billgibbins on Xanga

Weblog

Sunday, 08 November 2009

PENNY BRIDGE 8-11-09

Its pennybridge today ,the second leg of a two part trophy match ,one to be on a still water ,and one on a river ,the river leg was won by the vicar and he was taking a formidable lead into todays match with a 14lb advantage to his name .with today being pennybridge it was going to be near impossible to turn that over,still it was points for the overall league up for grabs as well so a good draw was needed to keep the pressure on john at the top of the table.
           the weather had taken a turn for the worst overnight with cold rain falling ,this coupled with the fact that the colour had dropped right out of the water a good draw was not going to be the shallow end as on previous form this was the kiss of death .well you guessed it i drew the shallowest peg on the lake .peg six was to be my home and although i had maybe five feet in front of me it was not anywhere deep enough to hold a head of fish .
      i set up two rigs one to fish the deepest part of my peg and one to fish just off the island that was 13metres away directly in front of me.
now there was a huge problem that i was facing ,i hadnt got any bait ,i couldnt get to the tackle shop in time yesterday so i would be relying on my mates to donate to the cause and chip in with a few maggot and pinky.so its a big thanks to gary lawrence who was on peg five ,the vicar on peg four and upyah harris on peg eight for enabling me to fish.
   the all in was sounded by roger funnel and his airhorn and i shipped out with a toss pot of pinky and a single red maggot on the hook ,this was on the deep [yeh right] line and i then fired out half a dozen big maggot out to the island and waited for a bite ,and waited ,and waited ,and waited ,no matter what i tried i could not get a touch .i could see julian on peg 22 catching small roach and skimmers and glen coleman on 21 also putting fish in his net.roger funnel was straight into his stride bagging his share as was the vicar although his were smaller.
gary lawrence was struggling for any sort of action and it was at least half an hour in before he caught his first fish. ,upyah was catching small stuff regularly and i couldnt see anyone else to know what was happening. after an hour and a half i had had five bites and put two tiny roach and a miniscule perch in the net for a total of maybe an ounce .my next bite came just before twelve thirty,the float which was shotted right down to about an eighth of an inch showing dipped and held flush with the surface ,a lift of the pole saw me expecting another plip ,well my ghast was well and truly flabbered when my number six elastic was streaming out the end of my pole at a rate of knots.bloody hell ,fish on,it was a very nervy three or four minutes that followed with me dreading the worst but fortunately my hooklength held as did my nerve and i slid the landing net under a very nice tench of around three pounds or so.the capture of such a specimen on such a hard day was a real boost as i was beginning to lose the plot .
a look around and julian and glen were both still putting a few in there nets ,both had by now snared three or four crucians and were looking likely to be contesting the frame .the grapevine was saying john was also the proud owner of a couple of decent perch and a couple of crucians so it could be close later on ,well my swim was dead and i never had another bite untill about two fortyfive when in three puts i had a perch of around half a pound and a roach of maybe six ounces.,this was to conclude my days work as i never had another touch .
gary lawrence had been having a nightmare which was bordering on hilarity at times ,he decided that the waggler might be a way to go so he set up the waggy and was just trimming his tag ends on his hooklength when he cut the wrong piece of line and he sliced all his hooklength off along with his dropper shot.his words are not repeatable on here and he threw the rod up the bank. a bit later on he decided to have another go at setting up and this time he was succsessful ,untill he had his first cast ,he stuck it straight out to the island and lost the lot .lol.his words were even more unrepeatable and again the vicar and myself were in stitches.
roger funnel and upyah had been catching small fish throughout the day and i thought that roger funnel had caught enough to beat me and upyah ,julian and glen had both been at it most of the day and so had john ,so when the scales were to come round it was the vicar who was first up ,he put 2lb 5oz on the board before gary put 11oz next to his name .my fish totalled a very welcome 4lb 9oz and the tench went 3lb 7oz ,this is to be entered for the tench trophy ,and at the moment is winning that one.upyah was next up for scrutiny and he put 3lb 5oz along side his name ,the surprise surprise that was what roger funnel put beside his.i really thought that mr funnel had beaten me hollow.
rudi was next and he was one of those that i couldnt see from my peg ,he weighed in 4lb 6oz ,not quite enough to beat me ,john was the next weight of any significance as he scaled 7lb 3oz to take the lead ,it was glen who was to maybe threaten that weight along with julian ,and my money had been on julian to have won the match ,but again surprise surprise glen weighed in 6lb 3oz and julian 5lb 9oz .
   so it was a win for john and with glen second julian third and yours truly with fourth place .
   well done to the vicar for winning the fieldbuss trophy this year .
   next match is at wylands ,on house lake ,.

