Hartleton 24-6-16

My third trip to Hartleton, and having got a little used to the venue now I really look forward to some pleasant fishing, some good company and maybe the odd beer too.

I arrived at breakfast time on the Friday in reasonably good weather and was surprised to find most of the vagrants camped on the usual back were far further down towards the deeper end than usual, and not only that, the island peg was empty. I’d been dying to give the peg a go, but being one of the later to arrive I reckoned my chances were pretty slim. But it was vacant when I arrived and I soon changed that.

So standard set-up followed. Tent, breakfast, fish for a few hours, lunch. Then a trip into Ross on Wye for a few bits and pieces (ice and alcohol were involved I think). 

Fishing wise, I have to say I still haven’t sussed the bream out. If you want to have a really good session at Hartleton you have to catch the bream and regularly. Maggot and caster won’t do it, neither will worm or soft pellet. And I’ve not done any good on meat or corn.

My first session (pre-Ross) was spent playing at 11m and produced the usual roach and bits – this is ok, but I can catch this closer in a lot faster. And sitting out for a big fish didn’t seem to work either. At one point I hooked a carp which briefly pulled out 8m of elastic before shedding the hook, but that was that.

Late afternoon (post-Ross) I tried a few different things, still no bream, but then I tried a soft 6mm pellet on my roach rig at 5m, fished incredible delicately on a canal-type rig. It took a little while to get it going, but soon the method really started to produce quality roach (4 oz ish) one a chuck. If I could make this work in the match then I reckon 30-40lb would be possible. This seemed a safer bet than the hope for a bream approach.

Saturday. Match day. 

I was up early on Saturday and decided to have a couple of hours first knocking fishing feeder to the island. I cast, I waited, nothing happened. Two lost feeders later (I should have clipped up a bit closer to me I think) and I gave that up as a bad idea that was unlikely to feature in my match plans. Still I had actually set up a rod and fished the feeder at Hartleton at last – only taken three year mind you.

So breakfast and prep for the annual match.

Tactics were as before, 11m line fed heavy for an occasional look at the bream, 5m on soft pellet for quality roach, rudd and skimmers.

Well, what can I say? All was going well until I tangled my K2 rig about two hours in, and when I looked into my rig tray I had nothing similar to replace it with (I don’t do the delicate fishing I used to) and try as a might, whatever rig I put on instead just didn’t give me the presentation I needed. I caught, but I lacked the fluidity and speed on the previous afternoon.

At the all out I reckoned on 20lb of fish. This was ok, but I was not overly confident.

I was weighed in first, 22lb 8oz. Good, but I suspected not good enough.

Musky (retired, terminal flatulence)

Next was Hamish with a very creditable 18lb 10oz. A big bag of small fish caught close in (I suspect my small fish tactics of the previous two years were starting to be copied).

Banksy was next with 17lb 8oz of hemp caught roach. Ditto the small fish tactics.

Then Godber pulled out a net full of bream. That was it, I thought. Beaten by bream (as per my second place on 2014). However, the bream were hollow and to everyone’s surprise they only weighed 20lb 8oz

That left Trev who being a carper had adapted to match fishing extremely well and weighed in 2lb 8oz.

And finally, it was down to Steve in the jungle. Steve is a good angler on an unknown peg, but he’d had a frustrating time and weight in just 7lb 8oz. The following day Steve absolutely took his peg apart losing a couple of carp close in and bagging bream and roach – just shows you the difference a day can make.

So yours truly retains the Sean Kelly-Patterson trophy.

What we'll all be wearing in 2017 (yeah, right). I promised Trev I wouldn't name names, so that's ok then :-)

That was the end of my fishing at Hartleton for 2016. Thank you all for your participation, you may now kiss my waders.

So looking forward to 2017 and hoping to work out what Godber does to catch those bream, and hopefully doing it better than him.

Local River 17-6-16

I had planned to go out in the 16^th (the joys of working for yourself) but a customer decided to schedule a meeting first thing, so I had to defer my trip to the 17^th (again, the joys of working for yourself). Ho hum, at least I got a few hours in.

This was a chance to try out my new centrepin (courtesy of my previous employer) so a few hours trotting was to be.

Overall it was ok, the river was a little low and there were limited pegs where you could trot properly, but a few dozen small fish and one slightly better chub graced the net. Next time I would go all out for some bigger fish, and for once target the barbel. (Yeah like that’s going to happen).

First decent chub on the centrepin

Total catch: about 40 fish (mixed bag) for 5lb odd.

Magic Lakes 11-5-16

As part of my ‘fish three new venues every year’ plan I’ve had Magic Lakes near Waltham Abbey on list of places to try for quite a while. And, for whatever reason I’ve never managed to get over there. Today was my chance. Having watched the weather forecast diligently for the past week, and avoided the match on Thursdays, as expected the weather forecast changed at the last minute. But a day’s fishing is a day’s fishing, even if it’s a bit damp around the edges.

