. I still took that as the first instalment.

Graham ‘G2e’ Twohey was pegged next to Chappy and proceeded to batter Chappy off the next peg. As the scales approached both Chappy and G2e agreed that G2e had somewhere in the region of 40lb’s. I would have loved to have been there when G2e pulled his net out to find a great big gaping hole, that even Chappy could have fit through, and about half of what he had caught still in the net. A possible section winning weight down the drain. For the record, G2e weighed in 22lb 8oz to Chappy’s 21lb odd.

Maybe Chappy ought to make up his own rigs as it’s obvious that mine don’t work, he may have caught more if he had remembered to bring his own rigs.

All round good guy and ‘Dons’ stalwart, John D Illingworth won the match with 72lb. Back up weights consisted of a 58lb, 55lb, 46lb and 43lb. All sections were won with more than 30lb. You can’t get any fairer than that.

I wonder if it is too late to have an attempt at the Kamasan leader board!!!

Giles, thank you very much for your advice, I’ll get you a beer at Go Fishing.

Full Result:

John Illingworth (Daiwa Dons) 72-01, carp, pellet, peg 26
Mick Herrington (Bob.Co/Oaks) 60-15 Peg 62
Andy Middleton (Oaks) 58-6 Peg 30
Chris Hall (Oaks) 55-12 Peg 29
Kirk Grainger (Tubertini Clay Lane) 46-6
Andy Dargue (Shimano Quaker) 43-0

Bruce 'Age Concern' Poland.

Don’t you think that he looks like a saddle bag with eyes?

Sunday 18th February 2007

Well here goes.

Bram was away on a club match at Birkin (?), which I was reliably informed, he won with about 70lb (ish), with no one to travel with, I ended up travelling all by myself. Well at least I can listen to Margaret Thatcher’s Greatest Speeches in peace.

Looking at the list of names down for the match, I was hopeful that it would have been a 50 pegger, but by the time of the draw there were 43 anglers in attendance.

I pegged it 2 pegs, miss a peg, all the way around the lake, then I took some of the worst pegs out, with the intention of trying to make some of the not so good pegs better, but still giving everyone at least one side of there peg as an empty peg, but you can’t win them all, as people still complained.

Nightie, Chappy, Fullstop and Rumpole were all in attendance.

Floatman quickly accosted me for the money for the floats that I borrowed yesterday. Well, when I say that he accosted me, he only paid £3.00 for his match. He can have them back when I have finished with them. Besides, he said that I could pay for them when I have tried them, well I haven’t even tried any of them yet. I want a full refund. I wonder if he does 30-day payment terms?

Whilst in the draw queue, Pete ‘Woody’ Baron (he informed a few of the lads in the pub that he had to get off early as it was ‘Line Dancing’ night and he was gonna take his missus) commented on Mick Grant’s new teeth by shouting ‘Steptoe’s Horse, keep the noise down’. You could have heard a pin drop, before we all started laughing.

I put my hand in the bag first – as always (question to all you other match organisers, do you go in first or settle for second best?) and managed to snare peg 21. YUCK!!!! Wished that I had waited now! Peg 21 is on the outside of a bend, with the island going away at 90 degrees, leaving you with a little bit of the island to go at, but hey, that is how the pegging went. I even complained to myself.

Oh well, you can but try. Nightie drew Peg 2; Fullstop was on peg 30, Rumpole – peg 44 and Chappy on peg 69. I was gonna be 4 quid down at this rate.

Upon arriving at my peg, I found that I had former Fisho-Mania champion ‘Dave Pimlott’ on peg 23. I quickly turned round to him and said “I would have had a quid with you, but I remember the last time we had a peg to peg” and Mark ‘Giant One’ Calvert on peg 18. (Think about it with the pegging, pegs 17 & 18 in, peg 19 not in, peg 20 taken out, peg 21 in, peg 22 not in, peg 23 in and shake it all about).

Whilst getting my gear out of my car, John Illingworth enquired about which peg I was on. When I replied, ‘21’, his face said it all.

Following my debacle yesterday, do I fish with the hook in the loop or not.

Sod it, go on then.

I set up 5 rigs, 2 across, one for the top 2 + 2sections, one at the base of the island and one for down the deep water down the side.

In view of yesterdays efforts, I set up a similar process or rigs in terms of a normal rig and a hook in the loop rig across. A hook in the loop at the base of the island slope and a normal rig on both the top 2 + 2 rig and the deep water down the side rig.

