Despite living fairly nearby (about 20 miles according to Google Maps), today was my first visit to Gold Valley for over a year - so long ago in fact they've built another building since I was there last! (I believe it is destined to be a new all singing, all dancing tackle shop.)
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| Gold Valley, Aldershot, Hampshire |
On entering the clubhouse for this Sunday open it was a little like a "Who's Who" of southern match fishing with Daiwa Dorking legends such as Will Raison, Steve Sanders, Mark Goddard and Ben Leach all fishing today. This, combined with a large number of other venue experts and internationals also competing, led me to keep my £5 winner takes all entry firmly in my pocket as I handed over my 20 quid to John Raison!
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| Weather forecast according to the Met Office app |
The weather has certainly changed for the better over the last week or so, with a shift from those bitingly cold northeasterlies to southerly and southwesterly winds bringing higher temperatures but rain during the week. However today was very warm and sunny - but with mega, mega winds! (So strong in fact that I saw at least three pole sections broken during the match, including John Light who managed to smash the number 6 and 16m sections of his Daiwa Airity!)
After the Daiwa Dorking lads had drawn all of the good pegs on Syndicate lake it was eventually my turn to dip my hand into the bag of dreams and out popped peg 89 on Middle lake - a very average draw 5 pegs from the fancied far corner and probably one of the narrowest pegs on the lake (the chuck to the central rope was only about 35m).
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| Plenty of options! |
As I had plenty of time to set-up (I was at my peg by 0915, with the match starting at 1100) and as I wasn't on an obvious flier I decided to chop and change tactics throughout the match to try and catch the odd fish here and there. To this end I set-up for a total of 5 different approaches:
- Banjo feeder to the central rope
- Straight lead at 25m
- Pellet waggler over the straight lead
- On the deck with the pole at top kit plus 3 (about 6m)
- Tight to the bank to my left on only a top kit
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| Today's bait selection |
Bait for today included some softened 2mm pellets (with added Sonubaits Stiki Pellet) for the banjo feeder (with some hard 6mm pellets and 8mm fluro pop-ups for the hook), 8mm pellets to catapult over the 25m straight lead and pellet waggler line, corn for the longer pole and some Sonubaits Supercrush Green groundbait plus dead red maggots for down the edge.
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| The pellet waggler didn't work today! |
At the start of match I feed some corn and a squeezed ball of 2mm pellets at 6m, followed by a full cup of lose groundbait and dead maggots down the edge (conventional wisdom says you should only start to feed down the edge in the last 2 hours but I felt my peg was so average I had nothing to lose!). I then picked-up the pellet waggler rod (which included a slim 8g Preston Innovations Dura model on 6lb Daiwa Sensor main line with a 25cm hooklength of 0.19 Reflo Power into a size 16 Guru Pellet Waggler hook with a hair-rigged band) and had 10 expectant chucks without feeding a thing.
This tactic has worked for me previously (most notably on Pollawyn at White Acres) but it didn't today so after five minutes I was down the edge on my top kit only rig with 6 dead maggots impaled on the hook - this tactic was even less likely to work at this stage of the match than the pellet waggler but I thought it worth investing 60 seconds or so just in case a double figure carp had moved straight over the groundbait!
This tactic has worked for me previously (most notably on Pollawyn at White Acres) but it didn't today so after five minutes I was down the edge on my top kit only rig with 6 dead maggots impaled on the hook - this tactic was even less likely to work at this stage of the match than the pellet waggler but I thought it worth investing 60 seconds or so just in case a double figure carp had moved straight over the groundbait!
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| The banjo feeder and two different hooklengths |
So eight minutes into the match I was already trying my third line of the day and the one that I was really relying on - the banjo feeder tight to the central rope. (Most of you will already be aware of what a banjo feeder is, but for those that aren't it is basically a variation on the method feeder designed by Andy Findlay and produced by Preston Innovations.) One of the interesting features of the banjo feeder is the long stem - this makes this kind of feeder a little obtrusive on short chuck venues (such as Marsh Farm and most of the lakes at White Acres), but for open water venues where a longer cast is needed (such as Gold Valley) I'm pretty sure the banjo is going to be my number one choice as they really do cast very well indeed!
(The model used today was the small 30g version on 8lb Daiwa Sensor main line stopped on the line with a Drennan quick change bead. Hooklengths were 10cm of 0.19 Reflo Power with a size 16 Guru QM1 for a 6mm pellet and a size 14 for an 8mm boilie.)
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| Waiting for a bite on the tip |
When fishing on the tip I always time the length of each cast very carefully with the stop watch function on my wristwatch - this allows you to build-up a pattern as to when a bite is most likely to occur and I believe gives a real edge over those that don't do so. Today was no exception and my plan was to recast every 4-5 minutes as now the weather is improving the carp should be more active and more likely to come to the splash of the feeder.
