Sedges, Brick Lake, 10 July (20 pegs)

I was a bit worse for wear when the alarm went off this morning following a late night sampling the delights of Staple Hill but I just about made it to Hilltops cafe for breakfast.
It was quite busy in there probably as there was a delay while they cooked up a special for Bela although it has to be said he is now a picture of physical perfection and the envy of many.
A full house today with 20 fishing which was good to see, payouts were for the top 3, 1 silvers and 2 sections plus a Pairs match just to spice things up a bit.
Will had split the sections across the lake as opposed to a section on each bank which was a good move giving those down the sheltered end a chance of picking up, he has been trained well!
There was a bit of conflicting information during the pre-draw discussions over the results of Lee Wiliams's Saturday match on the lake. (see here)
Apparently some were saying there were had been  seven weights over 100lbs but  I had heard peg 10  had walked it with 150-odd but the next best weight was half that and quite a few had struggled.
I suspect they were getting mixed up with a match on Tile or another match that had involved some decent anglers!
Anyway, the Gimp drew peg 10 so it was unlikely to be producing a three-figure weight today.
Somehow I managed to avoid drawing a corner and ended up in the middle of nowhere on 15.
My pairs partner Matt Williams drew peg 2 which was going to be tough as the wind was pushing up the opposite end towards 11 which was occupied by Degsy Williams.
I made sure though before the draw I had £1's with Alan Healey, Steve Sewell and Pete Uzzell just to cover my losses and make sure I went home with something.
Alan drew next door to me on 14 so I could keep a close eye on that pound.
On my left side was the "Silvers Slayer" Lee Waller who was not very well hidden behind the reeds ... a few more months of growing would be required before he would be completely obscured.
Today I had a cunning plan, well it wasn't much of a plan as it was the same thing I always do at Sedges and involved a 6g pellet wag, a brand new catapult (I've lost 2 at recent Viaduct matches) and lots of 8mm pellets but I also had a back-up plan which involved lots of corn and a tin of hemp to fish on the deck at 13m and down the edge.
The left hand edge was a no-go as I couldn't get the rig anywhere close to the edge due to collapsed reeds under the surface so I set up 2 rigs at top kit plus 2 down the right margin.
One tight against the vegetation at 3 foot deep and the other a meter off where it was a foot or so deeper.

At the start I gave all the pole lines a generous helping of corn and hemp then went out on the wag after firing out a healthy dose of pellets towards the rope.

Most were doing the same, including Chris Gay on 7 who had a carp on within minutes.

And it didn't take long for my first one either which I suspected was fouled but it turned out to be a fairly hooked common of 14lbs ... not a bad start by any means.
The match started slowly for most and in the first hour I had a smaller carp plus another double that put me well into the running.
Both Alan and Lee had started off on the pole and neither were getting any bites, it seemed the only carp being caught were coming on the wag or shallow on the pole.
I had a quick look round my pole lines and never had a touch on the deep rig while the edge rig was being pestered by small fish.
Back out on the wag and it was still hard work and was made harder as the wind had increased and was pushing back towards our bank.
By halfway bites were still hard to come by and those that I was getting I was missing due to slack forming in the line, a few were walking the bank and the news was that some hadn't caught anything but Degsy Williams was, predictably, doing well on 11 and so too was Luke Pester on 8.
There was a lot of fizzing going on out on my wag line so reluctantly I set up a lead rod and chucked that out.
It did produce one fish and another when I struck at an "iffy" bite that came off almost straight away.
I was getting loads of liners so I swapped back to the wag but with a 10g pike float on instead.
That was an improvement and I managed a couple more fish on this before the end.
My pole lines never produced anything.
Alan did eventually catch a carp but it was the smallest carp in the lake at about 2lbs (he got a bit of stick today bless him)

As expected the match was won by Degsy Williams with 95-12 followed by Luke with 83-4
and Ryan Radford was 3rd with 57-7
My seven fish total went 56-5 which got me the section and (more importantly) all 3 pound coins.
The silvers was won by the gimp with 13-7 and the pairs was won by Ryan and the gimp who had mugged a 14½lb fish on his silvers gear just to enter into the spirit of things.

Full Result:

1. Degsy Williams (11) 95-12
2. Luke Pester (8) 83-4
3. Ryan Radford (19) 57-7
4. Steve Burgess (15) 56-5
5. Chris Gay (7) 53-15
6. Steve Sewell (13) 41-3
7. Rich Jones (12) 39-1
8. John Bradford (10) 27-13
9. Adam Caswell (3) 25-14
10. Lee Tourettes Waller (16) 21-13
11. Mark Radford (6) 19-11
12. Rocket Ron Hardiman (20) 18-0
13. Steve o'Toole (17) 16-3
14. Matt Williams (2) 15-5
15. Will Dearlove (18) 11-9
16. Pete Uzzell (5) 11-3
17. Keith Ray (4) 10-11
18. Ross Sewell (9) 9-15
19. Alan chip shop Healey (14) 9-10 
20. Keith Bilder (1) 6-11

Silvers:1. John Bradford (10) 13-7
2. Luke Pester (8) 12-14

Pairs:Ryan Radford / John Bradford

Sedges, Brick Lake, 29 May 2016

We started the day with 20 booked in so a full house however my trusty assistant failed to pass on the update that 2 of our regulars were off sunning themselves, so we ended up with 18. Most people commenting we should leave out the early pegs as those who took a walked around said the fish were doing their business in the reeds.

Most people still wanted the fancied high numbers and with the fishery owner taking pegs 2 and 19 out, the rumours sounded true.

Keith Ray and Lee Waller were the lucky anglers running to their end pegs 10 and 11, myself and Rich Jones drew peg 1 and 20.

Simple tactics today with the sun out, the fish would be up in the water, so a pellet wag, slapper rig and a rig for 3ft deep about a metre from the end bank just pass the reeds to fish double corn.

Starting on the wag I never had a touch  despite fishing moving in the fed area, Rich opposite had a few on the slapper rig, I followed suit but again I could not get a take despite the fish moving around, after 2 hours and no bites it was time to try the corn rig which I had been feeding heavily with corn and groundbait hoping to stop a few fish before they ventured into the reeds.  This change worked well, bites were forthcoming by lifting a dropping the corn I would temp the odd large carp onto the hook and by fishing far enough away from the inside shelf, those fish looking for something other than food didn’t cause too many problem. Regularly feeding large pots of bait kept the fish interested, switching to pellet only brought the float moving all ways but under so the heavy rig and bait was the key with a little bit of movement. (Those interested in the rig, elastics, feeding patterns and my flower shorts will just have to catch me on the bank)

I ended the day with 17 carp in the net, 2 weighted in plus a few that I opted for the catch and release policy on for a total of 184lb, which I was hoping would be enough for 2^nd as Rich Jones on peg 20 was catching on a regular basis.

As it finished it appeared the lake had fished hard due to the spawning fish with most anglers struggling, Lee Waller on 11 throw in the towel early to watch Mr Jones, whilst Keith on 10 lost more than he caught.  Most anglers had around 25 – 35lb with only myself and Rich Jones weighing over 50lb, thankfully my 19 fish were enough to topple Rich's 23 for 1^st place on the day.

Top silvers went to my neighbour Mike Wilson who stuck with it and managed to find a few of the lakes skimmers for a total of 10lb with Chris Gay 2^nd.

We were also running a pairs event today with a member of each pair on each side of the lake, the result would be the team with the lowest points score, thankfully with a match win that was 1 point and my partner Chris Gay managing 3^rd in his section for a total of 4pts, which was enough to take the win from  2^nd place Rich Jones and Keith Ray who managed 6pts

Results:

1^st Will Dearlove Peg 1 = 184lb

2^nd Rich Jones Peg 20 = 146lb

3^rd Mat Taynton Peg 13 = 48lb

Silvers Winner Mike Wilson Peg 3 = 10lb

Full results can be found on our facebook page, this month’s meeting will be on the 7^th June, usual place and time.

Thanks

Will.