The island rigs; I set up the hook in the loop rig to fish across on top of the shelf. This rig, as yesterday, incorporated a .2 Garbolino DC 6 float on .10 line direct to a size 18 Kamasan B911 eyed hook. I plumbed up and found that I had 2ft of water across. My other across rig was the same rig, but I fished a little deeper, just down the shelf at 2.5ft deep. I also plumbed up to the hay bale down the side with this rig until I found the same depth.

My top 2 + 2 rig was a 4 x 14 Drennan Roach float on .10 Preston Powerline straight through to a size 20 Preston PR 23 hook. I plumbed up and found that I had nearly 6ft on this rig. The deepest part of my peg. I set up this rig, as yesterday Chappy had approximately half of his weight (not his body weight stooopid), on his top kit alone.

I also set up a hook in the loop rig as above, for the base of the far slope at 14m going towards peg 20.

My final rig was set up to fish in the deeper water down the inside and incorporated a .3 DC 6. I set this rig up to fish in the standard way – if there is a standard way.

Before the all in Haircut (have you seen his number plate? – P ??? ERM, I kid you not!) told me that he was on peg 20 yesterday and had 31 carp for 31lb and he caught most of them going towards peg 21. All on pellet!

At the all in, I baited up with double maggot and put some micros in my fruit-shoot top and shipped out with the rig that I was planning on fishing just down the slope. I dropped the bait and the rig in and settled back. After about 10 minutes, I got my first indication. I waited a little longer (about 1 minute), nothing. I lifted the rig and dropped it back in. The float had only just settled, when it buried. Fish No1 was in the net. An F1 about 1lb. I repeated the process and caught 6 fish over the next 40 minutes or so.

I then decided to try to spread my feed and also changed my feed by feeding 4mm pellets, whilst fishing pellet on the hook. After some 10 minutes, the float buried and a little F1 was again with its brethren in the net. My first fish of the day on pellet. What I did find was that if I fed the 4mm pellets, I waited that bit longer for a bite.

After about 1-¼ hours, I went over to the far side with the hook in the loop rig, baited with pellet and micro pellets in the fruit-shoot top. I dropped the rig in and got an indication straight away. After a couple of missed bites/liners, I got used to the bites/indications and plundered my peg for the next couple of hours or so.

Pimmy by now was panicking and saw nearly every fish that I caught. Exman’s head had also developed a ball joint and was also looking my way with every fish netted.

Wind Up Time.

Halfway through the match Chappy rang me to find out how I was getting on. I told him that it was really hard and I was struggling for bites. I said that I had about 6 fish. I told him that Pimmy had about 8 fish and Exman was bagging and had about 20 fish. Chappy informed me that he also had about 6 fish, but one of them was a decent fish.

With about 1 hour of the match remaining, the peg was starting to die on me and I had to go to 16m towards peg 20 to try to keep bites coming. I had tried on the top 2 + 2 rig on 3 occasions and never had an indication. I also tried down the side on the shallow rig and never had an indication. At this time of the year, I think that the matches are so tight, that you have to plunder the shoals whilst you can. Everyone else has to then play catch up.

With about 30 minutes of the match remaining Chappy rang me again. In answer to his question of how was it going, I doubled my earlier quotation for Pimmy, Exman and I.

That was it. All out.

I would estimate that I had about 30lb (ish) made up of 44 fish. By the time that the scales had arrive, Gandhi was winning it with 51-12. Shrek Middleton weighed in 49lb (38 fish) and Ron Jeremy weighed in 38lb.

Pimmy got absolutely fish caked. Exman plonked 51lb on the scales for 2nd overall and I put 35lb 13oz on the scales for 6th overall. Pimmy managed to scrape together a respectable 30lb. The Giant One ended up with 26lb, but that was only after he got of his box to have a pee in peg 20, saw what I was up to, then went back and started to fish pellet.

New rule – No walking on matches, and no eye spying on those catching around you.

Apparently, I got 4 Chappy Slaps for winding Chappy up. I must admit, I hadn’t felt the last 3, as I was still numb from the first one.

My thoughts on the ‘hook in the loop’? Well, rightly or wrongly I managed to snare nearly 36lb by using a light line (.10) and a smaller hook (size 18) than yesterday. I foul-hooked 3 fish all day and managed to get 2 of them out, one was hooked under the mouth, the other was hooked just outside the side of the mouth. The general consensus seems to be that you have to use a thicker line, would I have caught more fish? Or have I proved (if that was the case) that you can also catch fish on lighter gear as most of the comments seem to be along the lines of people don’t like the idea because you have to use heavier lines. Who knows? I will however be continuing my own trials and tribulations.

Also, if I had started off my second line earlier, would I have continued to catch for longer or would there have been more chance of splitting the fish into two shoals. Who knows? Hindsight is a wonderful thing.