Sunday, 25 October 2009

CLUB MATCH AT MUSHROOM FARM 25-10

         Its the main lake at mushroom farm today ,our previous match being on the race track lake.
    with some of the regulars having fished yesterday ,myself included the turn out for todays match was a little lower than hoped with only a dozen showing up to do battle .this being the case we were able to spread out a bit peg wise and everyone had an empty peg either side of them .
     i found myself looking at peg three which was not really where i fancied ,but ,it did have the wind on my back and as such wouldnt be as cold or difficult to hold a pole in such windy conditions.for company although a good few yards away i had gary lawrence on two and with four not drawn i was looking at quite a large area all to myself .this is normally a good thing but with the wind blowing so hard i fancied the fish would be on the opposite bank .
     setting up a method feeder and two tops for the pole i found a rather dissapointing depth of around two and a half feet,the vicar ,who was on the opposite bank was saying that he had a good four feet in front of him .
         on the whistle i cupped in a pot of 4mm pellet with a few grains of corn at ten metres straight out in front ,and then it was a pot of 4mm pellet and corn with a few maggots at eight metres at about ten o clock ,both lines fed it was out with the method ,i had clipped up to fish just short of halfway and the first cast was right on the money as no sooner had i put the rod on the rest than it was pulling round ,fish on ,a spirited fight from a three pound common carp and things were all of a sudden looking very good . unfortunately this was the only bite i had for the first half hour ,for try as i might i couldnt get another fish interested in the feeder .
    out with the pole at ten metres ,baited with paste and two minutes later i was striking into thin air as i missed a big sail away .
      back out and it was a repeat performance so it was a switch of rigs and out to the eight metre line baited with double maggot .it didnt take long for a bite and a skimmer of a couple of pounds was soon in the net .this was followed by a couple of hand sized skimmers before a carp came by for a very brief visit ,as it saw me off in double quick time .
      a new hooklength and back out ,this time the carp stayed attached and then it was back to catching small skimmers.
       looking across the lake i could see the vicar and jeremy stone both catching well and both down the edge .well i had been feeding my margin swim so had a look down the inside ,the eight metre rig doubled as a margin rig as the depth was the same so with a grain of corn on the hook i lowered the rig in ,ten seconds later and the elastic is being sorely tested as it was struggling to contain the unseen fish ,for a good five minutes the fish just wouldnt get his head up ,but when it did it was staring my landing net squarely in the eye and was soon relocated to my keepnet .i couldnt get another touch down the inside so it was a quick look back on the method ,it took less than two seconds for the rod to be nearly ripped out of my hand ,a four pound fish was soon in the net and it was back out ,it was an action replay as the tip just ripped round and another fish was placed with his cousins in the onion bag.then it was a biteless half hour before i went back down the inside ,i had been feeding 4mm pellet close in and putting on a soft hooker pellet i was soon playing a very hard fighting fish of about eight pounds .it was then a biteless few minutes before the float slid away again ,this time with double maggot on the hook .this fish had ideas of his own that didnt include being put in my keepnet and as such broke me up .a new rig was quickly fitted and i was soon cursing my luck as a fish of well over ten pounds again broke me up .19 line snapping like cotton .
   yet another new rig ,this time when the float went i was very quickly looking at a fish of huge preportions laying on the surface ,it had just come straight up and was laying there within five seconds of being hooked ,reaching for my landing net i was just six inches away from landing it when it recovered its senses and started to pull back ,big time .
      well the upshot was another bloody rig being put on as it busted me up after about ten minutes of playing catch me if you can.
       now whilst i was having all this fun jeremy was bagging big time ,it was a fish a chuck for him and he was in heaven .the vicar had been catching pretty well but nowhere in the same league as jeremy and the final two hours he never had a fish .
john manktelow who was also on the windward bank had been taking the odd fish through out the day ,no great numbers but great in size as the grapevine was saying that he had two fish for near thirty pounds .
gary lawrence had caught a nice grass carp as had simon elsey but i was beyond caring as i was still pretty miffed at being busted up three times on the spin .
      by the time the all out was sounded i had lost another two fish ,this time only hook pulls but i did add another couple of small carp to make my final weight an even 36lb .
       garys grassy went 8lb 6oz and he was well pleased . his total weight was a little dissapointing though as he scaled a small twenty pound weight . simon elsey put a very handy bigger 28lb on the scales and his grassy was just short of garys weighing in at just over 7lb.
john manktelow with his big lumps [alledgedly]weighed in a mid fortys weight and the vicar put a fifty plus weight next to his name for second overall . this left jeremy to put his days work on the scales ,he fell just short of his guestimate of 150lb with a very fine 147lb to take the days bragging rights big style. well done jezzer .
my weight was good enough for fourth place but with those lost fish could easily have been second ,but weve all been there at one time or another .
     next match is at pennybridge ,in a fortnight.

