12^th May – Billy The Bozo Loses The Plot… Again

I have another 2-match blog post for you and this one just about sums up all that can go wrong when you’re ill-prepared or just too stubborn to change tactics even when things are not working. Read on to find out how to avoid the embarrassment of being a first-class plonker…

Thursday 9^th May – Windmill Fisheries Costcutter – Mind The Gap!

There were 14 anglers in attendance for this one, with the weather forecast predicting a hot sunny day and light winds. My thoughts were, “if that doesn’t trigger the carp to spawn then I don’t know what will”, and with that in mind, I wasn’t really too bothered where I would be drawn today. Well, as it happens, I ended up on peg 7, which I haven’t fished before. This peg is right opposite a wide gap between the 2 islands and so there are lots of options. Bomb and pellet, meat, maggles etc. The method feeder, pellet waggler, long pole, short pole and inside lines… too many options to mention. So what did I do?

I had it in my mind to fish paste short. Why? Fook knows! It just seemed like a good idea at the time. So, on the all-in, I fed a ball of groundbait and sloppy paste to a 5-metre line. Allowing time for that to settle, I then chucked out the bomb and pellet close to the island on my left, which is about 18 metres away. I had noticed the reeds moving so carp were definitely there but after 30 minutes I had no signs, no liners, nothing. I wasn’t too worried though because now I could focus on the paste line out in front. My style of paste fishing consists of a slimline 0.4-gram pencil float, under-shotted with all the bulk of the shot positioned under the float and nothing down the line unless the lake is towing, which it wasn’t.

The paste itself will fully cock the float, leaving about 20mm of bristle showing. My main choice of paste was made up from Green Swim Stim groundbait but I also had another paste with me, which was made up of a bag of cheap 8mm fishery pellets. I poured boiling water over these and left them to soak for about 12 hours. Surprisingly, the resulting paste had a really nice texture, which was easy to work with. So, starting off with the green paste, I cupped out the rig and dropped it in. I was getting indications straight away but missed a few bites due to over-eagerness and bad timing on my part. When I finally waited patiently for the float to dip under and stay under, I hooked into my first carp.

Wow, this was one big mother fooker, which bolted out toward the island to my left at a rate of knots. I had to quickly add a few sections in order to gain some control. That’s one thing I’ve always experienced with paste fishing… you catch BIG carp on it… or rather you HOOK big carp with it. So, I’ve got this bigun on and we’re having a right ole tussle as it tries to bury itself inside the reed bed. I managed to persuade it to come out and then it carried on down the lake and just kept going until inevitably, something had to give. I definitely wasn’t expecting the hook to snap but surprisingly it did. It snapped at the bottom of the bend. This was a size 14 Preston XSH-B, which is supposed to be extra strong… WTF!

I don’t often use pre-tied Preston hooks as I prefer to tie my own, tried and trusted Guru hooks but I didn’t have any size 14s tied and with no time to tie any, I decided to buy some. Okay, so it was probably a fluke, a one-off, a flaw… but it cost me a big fish and that hurt. Anyway, after that I became totally preoccupied with fishing paste out in front, ignoring the pairs of cruising carp all around me. My next fish was a 2lb skimmer, which slurped up a big splodge of paste without hesitation. Then more carp moved in and I lost a couple of foul hookers before landing one about 10lbs. Then it went a bit quiet.

I hadn’t realised how much time I had spent on this method until I checked my watch. We were almost halfway through the match and I only had a single carp and a skimmer to show for my efforts. It seemed like time had elapsed while I was somewhere else… like I had been abducted by aliens or something… or I had nodded off. It’s amazing how quickly time can pass when you become fixated on something. Well, with that wake-up call, it was time to get my ass into gear and try something a little more productive. I fed a cupful of sloppy pellet paste to my left-hand margin and some sloppy green Swim Stim paste to my right-hand margin. (Note, I’m still fixated on paste).

The pellet paste was easy to work with as I moulded a ball of it around the hook and cupped it into the margin, which was 3 feet deep. Literally seconds later I was in, only to lose it so it was a probable foul hooker. However, I hooked and landed the next 2 from this swim but there didn’t appear to be any more. A quick look on the right-hand margin produced only a couple of small skimmers. Realising I had well and truly lost the carp race and the plot, silvers were now the target. However, I had left it way too late to make any kind of impact on the silvers pool and so I had to settle for 3^rd in the silvers with 3lb 5oz, missing out on a payout by 3 ounces. My 3 carp weighed a pitiful 26lb. The match was won by Leighton Palmer with 126lb of carp caught on the pellet waggler… well done to him but what was I thinking? Paste? Moving swiftly on…

Sunday 12^th May – Georges Lake, Whitehouse Farm – You Just Couldn’t Make It Up!

