It was back to Parrett Works for the next Stoke river match and after only catching 5oz in the last one at Kingsbury I was hoping for a few bites this week! I got there a bit early and the river looked lovely with a tinge of colour. Breakfast at The Ranch set us up nicely for the day ahead so now I just needed my drawing arm to perform!
Peg numbers on my wish list were 1, 8, 28 and 29 which had all done well in the last match at PW. Dave P announced the draw and the Grand Wiz went in early and got 29 (and he reckons I draw fliers!), Nick P was on 5 and PTP drew 24 (both pretty mediocre pegs). I went for it and when I looked at my milk bottle top, I was on 31 and a little unsure what to think really. It produced some decent results last year but has only been in once so far this season and weighed ounces that day, it’s also up against some great pegs in the section. Hainsey went in the bucket late and only pulled out number 8 again, he won off it in the first match and it’s been one of the most consistent pegs over the last couple of years.
We drove across the field and those of us in the second field had a bit of a walk to our pegs. After several trips, I’d finally lugged all my kit to the swim. I have to say it looked lush but then they all do, if anything there’s too many options, I had overhanging trees across and to the left, deep water and then some lilies mid river at the top of the swim.
I set up a couple of rigs, a 1 gram bodied float to fish down the middle and a 0.5 gram DH16 for fishing across to the far bank cover. Today’s side tray contained maggots, casters, worms and Bait-Tech Super Seed hemp.
Bob was below me on 32 (which also looked really nice) and got the match underway with a toot of his whistle. I cupped in some hemp and casters down the middle and went straight over it with single red maggot on the hook. Second run through I bumped a small fish and then had a nice 4oz roach. A couple of gudgeon and a small chublet followed and I thought I might have a decent run of fish but then it died and I wasn’t even having too many minnow problems.
Over the next hour, I only added two more gudgeon and bumped another small fish but after an encouraging start, I was now really struggling and Bob said it was the same for him. I did hook a fish that I knew straight away was an eel and at 8oz it was a handy bonus.
Trying double maggot resulted in the float flying under and it felt like a big fish, I was hoping for a chub but the speed it changed direction, I just knew it would be a trout and sure enough a two pounder was landed and put straight back! Around two hours in, Dennis came for a walk and reported that in the top section Dave Pope had around 4lb already on peg 13, Nick had a 3lb chub, Dave Nash on peg 1 was getting some small fish and Hainsey was catching lots of minnows. Our section was fishing really hard with most only admitting to minnows with the exception of Paul Smith on 28 and the Grand Wiz who had found the odd roach.
After poking the lighter rig in all the likely looking spots under the far bank cover and at the top of the swim with no bites whatsoever, I had to try something else so I chopped up some worms and fed them via a little bait dropper in the deep water. With half a worm on, I thought it might take a while to get a bite but thirty minutes passed without an indication and it didn’t look like it was going to happen. A little dink on the float peaked my interest and then the red tip sunk from view, I counted to two and then hit it, a decent amount of number 8 Slip came out of the pole before I netted another 8oz eel.
I fed some more worm and settled in for another wait, but it was only two minutes before the float buried, another eel around the same size was most welcome and things were beginning to get interesting. This one was choking up loads of worm and must have been right on feed as soon as I put it in. I repeated the process with another dropper load of bait and this time, it did take half an hour or so but another positive bite and this was a bigger fish, my heart was in my mouth a bit as I only had a 0.10mm hooklength on, thankfully it held and an eel around a pound probably put me on 2.5lb.
There was still an hour left so I upped the hooklength to 0.14mm with a size 16 Feeder Special but as time ticked by, no more indications and I had the nagging doubt that the thicker line was putting them off. Back to 0.10mm and it didn’t seem to make a difference at all but I’m glad I tried it for my peace of mind. With just 15 mins to go, the float flew under but as soon as I struck I knew this fish wouldn’t be going in the keepnet as another 2lb trout (same fish?) went airborne several times before it was landed, unhooked and safely returned.
That was the last excitement of the day and I finished up with 10 fish (4 eels, 4 gudgeon, 1 roach and a chublet) plus a few minnows. After packing up, I went to watch the weigh starting with Danny on 22 who had a specimen gudgeon in his 7oz, PTP did well with 14oz including a couple of dace which received a kiss before going back, Fieldy weighed 4oz on 25 and then Paul S had some nice roach to go into the lead with 1lb 14oz.
Danny with his specimen gudgeon
Parker ‘The Pole’ loves catching dace!
Paul Smith had 1lb 14oz of roach, dace, gudgeon and a perch
The Grand Wiz weighed 1lb 7oz which included a lovely roach and then my fish went 3lb and as Bob had chucked back, I won the section which I was really pleased with from there.
The Grand Wiz had 1lb 7oz which included a nice roach
I won the section with 3lb of mainly eels
Back at the results and the top section had fished well with Chris Haines recording another win from peg 8, this time with 6lb 8oz, he caught lots of minnows along with a couple of roach before catching two chub. Dave Nash was second with 4lb 12oz, Dave P had 4lb 10oz and Nick P weighed 4lb 4oz which included a chub of 2lb 14oz putting him in pole position for the President’s Trophy.
Section A
1 – Chris Haines (Haines Angling) – 6lb 8oz
2 – Dave Nash (Stoke) – 4lb 12oz
3 – Dave Pope (Stoke) – 4lb 10oz
4 – Nick Payne (Ilminster) – 4lb 4oz
Section B
1 – Jamie Rich (Bait-Tech/Colmic) – 3lb
2 – Paul Smith (Stoke) – 1lb 14oz
3 – Chris White (Stoke) – 1lb 7oz
4 – Steve Parker (Ilminster) – 14oz
Some close weights in the top section while it was hard going in the second field with bonus chub or eels making the difference. I picked up £30 for winning the section and really enjoyed fishing for eels although I suppose it’s all dependant on getting a few bites!
The Grand Wiz also presented Derek with a fantastic cheque for £1535 which will go to the oncology unit at Yeovil and District Hospital. That’s only the total so far as there’s more money to come in from other fund raising activities including raffles, used tackle sales and the Nugget-O-Meter so the final amount should be considerably higher, awesome from everyone involved.
Thanks to very generous donations from The Grand Wiz (£6), Chris Haines (£3) and a pound from me, the Nugget-O-Meter jumped up to £315.
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 – Revels
Coming soon – Lots more match reports
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