Saturday, 17 October 2009

SAMS LAKE NR HEADCORN,SILVER FISH ONLY 17-10-09

Its off to sams lake nr headcorn today for a silver fish only match run by nick gilbert. so not having ever seen the place before it was a look on the interweb for some info on the place .
from what i could gather it was skimmers and roach that would make the bulk of your catch and the possibility of a chub or two showing as well.with this all taken in i had got myself three pints of maggots for today and a bag of silver fish groundbait .
     now as i had to pass through hawkhurst on my way to the lake i picked vince gould up and we set off for the weald of kent golf course as they do a decent brekky there ,upon arriving at the club we were met by nick gilbert and matt love, who were already tucking in to a full english .
with faces stuffed we set off for the lake and met up with all the other anglers who would be taking part today .
pleasantrys exchanged it was soon time to draw ,i found peg ten in my hand and a quick look at where i was on nicks map put me right in the teeth of a very chilly north wind .for company i had matt love on peg eleven and dean kershaw on peg eight .looking at the swim i found i had an island at about thirtyfive yards away .my first thought was set up a feeder ,but with today being silvers only i decided to not set one up as the island was apparantly carp city .
     plumbing up i found that i had around four foot six wherever i tried and it was only two rigs that i set up ,one for fishing at depth and one for fishing shallow .i was going to fish two lines ,one at eleven and a half metres and one at six metres .
the all in was sounded by nick and i put in four balls of groundbait on the long line and fed by hand the closer line with maggot .
     matt had decided to start on the feeder and was busily casting his feeder out and letting it empty ,whilst he was doing this i was straight into a run of small roach and the odd small skimmer .looking around i could see trevor little fishing the waggler and he was catching small roach ,keith driscoll was also bagging a few on the pole and all the while matt was struggling to get a bite on the tip.after an hour i probably had about a pound and a half in the net .matt was blanking and the grapevine was saying that the far side wasnt really producing ,although nick was catching his share .
    matt had put the tip rod up the bank and was now on the pole at thirteen metres ,but again he was biteless so he started feeding maggot short at about eight metres ,this proved to be the line for him and he was soon into his stride picking up small roach.i was still picking off the odd roach and skimmer but matt was now starting to catch skimmers on his near line ,this prompted me to try my short line and i was soon catching small roach from it .
          matt was having to wait longer for bites from his short line than i was and my bits were just about keeping me level with his big skimmers that he was now catching.my short line was starting to slow down a bit so i went back out on my long line and was soon back into the roach when that died on me ,so i cupped in a big pot of maggot and put on double maggot instead of the one that had i had been using ,this was to prove to be a bit of a wrong move as the float went straight down the hole and i was playing a very surprised carp ,it took about ten minutes to land on my six elastic and it went some where around six pound .
i found that by switching between my two lines i kept the bits coming and i also picked up the odd bonus fish in the shape of a small chub and a rather grand looking perch of well over a pound and a half .
matt was by now fishing at thirteen metres and was getting decent sized skimmers come his way and one was a proper bream of around four pounds ,he also found a good perch and a real bonus which he thought was a carp ,but turned out to be a tench .
i had struggled to get many skimmers in my swim but the small roach kept coming and i even had to return unweighed a cracking looking common carp of very near double figures .
the all out was sounded by nick at four and a quick pack away and on to the weigh in .
well nick was to take an early lead with 12lb 7oz ,this was to stay in front untill we got round to roy gudgeon who put over twenty pounds on the board ,with 21lb 7oz this was to be eclipsed by matt who put 24lb 13oz next to his name for a fine win ,my weight was to prove just enough to beat nick for third place with 12lb 10oz being my total
    it fished hard today as the cold wind put the fish down ,but it was a pleasure to meet up with a few new faces and thanks to nick for running the match .