Saturday 17th February 2007.

Perverted rang me early on during the week to see if I wanted to get off on a fishing match on Sat 17th Feb. I said that I would go, then the debate started about where, The Oaks (No, Perverted thinks it’s sh?te, probably because he can’t catch), Woodlands (I said no, as it is really sh?te, especially if you don’t draw on any fish) and Lindholme. Perverted said that he would get back to me in connection with Lindholme on Friday. Friday arrived and it was still a No!! – too far!!!!!

As a consolation, I made arrangements midweek with Bram to let him know what I was going to do. A quick call to Bram was made on Friday night and it was agreed that I would scare him to death before we got there as I would drive us both. Andy ‘Shrek’ Middleton runs the Saturday matches and by the time of the draw there were 50 of us in attendance.

I was somewhere towards the middle of the queue and by the time that I arrived at the draw bag, I had missed some of the better pegs. I put my hand in the bag and peg 62 jumped into my hand. Bram ended up on peg 12. Peg 62 is considered by most to be one of the best pegs on the whole lake. Bram’s peg is a bit so, so. I arrived at my peg to find that I had Andy Hamilton on peg 61 and none other than the legend himself, Chappy Chapman on peg 64, with no one on peg 63. Chappy is gonna get a right battering today!!! Peg 64 is crap, 62 is better and with peg 63 being empty it got even better. There were only 2 of my usual quid bets around, Martin ‘Rigsby’ Holmes (the tight git) and the usual Chappy quid were the only pounds going around.

Floatman Malham was on peg 65, on the other side of Chappy.

Having been intrigued by the discussions taking place on Total Fishing and Talk Angling forums, I decided to finally have a go at the ‘Giles Cochrane’ Hook In The Loop method. This basically entails having an eyed hook moving freely within a 2” loop at the business end of your rig.

I set up 4 rigs, 2 for down the middle and 2 for across to the island. Both sets of rigs utilised the same floats, ie. .2g Garbolino DC6 floats for across and 4 x 14 Drennan Roach floats for down the middle. One of each float was set as standard, the other was set up as a hook in the loop rig. All of the rigs were set up on .10 Preston Powerline direct. I always prefer to fish direct for the reasons of having less knots on your line therefore having less week spots.

The ‘normal’ rig across was shotted with a bulk at half depth in 18” – 2ft of water. A size 20 Preston PR 23 completed this rig. My hook in the loop rig was completed with a size 16 (the smallest eyed hook that I had available, when I made up my rig) eyed hook, not sure what pattern. (When I showed Chappy the rig at the end of the match, he commented that it looked like a forged hook that still needed some work doing on it).

My normal deep rig was set up to fish dead depth at the base of the slope in about 5ft of water. A size 18 Pr 23 completed this set up. My hook in the loop rig was exactly the same, aside from having the same animal hook as above.

For bait, I had micro pellets, maggots and corn.

At the all in, I baited up the normal across rig (as that is the rig that I had confidence in using) with double red maggot, shipped across to the far side and dropped the rig in. No feed had been put in the peg at this point.

The float had only just settled, when it shot under and an F1 of about 10oz was soon in the landing net. White Hydro through the No. 2 and 3 match sections of my pole is suffice for the stamp of fish at the moment. I put 3 maggots in my fruit-shoot top, went back over to the far-side with my ‘gozunder’ float rig and waited, and waited. I even tried my hook in the loop rig across to the far side. The wind was blowing the rig onto the slope and a couple of times I struck at dips, that were either fish in the peg or more likely, the shot blowing onto the slope causing the float to dip.

After 45 minutes, of dropping the rig all over the far side, I decided it was time to have a look down the middle. Chappy also helped persuade me to go down the middle as by now he had about 6 fish to my one. The quid was in jeopardy already, even at this early stage.

I baited up one of the deep rigs with corn and dropped in down the middle. Some 5 minutes later, I got my first indication and struck, nothing there. I dropped in again. After about 2 minutes, the float buried again, a little F1 about 12 oz was soon in the net. I was using Yellow Maver Dual Core elastic through my pole tips down the middle as it is less forgiving than white hydro, especially in the deeper water.

One of the common mistakes that I see a lot of people do is to fish with tight elastic in their pole kits. This has the effect of keeping the fish in the fish catching area for longer as it cannot ‘run’ out of the part of the peg where it was hooked. I have just elasticated two poles for a couple of the lads that go to The Oaks. They had about 1 ft of elastic through a Tournament Pro top two, now figure that out.

