Acorn Fishery – Open – 6th May 2024

Bank Holiday Monday and a trip up to Acorn for their open which was well attended with 26 anglers fishing. Des was in charge of proceedings and asked Zoe to draw for him, she pulled out a good one in the shape of peg 10, then there was the usual scrum as everybody delved into the bag. Nick got number 4 on the island which is a great area and then I drew 27 on the new bit which really isn’t where you want to be at the moment, although apparently there was a chance of some silvers.

Mark Roberts was next door on 28 and said he’d drawn the same peg in the last match and struggled which didn’t fill me with confidence. There was also quite a bit of scum on the surface with loads of carp under it which was a tad worrying for a silvers angler!

I set up two Preston Innovations F1 Maggots to fish the top two plus two and then 11.5 metres straight out and the same distance angled to the right. On the side tray I had lots of maggots plus some Bait-Tech Special G F1 and Dark groundbait.

At the all in I fed all three lines with gb and maggots before starting long with single maggot on the hook. After 25 minutes I was still waiting for my first bite and it was already looking like being a tough day. Finally the floats gone under on the right hand line and a nice roach got me off the mark. I then pulled out of a decent skimmer but was getting a few bites now and by swapping between the two 11.5 metre lines, I was putting skimmers and odd little tench in the net.

Although not bagging, I wasn’t panicking yet as there are loads of big tench in Acorn and it only takes a few of them to put a good weight together. There were loads of blows coming up on the short line and after two hours I’ve had my first look but the floats just sat there! Rotating round my lines, I wasn’t even hooking very many carp (not that I was complaining about that!).

Mark had landed a big skimmer and a nice tench but bites were very few and far between for him as well, Darren Vowles on 25 to my right was catching carp well and Martin Rayet on 23 was bagging and on for a big weight.

I kept expecting my short line to come good but the only fish I hooked there all match was a carp and that wasn’t in the mouth! My longer lines just got worse and worse and during the last 2.5 hours, I’ve only had three skimmers to finish with 21 silvers and a few carp as my extended weekend finished with a damp squib!

As the scales got to us I went and had a look at the board, Nick had caught some big tench and was leading the silvers with 30lb 15oz while Walshy on peg 1 had the top weight so far with a massive 204lb 9oz. Mark next door had 36lb 3oz (which included 10lb 2oz of silvers) and then my carp went 22lb 1oz and my silvers added 16lb 3oz. Darren had 112lb 1oz before Martin’s multiple nets totalled 192lb 12oz.

With lots of big weights, it took the scales a while to get round to Des and despite a few moans that the wind had been blowing the wrong way, he won the match by a comfortable margin with 234lb 4oz to qualify for the Ace of Acorn final.

1 – Des Shipp (Preston Innovations) – 234lb 4oz
2 – Mark Walsh (Acorn) – 204lb 9oz
3 – Martin Rayet (Acorn) – 192lb 12oz
4 – Rich Lovering (Acorn) – 180lb 5oz

Sections
A – Paul Faiers (Acorn) – 151lb 8oz
B – Mark Broomsgrove (Acorn) – 144lb 15oz
C – Gary Bedford (Acorn) – 97lb 12oz

Silvers
1 – Nick Payne (Ilminster) – 30lb 15oz

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