On The Feeder Trail
Back on the Feeder Masters trail and two nice matches where I definitely had a chance both days…
On Saturday I drew peg 16 on Elm at an extremely windy Decoy Lakes. A cold morning so I didn’t think they’d want a lot of bait. I started short and down the middle, hoping the fish would push into my far-bank, but once I went over there it sadly never got going. I’ve drawn the peg opposite me before and really didn’t like the look of the far bank anyway as it’s deep against the reeds with no obvious place to chuck. Anyway, I lost my way the last two hours but did catch a few down the edge. Gambled and sat down there the last 30 minutes but never had another sign, swapped to the other margin and had one straight away and then the whistle went.
Ended up with nine carp and three barbel for 76lb. That was 4th in the 20-man qualifying zone split between Elm and Cedar. Meanwhile Si Fry on peg 14 and Zsolt on end peg 13 had a nice ding-dong battle, catching carp steadily throughout the match, with Si just edging it with 114lb and a place in the Final. He fished a really tidy match and deserved to qualify.
Sunday I was down at Albans for my third ever visit. It rained all the way there and it was cold, wet and windy when I arrived, so we were all huddled together in the hut awaiting the draw. Once again I drew on the massive Willows specimen lake. This time I was on peg 29, which is up the top end corner. Definitely a chance from there as it’s usually a tough, low-weight section. With the wind hacking down the other end we were probably all just fishing for three or four good fish to qualify in that zone.
I’ve got a nice long bank to chuck along with a prominent bush at 48 metres, so I started short of that and crept my way tighter to it. Simple tactics; 12ft Horizon Distance, 30g Open Alloy, 12 X7 to 0.23 Soft Steel with Fin Perfect micros, krill pellets and a 6mm pink Fluoro Bandum Wafter.
After two hours I finally had a pull and a nice mirror about 12lb, which took 19 minutes on my stopwatch. I was probably sitting in second place with that after three hours as there’d been a 7lb bream caught on my side and Pemb had a big 20lb carp on the opposite bank. Zak next door on peg 28 then had an epic reel-screaming fight and eventually slid the net under a 12lb+ carp. I don’t think either of us could believe it wasn’t a 20lb+ catfish!
Meanwhile I’d primed a new swim into the corner with several bait-ups. I was just thinking about having a chuck down there when a lovely and considerate family decided to stop along the path and let their two kids throw stones in my peg, just five metres from where I’d primed! I shouted across, one of the adults said sorry, then continued to let his kid throw three more rocks into my peg before eventually continuing their walk. Great!
So I reverted back to the long bush swim, gave it two quick feeders with the plan to sit on the third cast for 20+ minutes. Three minutes into that cast the lovely and considerate family returned. This time they stopped right next to the bush I’d just cast to. The dad then tore down two long thin branches from an adjacent tree and handed them to his noisy kids. When they eventually moved on the kids twanged their ‘fishing rods’ along the fence all the way back to me. Double great!
With 45 minutes to go I was back down the side and thought I saw a twitch on the quivertip. Lots of grebes and coots diving about, so I looked around to see if anything would pop back up, then the rod suddenly hooped around and fish on! It’s a bit of a mangrove down there, but I managed to stop the fish reaching the trees and hoisted it towards me. I then clumsily missed it with the net and it went on another crazy run, just stopping it reaching the trees again. I eventually got it in, breathed a sigh of relief and chucked it back down there. It had been in no more than a minute before it shot off again. I held firm but the 0.23mm hooklength parted like cotton, I assume it had hit a branch, or maybe it was from the previous fight? Either way I was gutted.
A new trace was quickly popped back on and two minutes later I was playing an 8lber. That was in the net without much fuss and I really felt I’d catch another. Sadly that crazy 15-minute catching spell was it and the quivertip never budged again.
My three carp were small by Willows standards and weighed 29lb 12oz. That was 2nd in the 20-man zone with Alex Eva catching a 7lb bream and a 24lb carp for 31lb 8oz! That’s the second time I’ve just been pipped on this lake now. A bit gutted, but that’s fishing. I did get a section prize for my efforts though. Hope you’ve all had a good Easter!