I decided to take the plunge, not literally, and try the hook in the loop rig. I baited up with corn on the hook and stared at the rig in disbelief, thinking to my self ‘what am I doing?’. I dropped the rig in and waited all of 20 seconds, the float buried, carp No.1 on the ‘new rig’. I was converted. I fished down the same whole for the next 3 hours and had about 24 fish, nothing bigger than 1lb. Chappy meanwhile was about 6 or 7 fish in front of me and he had a slightly bigger stamp of fish. In the last hour, just about every square inch of my peg seemed to be devoid of fish. I couldn’t buy a bite anywhere. Not down the middle nor across, not even with the ‘new gozunder rig’.

That was it. Match over for me.

By the time that the scales had arrived, Phil Sellars was leading with 49lb (no didn’t have that much), John Allerton had 46lb (didn’t have that much either). Bram had managed to plonk 31lb (didn’t think that I had that much, but it might be close) on the scales and there were numerous other 30lb weights. Panic put 24lb on the scales from peg 59. Andy Hamilton weighed in 15lb off peg 61. I put a disappointed 22lb on the scales. I honestly thought that I had more than that, some where nearer to 28lb would have been better. Now for Chappy. I got a proper Chappy slap as he put 39lb on the scales and got the section win.

Floatman managed to snare 23lb from the other side of Chappy and Rigsby managed to snare 25lb odd. What a poor day at the office, £2 down already, that is before I pay for my floatman floats. I even bought Chappy and Pimmy a pint and he was the one who won the money, there’s something wrong here.

My thoughts, there is definitely something to the hook in the loop method. I think that I may have got it wrong for trying to fish up the slope a little rather than fishing on the flat of the lake. Maybe I used the wrong hook, who knows (If Giles reads this, he may let me know, please?).

If there is one thing that I learned today was the Chappy fished his big heart out. I think that it had a lot to do with the fact of drawing next to me and stamping his authority around.

There’s always tomorrow……….. come back and find out how I got on.

Back in the pub afterwards, I quickly surveyed my surroundings and promptly raised a quid bet on Reading beating Man U with ‘Rosie and Jim’ Stonner. After about 10 minutes of the match starting, Chappy reminded me that I should have asked for the draw. A quick discussion followed with a lot of cussing, and I finally got the draw. No to say that I don’t understand football (not in terms of the offside rule, more like, I couldn’t tell you the names of 3 players that play for Leeds, could probably name about 3 Man U players and as for Arsenal and West Ham, I haven’t got a clue), but I felt as though I had jumped from the frying pan into the fire on this one.

WELL DONE READING!!!!!!

Tight lines.

Update No. 1

Just trying to bring you up to date with my activities over the past month or so. So, what have I been up to since my last update?

Work, work and more work I suppose.

Both of my administrators have decided to hand in their notice, one of them left on 5th January 2007 and the other will be leaving at the end of Feb (after I persuaded her to stay until the end of Feb as she was hoping to leave mid Feb), see picture below!!!. Now don’t get me wrong, I am not an ogre or anything, one of my staff left to go and work for her friend/cousin which included a promotion (wait until it’s pay day, she may be back), the other one is leaving in order to dedicate more of her time to setting up her own business. All that I seem to have been doing is interviewing of late. In addition to the girl that provided me with a list of her attributes (see below), one of the girls that attended for an interview was a tidy trainee fitness instructor (in her spare time). She was nearly offered the position for that alone, but alas, the job was offered to someone else with a steadier career history. You never know, she may be offered a job in the near future if the new girls don’t work out (geddit?). At the moment, I am trying to do my job and help with training and to assist the other staff with their job/tasks.

Well then, how has my fishing been going. So, so, is the straight forward answer.

For a breather, I went to an old stomping ground of mine, Raker Lakes just outside York. After gathering a bit of info, I went armed to the teeth with the intention of catching a few roach and the odd carp as the carp haven’t switched on yet. I had a word with Paul Connolly in the car park and he informed me that it was a roach affair, fishing with caster, some areas are ropey and other areas are full of fish. He advised to fish and feed caster. NO Groundbait. Paul ‘PK Peanuts’ Kozyra (try saying that when you are Brahms and Lizst) told me to fish caster over groundbait. Who to believe?

I put my hand in the bag and managed to snare peg 16. When the weather is warmer, the carp can be plentiful, but at this time of year it is stuffed with roach and skimmers, with the possibility of carp over to the far side. The peg is some 18 – 19m wide and the base of the far slope is at 16m. 5 minutes before kick off, I had a quick walk around the lake to see what was on people bait trays and to get an idea of who had drawn where. Connolly had no groundbait and Peanuts had groundbait.