Sedges, Brick Lake, 17 April (19 pegs)

Unfortunately for those of you who have expressed an interest (that's nobody then), my love life has taken a dramatic turn for the worse and sadly myself and Miss Frome are no longer an item.

Which means no more Sunday morning bacon sarnies or Sunday night trips to Mike's Kitchen to spend my winnings??

(Stupid name for a Chinese anyway)!

She does read this rubbish though but I suspect it's just to see the pictures of Psv's young studs such as Will, Rich Jones and Adam so today's her lucky day on that score.

Anyway, every cloud has a silver lining and mine was the fact that she had previously given me a can of de-icer and that was required this morning as we had an overnight frost .... see, there was a point to all that 😀

Also, the wind turbines at Avonmouth were generating nothing so quite a change from last Sunday, and that's a bonus as it can get a bit blowy at Sedges with it being so close to the seaside and all.

Down at the fishery a few thought the overnight frost and bright sunshine would make it hard work today, especially for the skimmers. I still had high hopes for some decent weights but maybe less so for the topkit match on Tile lake as the margins were still very clear.

I fancied any corner (except 1) but especially 10 however my luck at drawing at Sedges finally gave in and with four balls left I drew 14.

Nothing exciting about this peg with the only feature as such being the aerator but on the plus side plenty of fish were topping and swirling out towards it.

For company today I had, once again, Ryan Radford on 15 with local superstar Lee Williams next down from him. And on 13 I had Rich Jones followed by "Silvers Slayer" (his words) Lee Waller and Mark Radford in corner peg 11.

Mark wasn't happy and was moaning about the wind blowing the wrong way ... down towards peg 20 which was occupied by Pete Uzzell.

Peg 10, my preferred choice, had gone to Matt Williams and peg 1 to Steve Sewell who appreciated the short walk but maybe not the words of "encouragement" from others!

No suprises setting up today ... 

A deep rig at 14m for meat and a rig for topkit plus 2 either side, again for meat, on the first shelf at about 5' deep as I'd done ok on these on Tile a couple of weeks back.

I didn't bother with the margins as Ryan was giving me dirty looks and I didn't fancy them to produce much anyway even if I did spook a carp out when I put my nets in!

Last but not least, I set up a 6 gram loaded pellet wag for obvious reasons, no lead rod as I'd run out of time (and leads). In hindsight I maybe should have set up a shallow rig for the pole to give Rich Jones a harder time but never mind, too late to worry about now.

At the all in, after a bit of last minute rushing about, I fed the three pole lines with generous pots of soggy micros and meat (it worked last time) and fired some 8mm's out to feed the ducks.

By this time Chris Szskacs opposite on peg 9 was unhooking his first pellet wag-caught carp which was a bit odd as before the match he was doubtful about it working today.

Myself, Ryan and Rich had also started on the wag but nothing was happening.

Meanwhile the moaning in peg 11 had stopped abruptly as Mark Radford netted 3 fish in succession fishing long against the reeds.

Lee Waller was feeling quite pleased with himself after netting a 3lb skimmer on his first put-in but declaring himself "The Silvers Slayer" was always going to be a regrettable decision and he had 5hrs and 50 minutes to contemplate the error of his ways.

By the end of the first hour I was still fishless. My neighbours had both long since given up the wag and were on their pole lines, Chris Szakacs seemed to be getting one-a-chuck on the waggler and both Matt Williams and Keith Ray either side of him were both getting a few as well.

Lee Williams was busy winding Adam Caswell up which I don't think he mentioned in his version of the day's events [see here]

And the Silvers Slayer was having a torrid time losing hooklengths to "vermin".

I did a 10 minute tour of my pole lines which produced 1 sail away missed bite on the deep rig which was most likely a liner.

Back out on the wag and I finally got off the mark and followed that one up with a couple more over the next hour.
The middle stage of the match was quite productive for me and I managed to claw my way back a little bit but Rich Jones had also started catching shallow on his pole line and he seemed to be getting some bigger fish which included this net-busting 24lb mirror.

Across the other side of the lake Chris's flying start had slowed to a more sedate pace and he was on the pole bagging up on skimmers instead.

As the day went on though my wag line also dried up and it seemed as though the wind had pushed the fish over closer.

Rich Jones was taking full advantage of this and had a good last hour as did Keith who had stuck with the wag and possibly nicked Chris's fish while he was busy trying to win the match and the silvers.

As it turned out he didn't win either as Rich Jones's 10 fish went 108-4

And Keith snuck into second with 95-11 just ahead of Matt Williams (below) who had 90-12

The silvers was won by Steve o'Toole from peg 3 with 16-10 of skimmers caught on closely guarded secrets

His mate "The Silvers Slayer" packed up early in disgust!

Full Result:

1. Rich Jones (13) .... 108-4
2. Keith Ray (8) ............... 95-11
3. Matt Williams (10) ...... 90-12
4. Chris Szakacs (9) ........ 80-1
5. Steve Burgess (14) ...... 72-10
6. Will Dearlove (18) ...... 62-12
7. Steve o' Toole (3) ........ 54-10
8. Mark Radford (11) ...... 54-6
9. Steve Sewell (1) .......... 54-1
10. Ryan Radford (15) ..... 34-6
11. Lee Williams (16) ...... 31-15
12. Pete Uzzell (20) ......... 30-12
13. Mike Wilson (2) ........ 21-10
14. Degsy Williams (5) ... 19-13
15. Chris Gay (19) .......... 14-8
16. John Bradford (7) ...... 8-6
17. Matt Taynton (6) ....... 8-4
And 2 dnw's (including the "silvers slayer)!

Silvers:

1. Steve o'Toole (3) ...... 16-10
2.Chris Szakacs (9) ....... 9-12
3. Mark Radford (10) 
    Ryan Radford (15)
    John Bradford (7) all had 8-6
4. Matt Taynton (6) ...... 8-4
etc....

Next week is an inter-club match with Frys on the canals at Shiplate and it's fully booked with reserves so if you can't make it please let Will know.

I won't be there as I'm off on a stag weekend in Berlin which should be an experience.

In the meantime I'll leave you with a picture of the winner looking mysterious especially for the girls ... enjoy!!!

Sedges, Tile, 20 March (18 pegs)

Back to one of my favourite winter venues this week, Tile Lake at Sedges and with Will away sulking due to his inability to catch fish and Alan fishing a Frys series at Acorn I was reprising my role as match organiser for the day.
Nice and easy though with 18 fishing meaning the payouts would be 1st and 2nd overall, 2 silvers and 2 sections.
As ever Denise was on hand with tea and coffee and a stern  telling off for anyone foolish enough to put a wet spoon in the sugar bowl. And this week I had a lecture on the correct pronunciation of "aerator" as apparently "aereator" is a Bristolian made up word!
Come the draw and as per usual I kept the last ping pong ball for myself and that gave me peg 40!
Which will probably provide a bit of amusement for the cynical few that seem to think I only ever draw corners at Sedges, but anyway I was more than happy with that and I never had to run to it either as its the shortest walk on the lake. 

Keeping me entertained today was Ryan Radford on 39 and Brian Shanks on 38 and Steve Sewell (who has his name stitched on his waterproofs in case they get lost) was just about within piss-taking distance on 21

Sadly my travelling partner Derek had to go back home as a member of the family had passed away in the early hours of the morning so I re-jigged the sections a bit putting peg 30 into our section making 2 sections of 8 as Ryan wasn't in the pools (which was probably not the best decision he's made this year)!

Mark Radford, who was in 30, wasn't too concerned as for the second week running he was expecting a carpless day and to be honest I had to agree with him on that (it's certainly not a peg that I would run to)

Back to peg 40 and it's a peg I have drawn a few times now and it has loads of options.

I untangled the tip rod from last week at Viaduct (starting to sound like a "lead-slinger") which could be chucked to the island or along the left-hand bank, and set up a pole rig for 14m and a rig for down the edge in various places between 5m and 14m where I could find roughly the same depth (about 3½') which in places was tight to the edge but further down towards the corner was around a metre away from the edge.

