Before I get on to the latest post, in the week I received the terribly sad news that Roger Russell had passed away. I’ve known Roger for over 40 years, he used to fish the Isle and Dillington with IAA and in later years he enjoyed fishing for silvers at Summerhayes and when he stopped fishing due to ill health, he would still come for a wander and see how we were doing.
Roger with a net of big perch from Dillington
I remember saying to Scotty once that I’d never caught a grayling and he said he’d take me on the River Tone and me, him and Roger had a lovely day, sharing a rod and taking it in turns, we caught a fair few grayling, nothing big but it was great fun. I also remember winning the IAA Pairs trophy with Roger in my first year fishing the senior matches, great times. My heart goes out to Scott and all the family, rest in peace mate.
On Tuesday I booked a day off work to head to Revels as I haven’t been for a while and I start to suffer from withdrawal symptoms. My last two visits had seen me getting drawn up on Trendles so I was desperately hoping for a change of scenery this week. Don’t get me wrong it’s a lovely little lake that’s rammed full of fish but I just can’t seem to get on with it. I never used to think you could compete fishing for silvers but it’s framed several times recently and Duffers won with 13lb the last time I was here.
A fantastic turnout of 23 anglers fishing today and we’d be spread over Main, Woodlanders and Trendles. I was fairly near the bottom of the list and as the names and pegs were being drawn, quite on few on Trendles went early with Duffers on 36 although the two I wanted on Woodlanders had also gone. When my name came out I wasn’t paying attention and didn’t hear what number I had so when the draw finished I went to check and saw 33 next to my name, Trendles again – bugger! That’s three matches on the trot now and after only being up there once between 2021-2023, I’ve drawn it four times this year (and it’s only July!).
It was a gorgeous day
I did actually finish second when I drew the same peg a couple of matches back and probably should have won it so I would approach it the same again today, fishing short with lots of maggots. Duffers was the next angler on my right so we decided to have a pound on silvers and another on overall weight.
Rigs today were a 0.3 gram F1 Carbon Slim for top kit to hand plus a 0.1 gram Colmic Elsa to fish top two plus one and I also set up a little float to have a go at mugging carp as there were a fair few cruising around. The side tray contained lots of maggots, disco pinkies and some Bait-Tech Special G F1 Dark.
On the whistle, I fed a little loose groundbait and a few pinkies on the top kit line and went straight over it, I was expecting to catch small fish and little carp from the off but the float just sat there while I could see Duffers swinging in fish regularly. Ten minutes passed before I caught a little perch and then began to get a few fish, including two little 3oz skimbobs and the inevitable pasties/F1’s/crucians. I did see a carp cruising so quickly swapped rigs and flicked a single maggot in front of it, the float buried and a 3lb carp was soon landed.
Back on the top kit line, I was catching a few and also started feeding another line to the left and swapped between the two but I was also hooking some weed which was being a pain and also lost a couple of slightly better carp that snagged me. After around ninety minutes, Rich Chave phoned from peg 9 on Main and said he was catching well and had 82 fish in the first hour! With Andy Miller and Neil Saxby both on Woodlanders, I was sure they’d be catching silvers well (despite Andy’s electric trolley developing a mind of it’s own and driving into the lake and Neil then doing his Baywatch bit to retrieve it!). Add to that, Rich bagging and Duffers catching well, I felt my best chance of a result would be to catch carp.
I began to spend more and more time trying to unsuccessfully mug cruising carp and instead of sticking to my original game plan I was chasing shadows. There seemed to be loads of carp up in the corner to my left so trying to be clever, I got another top kit it out, this one with black hydro and set up a Drennan Crystal Dibber to fish banded pellet as my match spiralled further out of control!
My new game plan got off to a decent start when I mugged another 3lb carp and then had one when I ventured into the corner but the next one tore off under the brambles and snapped the hooklength! Over the next couple of hours, I basically sat there catching not very much and trying to mug carp that were laughing at me.
The last hour was spent back on the top kit with maggot on the hook (which I should have done all match) and caught well including a gorgeous little 2oz tench and a goldfish! I also had a few more small carp but lost a couple of better ones and just before the all out, Dean and Jason turned up ready to start the weigh in and got an action shot of me playing a big fish (or possibly making a meal of a 2lb carp!). Photos courtesy of Revels*
Me in action!*
My silvers weighed a lowly 2lb 3oz and the carp net went 29lb 2oz so I paid Duffers my £2 as I was sure he’d battered me again. He had a nice net of silvers for 9lb 13oz which included a decent perch and a couple of nice skimmers before his carp added 31lb 6oz to give him a total of 41lb 3oz. Steve Crowford on 39 weighed 30lb 1oz and then Dave L on 25 had 19lb 6oz, John Bass weighed 23lb 1oz and Debbie Chave had 11lb 4oz which also included a goldfish.
I weighed 31lb 5oz and should have brought a goldfish bowl!’*
Duffers had the top weight on Trendles with 41lb 3oz*
Debbie Chave weighed 11lb 4oz which included a nice ‘instant win’!*
Back at the results and Rich Butler had the top weight with 64lb 11oz from peg 16 on Main with Big Al second from 11 with 54lb 12oz and Duffers took third spot. Rich Chave on peg 9 won the silvers with a brilliant 19lb 2oz and had caught a lot of his fish on the waggler, Andy Miller was second with 16lb 2oz from 75 and Neil Saxby was third by default with 7lb 10oz. It was also great to see talented young angler Jack Copp do well again with 28lb 9oz, definitely one to watch for the future.
Rich Butler won with an impressive 64lb 11oz*
Slimline Al was second with 54lb 12oz from peg 11*
Rich Chave won the silvers with a lovely net of fish for 19lb 2oz*
Andy Miller was second in the silvers with 16lb 2oz from peg 75*
Neil ‘Hasselhoff’ Saxby was third in the silvers with 7lb 10oz*
It was great to see talented young angler, Jack Copp who did well with 28lb 9oz on peg 10*
1 – Rich Butler (Revels) – 64lb 11oz
2 – Alan Winsper (Alan’s Angling) – 54lb 12oz
3 – Darren Duffield (Ilminster) – 41lb 3oz
Silvers
1 – Richard Chave (Colmic) – 19lb 2oz
2 – Andy Miller (Revels) – 16lb 2oz
3 – Neil Saxby (Revels) – 7lb 10oz
With a great turnout, the weigh sheet was over two pages!
I must admit, I drove home kicking myself after the match as I think my peg was definitely capable of framing if I’d just stuck to my original plan, I spent too long trying to catch carp with pellets and mug fish when I should have just got my head down catching everything with maggots.
There’s still a great offer running if you fancy treating yourself to some new fishing gear, use the exclusive discount code AgainstMenandFish10 to get 10% off when you shop online at Somerset Angling
Also I still have copies of my book available from eBay here or Amazon here
And if you could spare five minutes to leave a nice review on Amazon, it would be very much appreciated.
Next up – Acorn Fishery
Coming soon – Lots more match reports
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