One of the challenges of new places is finding a bit out about them. Magic Lakes was tougher than most with no own website and the same generic info on the same ubiquitous ‘where to fish’ type websites. Anyhow, here is what I know – the postcode is EN9 3LE and the nearby McDonalds is at EN9 1BY. There are two lakes, a small one with a wide range of varieties of smaller fish and the second one with 33 pegs with the main species being carp (to 20lb or so) and barbel (to 6lb) with skimmers, roach and F1s also present. The best barbel pegs are 15, 16 and 17 and peg 12 is the flier in the matches. Day ticket is £8 and it has the cleanest toilets of any place I've ever fished. The owner is a passionate matchman who is mine of useful information. 

The small lake - right next to the car park

One thing that attracted me to the venue was the stillwater barbel – it’s got to be a decade since I caught a stillwater fish, so this seemed like something different to do.

After a quick chat with the owner, I located peg 17 which had the central island and a nice bunch of reeds at pole distance, with open water and a nice margin to the left.

My peg for the day (number 17)

I set up with strong pole gear at 11m, just in front of the reeds. There was a fair bit of bubbling going on around the swim, so the signs were good for a bite or two. Depth was about 3ft, a few inches less than down the track but not that much. There was virtually no difference in depth as you went right across, so this seemed like a good starting point.

An 11mm expander pellet was placed on the hook and I started fishing over a patch of 6mm pellets that I’d potted in whilst setting up. Almost immediately I started getting knocks and bites on the line, but it was a good ten minutes before I made contact and, shortly after, pulled out of my first fish. Frustration followed and I caught a pastie-sized mirror and then followed with a 4lb common carp. The presence of the smaller fish (which went 3 or 4 to the pound) might explain a lot of what was happening with the float – half-hearted knocks that were not producing fish. I persevered and pulled out of several larger fish, which I suspect were going through the swim just off bottom. I tried a few tricks, but they didn’t pay off and an hour in I had about 10lb of fish – 2 decent carp and a few smaller ones, but I had pulled out of at least 5 good fish. 

Typical stamp carp around the 5lb mark and in pretty good condition

So plan B. Plan B was a kind of ‘match the hatch’ process using a lighter rig with a 6mm expander fished over the same line. Some days the big expanders can pick out the better fish, some days they achieve nothing. Immediately the dips turned into bites, but mostly from pasties with the odd better fish thrown in. Then, just when I was about to think I’d sussed it out it all went quiet.  

Plan C. It had barely turned 10 am and I was potting in on my two other lines – 7m in the open water where the barbel could be caught (apparently) and 9m to the reeds in the margin. Not long after the 7m line produced lots of bubbling (skimmers, perhaps) but no bites. The margin nothing.

And so this became a pattern. Trying different spots on the far bank with big and small pellets, having a quick look at the other lines and trying to pick up the odd bites and fish.

Slowly, and I mean slowly, I picked up the odd fish, but it was feeling very slow. I even considered switching to the other pool behind me at one point for a few bites, but instead had a bit of a walk and took a few pictures.

Then in started to rain. Not really bad, but I’m glad I got my umbrella up at the early signs of the wet stuff. 

Pole fishing in the rain - now lets play spot the float (you can see the 7m line fizzing on the left)

Not wanting to go too crazy in the wet I added another pole section to go out to 12.5m and played around just to the right of the reeds. And, by carefully adjusting the depth to get some critical balance on the rig, I started to get bites. They were not quick, but they did produce fish. Sometimes pasties, sometimes a little bigger. And chopping and changing between the rigs would often give a bit more impetus if it slowed down.

The weight was just starting to tick along – not spectacular, but ok. A good match weigh on the venue is about 90lb at the moment. I would not be getting anywhere close to this, but on this day given the carp had been spawning previously, a nice little catch would not be a bad achievement.  Chatting to other anglers and the owner on the day suggested it was not fishing well, so I’m not beating myself up too hard about it.

The 7m line was still fizzing, but no bites. The inside looked dead, so back to 12.5m it was.

The long straight at the back of the pond - the higher peg numbers I believe

The odd bonus fish headed for the reeds when hooked, but the strong pole gear soon prevented that. And then… a proper fight. I hooked into a lump (something the peg is famous for) and had to play it out for a little while.

A couple of minutes later and 14lb of mirror carp was in the landing net. Very nice – first double of the year.

14lb of Mirror Carp safely in the landing net

It carried on in much the same vein for the next few hours until I called it quits and packed up. I finished on 55lb of fish, with lots of carp in the 3-6lb bracket, some F1s and lots of pasties. But no barbel -still that gives me an excuse to go back some time. On the day I think some maggots and corn might have helped the catch rate, but I’d had a good first visit and a nice day’s fishing.

Catch list:

Commons: 12

Mirrors: 20

Ghost carp: 1

F1 Carp: 5

Total weight: 55lb