Bait for the day was meat mixed with a bit of damp 3mm pellet plus a pint of dead reds that actually stayed dead this time so I'm guessing Derek's freezer kills them better than mine although he did phone me at 3:30 on Friday to ask if I wanted any bait from Scotts so they had got a bit longer to freeze than mine normally get!

Anyway, starting off I went out on the straight lead to the island with hair-rigged meat and straight away was getting little knocks and indications which I put down to roach or skimmers having a poke at the bait, then 5 minutes in I had a proper indication .... the rod bent through 90 degrees and line came off the reel, so probably not a skimmer, and I was correct as it was a carp of about 5lbs ... a nice start.

2 or 3 carp followed during the first hour and I seemed to be doing better than most.

Pete Uzzell in 31 had an early fish and Keith and Ron were getting odd ones up the same end of the lake, Ron fishing the shallow wag which was an interesting choice.

I could also see Steve Sewell catching on the tip opposite on 21 ... I knew it was him as he has his name embroidered on his waterproofs (I may have mentioned that earlier)

Ryan next door had started on bread on the tip but despite getting liners was having a bit of a "torrid time" hooking snags and loosing fish but he did get a nice big scale which was a bonus for him.

I got bored of waiting for the rod to rip round so had a look on the pole line which gave me a nice skimmer followed by a good sized carp (hooked in the wing) then went a bit quiet so I re-fed it and went back on the tip but this time chucked down the bank and that produced almost immediately.

Next chuck was one of those that you wished you'd caught on video as it landed within inches of the bank and went round instantly. Unfortunately, the fish instantly snagged me and that was the end of that rig.

Ryan meanwhile had switched to meat and had gotten his act together and was landing a few, but it soon went torrid again when he landed a "weigher". He was looking at it in the landing net and doing mental maths trying to work out whether to put it on the scales or not when the landing net collapsed and the fish returned itself to the lake and at the same time, the stray net handle landed on his pole and broke the no4 but I didn't laugh (honest)!

And it was just as well because I then completely mis-cast and sent the rig into a tree which put paid to the lead rod for the second and last time.

So back out on the pole and a quick look down the short edge with maggot produced no bites at all (odd) but out at 14m in front gave me a couple of carp.

But they weren't coming out as frequently as I would have liked and they certainly weren't coming out as frequently as they were next door as Ryan had gone into overdrive and his tip was going round every chuck and he was landing big fish as well.

Into the last hour and I had been joined by Mark Radford and Nick Saunders who had both surrendered and reckoned it was a 2 horse race between myself and Ryan as nobody else was catching except maybe Degsy Williams on 22.

A look down into the corner with meat gave me a fish straight away which was good news for Nick as he ate my chocolate bar while I was playing it.

Three more followed before the all out and I was kicking myself that I hadn't gone down there earlier but never mind.

As I suspected, Ryan's late charge was more than enough for him to take the honours with 88-5 (the catch and release incident would have easily took him over the 100lb mark),

My 74-14 was good for 2nd and top pools payout (thanks Ryan) and Degsy was 3rd with 56-14

Silvers went to Lee Waller with 15-6 of skimmers from peg 37.

Overall Result

1. Ryan Radford (39) 88-5

2. Steve Burgess (40) 74-14

3. Degsy Williams (22) 56-14

4. Brian Shanks (38) 49-6

5. Chris Gay (26) 41-9

6. Steve Sewell (21) 38-8

7. Ron Hardiman (33) 25-5

8. Keith Ray (32) 25-3

9. Adam Caswell (24) 23-12

10. Lee Waller (37) 19-15

11. Pete Uzzell (31) 13-9

12. Lionel Legge (29) 10-14

13. John Bradford (27) 4-3

14. Matt Taynton (28) 3-11

And 4 dnw's

Silvers:

1. Lee Waller 15-6

2. Keith Ray 7-0

Sedges, Brick Lake, 05 July 2015

Back this week to one of my favourite summer venues, Brick lake at Sedges where, at this time of year, almost any peg is capable of throwing up a match-winning weight and as the carp in this lake average a hefty size you don't need loads of them either.
Generally that will be fishing shallow, either on the pole or wag, or from the margins (or a combination of both).
As the carp here like to hang out in the surface layers they do tend to follow the wind which usually blows up the lake towards the corner pegs (10 & 11) so a draw up that end would be good news.
Good news for me then as Denise handed me the draw basket and out popped peg 11 and even better news was that there would be nobody on 12.

The only downside was that the last time we fished here in similar conditions peg 11 dnw'd which was a slight concern but to be honest not a massive one as there were obviously a few fish in the area today.

The picture above was taken when I got to the peg and it was flat calm then but it didn't stay that way for long.

First out of the bag today was the obligatory pellet wag rod followed by 3 pole rigs.

The first for bottom of the shelf at 13m along the end bank where it was about 5 foot deep to fish with corn and then 2 shallow rigs, with and without bands.
After feeding the pole line with a pot of corn and 6mm pellet it was out with the wag and after about four chucks the first carp of the day was hooked and landed.

Three more followed in the first hour so hardly hectic but I couldn't see anyone else catching so I was happy with that.

And by the end of the first hour most who had started on the wag had long since abandoned it.

As I've found before here the carp weren't taking the pellet on the drop and it was a case of chucking the wag out and firing pellet over the top (as best as possible in the gusting wind) and waiting for a bite.

The trouble with this is that you invariably get a bite while you're loading the catty so a lot of bites are missed and in addition the wind was pushing the float back towards me so that when I did get a bite I often had too much slack line to hit it.

At one point I tried reeling in slowly to keep in touch with the float and just watched the rod tip which worked for one fish.

After the second hour I was up to maybe 7 and my neighbour Ron Hardiman had wandered up and confirmed that nobody else was catching much and it seemed the lake was fishing below par although it can often switch on late here so there was still plenty of time for things to change.

Around midway through the match I had a look on the pole line and hooked a fish straight away, a big red and black koi that I'm sure I've caught before.

Next put in and another fish was hooked and I could tell straight away that this was a big one but it didn't want to come in and kept plodding off until the hook pulled, bugger!

The next fish was a fantail / crucian type thing (most likely an escapee from the canal) that was my only "silver" of the day.

After that I started getting roach holding up the corn hookbait so I dumped a pot of pellet and corn on their heads and after a brief and fruitless look on the shallow pellet rig in the right margin where I'd been throwing pellet at regular intervals, went back on the wag.

This coincided with the first of several torrential thunderstorms which got all my kit and bait completely drenched.

After the second of these downpours the wind suddenly dropped and the lake became flat calm.

This break in the weather allowed me to fish the wag properly and while it lasted I had three or four fish but going into the last hour the wind returned and changed direction and was now coming straight at me making it virtually impossible to fish the float or feed with the catty, especially as my pellet had turned to mush (twice).

Even worse for me was that across the lake on peg 8 Brian Shanks, who had caught hardly anything all day, had a complete transformation and was getting a fish a chuck on the pole.

Every time I looked up he was playing another one or wandering over to the scales on the bank.

At 4:15 I shouted the all out and hoped I'd done enough in the first five hours to hold off Brian's sprint finish.

But when he weighed in a total of 94-3 I was pretty sure I wasn't going to beat him and I was right as my nets went 81-12 for 2nd

Third place went to Chris Szakacs from peg 16 with 77-0 caught late on meat at 5m

Completing the frame was Matt Taynton with 55-14 from peg 4

That place could have been taken up by Lionel Legge but unfortunately his seven carp had an early release when his net slipped into the lake, unlucky!

Top silvers went to Steve Sewell on peg 9 with 15-1 of meat-caught skimmers.