I decided to knock up some Sensas Roach (neat) laced with a few pinkies and Casters. I set up 3 rigs:

Rig one was a 4x14 Drennan Roach rig on .10 direct to a size 20 Preston PR 23 hook. I plumbed up down the middle at 13m and found that I had about 7ft. I used white hydro to complete this set up.

Rig two was a .8g Series Top float on the same set up as above. The reason for the heavier float was to try to get the bait down quicker if I was getting a lot of fast bites and was also in case the wind decided to pick up. White hydro completed this set up.

Rig three was a 4 x 12 Series Top. I attached this to .10 Fox Match Plus line direct to a size 18 Preston PR 23 hook. I plumbed up at the base of the near slope, which was some 7m out to my left. Maver Yellow Dual Core completed this set up. The reason for the bigger hook and the stronger elastic, was that I felt that there was a better chance of a carp on this line than on my 13m line.

At the all in, I catapulted a few pinkies out to 13m and put some maggots and caster in at 7m. I baited up with a single maggot on the hook. My first indication some 10 minutes into the match resulted in a roach of about 2oz. Although it wasn’t a monster, a fish is a fish at this time of the year. After some 30 minutes and a couple more pairs of eyes, I took a gamble and decided to put in a golf ball of groundbait at 13m. I also put some micro pellets in at 7m with a few more maggots.

I started to get indications some 10 minutes after putting in the groundbait. I caught a skimmer of about 10oz. The bloke on peg 15 had managed to snare a carp and the bloke on peg 17 had a couple of roach. I started to cup in about 10 casters after every fish and the fish were starting to come thick and fast. After about 20 minutes, some bubbles were coming up on the 7m line where I had fed the micro pellets. I quickly swapped over to my 7m rig, baited up with double maggot and dropped in. The float buried straight away, a liner. I dropped back in and waited and waited. After about 5 minutes, the float buried and a roach of about 8oz was soon in the net. Not what I expected, but it’s 8oz more than I had.

I swapped back to the 13m line, baited up with caster, put a few casters in the tosspot and proceeded to catch roach for the duration of the match. I put in a few micro pellets to try to bring in more skimmers, this failed to bring in the skimmers and it also knocked the roach on the head for a time. I put in another couple of balls of groundbait throughout the duration of the match and proceeded to plug away, fishing caster over the odd ball of groundbait and feeding casters via a ‘TossPot’. At the all out, I weighed in just short of 9lb of roach and skimmers. The lad on peg 17 had a carp of about 7lb and 2lb of bits for just over 9lb, and the lad on peg 15 sat it out on the floating pole all day for 6 indications and 4 carp for 11lb odd. 22lb of skimmers won the match, with 21lb of little pasties second.

I enjoyed myself. Every time the float went under, you had the anticipation of the fish being a skimmer (they run to over 7lb), a good roach, a tench or even a double figure carp. I might have to go again sometime soon.

This is a picture of one of my staff that is leaving.

I will be sorry to see her go for one or two obvious reasons!!!!

Sunday 14th January 2007.


Well well well, where do I start. I suppose first of all, with a belated Happy New Year and tightlines to you all.

So what has happened since my last blog? Here goes…

We had our Christmas Cheer on the 17th December with a first prize of £500, 2nd £300 and 3rd £200 with five man sections winning £100. I drew peg 39 and had to contend with pegs 36 to 40. The Pacifier was on peg 36, Neil Chapelow on 37, Age Concern on 38 and Slob Armitage on peg 40. This should be a walk in the park. After 5 hours I had amassed a total weight of 11lb odd. I had 14 F1 carp. Slob had 13 carp and put 15lb on the scales. The Pacifier managed to snare 16lb odd for a section win and £100. He had managed to capture one of Gandhi’s (one of the lads that works in the café) pets. The smallest of these carp go 6lb and have reached over 8lb. Due to not winning his section, Slob declined going back to the pub for the banter and the piss taking. This is where the real fun begins.

‘Charisma’ Pawlett won the match and £500 with 28lb odd. David and Tom Kaye (the pond owners) had donated a few prizes to go with all of the Xmas alcoholic prizes. One of the said prizes was a 28” TV, which was duly won my non other than Andy ‘Rosie and Jim’ Stonner.

Prior to the raffle, I had a few prizes to hand out. I awarded a bottle of bubbly to the lowest weight weighed in on the match. Age Concern was on for a double has he along with 2 other compadres weighed in 1lb 12oz. Age Concern weighed in 1lb 1oz last year. He commented that the wanted the triple crown at next years (or is that this years) event.

A ballot was held on the Oaks Banter discussion forum for the ‘Numpty of the year’ and after getting over half of the total votes (11 votes out of a total of 21 brave souls, brave enough to post a vote) unfortunately John ‘Chappy’ Chapman was this years winner. He graciously accepted his bottle of plonk for his troubles, that was after chasing me around the pub.