I was so looking forward to a change of venue and Georges Lake at Whitehouse Farm is about as different to Windmill as you can get. However, I was repairing and replacing my garden decking on Saturday and only gave a brief thought to whether I had enough bait and rigs tied ready for Sunday. By the time I checked, it was too late to get any more bait and so I would have to manage with just over half a pint of maggles. I had plenty of pellets, both hard and expander, meat, and also plenty of paste left from Thursday. I did mean to stop off and buy some corn in the morning on the way but time was of the essence and so I decided not to bother

Okay, so onto the draw. I wasn’t too concerned about where I would draw but when I drew peg 10, I had an overwhelming sinking feeling. This peg has a clear chuck to the island, where the chub had been showing of late and these chub simply love maggles. When I arrived at my peg, I realised I had left my front pole roller in the car and so I walked back to the car park to get it. I was going to be fishing at 16 metres toward the island so I was definitely going to need it. So, the island would be my number one target and as I was lacking in the essential maggles, I would fish meat and spray a few maggles over the top. That might work yeah? NO! No way. From the all-in, I tried this for the first 30 minutes with nothing but an arm ache.

I had 2 good-looking margins, one to my left with a few small lilies and one to my right under an overhanging willow tree. I also had a lot of open water to fish to so I fed a line for skimmers at 10 metres, with groundbait and expander pellets. Now when I came to setting up a rig for this line I found I had left my light elastic rigs back home in the shed. That’s because I have been fishing at Windmill for so long, I had forgotten that I took them out of the holdall. That meant the lightest of the elasticated top kits I had with me was fitted with a size 10 elastic instead of my usual 4 or 6 for silvers. Needless to say, I bumped off a load of skimmers, some were quite big too. FFS! Once again, I was getting it all wrong and only had myself to blame.

I fed some sloppy paste and groundbait under the tree to my right and kept this topped up while I fished the bomb and maggle to the island. I don’t know why I didn’t feed the left-hand margin… I just didn’t. So, by now I had totally given up on my silvers line although I did manage to get about 4lb of fish from it. Fishing bomb and meat or maggle on the hook to the island only brought a couple of small perch, so that had to stop. It was time to take a look down the right-hand edge. The carp in this lake go to about 26lbs or more so you need some serious kit to tame them. However, I left my margin pole in my holdall… why? Fook knows! Too lazy I guess.

I wasn’t too worried though as the rig I was using was certainly strong enough with a size 18 elastic, 0.22 mainline, 0.17 hook length to a size 12 hook. Ideal for paste, meat and pellet fishing down the edge. Okay, so I baited up with paste and carefully dropped it in. I was getting plenty of indications but no proper bites. A change to meat brought an unexpected rudd so I changed to 8mm hard pellet and that did the trick. The float slowly slid away and I struck into a proper unit. This was a double-figure biggie for sure. It took a little while for it to wake up to the fact and when it did the resistance changed from a hefty, deep-down plodding action to a full-on express train accelerating out of the station. Fook me! I thought my top kit was going to snap in half. It didn’t but the 0.17 hooklength did.

So, yet another big mistake to come to terms with. (Reminder for me)… ALWAYS use your margin pole and a margin rig on this venue! My margin rigs have 0.22 hooklengths and I rarely lose big fish on them. Oh well… 62 years fishing and still learning! I tried for another but with no luck. So, my last option was to set up a maggle feeder and fish to the island with what few maggles I had left. Half-filling the feeder each time and with 3 maggles on the hook, I managed to temp my first chub. A nice, healthy 3-pounder. I then pulled out of one before landing another about 2 pounds. Then I had a skimmer of around a pound or so before losing 2 more chub near the end of the match.

I’m still kicking myself for not bringing enough bait and I definitely should have known better. So another p*ss poor performance from me with just over 10lb on the scales to echoes of “he’s a real nowhere man”, playing in my head. Well done to John Dursley who had a smashing time putting 43lb 15oz on the scales, including a carp of 15lb 3oz… all caught on corn! Well, moving away from the disaster zone and into the realms of reality, I won’t be fishing again now until next Sunday, as I have a more important issue to deal with midweek. Hopefully and all being well,  I’ll be on the K&A canal next Sunday with my Kingswood RBL club mates… what could possibly go wrong? Keep you posted!

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