Full Result:

1. Brian Shanks (8) ......... 94-3
2. Steve Burgess (11) ........ 81-12
3. Chris Szakacs (16) ......... 77-0
4. Matt Taynton (4) ............ 55-14
5. Steve Sewell (9) ............ 49-8
6. Rich Britton (14) ............ 43-3
7. Alan Healey (15) ............ 39-4
8. Rocket Ron (13)* ........... 39-1
9. Ross Baker (17) ............. 29-0
10. Mark Radford (20) .......... 28-10
11. Colin Butler (10) ............ 27-12
12. Ryan Radford (6) ........... 22-0
13. Paul Preston (1) ............ 17-8
14. Lionel Legge (18) .......... 9-8 (oops)
15. Julian Nurse (5) ............ 6-5
16. Adam Caswell (7) .......... 6-1
17. Lee Waller (3) ....... dnw 

Silvers:

1. Steve Sewell (9) ....... 15-1
2. Chris Szakacs (16) ...... 13-2
3. Paul Preston (1) .......... 12-2

And finally I often hear comments about the amount of kit match anglers take to their pegs and I now know the answer to that as there were four or five guys having a knock-up on the canal lake who I guess were staying in the caravans and were obviously "travelling light" as each of them must have walked behind me about ten times during the match.

I don't think they were from round these parts as one of them stopped for a chat but I couldn't understand a word he said, must have been a northerner (or Welsh).

But anyway that is why we take everything but the kitchen sink, so that we can cater for every eventuality.

Try telling that then to Adam Caswell and Steve Sewell who both never bothered to bring their coats and both got a bit damp!

Inter-club vs Crapenters Arms, Sedges, 17 May (31 pegs)

Before I venture down the long and drawn out road of self appreciation it's worth mentioning that I fished a match on the Saturday at Docklow pools near Hereford.

It was a 58 peg "knock-up" that had been organised by Norm Sterry through the Match Fishing South West Facebook page.

I have to say that Docklow was a bit of an eye-opener for me as not only do they have 8 well kept lakes, but there are also holiday cottages, a pub/restaurant and a proper tackle shop 

http://www.docklowpools.com/

The match itself didn't go quite to plan for me as I treated it like I would do at the venues I'm more used to and to be honest it went a bit "tits up" from start to finish but my peg did look nice ....

Ok so I never bothered to trouble the scales but it still beats work!

And with this in mind I was determined to make up for my failings today so I spent Saturday night making up suitable rigs like proper anglers do.

On to today then and I was on my own in the fishing bus as my usual travelling partner was away watching a non-league football match which his team scraped through by the skin of their teeth to secure a place back in the proper league so well done them.

My first port of call was breakfast at Hilltops which was comical as Trigg was in there quizzing Bela on the finer details of his "random slapping method" while eating lemon meringue pie which is a scene you don't come across every day.

We had 31 between us fishing today on Brick and Tile and everyone was in good spirits with the usual nonsense pre-match banter flying around.

The two team captains sorted out the draw aided by fishery owner Jamie which gave us a fair, if not complicated, mix of pegs and as Carpenters had less fishing than ourselves they kept Stevie Wynne and Rich Jones (who are members of both clubs) and I believe we lent them Keith Ray to balance the numbers (but I could be wrong on that)

The wind was blowing left to right and slightly towards pegs 20 & 40 (looking down the lakes) so I was hoping for a peg with the wind behind me which would make the wag easy to fish, or any corner except 1 or 30.

Most people were hoping for a draw on Brick as it contains a bigger average stamp of carp although Tile has big fish in it but also a lot of smaller ones.

Our lot drew first and I took my chances in the middle and pulled out peg 10 on Brick which is a corner and one of the most desirable pegs out of the two lakes.

Most people would have ran to it but I chose to take a steady stroll with a smug grin and tried to ignore the obvious comments.

Lee Williams drew 30, and he didn't run to his peg either but for entirely different reasons ... never mind!

Read his tale of woe here

For company today I had Chris Woolley on peg 9 who apparently is quite an artist when it comes to fishing the paste and legendary amongst his Carpenters Arms colleagues.

Down from him on 8 was, yet again, 2-pegs Taynton who I reckon must have a bit of a man-crush on me considering how often he appears near me on the bank. I think I'll have to print him off a picture to keep under his pillow for the rest of the week!

Behind me (and the tree) was Phil Terry in 31 who I was expecting to do well and next(ish) to him on 33 was our Team Captain Will Dearlove who had somehow managed an empty peg either side of him which was a massive advantage and one not to be squandered in a team match.

Meanwhile Alan Healey, who had drawn 26 on Tile, popped over for a chat and attempted to give me his pound before the match had kicked off but I made him keep it warm and flatly refused to fall for his mind games. I do find it quite comical the depths some people will sink to for the sake of a shiny pound coin!

I did at one point consider walking down to fetch another net before the all in but as I said, I'm not into winding people up.

Anyways, rigs for today consisted of a shallow rig which was capable of supporting an 8mm pellet (unlike yesterday's).

This was to fish tight to the reeds near the tree stump towards the corner and would double up as a rig for "random slapping" in open water.

Next was a rig for the same area but about a meter away from the bank where there was an even depth of about 4 feet and that would be for meat over meat / pellet.

A third rig was set up for meat at 5m at 1 o' clock which was more of an emergency back-up in case all else failed.

Finally a shallow wag rod was set up with a 3ssg float set to 18" as there were quite a few fish swirling all around the peg.

Bait today was nothing fancy, 8mm pellets for the wag (but more like 10's),

2 tins of meat (there's a 3 tin limit at Sedges currently), and a bag of 6mm pellet left over from Docklow for feeding the ducks by the tree stump.

Nothing there to interest the silvers as they were not on the menu today (hopefully)

Will shouted the All-In at 10:30 and after feeding my pole lines I started out on the wag and by 10:31 my float had vanished and I was playing my first fish which took me a bit by suprise, a nice black and yellow ghostie of about 8lbs

Chris next door though was having none of it and also landed a similar sized wag caught fish minutes later and this was how it continued for the first 2 hours with myself and Chris matching each other fish for fish, not loads of them but they were averaging around 10lbs.

And from what I could see of it we were the only ones catching anything of note and especially on the far bank of Brick there was a line of glum looking faces.

The guy in 11 (with the nasty cough) who I had spoken to before the start had said he was going to target down the end bank by the reeds with paste but it seemed that hadn't gone to plan and he was later slinging a wag around to no avail.

A look over my shoulder and I got a big thumbs down from Will who was struggling from his three pegs and he reckoned nobody on Tile was getting a great deal.

After the first couple of hours the wagg line seemed to grind to a halt, bites were few and far between and those I did get I was missing. So I had a look round the pole lines.

The tree stump produced nothing even though I had seen fish moving there and the short meat line gave up one bite that I missed.

I had a go at the random slapping but it only produced one fish that was hooked in the chin.

Chris meanwhile had gone out long with paste and was catching well on it which was concerning as I had hit a wall and was getting nothing.

The bankside rumour mill reckoned Matt Taynton had been catching all day long on the wagg and looked to have it seem up.

With 90 minutes to go I started to get some fish from the tree stump and I was catching well for the last hour adding maybe another 40lbs in that time.

Come the all-out it seemed that Brick had been the better lake and had produced the top 6 weights but Tile had been more consistent with lots of weights  in the 50's and 60's

Matt was the clear winner with 135lbs 2oz followed by myself with 115-14 and then Chris with 91-4 (but still battered from both sides).

Lionel Legge in peg 20 took 4th spot with  79-0.

Top weight on Tile was Keith Ray with 69-13 from peg 22

The top Silvers  went to Colin Butler with 22-7 of skimmers from peg 5

The inter club match was decided on the top ten weights from both clubs and predictably went to Psv with 656-2 against 582-2

Weigh Sheet:

The guy in peg 11 with the nasty cough packed up early, fishless. I reckon he coughed all the fish out of his peg!

Sedges, Tile Lake, 08 Feb

Following a week of frosts and the possibility of ice-breaking by Friday the numbers for this match were diminishing rapidly and I was considering cancelling but we had a couple of late book-ins and the weather forecast was promising a bit of a rise in temperature and no frost overnight.

In addition I'd phoned the fishery and both the main lakes were ice free unlike a lot of other Somerset venues so no need for my sledgehammer head to weigh down the brand new fishing bus!

Even better news was that Alan Healey was helping me christen the new bus which meant he was buying at the cafe and the icing on the cake would be to rob him of another pound coin but unfortunately that wasn't to be.

