Sunday 16^th March – Time To Reset With A Pleasure Session – Georges Lake, Whitehouse Farm

Before I get into the delights of my pleasure session, I did fish a match at Windmill Fisheries on Thursday, 13^th March. It was another Costcutter 500 qualifier and there were 13 anglers in attendance. There was a bitter North East wind blowing up the lake and I kid you not… It was cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey. I fancied one of the lower pegs on the left-hand bank, especially 7,8,9 and 10 as the wind would be off my back, but I got peg 1 instead. Okay, so peg 1 can be good sometimes and there are lots of options. Peg 2 wasn’t in and so that was even better as I would be able to draw any fish from that peg into mine… right? Yeah right!

I had Paul Barnfield for company on peg 3 and Nick Saunders on peg 25. Nick had the wind blowing straight at him all day… what a brave man! So, what to do? Well, I decided to kick off with the obligatory bomb and maggle for fishing right over against the island. I also opted for a line straight out in front at 9 metres and an inside line to my right, adjacent to the reeds. On the all-in, I cupped out some chopped worm and groundbait to the 9-metre line and then lobbed out the bomb with 2 maggles on a size 16 hook. About 6 casts later, I finally got a liner and then soon after that I foul-hooked a carp and lost it. Undeterred, I went out again.

It must have been a good 15-20 minutes before I began getting more indications and then finally, my first carp was hooked and landed. It wasn’t very big, at around 5lbs, but very welcome. Soon after, Nick began catching. First down his left-hand edge and then out in front in wide open water. I couldn’t get any more bites on the bomb, so I went over my chopped worm line. I gave it 30 minutes, but there was just nothing happening there. I decided to start a new line right over to my right at 10 metres, fishing just single maggle. Nothing doing there either. I changed to corn on the hook but I was going nowhere fast. Meanwhile, Nick was catching a few and I was now 3 fish behind him.

Well, I had tried everything except down my left-hand edge, so on went a serious short top 2, complete with 18 slick, 0.19 mainline and a size 14 hook to a 0.17 hooklength. A 6mm pellet of meat was lowered in and I had an indication right away. About 10 minutes later, I was in and another small carp was netted. This was quickly followed by another, but I was still 2 carp behind Nick, who had just added one more to his net. With an hour to go, I had 3 more smallish carp and lost an almighty animal after playing it for some time. However, Nick had put a lot of daylight between us during this time and so I ended up with just 6 to his 10. Barney on peg 3 had a late run on the worm, bringing his tally to 6 carp, which just happened to be a bit bigger than mine. Who said size isn’t everything?

Well, I weighed in 6 for 26lbs, Barney had 6 for 34lbs and Nick had 10 for almost 57lbs. Well done to him and well done to all the framers. I’ll be back at Windmill next week for another go, having developed a new “cunning plan.”

George’s Lake, Whitehouse Farm

If you’re constantly fishing matches and getting overwhelmingly frustrated with your performance, then I highly recommend a nice, relaxing pleasure session to beef up your confidence. That’s what I did and it worked a treat. So, myself and Alcove Match Secretary, Jason Pitman, headed over to Georges Lake for a silvers session. First, it was a real pleasure to wheel my barrow down the new hard track and then unload onto a nice new platform. There were 2 anglers already on the lake and a few more turned up later on what turned out to be a lovely sunny day, although there was still a little nip in the air. We opted for pegs 3 and 4, with me picking peg 4.

Our target was skimbos, which are real weight boosters with some of them weighing in at over 2lbs a piece. Otherwise, all silvers would be welcome and there are a lot of them in this lake, including F1s, chub, roach, rudd and perch. As the wind was light, I decided to fish 2 lines out at 11 metres. One line was to my left, where I fed chopped worm and groundbait and then one line to my right with corn and maggles. I fed both lines at the start and then went on the 4.5 metre whip for 20 minutes, catching a few small roach from under the tree that separated us. A look over the chopped worm line brought a small roach but little else and then a look over the corn and maggle never produced any interest whatsoever.

I topped up the chopped worm line and went back on the whip for another 30 minutes, catching a roach a chuck. Then back out over the choppie and I had my first skimbo, which was only about 12 ounces. Meanwhile, Jason had started catching some good quality skimbos at around 8 metres on maggle. I was tempted to come short but I really wanted to see if I could catch any biggies on worm a bit farther out today. We have a match on both lakes next Sunday, so in essence, this was a bit of a practice for both of us. Well, I did hook into a couple of bigger skimbos, but they came off as I was bringing them in. I changed to a lighter elastic and then managed to net 2 but both were around the 10-12 ounce mark and I had to wait a long time for bites.

I had already abandoned the corn line earlier and so now I had to dedicate the rest of my time to fishing the whip. I began fishing both left and right at a depth of 3 feet and then it began to get quite interesting. The roach were getting bigger and then the rudd joined in. I also had a couple of perch join the party before a 2lb F1 decided to gate-crash. I then had another F1, and then another, followed by 4 small chub. I love fishing the whip when they’re queuing up. It’s surprising how quickly you can build a weight and you just never know when a bonus fish will put in an appearance.

Well, the whip saved the day for me and served up a weight of over 13lbs. Jason managed to keep the skimbos coming and finished up with over 18lbs, which included a bonus 2lb plus goldfish. Verdict: Maggle was the best bait all round with worm managing to stir a little interest but corn was a no-no today. The match we have here next Sunday is a rover and will be on both lakes. So, that has presented us with a real problem… what lake will we favour and what peg would we choose? To be continued…

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