With my secondment to working in Dagenham now over, I am now working back in Milton Keynes, but not scheduled to go back until the 16th, so it made sense to fish the Tuesday Costcutter at Alders Farm. I did not know which lake it was to be on, but have decided I need to try to learn how to fish hard pellet. Now this may sound simple to most, but trying to get the best from it, is what you need to work out. I do not take these matches too seriously, they are more relaxed and people tend to open up a little on these events.
There were 10 of us in the queue for the draw, pegs 10 to 25 on Pines Lake. My draw saw me sitting on peg 16 in the open water. I would have preferred a peg on the dam wall or the top end of the lake but it was not to be.
As I have already stated I wanted to practice my pellet fishing, so I only took a tin of corn as a change of hookbait, no corn feed, a couple of fishery 4mms bags and a bag of 6mm fishery pellets as hookers. I also had a few 8mm hookers, again as a change bait. I was going to fish the open water, 2+2 line, so set up 3 rigs to cover the 2ft depth. Two set dead depth, one at half depth. I also set up a margin rig to fish top three to my right. The two at dead depth were .20 to a size 16 B911F1 hook and a Del Smith Margin float. The half depth float was also one of Del's green slimmer range.Over the last couple of weeks I have tried a hair rigged band on the hook and this was not right. A straight band on the hook resulted in more fish in the net and less foul hookers.
I had Paul on 14 and Matt on 18, so needed to keep an eye on them. At the all in I started off on the deck feeding around a dozen pellets every 20 seconds or so. This saw me put my first fish in the net after around 10 minutes. I felt that there were not a lot of fish in the peg at this point as it was a slow start. Both Matt and Paul had a couple of fish and I was already behind. However after the first hour I had 11 fish for about 30lb and going well. Hour two saw the trend continue. I was getting bites but missing a lot, probably liners and tried the shallower rig for a couple of fish but was waiting longer for a bite. Back onto the deeper rig, and by adjusting the depth by an inch I managed to cut out a lot of the liners. A small difference but a learning, none the less.
Into the third hour, I started having a few problems, losing fish for no apparent reason, they did not seem foul hooked. I had a quick look shallow on two added sections for a single carp. I changed the feeding on the 2+2 line slightly, by doubling up the feed and sitting on it before re-placing the rig after a minute if no bite came. Feeding again and leaving for the minute and so on. I now had around 75lb in the net and pulling ahead of Matt and Paul. Matt was now concentrating down the edge. I had had a couple of quick looks down the edge for no fish, so it was time to leave it and concentrate on the 2+2 line.Hour four saw the perseverance pay off, I was fishing just off the feed by coming a half section closer and the bites were more direct. Into the last hour I was getting a few fish, but they were all small fish at around 2lb. I thought I had done enough to beat either side of me so was happy with my days work. I had learnt a few new things and had a couple of ideas I think my help in the future, so a positive day.
Overall
1st Del Smith 250-08 Peg 22
2nd Terry Lancaster 164-11 Peg 25
3rd Keith Ashby 145-09 Peg 16
4th Charlie Lancaster 144-15 Peg 12
5th Neil 129-03 Peg 10
6th Roy Makins 123-03 Peg 13
Unfortunately Charlie fell foul of the weight limit on his keepnet and was knocked back to 50lb for the net costing him second place.
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