Predictably the weather forecast was completely off the mark and the skies had cleared overnight resulting in it being very cold and foggy (although that didn't hang about too long once the breeze got up).

So with just the seven fishing, pegging was a bit of a head-scratcher .... One bank, but which? Or spread out on both banks?

In the end we decided on the one bank, the bank shared with Brick lake, leaving out the corners (31 & 40).

No doubt it was the wrong choice as in this kind of situation you're never going to please everybody but never mind.

The match itself was fairly un-eventful for some, especially for Lee Williams on peg 39 who, despite his best efforts, gave up early after snaring just two very greedy (and very tiny) roachlets.

The serious action took place at the other end of the lake and was shared between Lee Waller on 32 and Alan on 33.

Lee fished soft pellet over micros long and found quality skimmers whereas Alan opted to sit it out on the tip with bread all day for four bites and four carp totalling 17-5 but it wasn't enough to beat Lee who's net of skimmers plus a bewildered carp went 19-5.

I had found myself on peg 36 sandwiched between Keith Ray on 35 and Matt Taynton (who seems to enjoy drawing next to me here) on 37.

36 is an open water peg but I spent the first hour chucking a method feeder with micros and 3 dead mags to an island I discovered accidentally (Keith insisted I mentioned that).

Regardless though of whose peg it ended up in it produced bugger all.

Dropping back on the pole at 13m with a single maggot over micros eventually produced a tiny skimmer which was a relief as I was starting to have ideas about a dreaded blank.

That one was followed soon after by its twin brother before the next bite produced something a lot more substantial which turned out to be a skimmer of about 1½ lbs.

Unfortunately though, despite the most delicate of shipping back, it nodded its head and shed the hook leaving me close to tears and wishing I had a seven metre landing net handle as it floundered around on the surface for ages like a jellyfish before it realised it was free and swam off to warn its mates.

Closer inspection revealed the maggot had flipped over the hook point ... bugger (as they say on the good blogs)!

So a quiet spell followed at which point I got bored and went back out on the tip for more biteless action (although I did have a liner).

In the meantime Keith had spent several hours fruitlessly bread-slinging  and Matt had been trotting a wind and tow assisted waggler past the island whilst muttering about being on the wrong bank. That had produced just one roachlet so I was doing ok in my 3 man section.

That was until Mat dropped onto his pole line after 3 hours and promptly had four skimmers in a row, reversing the deficit, before losing number 5.

By now I was getting no indications at all on the pole but I was struggling with presentation as the tow was pushing the rig back towards me. Adding a section and fiddling around with the shotting improved things a bit and I managed to get a few more skimmers and baby roach including a fish around the pound mark.

By the end Keith had followed Lee Williams on the walk of shame after netting just one skimmer (that was hooked in the wrong-un).

With first and second places sewn up it was going to be a close call between myself, Matt Taynton and Matt Challenger on 38 for the default silvers payout.

Matt Taynton took the honours with 5lbs dead which comfortably beat my 3-7 and Matt Challenger's 3-3.

So a hard day but it was enjoyable working hard for every fish.

Full Result:

1. Lee Waller (32) ....... 19-5

2. Alan Healey (33) ..... 17-5

3. Matt Taynton (37) .... 5-0

4. Steve Burgess (36) ... 3-7

5. Matt Challenger (38) ... 3-3

And 2 dnw's

Next week we are on the main lake at Plantations and hopefully it will have warmed up a bit by then and it will be a better result.

At least there are a few going though and there are some spaces available for those that forgot there was a meeting last Tuesday.

Sedges, Tile Lake, 11 Jan (15 pegs)

Back again to Tile lake at Sedges for our first match of the year as it's always good for a few bites especially when a lot of other venues have gotten a bit challenging.
Plus its a venue I really like (which helps)!
So with this being my last year in charge of the fixture list (yes I know I'll be sadly missed lol) I suspect we'll be fishing a few more matches there yet.
Anyway, it was a relief to find the gale force winds we'd had over Friday night and into Saturday morning had passed and we were greeted with a reasonably nice day for the time of year, not too cold and with a bit of breeze blowing into the causeway bank.
With 15 fishing I put 8 on the more sheltered rosdside bank and 7 on the causeway side.
All four corners were in including 30 which is a peg that I usually avoid but it has had a bit of form recently but if I could have chosen a peg it would have been 40 as the wind was pushing into it so it's just as well it wasn't a rover match as Chris Szakacs drew it and ended up chucking back (hero to zero award maybe)???

Otherwise I would have been happy anywhere on the road bank except 23 which I had last time round and spent the day watching other people catch, including Adam Caswell on 21.

So back on 23 again for me and to make matters worse, Alan Healey was 2 pegs up on 25 so if things didn't go too well for me I would be hearing all about it

(And I did)!

Payout today was top 2 overall, one silvers (as the silvers weights have been iffy) and two 7-peg sections as Ryan wasn't in the pools today.
It was agreed to split the sections between the two banks regardless of where Ryan drew so it was Sod's law then that Ryan drew on the 7 peg bank resulting in a section of 8 and a section of 6 but nobody was too concerned.

The match started slowly for most although Keith Ray on 21 got off to a good start getting regular bites chucking a lead with bread? (I think) along the bank and over to the island.

Over the course of the first two hours he landed half a dozen carp and was looking on course for an easy win but for some strange reason his peg completely dried up after that, they probably moved up into the safety of empty peg 22 (or peg 23).

In the meantime, Matt Taynton who was next to me on 24, after a fruitless hour throwing a lead around, switched to the deep wag and started catching a few out in open water alternating between maggot and pellet on the hook and feeding a small amount of 6mm's.

Elsewhere Lee Williams and Chris Gay were having a close battle on 27 & 28 (read Lee's blog here ) and on the opposite bank, Mark Radford was getting a few on 33 as was Rich Britton on 37.

Winner on the day was Matt Taynton with 57-4 caught mostly on the wag on the deck with pellet.

Rich Britton was 2nd with 51-11 caught on bread popped-up at various depths.

And Lee Williams just about got the better of Chris Gay with 49-4 against 47-6 which gave him 3rd (section win)

Mark Radford took the second section with 38-14 and Lee Waller needed just 4lbs to take top silvers.

I had a crap day believe it or not, the tip produced nothing, I never had a proper wag set up in the rod case and a half-hearted play around with a pellet wag set to 4 feet deep was equally fruitless.

And I struggled for most of the day at 14m with various baits for a paltry 2-14 of silvers.

My only saving grace was that at one point later in the match I did hit into something that pulled out a lot of elastic and it wasn't a carp but it mattered not as it soon un-hooked itself.

Possibly if landed it could have got me the silvers money but everyone loses fish so no point in going on about it but it made me feel slightly less insignificant at the time!

Especially as I started 2015 giving pound coins to Alan and Adam.

Full(ish) Result:

1. Matt Taynton (peg 24) ....... 57-4
2. Rich Britton (37) .................. 51-1
3. Lee Williams (27) ................. 49-4
4. Chris Gay (28) ..................... 47-6
5. Mark Radford (33) ................ 38-14
6. Keith Ray (21) ..................... 18-0
7. Alan Healey (25) .................. 12-13

 Silvers:

1.  Lee Waller ....... 4-0
2. Chris Gay ......... 3-0
3. Steve Burgess .... 2-14

Sedges, Tile Lake 16 Nov / Shiplate, Main Lake 23 Nov

Two (old) updates for the price of one this week so no prizes then for guessing that neither of these matches went well for myself.

At the Sedges match I went well-prepared with a plan of action laid out that has served me well here in winter.

Unfortunately the conditions didn't suit my plans and I ended up fishing too negatively when the lake fished much better than I was expecting.

At the Shiplate match I drew a great peg, 3, which is the in-form silvers peg on the lake but is also good for a few carp.

But instead of concentrating on one or the other I played around at catching both and caught very little. 

Oh well, never mind, onwards and upwards!

