31/01/09 - Lands End - Match Lake

Weight – 13lb 0oz
Catch – 37 Perch, 17 Roach, 1 Tench
Weather – Cold, cloudy. Easterly breeze.
Water Temp– 6.0c > 6.5c
Match – Open – 6th overall, 1st in Silvers

The weather had recently turned colder, with a strong easterly breeze likely to chill the water and put the carp off feeding, so I really wanted to avoid the corner pegs 12 & 13, however peg 12 found its way into my grubby mitt. Mike had won the midweek open from 12, so I was hopeful the carp were still there, or had they disappeared to a warmer part of the lake?

When I arrived at my peg I was pleasantly surprised to find the wind had dropped a little and the water colour was better than of recent, so I was a little more optimistic.

Since there had been carp in the area, I decided against setting up an out and out silvers rig. Instead I opted to concentrate on the bottom of the margin shelf with a Drennan roach 4x14 float with a strung out styl bulk, a .11 bottom and a 20 drennan silver fish pellet hook, attached to doubled 6 elastic. This was the 1st time I had tried this hook pattern, which is very similar to the B911, but a lighter wire and they looked spot on for catching big silvers and occasional carp

At the start, I potted a handful of caster 13m down the right the margin and the same down the left margin under the pallet on peg 11. Whilst I let that settle I started on doubled hair rigged corn at 15m next to the aerator, without feeding. Other than a slight dip on the float the 1st 15mins was uneventful, as was the next when I tried the same swim with maggot. Ideally I didn’t want to overfeed the aerator swim, since it was the deepest part of the swim and I was hoping for the carp to turn up later, so just a pinch of micro pellet & caster was deposited.

First put in down the right margin resulted in a small perch, as did the 2nd put in on maggot. I decide to try a caster and that resulted in a bigger perch. For the next 2hrs I caught consistently on caster, swapping between the right & left margin feeding either by a tosspot or catapult.

Half way through the match I had 30 fish for an estimated 7lb and other than Mike Duckett on peg 7 I couldn’t see much being caught. I occasionally tried under the aerator, but only caught small roach & perch – no carp. So for the remainder of the match I decided to concentrate on the silvers.

My margin swims were dying, so with 90 mins left, I set up a swim 15m to the point of the island, which turned into a good idea, with a few more perch, roach and a tench.

None of the really big perch showed, but I had a few between 1lb & 1½lb and reminded me how Lands End can be. With no carp showing, there are usually plenty of silvers to go at.

During the weigh in I was hopeful of winning the silvers, but heard that skimmers had been caught on the other bank. In the end, peg 5 weighed 11lb of silvers, whilst Mike West on peg 18 weighed 12lb of skimmers and tench, but lost a big bream estimated between 5-7lb.

Anton Page won the match overall with 68lb from a sheltered and warm peg 24.

As for the new hooks, I was really impressed.