Following last week’s success at Busbridge I was really looking forward to having the chance to make-up for blanking on my previous visit to Willow Park – especially as the temperature gauge in the car was showing a balmy 8 degrees Celsius at seven thirty in the morning!
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| Nice and mild for a change! |
Even though three of my six fishing trips in 2013 to date have been to Willow Park I’m a relative newcomer to the venue, so when I pulled peg 25 on Middle Lake out of the bag of dreams it didn’t mean much to me – however when I realised I was the only person pegged on the road bank with three spare pegs either side and the other three banks had most of the pegs in I started to think I’d drawn rather badly!!! (This was reinforced by a tweet from venue regular Pemb Wrighting that simply read ‘oh dear’.)
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| Willow Park, Middle Lake |
However, like most people I only get to go fishing once a week so I was determined to be positive and make the most of my day on the bank. A couple of texts from my mate Ian McClaren (known as The Bard on the Matchfishing-scene website) confirmed my thinking on how to approach the peg and I settled on an open-end feeder, a straight lead rod for fishing with a pellet cone and the pole at 14.5m.
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| The two different types of hooklength for the open-end feeder |
In conjunction with the open-end feeder I’d be using two different hooklengths – 30cm of 0.17 Reflo Power into a size 16 Guru QM1 with a hair-rigged band for a 6mm pellet and 45cm of 0.15 Guru N-Gauge with a size 18 QM1 tied into a loop for fishing two dead read maggots.
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| Bits and bobs for the 'QM1 in a loop' arrangement |
Since using the QM1 in a loop last week at Busbridge I’ve been thinking about ways to fine tune it and I’ve decided to make the loop that the hook runs in neater by making it nice and small using the little green plastic device shown above (it’s a Seymo loop tyer and I use the pair of pins with the smallest gap).
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| The two different feeders used today |
On the whistle I clipped-on a large green Drennan groundbait feeder and ‘spodded’ ten loads of Sonubait’s F1 Dark groundbait, dead read maggots and soaked 4mm fishery pellets at about 30m slightly to the right. (This was a something of a gamble given the time of year, but as Del Boy Trotter would say ‘he who dares Rodney, he who dares’!!!)
In order to allow this line to settle I then picked-up the pellet cone rod and cast to about 35m slightly to the left in the hope of landing an early bonus – however no indications after 15 minutes saw me reaching for the open-end feeder rod again, this time with a mini Drennan stainless cage feeder and the 45cm QM1 in a loop hooklength attached. By this time it was 1025 and I hadn’t seen anybody catch anything yet - hence I was more than happy to see the tip fly ‘round first cast with a positive bite and a big fat F1 was in the net in double-quick time!
I was even happier to see my 10’ Preston Mini Carp rod nearly dragged into the lake within about 5 seconds of my feeder hitting the deck on cast number 2 and an even bigger and fatter F1 joined its friend in the net!!! I had a couple more casts with double dead read maggot without any indications, but a switch to the hair-rigged pellet band hooklength and a 6mm pellet gained an immediate response and I was onto 3 F1s for about 9lb at the end of the first hour.
I was even happier to see my 10’ Preston Mini Carp rod nearly dragged into the lake within about 5 seconds of my feeder hitting the deck on cast number 2 and an even bigger and fatter F1 joined its friend in the net!!! I had a couple more casts with double dead read maggot without any indications, but a switch to the hair-rigged pellet band hooklength and a 6mm pellet gained an immediate response and I was onto 3 F1s for about 9lb at the end of the first hour.
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| Another view from peg 25 |
As bites were now very few and far between I decided to put some more bait into the main feeder line and re-spodded with 5 large feeders worth of bait. To give this line a chance to settle I had a quick go with the straight lead rod (no pellet cone this time) over an area at about 25m to the left that I’d been loose feeding with a few 6mm fishery pellets via a catapult. Unfortunately this didn’t yield any indications, but a switch back to the main feeder line did see two nice skimmers in the net – one on maggot, one on 6mm pellet.
This meant that at the end of the second hour I had 5 decent fish in the net for approximately 15lb and I felt as though I was doing well as I hadn’t seen anyone else catch as many – however the wheels started to come-off during the third hour as I didn’t have any indications whatsoever and Chris Love, Alex Clements and Rob Harvey all started bagging-up and easily overtook me!
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| The Mo Brown Slim'o |
Despite not catching anything during the third hour I had started to feed my 14.5m pole line with soaked 2mm fishery pellets, and just as I was becoming rather despondent halfway through the fourth hour I hooked and landed two nice skimmers in a row on a 4mm expander pellet. (The rig for the pole included a 0.1g Mo Brown Slim’o on 0.13 Reflo Power into a hooklength of the same material in 0.10 with a size 20 Tubertini 808. Elastic was pink Hydro. Shotting was five number 8 stotz spread evenly 20-40cm from hook.)
During the fourth hour I also caught another big skimmer on the main feeder line to put me on 8 fish for a good twenty pounds – I knew I was miles behind Chris Love and Rob Harvey, but given my iffy draw I was pleased to be in contention with Alex Clements and Mark Burrows (amongst others) as the best of the rest.
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| The view towards the Small Lake |
The start of the final hour saw 5 more large feeders worth of bait applied to the feeder line as a final gamble – though in the end this didn’t pay-off as no more fish were to fall to the feeder. Unfortunately it was the same on the pole, but I did (rather annoyingly) contrive to miss two proper bites that were presumably from decent skimmers.
That left me on 8 fish that went 23-14-0 – a decent result given my previous blank and a somewhat dodgy draw! Rob Harvey’s 3 F1s and 15 skimmers were enough to beat Chris Love’s 15 skimmers by a mere 5 ounces to take the victory, and Mark Burrows’ catch pushed me down to fourth by 10 ounces – small margins, eh?
Final result (based on weight only):
- Rob Harvey, 53-15-0
- Chris Love, 53-10-0
- Mark Burrows, 24-8-0
- Phil Morris (yours truly), 23-14-0
Final result (based on the continental pay-out system used at Willow Park):
- Rob Harvey, 53-15-0
- Dougie Graves, 19-6-0
- Chris Love, 53-10-0
- Ian Covey, 13-2-0
So all-in-all another enjoyable day at Willow Park – a cracking breakfast and some decent fishing given the time of year. All I have to do now is figure-out how to catch an additional 30lb to win outright – or failing that learn how to draw in the right section so I can finally take some money from Ian Covey!!!
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