Sedges, Tile Lake, 16 November (10 pegs):

Only 8 ended up booked in to this one but this was boosted to 10 with the help of a couple of guests who had got in touch via the Psv Facebook page.

Not too sure why the numbers are struggling so much lately but at least it meant we all had plenty of room with everyone having an empty peg each side except for the end pegs 21 & 40 which had the advantage of the breeze blowing down that end of the lake.

Those pegs were occupied by Adam Caswell and (guest) Adam Smith and both these pegs were expected to do well.

I was on 23 which meant I had Adam Caswell for company on 21 and the other Adam's dad, Martin on 25.

I'd had a look at the recent results on the Sedges website and the most recent matches had been won with 100lb ish weights but the back-up weights had been in the 60's and 50's.

But there didn't seem to be any pattern to where the weights were coming from.

The silvers weights had been a bit iffy though with the most recent silvers  match needing just 12lbs to win.

So anything could happen!

As it turned out the lake fished really well.

Top honours went to Chris Szakacs from peg 36 with 95-14.

Unfortunately due to poor lighting I didn't get a picture of Chris with his fish so I've had to make do (sorry) ....

Chris caught most of his fish on the pellet feeder plus a few on the pellet wag and rounded it all off with four lumps from down the edge on dead maggot.

Second was (guest) Adam Smith with 85-7 from peg 40. 

If I remember rightly Adam caught mainly on worm over micros and his weight was boosted quite dramatically with a fish of just under 20lbs caught in the last 20 minutes.

Mark Radford was third with 78-7 from peg 29.

Mark struggled early on catching a few fish on the pellet feeder but things improved  after a switch to the shallow wag and he later had some big fish down the edge towards peg 30 on corn.

The silvers went to Martin Smith with 10-3 caught on worm over micro.

Full Result:

1. Chris Szakacs (peg 36) ..... 95-14
2. Adam Smith (40) ............. 85-7
3. Mark Radford (29) ........... 78-7
4. Adam Caswell (21) .......... 71-9
5. Matt Taynton (38) ............ 61-4
6. Lionel Legge (32) ............ 59-15
7. Ryan Radford (27) ........... 31-10
8. Martin Smith (25) ............ 26-1
9. Steve Burgess (23) .......... 25-10
10. Gimp (34) ..... gave up!

Silvers:

1. Martin Smith (25) ....... 10-3
2. Mark Radford (29) ...... 6-9
3. Matt Taynton (38) ....... 6-3
4. etc

Shiplate, Main Lake, 23 November (14 pegs):

This match was a bit of a struggle for many but not for Alan Healey who drew peg 15 and was quite pleased with himself.

Alan caught steadily through the day and with the help of Mark Radford on peg 1 who was telling him where the fish were, went on to win the match comfortably with 97-6.

Coming in a close second was Stevie Wynne with 33-13 from peg 10 

And Mark Radford was 3rd with 27-0

Top silvers went to Lionel Legge with 18-0 from peg 14.

As I said earlier, my day didn't go too well and just to add insult to injury with minutes of the match left I hooked a fish on my silvers rig that pulled out yards of elastic and then launched itself out of the water like a scene from Free Willy fortunately shedding the hook in the process.

I say "fortunately" as if it had stayed connected I would probably have been still playing it now as it was the biggest fish I've ever seen! Anyway ....

Full Result:

1. Alan Healey (15) ..... 97-6
2. Steve Wynne (10) .... 33-13
3. Mark Radford (1) ...... 27-0
4. Ryan Radford (4) ...... 26-4
5. Lionel Legge (14) ..... 25-2
6. Chris Szakacs (8) ..... 21-14
7. Lee Waller (11) ........ 16-6
8. Steve Burgess (3) .... 15-8
9. Mike Wilson (12) ...... 10-0
10. Derek Lucas* (5) ...... 9-1
11. Darren North (7) ...... 8-4
12. Adam Caswell (13) ... 6-2
13. and 2 dnw's

Silvers:

1. Lionel Legge ... 18-0
2. Lee Waller ...... 10-12
3. Mike Wilson ..... 10-0
4. Derek Lucas .... 9-1
5. Darren North .... 8-4
6. Alan Healey ...... 7-10
7. Ryan Radford .... 7-2
8. etc

And finally, there is a meeting on Tuesday night (2 Dec) at The Midland Spinner and, as well as the usual stuff, we will be sorting out the details for Sunday's Christmas Match and collecting pools money from anyone who has yet to pay.
Next matches will be in the New Year at:
Sedges, Tile Lake (11 Jan)
Shiplate, Main Lake (18 Jan)
Emerald Pool (25 Jan)

The Sedges 14 pegs

If Carlsberg done fisherys........

unlike last weeks bleak surroundings this week the club were at one of the finest fisherys In the southwest, not only is it easy on the eye but your always afforded a warm welcome by the owners with a free cuppa, and to cap it all the lakes offer some fantastic fishing!

Originally we had a full house of twenty but for whatever reason a few dropped out leaving fourteen so match organisor mr Healy decided on paying a top three plus two silvers places

On our last visit the skimmers fed really well with Chris Davis  catching nearly 70lbs of them unfourtunately today they didnt show in any numbers infact it was a slow day for most people. On peg 15 Adam Caswell started well with four decent carp in as many put ins on his favoured putty but thats as good as it got for him, elsewhere it was slow going with the odd carp and skimmer being caught.

My dip in to the bucket of balls gave me a short walk to corner peg one, i was not overly confident as there was no ripple at all so expected a tough match but being the corner you usually get a few fish turn up late on, i started on a pellet feeder along the bottom bank one pull round was all i had in the first hour but that came off halfway back. Dropping on my 5metre meat line my first bite was a 2lb skimmer next put in the float kept going and a ten pounder was soon in the net thats where my action stopped. Id been pinging pellet 16 metres along the bank at the only point I could really get tight, going Into the last hour i noticed activity so went out with a double dendra on the hook and had areally good last hour hooking 13 carp landing 10 with the fish litery ripping the elastic out. I finished with 87lb which was good enough for second on the day.

Winner for the second week running was Chris Gay who made the most of flyer peg 11 to weigh 98lb 5oz, Chris caught most of his fish long shallow against the reeds plus a few down the edge on worm over groundbait.Last in the frame was the master lead slinger Alan Healy with 68lb 14oz all caught on the lead and pva bag.

Top silvers was Colin Butler with 17lb 5oz of skimmers caught on soft pellet over grounbait with Mike Wilson coming second doing the same.

Main frame and silvers winners

FUll RESULTS....

1ST    Chris Gay              98lb 5oz       peg 11
2ND   Chris Szakacs       87lb                      1
3RD   Alan Healy             68lb 14oz             9
4TH   Lee Williams          59lb 9oz               12
5TH   Mike Wilson           58lb                      3
6TH   Adam Caswell       57lb 12oz             15
7TH   Rich Jones             51lb 5oz               18
8TH   Will Dearlove          45lb 2oz               6
9TH   Mark Radford         32lb 2oz               5
10TH Colin Butler             28lb 6oz               17
11TH Ryan Radford         22lb 14oz             10
And three DNW

SILVERS.....

1ST    Colin Butler             17lb 5oz
2nd    Mike Wilson             12lb 9oz

Sedges, Brick Lake, 13 July (13 pegs)

A pity nobody told the frog!

A bit of a change in the weather today meant that after the long spell of hot and relatively windless days we've enjoyed through most of June we had a drop of rain overnight and we were greeted with slightly fresher conditions, cloudy with a bit of breeze that was blowing diagonally across the lake towards peg 20.

With this in mind and with 13 fishing, peg 1 went into the bucket along with the rest of the odd numbers on the central bank plus peg 10, and on the far bank pegs 13, 16 and 19 were left out which gave everybody a bit of space.

Ironically Adam Caswell drew peg 1 and I had to admit it did look like a good draw today.

The other corners were occupied by Darren North (10), Chris Szakacs (with much to prove in 11) and Mark Radford in 20 which was where I would have chosen to be but if I drew another corner today I think I would have been physically abused!

