Welcome to my fishing blog… January 2023

January 15th – Roundup – The Good, The Bad and The Ugly!

Happy New Year! In my view, fishing is not just about bagging up every week on some commercial fishery… if only! It’s also about having to endure those soul-destroying, mind-numbing days when no matter what you do you can’t even get a bite. Everyone has been there and I’m sure this year, although it’s only a few weeks old, I’m already at the top of the losing leaderboard. At least it feels that way. Well, we’re 2 weeks into the New Year and I have 2 matches and a pleasure session under my belt so far. My first match was on the 8th of January and it should have been on the Crane section of the river Avon at Keynsham but with the water lapping the top of the bank and with more rain forecast this had to be cancelled.

So, I decided to have a go at the open on the Windmill Fishery, near Westerleigh. I did okay there 10 days previous with a win from peg 25, needing only 4 carp to take home the spoils. However, in this game, a lot can happen in a short space of time. This time, I drew peg 6 on the left-hand bank, which at any other time of year I would have fancied. Today however, the wind was howling from left to right and the driving rain was relentless. Okay, so it was the same for everyone and no excuses there, it just made any proper pole presentation very difficult. So, the plan was to chuck the maggot feeder out first and wait. I was able to get quite close to the edge of the island opposite and work my way back and out over the first hour but no signs of any life.

I changed to bomb and bread and maybe I should have started on this method… but I’ll never know. Anyway, after plopping bread in here, there and everywhere for another hour, still nothing… not a sign… not a liner… not a sniff. A quick change to corn on the bomb rig and a repeat of the previous motions brought nothing either. So, it was time to give up on this method and get the trusty pole out. I had already primed a swim at 9 metres with micros and an inside line with Pro Thatchers green fishmeal groundbait and now it was time to see if any of the reluctant inhabitants were curious enough to wander over my feed.

It was 7 feet deep on the 9-metre line and taking into consideration the strength of the wind, I had chosen a 1.5-gram Chianti float rig with a size 18 Guru MWG hook to an 11 Duraslip elastic. A single red maggot was the initial offering followed by double red pinkie and then a single pinkie. That brought a big fat nothing! A look down the edge with expander pellet, maggot, corn and worm produced nothing too. Well, what else can I say? It was just one of those days. Half the field had packed up early or didn’t weigh-in, although organiser Gerry Welsh managed to find a few carp on corn to win comfortably. Second place went to Kev Winstone who latched onto a carp on the very last cast of the day, landing it in extra time.

After that little episode, I had to get out and catch some fish in order to restore my self-esteem, or sanity as some people might call it. So, the following Wednesday I decided to head over to the Clamp, a stone’s throw away from Windmill but a totally different fishery. The Clamp is controlled by Alcove AC and holds a good head of silvers. I only set up one rig for fishing at 11 metres with maggot, pinkie and expander pellets, feeding a few micros through the cadpot at every put-in. After 15 minutes I had an F1, quickly followed by a run of skimmers and quality roach…  I lost a carp on light gear at the end of the session finishing up with about 6lb of silvers. It was a lovely day and the self-confidence meter was sufficiently topped back up.

Then it all went wrong again!  My next match was the belated Christmas club match at Whitehouse Farm. On the original date, (December 18th), the lakes were frozen solid so the match was put back. The weather today wasn’t too bad apart from a wet spell at the start and a continuous wind blowing the full length of Margaret’s Lake, where I had drawn. Jokingly, I asked match secretary, Tony Welsby for peg 17 on Margaret’s, which can be a flyer. I’ve won several matches from this peg so I was ‘tickety-boo’ when I drew it again… (really?… tickety-boo?) Okay, happy as a pig in sh*t then!

My first big mistake was to laser target the chub, which live close to the island, with a maggot feeder for the first 90 minutes. There was no sign of life on that method so I cupped out a small ball of Thatchers green and some micros and pinkies at 10 metres, dropping my 1-gram rig over the top. My rig was set to 4 inches over-depth to counteract the wind with the bulk of the shot about 12 inches from the size 18 Guru hook to a 0.15 Guru N gauge hook length. I started on pinkie and caught a tiny perch so changed to maggot, which brought a 3oz roach about 10 minutes later. But it just wasn’t happening so back out on the maggot feeder to the island for the chub.

Well, another 90 minutes had swiftly gone by before I had to finally concede defeat with this method. Strange really… the chub always patrol the island and you can usually pick off a few before they move on. At around 2-3lb a piece, I knew I wouldn’t have needed many to be in with a shout today but it just wasn’t to be. With less than 2 hours left to go, I had to now focus on my pole line but I felt I might have missed the boat as others around the lake had caught a few roach and skimmers leaving me well behind. So, back out on the red maggot and after a few minutes I caught another tiny perch. I then put a white maggot on and laid the rig in over the feed. The float had just settled and then darted under. At last a decent fish! At first, I thought I had latched onto a carp but as it came closer I realised it was an F1 about two and a half pounds… at least!

As I got the fish closer, it stayed down deep and began to go around in circles under my pole tip so I started to put some pressure on so that I could get its head up and then… disaster! We parted company. In hindsight that one fish could have won me the lake as only 2lb 10 oz was needed for the win. I always seem to lose quality fish in matches and I’ll never get used to it. No matter how much I balance my tackle they always seem to get the upper hand or fin… or am I just being a silly Billy and feeling sorry for myself? Anyway, I carried on regardless and caught another small roach before the final whistle, ending up with just 9ounces for my efforts. Bah humbug! Happy fecking Christmas!

My next match is a winter league match, which will be on the Fishponds Lido on Sunday 22nd January… can it be any worse? Oh yes! Watch this space!

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January 2023

   22nd – The Lido, Fishponds, Bristol

   29th – Boyd Valley Lake, Bitton

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…………………

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