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Monday, 28 November 2011

Rods&Reels Autumn Series Barston Lake 9th October

Having missed the last round of the autumn series due to me getting up late and not being able to find the fishery (cheers sat nav!) I was looking forward to fishing this round at Barston lakes.
My history at Barstons has never been good and I always tend to blow out every match I have fished there, this time round I was hoping to change all that and come away with a good result.
Having got there nice and early and settled down to a nice fry up breakfast (one of the only reasons I go fishing to have a good fry up) it wasn’t long before the rest of the lads shown up ready for the draw.
We had been allocated pegs 34 upwards to the high 60’s with the island swims in this is where I fancied on drawing and was hoping one of these pegs would come out. That wasn’t to be and out came peg 56. Not knowing too much about the peg off I went to the car to sort my kit out.
On getting my kit out I had noticed that I had not packed my trolley and knew with the kit I carry it was going to be back breaking getting it to the peg.
Well after half an hour up and down the bank getting my kit to the peg I took time out to decide what I wanted to do. With the wind blowing a gale left to right I knew it wasn’t going to be easy fishing the pole but wanted to set up a chopped worm and caster line 11-13 meters out.
The other swim would be the method feeder straight out to the front at about 55 reel turns.
After sitting down and I started setting up for the pole line I opted for a Sensas Jean Desque 0.8gr with a bulk shot and 2 droppers fished 2 inch over depth due to the wind and tow on the lake. Line of choice as always was Browning Cenex line 0.12mm main line to an 8 inch 0.10mm hook length finished off with a Tubertini 808 size 16 hook. Elastic choice would be a Browning solid latex size 12 on a pulla bung set soft for the skimmers but handy should the carp turn up.
For the method line I fished a mix of 3mm pellet and ground bait on a 30gr Kobra inline method with a 0.14mm 4inch hook length with a PR36 size 16 hook. Bait choice for the hook would be Browning marbles in different flavours and colours (mini bollies) to see what the fish were having if any at all. All of this attached to a 0.16mm main line with my Browning Force 12ft feeder rod.
As the all in was called is was off to work feeding my pole line then going straight out on the method casting every 2 minutes for the first 20 minutes to get some bait down in the swim then I slowed it down and cast every 15 minutes watching the tip for indications to see if the fish had moved in. My plan was to sit most of the day on the tip looking over my pole line every hour to see if any fish had moved in and were feeding; it wasn’t some thing I wanted to stay on all day due to the wind as it was getting worse.
After the first hour I had managed 2 small F1’s I had plenty of indications on the tip and I thought to myself just to stick it out. With 2 and a half hours gone and just 2 F1’s to show for it and nothing happening on my pole line I had a feeling of deja vous. Looks like another blow out on the cards. With this in mind I unclipped from 55 reel turns changed the setup to a cage feeder with a 1ft hook length and fed chopped worm and caster in the feeder plugged both ends with a mix of 3mm pellet and ground bait and cast it 65 reel turns feeding half a worm on the hook and let it settle. Within 5 minutes the rod tip bent round and in came another F1. Another 15 minutes saw me land another one and things were looking up, as from what I could see people around me were also struggling. This carried on for another hour landing small F1’s totalling 5 in an hour it was nice to be catching but needed some thing larger to start bumping my weight up. I changed the hook bait for an 8mm red boillie to see if one of the resident large carp would be tempted.
After 2 casts in half hour nothing happened on the tip just as I was about to reel in the tip shot round and this time it was a larger carp. It didn’t take long for it to power up and then it was gone. I was gutted that would have done nicely in the net but that’s fishing.
With only an hour remaining and still gutted I had lost a big carp I decided to sit it out on the pole line. And sure enough the skimmers had moved in with a steady last hour of skimmers coming to the net I had added another 10-12lb to my net. With the all out being called I was unsure where I had finished in the section and match overall.
With the scales coming round I put 28lb on the scales enough for section 3rd with the winning weight coming from 10 pegs down who had managed to get them going all day on his pole line landing a carp to 19lb.
Another blow out from a lake that I just can’t get to grips with and need to visit more often to suss out what works when and where.
It has left me thinking of ways to tackle the venue and one I am still looking forward to fishing in the future get the tatics and feeding right and a good day is in the cards.



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