Billy's Fishing Blog » Billys Fishing Blog April 22nd

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Welcome to my fishing blog… April 2023

April 22nd – Saturday Shield – Georges Lake, Whitehouse Farm – A Tale of 2 Lakes

Unusually, I fished a Saturday match this weekend. It was the Saturday Shield, at Whitehouse Farm. Tony the match secretary, decided to treat this like 2 separate matches because each lake can fish so very differently. Margaret’s Lake has the advantage of deeper water at one end and a large island, which is home to a sizable shoal of quality chub. George’s Lake has less chub and a very small island. The best weights almost always come from Margaret’s Lake so I fully support Tony’s decision.

So, it’s Saturday morning at 6am and it looked very white outside. As I left home at 7am it was still white and minus 1, which is absolutely NOT what was forecast. According to Tomasz Schafernaker, the weather should have been misty for our region, so wrong again matey. When I arrived at the venue it was still white and I was feeling pretty glad that I had brought maggles and pinkles with me, as I was sure they would come into play.

Well, the usual banter proceeded and as everyone had arrived on time we got on with the draw a little early. I obviously wanted a draw on Margaret’s but instead, I got a peg on Georges. G18 emerged from the draw bag and I was sort of happy with that as there are definitely worse pegs on this lake. At least I had some deep water, about 7-8 feet of it, and there was nobody drawn on peg 17 to my right, which was a bonus.

Tony, the match secretary drew on peg 19 to my left and Bruce was on favoured peg 1. However, I think Peg 1 is strictly a summer peg as I have done well there during the summer months but struggled during the winter. Andy Brookman had the island all to himself and Julie had the famous pontoon to fish against, which is okay if the carp wanted to feed. So to be fair, it was anyone’s guess where the top weight would come from today.

I decided to set up a full-depth rig to fish at 10 metres, with a 0.5 gram pencil float, a size 20 guru MWG hook to 0.11 hooklength. My target species would be skimmers and roach. I also set up a shallow rig at just 20 inches deep, with a size 20 MWG and a 0.08 hooklength. This would be for targeting the rudd and roach close in. My final setup was a margin rig for both the left and right-hand sides, set at 3 feet deep with 0.2 gram Chianti style float and a size 16 Guru Super XS hook to a 0.19 hooklength. This was for the monster 20-pounders. I was sure you would only need one today for a win.

On the all-in, I cupped out a large ball of 50/50 micros and Supercrush F1 dark groundbait, laced with maggles and pinkles. Then I dropped some micros and sweetcorn into both margin swims. While I was waiting for everything to settle down, I started loose-feeding maggles at about 5 metres, just beyond the weed line. After about 10 minutes I began catching small rudd and after about 40 minutes I had about 15-20 of them in the net.

I carried on feeding a few maggles over this line throughout the day. So, now to try the 10-metre line with a single red maggle. I had an instant response from a small roach followed by a couple of small skimmers. I started using a cad pot to top up with groundbait and maggles after every 2-3 fish, which kept them coming for the first hour. Tony to my left was catching steadily and his skimmers were much bigger than mine. Despite what they say, size does matter, in this case.

I noticed he was fishing pellet on the hook so I changed to a 4mm expander but just couldn’t get a bite on them. So, back on the maggle and a bite right away. I then started to experiment with maggle and pinkle on the hook, which brought a couple of better fish. However, the bites began to slow down so I topped up and left this swim for a while to concentrate on the short swim with maggles. The rudd were waiting and I must have had another 10-15 in a row, some were chunky 4-6 ounce fish, so worth targeting.

The rudd moved away and so I went back onto the 10-metre line. I had a couple of roach but then it went quiet again. I changed to a single fluoro pinkie and instantly hooked into a carp only to lose it about 3 seconds later. With that, it was time to try the 2 edge swims with corn. I did get an indication on my right-hand edge but nothing positive. I didn’t get any interest at all on my left-hand margin so back out onto the 10-metre line again. I soon added another pole section, thinking perhaps the skimmers had backed off and sure enough they had.

I had 4 decent size skimmers at 11 metres but that was it. I could tell that the fish had all moved off so I decided not to waste any more time on this. The wind had picked up too, which was making presentation a little tricky. For the last hour or so I would focus entirely on catching rudd up in the water. This worked quite well but I had to keep searching for them and moving further along the line just off the edge of the weed. I had a couple of nice 6-ounce roach too, just a bit further out.

Tony was running away with it by now having caught a couple of F1s and a big goldfish plus some big skimmers. Andy had caught a couple of chub off the island but I hadn’t seen much else being caught so I was counting on second place. I continued to catch roach and rudd at 20 inches deep right up until the all-out. I had no idea what weight I had but hoped it was enough for second place after all the hard work I had put in.

Tony started the weigh-in with Andy who was on peg 6. When the carp are feeding this can be a match-winning peg but when they’re not, you can struggle on this one. Andy weighed 3 chub for 10lbs 2oz. Tony was next to weigh and had a lovely net of fish, which went 17lbs 7oz. My net went 10lbs exactly, which put me in third place. Everyone else on George’s had under double figures, so at least I had some beer tokens to collect.

Margaret’s Lake had fished much better, as expected. Steve Dawson weighed a total of 38lbs 12oz of silvers, mainly chub from the island to win the lake and the match overall. Legion teammate, Kev Murch, was second overall with 24lbs 6oz, which included 2 carp. Barry Summers finished third on the lake with 20lbs 8oz. Not a bad result considering the frost in the morning. My next match is at Bitterwell Lake on Tuesday, where I’m planning to hammer out a big bag of silvers, but you know… “The best-laid plans of mice and men”.

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