Tongue Tied To The Final
My first ever trip to Watmore Farm Fishery Saturrday for a Fish South Silvers qualifier. Clearly a lot of fixture clashes as I turned up to discover only a dozen had booked on and two of those never turned up! I hadn’t sponged any info on the place beforehand other than seeing a few catch shots online, so I just fished it how I saw it. It’s a really nice looking, deep lake with dense bushes between each peg. I opted to fish 14.5m, 10m and a top kit and was ready in plenty of time.
Half an hour before the start I thought I’d make up one more rig when something bizarre happened. I’d somehow managed to lasso my tongue after moistening the loop I’d just tied!? I obviously couldn’t see what I’d done and tugging it made it even tighter. So, tongue fully out and a pole rig still attached I waddled next door to Malcolm, unable to speak, but he could see my dilemma! We both winced as he attempted to cut the line with my grubby fishing scissors. A new experience and as I’m really squeamish it’s not something I ever want to repeat!!
On to the fishing… It was a slow start but I eventually started to catch some decent roach on the 10m line. They took a bit of working out, but I managed to keep putting fish in the net fairly steadily, mostly on maggot, but a few on caster and a brief run shallow.
My long line was poor, so I changed the feeding a couple of times and eventually caught more roach and a lone skimmer over my usual Sonubaits F1 and Thatchers combo. Last 40 minutes I managed another five skimmers on the shorter line for a great finish.
After a cracking day’s fishing I put 19lb of quality silvers on the scales for the win and a place in the Final. Certainly not the biggest of matches, but a win’s a win! 🙂
Sunday was the second round of the Solihull Silvers League at Packington. I drew peg 27 on the back bank of Molands, which is an area I’ve not seen for ages. Hoped to catch a few skimmers, but the peg was full of tiny roach, so I just got my head down on the short pole and a few fish down the edge. Eventually made a dent in the 1/4oz blades and caught a few stampers and a very occasional little skimmer or perch. The clocks went forward (or back, or whatever!) today, so I wasn’t too surprised to keep hooking big F1s the last hour when the light faded.
After a really busy match I ended up with 13lb 12oz for 2nd in section and 3rd on the lake behind Jack Shirley and Grant Merrett. That made up a bit for my first-round disaster.
Hope you all had plenty of bites this weekend.
