This will be a very short blog because there isn’t much to tell! Robin had put in some pretty good pegs with only eight of us fishing and of course everybody wanted to draw 125 but it goes without saying that Martin Heard drew it! I stuck my hand in the bucket and pulled out 72 (hellhole) which I wasn’t overly impressed with although it can throw up the odd weight. Neil Dring had drawn the council house swim (peg 70) which hasn’t been in since Ashley did over 26lb off it.
The river looked ok and it was actually quite a nice day, my peg had loads of options and people normally catch where the flow comes in, to the right or in the slack water (which wasn’t that slack today) in front or sometimes in the tail of the swim. I set up ‘Old Faithful’ and at 10:15 started where the flow comes in. No bites here saw me try the tail and then the slack water. Without an indication on caster, maggot or lobbie I was already scratching my head. I settled on fishing across where there was a nice depth and steady water but this was just the same and you wouldn’t think there were any fish in the bloody river!
With a couple of hours gone I was just thinking about popping up to see how Neil was getting on when he appeared behind me, he’d had the usual ear ache from the bloke in the house opposite. Really don’t understand that as it’s not like we fish that peg very often, once or twice a year at most. Anyway Neil had only had a minnow and said he’d spoken to Rob who hadn’t caught and nor had Roger on 24. After he left I went back to maggot to try and catch a minnow and eventually did manage one on single maggot although a further two dropped off! And that was basically that, I won’t even mention the golden last hour as I don’t think that applies anymore! Also I can’t remember catching a fish on lobworm yet this year.
All the time I was sat there I couldn’t believe Rob had put my peg in and not 66 or 74, mind you with the way the rivers fishing there’s no guarantee I’d have caught from either of those. Me and Neil both had an ounce for our minnows (as it’s the lowest weight we give) although Neil’s was twice the size of mine! Elsewhere Martin, as expected, won with a brilliant 21lb 2oz of quality roach and then it went pear shaped with Malcolm Levy only needing a single chub of 2lb 6oz for second from Ilford and Roger had a small chub of 1lb 7oz for third from peg 24. The other three anglers didn’t weigh – not good.
My 1oz gave me two section points which means Martin pulled a point on me and Malcolm gained a point on me although I’m not sure if this was the last match or if there’s one more! Everybodies saying that it’s a lack of fish but I’m not sure as all those small fish we were catching in Oct and Nov haven’t gone anywhere and at the same time next year they’ll show up again.
Anyway that’s enough for now as there’s not much more to say, hopefully next week will be better, can’t be any worse surely?
1 – Martin Heard (Tiverton) – 21lb 2oz
2 – Malcolm Levy (Tiverton) – 2lb 6oz
3 – Roger Russell (Ilminster) – 1lb 7oz
