weds landsend open

since my last visit to the fishery mike has worked non stop to get the lakes clear, and he has done a brilliant job, on tues myself, fabio and mike west went down to do a bit and we got quite a bit done , we finished the 7 platforms on the carpark side of the speci lake, cut a couple of trees down(well big branches)and strimmed up the margins on the speci lake, that was until the end fell off the 10ft long hedge trimmer and the drive shaft fell out of the end and sank but that was on the last peg so it wasnt to bad. i think mike is going to glad to get back to the flower shows for a rest (only joking mr anon)
back to the draw and with 17 booked in we used the match and part of the speci, i fancied a speci peg if only to sit on the new platforms, mat tomes drew for me and gave me 22 which i wasnt complaining about as it has lots of form as you have the island to fish to aswell as being able to reach the end of the island, mat had 16 himself which he wasnt moaning about. it was good to see rod wootten back on the bank after his recent illness, he seems well on the mend which is good news.
back at my swim and with a few fish up on the surface the stalker rig was assembled which is a 4x12 dibber rig on .16 with a 18 b960 on for banded 6mm and set to fish about 8 inches deep,another shallow rig at 15 inches on the same line and hook, a 4x12 rig to use on the island shelf and at the end of the island by a bush ,same line but a 16 hook, and a meat rig for the margins on .18 with a size 14 middy 9313 hook on the end.
at the start and with the sun out the cruisers were to appealing and in the first hour i had 8 fish on the stalker but after that as is normal the fish started to dissapear, but i wasnt to worried as there were fish slurping on the island where i had been firing 4mm pellets, i gave it another 30 mins chasing shadows but they seemed a bit spooky. i dropped the stalker tight to the island and had one straight away, but these fish wont stand to much of this as they know when there is a pole over there heads and soon sink away when they see it, i tried the deep rig at the end of the island and straight out against the island but all i could do was foul fish so that was put on the bank never to be used again, so the rest of the match was spent fishing shallow against the island apart from the one bite i had down the edge on meat which was a 5lb ghostie.
i must mention steve kedge who was on peg one as he really must stop talking and cursing to himself ,if he continues the men in white coats will be picking him up, but then again he will be in good company as he will probably be in the same padded room as gary etheridge lol.
by what i could see and hear no one was catching much so thing were looking good, the slightly deeper rig seemed to work a lot better but you still needed to slap it on the water to for a better response, by the end i had 13 in one net 15 in the second as i thought they were a bit smaller and 5 in the 3rd so no problems going over today!!!!!.
by the time the scales got to me mat on 16 was top with 72.5, i got my first net out with 13 in and it went 68lb ,no probs today, got my second net out with 15 fish in, bugger guess i will only be getting the net net limit of 80lb for that one then, so with the 5 from the other net i ended up with 167.5 which was enough for first (its been a while)
2nd was tom thick on 34 with 91.13 which included top silver weight of 50.5 all taken on his favoured soft pellet approach
3rd ed wynne 82.10 peg 40
4th mat tom(m)es 72.5 peg 16
5 phil harding 68.3 peg 36 which also included second in silvers with 43lb
6th martin lenaghan 61.6 peg 11
a word of warning to the silvers anglers who fish here mike has imposed a 50lb weight limit for silvers.