Whilst partaking in the raffle, I devised a new sport – ‘Baron Baiting’. Let me explain….

Whilst announcing the winners of the various raffle prizes, I eye-spied Lizard Baron’s raffle tickets. I put my hand in the bowl and selected one of the tickets. I looked at it, covered up the first number (3) and proceeded to announce the winning ticket as ‘Blue 21’. The Lizard woke up and proceeded to dance about, shouting profanities as he had finally won something. After finally getting him out from under his rock, I had to tell him that I had got it wrong and that winning number was actually ‘Blue 321’. I was allowed to breath some 2 minutes later, after he had let go of my throat. Everybody was in stitches. I was laughing so much, I had tears streaming down my face. Some 10 raffle tickets later, I went for the double. I shot and I scored (my throat was red after this episode). To his credit, the Lizard took it in the vain that it was meant to be.

A word of advice, never join together with Xman Exley to get a raffle ticket or anything that relies on luck/chance. We must have had nearly 60 or 70 raffle prizes and Xman managed to dodge all of them, despite having half a book of raffle tickets in front of him. I think that out of the total prizes on offer from both the match and the raffle, Xman ended up with ‘absolutely nothing, nada, zilch, zip, a big fat ZEROOOOOO!!!’.

All in all, it was a good do. The Kaye’s had put on a spread of food for us, donated some raffle prizes, gave us the lake for free, and that was just for this match. The pond owners do try to accommodate and look after all of the visiting anglers and this is their way of showing their appreciation.

David and Tom, thank you and I can safely say that that is from all the visiting anglers who go to The Oaks Lakes.

In view of my one of my administrators leaving, I was carrying out interviews at work week commencing 18th December. One of the blokes that applied for the job, that I got in for an interview had a weird laugh to say the least. Following his interview, and after he had left/was shown off the premises, the Sales Manager asked me what the noise was coming from the interview room. I explained that he thought that he had said something funny and was laughing. The Sales Manger thought that he was having a fit.

On one of the other CV’s that I received, a girl had completed her name and address details, the proceeded to describe herself attributes as follows (these were serious entries on her CV):

Height: 5ft 4”
Hair: Brown
Weight: 8 stone
Size: 10
Bust: 34 C

I was nearly tempted to get her in for an interview, just to see if she was lying about her bust size.

One of the other applicants (male) had a good CV, that indicated that he had a degree in something or other. Whilst interviewing him, I was pointing out some of the duties that he would have to undertake and mentioned ‘typing letters’. He replied that he didn’t know how to type letters, but would use the internet to source how to type letters so that he wouldn’t forget next time. He will go far, won’t he!!!!

Anyways, back to the fishing. I managed to get off over the Xmas period to Naburn Lock at York with a mate of mine – Nick ‘Chod’ Garbutt. We decided to fish the canal section and balled it in with groundbait (a 50/50 mix of Sensas Lake and brown crumb) laced with casters. I fished with .5g rigs using both maggot and casters as bait. I managed to snare about 50 roach between 1 oz to 5 oz (mainly 1 – 2oz in size) and maybe a dozen perch of between 2 oz to 8 oz. Chod had a similar number of fish, but had few bigger stamp fish. He had fed hemp and I wonder if that had drawn in and helped to hold the larger stamp of fish. An enjoyable day was had by both of us, that was until I decided to check the depth of where I had been fishing, literally. On the towpath, there was a little ledge on the water line of about 6” wide. I decided to put my foot on it in order for me to rinse out my bait boxes. My foot slipped and I found out that it was deeper than 5’ 10” as I had to swim out. This was on one of the coldest, windiest days at the back end of last year. The water was some 8ft deep for you information. I clambered out using one of the hand rails on the tow path (I think that people fall in quite regular here to the extent that they have hand rails installed similar to what you will find in a swimming pool). In view of wearing my Preston’s Dri-Fish 150 suit, my feet and lower legs (from knee to ankle) and my hair were the only things that were wet. My Preston Dri-Fish 150 had done me proud. My phone had gone on the blink as some water had got in it, I put the phone on one of the car heating vents and by the time that I had got home the phone was working again (and still is).

Sunday 31st December. I drew peg 40 which was a peg away from where I was on the Xmas Cheer match and had Timothy ‘Sorry’ Moran for company to my right on peg 41. I was after a re-match in view of him taking a quid off me (or is it two quid) during the warmer months. After 5 hours I amassed 14lb odd. Sorry ended up with 11lb odd. Oh, he was also a quid down to boot. Chappy ended the last match of the year in the same vein as the first pound side bet by taking my quid again. I think that for 2007 I will pay him £52 as a lump sum and ask him for £2 back should I win. He said that I should pay him for the year and make do with that with no refunds or anything. I said that I will think about it not!!!