As per normal I took the last peg which gave me 17 which didn't fill me with confidence but Vic Bush (who was fishing the top 2 match on Tile) reckoned it was a decent draw as did Jamie the owner.

I was a bit disheartened though as the wind was blowing straight into the peg meaning the wag was going to be a non-starter.

My neighbourhood watch for today was Ron Hardiman on 18, looking tanned and toned after his luxury holiday chasing turtles in Zante, two up to my right was Lionel Legge who has an uncanny habit of drawing next to me at Sedges and up from him was Bridgwater's finest pools poacher Lee Williams.

The rest of my bank were out of sight but I was expecting to get battered from the two corners at least.

I did set up a shallow wag (a hefty one) and started off on that hoping to nick a couple early but as expected the presentation was rubbish and I had no indications on it.

Plan B was out on a full depth rig at about 9 or 10 metres with corn on the hook over 4mm pellet and this eventually produced a hand-sized skimmer but it was slow going.

Fortunately for me nobody else was really setting the place alight except for Chris Davis across on peg 3 who had been catching steadily from the start.

I couldn't make out exactly what he was catching but I could see plenty of elastic so I guessed it was carp although I found out later it was skimmers and plenty of them!

A change to meat on the hook was a bit more productive for me with a couple more skimmers and one that filled the bottom of the landing net but I was still struggling.

Halfway through I untangled a full depth waggler and had a play with that but with no joy and by now I could see Adam was "hooking" a few carp in peg 1 which was worrying and Chris was miles ahead of everyone else.

I did manage a few more skimmers from the deep rig including a couple more of those net-fillers that make your arse twitch a bit when you're bringing them in as every time they shake their heads it seems like they're going to shed the hook.

I spent the last 90 minutes fishing meat down the left hand margin and I managed to get 4 decent sized carp out but the lake really switched on for everyone in the last hour so there was to be no Curry Kings tonight.

My collection of skimmers went 15lbs (which I was quite proud of) and added together with my 4 carp gave me a grand total of 50-4 for nowhere and to make matters worse I was beaten by Adam, Alan and also Lee which cost me £3 so an expensive day!

The match was won by Chris Davis with 119-9 which also included the top silvers weight of 67-7 of skimmers.

Added to that, Chris was on the golden peg which earned him an healthy bonus of £100.

Chris caught the bulk of his fish on meat over loose fed meat at 5/6m.

Brian Shanks ran him a close second with 118-7 from peg 9 followed by Chris Szakacs with 93-13 from 11 (I was expecting him to do a little better than that but I guess he tried his best) and 4th place went to Mark Radford in 20 with 85-8 caught on paste.

Top silvers, as mentioned already went to Chris so the default silvers pool went to Bridgewater Silvers Superhero Lee Williams with a level 40lbs.

For a blow by blow account of Lee's heroics click here!

Rocket Ron Hardiman took the second (default) silvers spot with 20-10.

The skimmers really got there heads down today with a total of 202lbs weighed in.

Incidentally the top 2 match I mentioned earlier on Tile lake was won by Vic Bush with 164-4 from peg 39 which is a new record for the topkit matches.

Tile lake has been fishing really well recently with match records being beaten several times over the last month or so.
For all the latest Sedges match results click here
(not that the frog would be too bothered)!

Full Result:

1. Chris Davis* (peg 3) ....... 119-9
2. Brian Shanks (9) ............ 118-7
3. Chris Szakacs (11) .......... 93-13
4. Mark Radford (20) .......... 85-8
5. Alan Healey (7) ............. 64-10
6. Adam Caswell (1) .......... 60-8
7. Lee Williams (14) .......... 54-5
8. Steve Burgess (17) ....... 50-4
9. Darren North (10) ........ 36-3
10. Ryan Radford** (12) ..... 33-10
11. Mike Welling (5) ........... 28-15
12. Ron Hardiman (18) ....... 20-10
13. Lionel Legge (15) ......... dnw

*golden peg
**silver peg

Silvers:

1. Chris Davis (3) ......... 67-7
2. Lee Williams (14) ...... 40-0
3. Ron Hardiman (18) ... 20-10
4. Mike Welling (5) ....... 16-1
5. Steve Burgess (17) .... 15-2
6. Alan Healey (7) ........ 12-12
7. Brian Shanks (9) ...... 12-9
8. Ryan Radford (12) .... 10-1
9. Mark Radford (20) ..... 3-13
10. Adam Caswell (1) ...... 2-5
11. Darren North (10) ..... 2-3

Sedges, Brick Lake, 08 June (16 pegs)

With 16 fishing today and everybody in the pools it was a simple matter of taking out 2 pegs on each side, that was until all the would-be match organisers decided to have their say, so after much deliberation, 2 & 3 were left out on the bank shared with Tile and 13 & 19 on the opposite bank.

Personally I would have taken peg 1 out (and 20) as these pegs had no wind but a certain person was ADAMant that peg 1 was full of carp, so much so that he was happy to be given the peg. 

I was tempted to let him have it but I didn't and Alan Healey drew it instead!

He probably won't be running to it next time around!

Anyway, we had a practice draw before the main event and I drew out a couple of iffy pegs and then left it as I didn't want to jinx my chances in the proper draw.

And that proved to be a wise move as the last ping-pong ball in the bucket was peg 11 which is the top right corner and the wind was blowing up there.

Brian Shanks drew 10, the opposite corner which usually wins when there is a tidy angler on it and for company I had Chris Gay on 12 which was a repeat of last week but hopefully the result would not be quite so unfortunate ... It wasn't!

Setting up never took long, a shallow rig for 8mm pellet which never got wet and a rig for 14m along into the corner which was about 4' deep to fish meat over 5mm pellet.

Finally, the wag rod was untangled and set up for 8mm pellet at about 12 inches deep.

On the "all in" I fed the corner with a cup of pellet and meat, fired out a pouch of 8mm's and slung the wag out.

By this time Brian was playing his first fish and I was beginning to worry that I was going to get my backside spanked again by the Westerleigh Slapper when the rod was nearly ripped from between my knees.

Needless to say I never saw that fish but the next fish wasn't long in coming.

By casting about two thirds of the way across and letting the float drift into a small gap in the reeds I was getting some really confident bites and after an hour and a half I was quite a bit ahead of Brian who was struggling a bit on the pole but he dug out a waggler rod and caught on that straight away casting around the tree that overhangs peg 10.

By midway the fish in my peg started to get a bit cagey and I was having to cast a bit further along the bank and out into the open water to keep the bites coming. Brian meanwhile had abandoned the wag rod and was back on the pole and getting a few fish from in the corner of his peg and to my left, Chris Gay was catching in close and made sure everyone knew it by wandering up and down the bank with "weighers".

Just before the last hour we had a downpour and the wind dropped for a short while and after that I struggled.

I had a look down the edge with the meat rig which resulted in a foulhooker that came off and not much else.

In hindsight I could have tried the shallow rig down the edge but it was of little consequence as my 20 or so carp went 134lbs exactly which was good enough for 1st although Brian was only 1 fish away from that with 125-8 so it was close.

Chris Gay made the best of the empty peg next to him and weighed in 83-12 for third place catching mainly on worm over groundbait close in.

I forgot to ask him if he caught on a single worm or a specific number of pieces of worm ... I'm sure he will put me right!

And fourth was Pete Uzzell with 57-2 from peg 6. His weight was boosted quite a bit with a fish that went just over 22lbs which he hooked minutes before the end of the match and it was just starting to get dark by the time he landed it but at least it gave his new pole a good workout and the section money he won should go some way towards paying for it!

[I'm pretty sure that Matt Williams has been sent the picture by now]

The silvers fished really well today by Psv standards and made up 1/4 of the total weighed in.

Rocket Ron Hardiman took the honours from peg 4 with 35-12 of good quality skimmers caught on 8mm meat fished at 6m.

Second was Matt Taynton on peg 18 with 24-8 caught on double caster at 14m

And Keith Ray managed 21-12 of skimmers from peg 8.

Section winners were Pete Uzzell by default and Mark Radford by lots of defaults!