Tuesday, 13 October 2009

HARTLEYLANDS ,PEARTREE, 13-10-9

A good freind on the maggot drowning web site ,kevin lovelands is soon to be moving to pastures new ,or is that oceans new as he is doing what a lot of people would love to do ,and that is up sticks and go and live in the bahamas .whats that got to do with fishing ,well kev is getting in as much as he can before he goes and today is one of his last outings before he goes ,so today is a knockup on peartree at hartleylands .
    thirteen anglers turned up and with dave collier running things the draw went smoothly and i found myself looking at peg eleven for the day ,now peartree is permanantly pegged and peg eleven was to prove to be the peg that i fished a couple of years ago in the maggot drowners southern individual championship.i remember that day very well as i was in a lot of pain at the time with a really bad case of tennis elbow and landing fish that day hurt like hell.
    well today im fit and healthy and raring to go ,looking at the swim it is on the end of the island, and with every other peg being put in i had almost the whole of the end of the lake to myself .
      i set up a method feeder to fish to the island and two pole rigs ,one for down the edge and one for fishing out in front at about seven metres ,as this was the bottom of the shelf that i had found .
      the all in was sounded by dave at ten fifteen and it was straight out to the island with the method ,a quick feed of pellet to the margin and the seven metre line and the tip was rattling round ,fish on , a spirited fight from a two pound carp and it was back out to the island .
      another helping of feed to both pole lines and again the tip is in an "L" shape as carp number two was looking to grace my keepnet ,unfortunately the carp hadnt read the script and decided that my keepnet wasnt going to be his home for the day and we parted company at the net .back out and a look around to see what was going on else where ,i could see tony roberts playing a carp that he had snared from his feeder line and peter morton was playing his third .dave talbot was also playing a fish that he had caught on the pole and this was giving him a right run around as he couldnt get the fishes head up.eventually he put the net under the fish and it was a common of eight and a half pounds [we weighed it at the end]this dave said was his pb carp on the pole and was well chuffed .
   with dave catching that biggy i did wonder weather to try my pole line but resisted temptation for all of five minutes as dave was very soon playing another biggy ,this was enough for me to toss the method up the bank and fish the pole.first put in with a banded 6mm pellet and im playing a small mirror of about a pound ,he was soon reunited with quite a few freinds as i took one after the other for the next hour ,so with maybe just over an hour gone i had maybe fifteen carp in the net for about as many pounds .
      things were looking pretty good as even though tony was still catching and dave was catching neither of them were catching as fast as me .
       the bites slowed a bit during the second hour and i was trying corn and soft hooker pellet to see if this would entice a quicker response but it didnt ,so the next thing was try a bigger pellet on the hook ,so i put on a 10mm pellet and shipped out ,it wasnt long before i was taking slightly larger fish than before ,one was around the four pound mark which was a right bonus .
        dave by now had dried up as had tony and peter and from where i was sitting i couldnt see anybody else catching at all. i suffered a three quarter of an hour barren spell myself before i took one small common and then another barren spell of the same time afterwards.
        time for a look down the edge ,so i put in a large pot of pellet on the seven metre line and dropped in down the edge ,i had been feeding this all morning and the reeds were knocking about betraying the presence of a couple of fish .the float was soon being dragged under and all i got for my troubles was a scale ,back in and the fish had gone ,spooked no doubt by the breif encounter of there mate.
      back on the seven metre line and things start showing signs of improving as i had a couple of bites before i hooked into a fish ,from then on it was a case of a large toss pot of 4mm feed pellet and a 10mm on the hook and wait for a bite ,which didnt take long coming as i was taking maybe six fish an hour as i was missing quite a few .
tony by now had given up with the method and was now fishing under a bush to his right ,this was in the hope of snaring a carp or two on maggot ,but much to his dismay all he could get were small silvers .
   dave collier was doing the exact same thing in his swim but he did manage his three biggest carp on the maggot .
     dave talbot was now starting to get a couple of fish from his inside line but was soon back out on his seven metre line and when the whistle sounded for the all out he was playing yet another biggy which he landed after what seemed like a very long fight .
    my day had been one of frustration as i had missed so many bites ,maybe my hook wasnt the right pattern to fish the banded pellet, or my pellet was too big and i should have been on 8mm instead of ten.
     with the end sounded by dave it was a quick pack away and get to the job of weighing in ,
     it was kevin lovelands first to be scrutinised and he had had a very hard days fishing as he put a very lowly 2lb 8oz on the board. next was dave collier and he had a reasonable day with 28lb to be pencilled in .
     the next weights were very low untill my turn at spinning the needle on the scales, i hadnt really got a clue as to my weight but was slightly dissapointed to record an even 49lb .to take the lead , jim boase was next up and he had been fishing maggot for a good part of the day and he weighed a little over four pounds .
   dave talbot was next and he was well happy when he was called to have 30lb 8oz as his total.
      tony roberts was next and he fell short of dave collier which cheered dave up . next was peter morton and he was saying that twenty pounds was all he had ,well give the man his due as he put 19lb 8oz on the board,
    the only other weight of significancewas by al loader ,he was saying that his clicker had thirty pound on it ,now this normally means bugger all as he is a terrible guesser ,but surprise surprise he was nearly bang on as he put 30lb 4oz on the score sheet,
   all this meant that i had taken the win ,with dave talbot just sneaking in with second from al by four ounces 30lb8oz to 30lb4oz respectively.
     it was nice to fish with kevin again and i will be fishing with him ,or is that against him very soon at shannons in a charity match .