I thank you for reading thus far and I will try to get the next instalment up and running in the v. near future. Keep coming back and having a read to see if there is anything new.

Updated Blog.

My good lady wife has been away for the past 3 weeks, one of my staff has decided to hand in her notice at work (office administrator required, salary c £14k) and I have been washing and ironing my oldest two lads school and home clothes. I have had both the month end and the year end accounts to prepare along with the VAT return. So as you can see, I haven’t had time to fart!!!

Well here goes, I will try to condense the activities of the past 3 weeks into as few pages as possible.

I was on a high following sitting behind Alwin as I had a 3rd and a 7th overall.

Sunday 19th November, I drew peg 77 and for company, I had Rumpole of the Bailey to my left on peg 76 and Marco Drury’s brother ‘Dino’ to my right on peg 78. Team Glum’s ‘El Capitan – Stef ‘Slim’ Armitage’ was within earshot on peg 75. Marco was on peg 74 (with corner peg 73 empty, I hastily add) and Charisma Pawlett was on end peg 80.

When I arrived at my peg, there was a frost on the ground. In defence of my performance, the area that I was in has not produced anything since the middle of summer. At the moment, the best weight from pegs 68 (ish) round to peg 80 is lower than the worst weight from the rest of the lake. The reason being that although the sun does shine ‘ooooppp North’ there is a wall of 40ft conifers and evergreens some 12m behind you. The only saving grace is that if there is a strong Southerly wind, you don’t tend to feel it.

Whilst I was setting up there was a plethora of quid side bets flying about, all of which were aimed at yours truly. Haven’t they seen my results from the previous two weeks? Obviously not. In addition to the obligatory quid’s with the usual suspects, I set up a quid with Dino, Rumpole and Slim. A couple of easy quid’s were gonna come my way. Marco decided to stick his beak in and also roped me into a quid. Charisma wouldn’t have a quid ‘the wuss’.

Steve ‘Toastie’ Hall, who was looking somewhat the worse for wear, courtesy of a glass or a bottle (one of the two) tried to rope me into a quid. I hastily declined.

I set up the usual array of Garbolino DC6’s for across and a couple of Drennan Roach rigs for down the middle.

I kicked off down the middle and observed all and sundry starting to bag around me. It took a while, but eventually a carp fell to my double red maggot hookbait. After about 50 minutes down the middle, I had 3 carp for about 2lb and both Rumpole and Slim had about 6 carp. I decided to have a look across. I had been flicking the odd couple of maggots or so, on both the line across and down the middle.

I dropped in across and managed to snare 3 carp before the gnomes either side of me had managed another bite. My peg was ripe for reaping.

Over the remainder of the match, I swapped between down the middle and across trying to pick the odd fish up of each line. I ended up with 19 fish and plonked 15lb odd on the scales. ‘Slim’ managed to snare 8lb as did ‘Rumpole’. Dino Dnw’d (but I didn’t take his quid). Word of warning, don’t have a quid with ‘Slim’. He tried to pay me in the plastic money that you use when you are in nursery school and you buy a plastic tin of peas (you know the money that I mean). Marco upset the applecart due to plonking 19lb on the scales. I was also glad that I never pushed Charisma into his quid as he also plonked 18lb on the scales.

My section winner (after a bit of fiddling J (chin up Marco)) was Chappy who was the first angler in our 11 peg section. There were a couple of tears following the announcement of the overall result and section winners, both from myself (as I had to give another quid to Chappy, which considering that he had been out of pocket for the past two weeks and couldn’t afford his weekly porno mag (The Sunday Sport), I found pretty hard to take) and the other person that had a ‘sad on’ with me was Marco as he was adamant that I had fiddled the section in order to award the section prize to Chappy.

I put the smaller sections at the beginning of the lake (2 x 10 peg sections) and the larger sections at the back end of the lake (5 x 11 peg sections) as I do every week, but alas, there was no consoling Marco.

The following week (Sunday 26th November), I dipped into the drawbag and managed to extract peg 21 from the deepest, darkest depths of sorrow. It is utter @h{ite and that is at the best of times

Upon arriving at my peg, I had ‘Fullstop’ Byron on peg 19 (the better peg), Raymondo Wallace on peg 20 and ‘Meatcutter’ Bailey on peg 22. Meatcutter had been on peg 23 last week so was in tune with this particular area of the lake. On yesterdays match the best weight from this corner was 16lb. A good day was not on the cards. Meatcutter was quickly added to the quid corner for the day.