Anyway I had plenty of time to test this theory as the first hour passed-by without a bite! However I was in the same boat as those around me so I was very pleased when the tip did eventually go 'round just after 12 o'clock - unfortunately it was a small skimmer that took a fancy to my white pop-up and not one of the lake's big carp I was hoping for!
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| A nice day for it! |
The only other action of the second hour was a bumped fish on the 6m line on corn followed by a four ounce roach on double maggot - however the start of the third hour saw a flurry of activity with a carp on the straight lead with an 8mm pellet and two more carp (in two casts) on the banjo feeder with a 6mm pellet on the hair. All of these fish came out of the blue and (as is often the case) whilst I was playing those carp the anglers either side of me also hooked into fish - I'm not sure what the scientific reason behind this is but I can only assume that either a shoal of carp moved through our pegs or that certain precise weather conditions triggered fish that were already present into feeding at the same time!
Unfortunately this proved to be a false dawn and the only other action up until the end of the fourth hour (ninety minutes later) was a proper "three foot twitch" on the banjo feeder that I still cannot believe wasn't a hooked fish - but that must've been a liner as there was nothing on the other end! Luckily 10 minutes later the tip did go 'round (and stayed 'round this time) and carp number 4 was soon in the net.
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| Gear for down the edge |
Despite chopping and changing between the banjo feeder, straight lead and pellet waggler (I'd been pinging 8mm pellets to 25m all day) no further bites materialised on my rod and line approaches so I decided to spend the final 15 minutes down the edge. As with most established commercial fisheries the fish that come close in to the bank at the end of matches tend to be very big so strong gear is needed - however as the water was still very clear I stepped-down slightly from my normal edge gear and my rig today was a 4x14 Preston Innovations Durafloat 10 (as it was nearly 3' deep tight to the bank) on 0.17 Guru N-Gauge straight through to a size 16 Guru MWG. Elastic was grey Hydrolastic through a pulla bung.
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| Marginal feature |
Tennyson famously once wrote "Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all ..." which I'm going to rephrase as a question - is it better to have hooked and lost a real munter that would've doubled your weight or to have never hooked it at all??? Yes you've guessed it - with less than 10 minutes to go the float shot under and I was attached to a real beast! To say it wasn't happy is the understatement of the year and I had absolutely no control over this fish - my grey Hydrolastic was soon fully extended and I felt certain that the fish was going to appear the other side of the central rope! It did eventually come back towards me before veering to my right and heading towards the angler to my right (who was two pegs down as there was a spare platform on this side) - then as the fish started to inch along the bank in my direction disaster struck and the hook pulled-out! The rig was fine and the worm hookbait was still on the hook though now masking the point - though I can't be sure if this is the reason the fish parted company or if it happened afterwards.
As I was staring up at the sky in disgust the final whistle was blown and my 4 carp, one skimmer and a roach went 16-4-0 - enough to beat the three anglers to my left (including the end peg) and one to my right but to be absolutely nowhere near picking-up a brown envelope!
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| The final reckoning |
The frame:
- Pete Arnold, 92-14-0
- Malcolm Bond, 76-8-0
- Roger Beale, 64-6-0
- Charlie Dalton, 40-12-0
- A Thomas, 38-10-0
- Pete Franklin, 49-0-0
- Milen Petrov, 58-4-0
In conclusion: I only normally focus on one or two approaches in a typical match but even though not all of the lines were productive today I still feel they were all valid. The pellet waggler was probably the least likely to work but it will come to the fore over the coming weeks if the weather is good. (With hindsight I should've swapped to 4lb main line to aid casting and reduce the drag on the float once it was in the water. I should have also tried a big (15g) waggler tight to the rope.) The straight lead is a favourite of mine at Gold Valley but perhaps again it was a little too early for it as the carp aren't evenly spread and actively looking for food yet - plus the high winds made catapulting 8mm pellets accurately nearly impossible. (I could've stepped-up to 11mm pellets but these seem very big to me.) The pole at 6m only yielded a four once roach - but this put me 2 ounces in front of the guy to my right so would've been very important in a festival or team event. The banjo feeder worked well today and gave me the majority of my weight - any sort of feeder to the central rope is going to be an effective tactic at Gold Valley at any time of year. My down the edge rig nearly got me to a decent weight - I've seen before that the fish do come very close to the bank and very close to anglers (I was only using a top kit today), but I should've opened a second line to the right so I could see if groundbait and dead maggots were more effective than (say) pellets and corn. I'll also be stepping-up to either 0.17 straight through to a size 14 MWG and black Hydrolastic or 0.19 to a size 12 and red Hydro.
Until next time ...
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