February 11^th – Kingswood RBL Club Match, Kennet & Avon Canal, Bradford-on-Avon – Mystic Billy’s Prediction Is Not Far Wrong

Windmill Fisheries

I’ve fished 2 matches again this week. On Thursday 8^th I was at Windmill Fisheries for the mid-week Costcutter. The weather was foul in the morning and only 6 bods turned up to fish, so we decided to have a rover match. I chose peg 23 for a short walk and with deep water, I could target the big skimmers. Incidentally, the weather vastly improved as the day went on. So, looking around my peg, I decided to set up pole rigs for fishing at 7 metres and 10 metres plus the inside edge to my left. I thought that after all the overnight heavy rain, the carp might be a bit unsettled today so silvers would be my main target right from the off.

I set up identical rigs for both lines, which consisted of a 0.4 gram (4×14) pencil float to 0.15 mainline. The only difference was the hook sizes and hook lengths. On the 10-metre line, I had a size 18 hook to 0.11 hooklength and on the 7-metre line I had a size 20 hook to 0.8 hooklength. On the longer line, I intended to fish soft pellet and on the shorter line, maggles and pinkles were the selected bait. So, although I was primarily going to target silvers, I would keep a close eye on Kev Murch, who was opposite me on peg 1, and John Williams who was on peg 25. If they started catching carp then I might have to change tack to stay in the game. On the all-in, I cupped out a small ball of Thatcher’s Green groundbait to both swims.

While I waited for that to settle, I chucked out a bomb with double maggle to a size 16 hook, close to the island. After 30 minutes there were no signs of carp or anything else. No liners, nothing. So, it was onto the 7-metre line with a single pinkle, which brought an instant response from a small skimmer. Long story short… I carried on experimenting and alternating with different baits on both lines and after 3 hours decided to stay fishing for silvers to the end. There were not many carp being caught but I was getting quite a lot of bites from small roach and occasionally, I’d catch the odd 3-4 ounce skimmer. Maggle and pinkle worked best today. I had nothing on the soft pellet.

I did catch a 3lb 11oz carp in the dying minutes of the match, which took a single pinkle. It took me a while to land that one on a size 20 hook to 0.8 hooklength and a number 5 elastic. Well, I finished up with that one carp and 1lb 5oz of silvers, which isn’t a lot but more than enough to win the top silvers prize… happy days! The match was won with 6 small carp for 26lb.

Kennet & Avon Canal

This match was hastily switched from the river to the canal due to the river being in flood again. That makes 2 RBL river matches lost due to the weather. It seems you only have to take a p*ss on the bank nowadays and the river is over the fields… sheesh! So, due to the change of venue, we were down on numbers, with only 10 turning out for this one. For some, this match was all about precious points as currently there are 4 anglers in contention for the Club Champion title. We had selected to fish on the Moulton Drive stretch as it’s quite a fair venue and parking is not a problem. There’s also less foot traffic in this area and very few bikes to contend with. So, onto the draw… (BTW: I had predicted a 3-4lb winning weight)

I drew peg 1. Now, I tend to think that end pegs on a canal can be a bit of a disadvantage as the fish can wander off out of your swim and not come back. Anyway, I had a job to do. My plan was to set up 3 lines. One at 6 metres, one at 9 metres, and one right over at 12 metres. The depth on the 6-metre line was about four and a half feet. I had 5 feet of water on the 9-metre line and just under 3 feet on the far shelf. My choice of baits today was maggles and pinkles on the short line over a 50-50 mix of Thatcher’s Green and Dynamite brown crumb. On the 9-metre line, I fed a 50-50 mix of liquidised bread and Dynamite brown crumb. I would only loosefeed the long line as and when I tried it.

So on the all-in, I cupped out a golf ball size of groundbait together with a few pinkles to the 6-metre line and the same size ball of liquidised bread and crumb to the 9-metre line. I then went straight over the shorter line with a single red maggle only to hook and lose a decent size skimmer on the first put-in. I think “fooking bollo*ks” was the choice phrase of the moment but at least I knew there were a few skimmers about. I worked this line by fishing maggle on the hook and feeding pinkles and groundbait after each small fish I caught. Occasionally, a nice size skimmer of about 6-8 ounces would show up but it was mainly roach in the 1-2 ounce bracket that dominated the catch.

I would get a flurry of bites and then it would go quiet for a while. When this happened I would go out on the 9-metre line with punched bread but to be fair, they didn’t really want bread today. I only caught one very small roach and a gudgeon on bread so I changed to fishing pinkle on this line, which brought a stream of small roach. When both lines went quiet, I went over onto the 12-metre line with maggle and caught a couple of perch and roach there. I kept myself busy by working all 3 lines and topping up the shorter 2 lines regularly. At one point I intended to put some chopped worm in next to the boat on my left but they upped anchor and went off, leaving a gaping void.

So, I just carried on working all 3 swims like ‘poetry in motion’, catching whatever I could right up until the end of the match. Before weighing, I reckoned I had about three and a half pounds so I was well happy with 4lbs 7oz, and third in the match plus a few more beer tokens in the pocket. I needed the points too, which now puts me in second place on the leaderboard, 3 points behind Jason Pitman… who once again found winning form, finishing up in joint first position with 5lb 13oz (Not too far off my prediction). One of these days I’ll beat that young whippersnapper! Jason tied with Jon Amato who used his 4-metre whip to great effect. Well, hopefully, we will be able to fish our last club match of the season on the river as planned.

For my next match, I’ll be back at Windmill again. I’m getting to like it there and I find fishing for the limited number of silvers is challenging but does have its appeal… I’ll keep you posted.

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