Peg 21 is a corner peg on the outside of a bend with the island being almost at a right angle. The island part of the peg is one of the shortest pegs on the whole lake.

At the start of the match, I fished down to my left hand side at about 8m along the bank and about 4m out, fishing just at the base of the deepest part of the corner peg. After about 20 minutes, I got my first indication and missed it. I dropped back in and managed to hook into something. As I was shipping back, the hook pulled. It took a full 40 minutes plus before I put my first fish in the net. A small F1 of about 8oz.

After about 2 hours, I had managed to put about 8 fish in the net. I decided to have a look across to the far side. I dropped in and the float shot sideways straight away. A chub of about 12 oz was soon in the net. This was my one and only fish from the far side.

With about 2 hours to go I observed Raymondo catching a few fish on his top 3 kit. He seemed to be fishing about 4ft deep down the nearside slope. I decided to change tack. I got another rig out a 4 x 12 Drennan Roach and plumbed up at the base of the near slope and found that I had about 5.5ft on a long top two kit. I baited up with corn and fed a couple of maggots and a grain of corn. Over the next couple of hours, I had managed to put about 15 fish in the net, but alas they were all small. I looked at my watch and saw that the match was all but finished. I waited for Meatcutter to ship out, chuck a bit of bait on top of his float (he had also come inside on his top 2 kit). Just as his float settled, I shouted time. Hard luck mate. Just as I shouted time, my float trembled (it must have been the vibrations from me shouting ‘Time’). I waited all of 10 seconds and the float shot under. I had to chuck back a carp of about 12oz. That fish may cost me as it was very close between Meatcutter and I. Fullstop managed to put 14lb on the scales. Raymondo tipped back. I weighed in 16lb 8oz. Now Meatcutter’s turn. He put 16lb 12oz on the scales. I had been done. Marco had weighed me in. I think it was revenge from last weeks match when he didn’t win his section.

Sunday 3rd December 2006. Nearly Xmas time chaps. The weather is getting colder. The wind is getting stronger. The rain is blinking freezing. All I am waiting for now is the snow. The wind was ‘BLOWING’ from a South-Westerly direction, therefore making for a good day for the pole repairers.

I put my hand in the bag and managed to pull out peg 43. At least the wind was going to be more off my back rather than side on (or that it was I thought). When I arrived at my peg, the peg was more or less coming from right to left, although it did occasionally decide to come off my back. I had Pat Bailey to my left on peg 42 and Neil Chapelow on peg 44. Meatcutter was in earshot on peg 45. The return quid was back on.

Meatcutter asked me a serious question at the start of the match. ‘Will I catch on the bomb rod?’ ‘Don’t be daft idiot’ or words to that effect erupted from my mouth. He still set it up.

I set up 3 rigs to fish 3 different lines, 1 on the top 4 kit, one at the base of the far slope and one across. I fed a couple of maggots on the close in line and flicked the same out to the other two lines. I baited up with corn and dropped in. Before I had even had an indication, Pat had managed to get 4 carp off the far side. My float buried and a carp of about 1lb was soon in the net. I managed to get back to 5 – 4 with Pat still in the lead.

In view of me now starting to get a couple of fish, Pat decided to come close in and have a look. He dropped in and caught a bream of about 3lb, then a carp of about 2lb. I was way behind again.

Meatcutter had managed to snare a few. He gave a quick shout to me and I observed him chucking the tip rod out. FOOL!!! About 20 seconds later Meatcutter shouted at me ‘Mick, I thought you said the tip didn’t work’. Basket!!!!

About 15 minutes later I shouted over to Meatcutter ‘Have you finished with your bomb rod?’. I even had to walk over to him to get the rod, the lazy sod. I chucked it out and I managed to get ‘ABSOLUTELY NOTHING’. I told you the bomb rod doesn’t work. The rod was a Garbolino model (not sure which), but it was fantastic. Nice, soft and responsive. Gonna have to get me one of them.

That was it, match over. I felt as though I hadn’t really caught anything (no change there then, I suppose). Pat had been getting the odd fish, all of which were a considerably better stamp than mine. I ended up with 19 fish for 16lb. Pat had 21 fish for 32lb. Ho Hum. Meatcutter put 23lb on the scales. To my defence, Neil Chapelow only managed 11lb odd.

There you go, that’s it. I’ll try to go back to the more informative report as soon as I can.

With regards to the quids, over the past 3 matches or so, I have won some and I have lost some. All I can say is thank god that I have a regular quid with the Orc, at least then I manage to take a quid home nearly every week.