Sunday, 11 October 2009

HARTLEYLANDS BRAMLEY LAKE SUN 11-10

Well its bramley today and its a lake i havent fished this lake before ,so i was looking forward to today as i had gleaned a little bit of info on what to do and was confident that with a decent draw that i could do well .meeting in the carpark in readiness for an eight o clock draw i found peg nineteen being my home today ,it didnt mean anthing to me as i didnt know where it was on the lake .
i got to my peg and surveyed the scene ,i had the island about twentyfive yards away and upon closer inspection i had a small concave area to put a feeder into. it looked pretty good .i set my box up and placed everthing where i wanted it and as i bent down to get my feeder rod from my holdall i felt really dizzy and nearly fell over ,what the hell was that i thought as i stood up ,about two minutes later i was sweating buckets and feeling cold ,I FELT CRAP.i poured myself a coffee and said to gary lawrence who was on peg 18 that i felt ill and was thinking about not fishing ,anyway i tackled up my feeder rod and mixed some groundbait in readiness for the off .
     the all in was sounded and i tossed the feeder tight to the island and fed about a dozen 4mm pellet over the top ,well the tip was straight into twitch mode as the carp were attacking the method feeder. it took about a minute and the tip pulled round ,and i missed ,this was repeated another four times before i connected with a spirited carp about two pounds ,which for bramley is a decent size fish. well to cut a long story short ,it was about 45 minutes into the match and i had six carp in the net two about two pounds and four about a pound each.
     well it was just at this time that i really felt ill so i tipped back my fish and slowly packed my gear away .thus ending my days fishing .
i will put up the result when i know it but for me it turned out to be a bad day .

    well the match was won by julian copper ,he said that he caught three seven pound fish in the last half hour and this gave him the win ,second was john manktelow and third was al loader .
    all this means that i am now no longer leading the series as john and julian have overtaken me ,but rest assured this is just a minor hiccup as normal service will be resumed at the next match .

browse entries:
older »

Top Tags - Weblog

View all tags

Connect

Weblog Archives

Don't worry - your calendar is here… to see it in action just click "Save" above and refresh the page.

View all weblog archives

About Me

hi my name is Bill Gibbins and im an angler of many years this site is all about my days out fishing,with my club which is crowborough and district anglers assoc and the website i am a member of maggotdrowners i dont profess to be the best angler in the world ,far from it ,but i do have my moments and they can be read about in this blog .