Full Result:

1. Steve Burgess (11) ....... 134-0 (no silvers)
2. Brian Shanks (10) ............ 125-8
3. Chris Gay** (12) ............. 83-12
4. Pete Uzzell (6) ................ 57-2
5. Matt Taynton (18) ............ 48-5
6. Ron Hardiman (4) ............ 44-12
7. Mark Radford (16) ........... 40-12
8. Darren North (15) ........... 32-4
9. Mike Welling (9) .............. 27-8
10. Adam Caswell (7) ............ 26-10
11. Lee Waller (5) ................ 25-11
12. Keith Ray (8) .................. 21-12
13. Alan Healey (1) ............... 18-11
14. Ryan Radford* (17) ......... 17-12
15. John Bradford (20) .......... 8-8
16. Steve O Toole (14) .......... dnw

*golden peg

**silver peg

Silvers:

1. Rocket Ron Hardiman (4) ... 35-12
2. Matt Taynton (18) ....... 24-8
3. Keith Ray (8) ............. 21-12
4. Lee Waller (5) ........... 19-4
5. Pete Uzzell (6) .......... 15-9
6. Mike Welling (9) ........ 12-8
7. Chris Gay (12) .......... 12-0
8. John Bradford (20) .... 8-8
9. Darren North (15) ..... 7-4
10. Alan Healey (1) ........ 7-3
11. Adam Caswell (7) ..... 7-2
12. Ryan Radford (17) .... 6-4
13. Brian Shanks (10) ..... 2-4
14. Mark Radford (16) .... 2-0

Next week is on Campbell at Viaduct and I wont be there so please let me know by Friday if you can't make it so that I can give the fishery an idea of numbers and book a time slot that isn't going to upset anybody.

There are a couple of spaces left for this one.

This also means that your next update will be brought to you by the very talented and marginally less sarcastic Chris Szakacs.

Sedges, Tile Lake, 27 April (19 pegs)

19 fishing this week which is a full house all bar 1 peg.
I had the choice of taking a peg out with the obvious choice being 30 as this one doesn't seem to do too well for us, or to leave all 20 in and let fate decide.
I stuck with the latter which resulted in 29 being the last ping-pong ball in the bucket and the empty peg which gave peg 30 a bit more of a chance so that worked out quite well.
The second last ball to come out went to myself and that was 21, a corner surprisingly, and it had the wind blowing into it so no complaints from me!
That's the third week on the trot now that I've drawn a corner and also the third time on the trot I've drawn a corner on Tile lake so somebody up there must like me.
Payout today was top three, two sections and just the one silvers which I expected John Bradford and Matt Challenger to be fighting over as they were both drawn in the mid thirties which tend to throw up some good silvers weights. (Got that wrong then)
Arriving at my peg I had Brian Shanks next door on 22 and up from him, thankfully obscured by undergrowth, Alan Healey.
Opposite I could see Adam Caswell in 40 which is a good corner peg and won last Sunday's match with over 140lbs. Strangely though, Adam had geared himself up to fish for silvers and never brought any rods so that peg was wasted (dnw)!
I could also make out Matt Taynton on 37 through the gap between the islands.
Setting up today I never got any rods out as, with the wind blowing into the corner, even a blind man could have worked out how to fish it (got that wrong as well)!
Plumbing up revealed there wasn't any definite ledges to fish on so I set up 3 rigs, one to fish at the shallowest area (tight to the bank), one at the bottom of the slope and one somewhere in between.
Bait was to be casters (with groundbait), meat, 6 & 8mm pellet and there was a tin of corn in reserve in case all the other options let me down.

On the all-in, which was on time as even I can manage to sort out three pole rigs in an hour, I churned up 3 handfulls of caster into the groundbait mix and deposited a ball on each of the three lines at 13m plus I fed some caster down each margin and over into the corner,

Starting with double caster on the full depth kit produced a slow start but after 30 minutes a couple of roach and a tiny skimmer gave themselves up.

Brian next door had started shallow with pellet slapping a stumpy little waggler to aid presentation (something he has picked up from Si Belcham but wouldn't admit to) but it wasn't having the desired effect and he was soon fishing soft pellet on the deck, probably to get some use out of his new plummet.

At this stage the only pegs that were producing were Lionel Legge in 31 and also peg 32, most others were struggling.

Having re-fed the deep swim I tried the "up the slope" rig but this was also unsuccessful.

I had a look on the shallowest line with an 8mm banded and after a few lifts I hooked and landed a carp of a couple of pounds and for a brief moment it looked like the tide had turned but nothing followed. 

My inside caster lines also produced nothing and a look into the corner only gave up a couple of suicidal micro-rudd.

The emergency tin of corn had no effect either!
Shanksy meanwhile had snared a couple of fish on the 13m line but was struggling to get into any sort of rhythm and was chopping and changing between every method that didn't involve watching a rod tip.

It was time for a walk!!

As it turned out the lake was fishing much harder than I had anticipated perhaps due to a bit if pressure in the week from the Sedges / Avalon Spring festival.

On my return I happened to spot a fish top out towards the aereator cable so with half the match gone and nothing to lose other than my dignity and pound coins to Alan and Lee Williams  I filled a bait tub with 8mm pellets and dug out the (almost brand new) waggler setup.

First random chuck towards the edge produced a bite almost straight away which I wasn't expecting and therefore missed completely.

Reeling in it became apparent that the wind had blown my line in amongst the undergrowth as instead of the rig heading back to me it veered off to the right and lodged itself in an overhanging reed bush resulting in the first of many trips along the  end bank!

Second chuck had the same result only this time I was coiled like a tiger and this one was safely landed.

The rest of the match followed the same vein with a few fish followed by a walk round the bank.

Occasionally the bites went a bit "iffy" either because the fish had come up shallower or they had maybe backed off a bit but on the whole they were small fish around the 3lb mark with the odd better fish thrown in but none of the proper ones that you would normally expect to come shallow and are necessary for a big weight.

Mr Shanks in the meantime had stepped up a gear and was putting a few fish together on his long line, probably due to superior presentation helped by a back-shot (ask him)? 

Unfortunately in his desperate attempts to catch up he was wasting time swapping methods instead of sticking to the one that was working which was the cause of his demise.

I was first to weigh and put 58-5 on the scales and despite my concerns Mr Shanks could only muster 49-6.

Alan had fished for silvers and deposited 10-8 of them on the scales, his three carp boosted that to 22-15 although he did manage four carp on the lead after the all-out by the time the scales reached him!

The rest of the weights up this bank were  mediocre with the exception of Chris Davis on 28 who had 43-8.

Lionel on 31 had just under 52lbs and Matt Taynton on 37, who had had a bit of a late charge had me sweating for a moment, running me close with 54-8

Which just left Matt Challenger to weigh on 39 and he put 79-0 plus a couple of pounds of silvers on the scales which well and truly pissed on my fire!

I think I will be visiting Avon Angling in future for my bait and tackle!

And Alan's dismal silvers weight was good enough to win the silvers money which meant the Healey family's KFC bill was sorted for another week.

So no big weights but a close result. 

And I think the same could be said for the Board Mills club match on Brick as there were a few dejected souls packing up early on that one but I don't know the winning weight (please comment if you do)

This Sunday we are up at Hillview on the canals for a change of scenery ... Should be interesting as we've not been up there for a few years.

Full Result:

1. Matt Challenger (peg 38) ....79-0
2. Steve Burgess (21) ....... 58-5
3. Matt Taynton (37) ......... 54-8
4. Lionel Legge (31) ......... 51-15
5. Mark Radford (39) ........ 51-7
6. Brian Shanks (22) ........ 49-6
7. Chris Davis (28) ........... 43-8
8. Lee Williams (27) ......... 39-6
9. Andy Gay (32) ............. 38-8
10. (Not so) Rocket Ron Hardiman (25) ... 32-4
11. Steve Wynne* (35) ...... 29-15
12. Rich Jones (24) ............ 23-14
13. Alan Healey (23) .......... 21-15
14. and 6 DNW's

*golden peg
**silver peg