Woodside Canal Sunday 17/6/12

This was a Cradley Heath club match that was rearranged from the end of April due to bad weather on our local canal we call Woodside, I drew peg 75 which is a good peg but in a good area with any peg 57,58,59,69.71,73 & 77 capable of winning. With no Roach showing from the canal in the last few weeks since spawning I based my attack around chopped worm & caster for Perch & Skimmers, I fed 2 lines with with this down the track and a caster line over at 14.5m I also put a pellet line just up the shelf at 11m. I caught a few perch from the worm lines for first half of the match before I stopped getting any bites at all the fish had just switched off, the lads either side of me had the same just like someone had flicked the switch off even JB who was on peg 71 came for a walk and said he was the same catching then nothing? In the last 45mins we had a boat come through and I lost my hook on a snag so I sat on the 14.5m caster line for the rest of the match, with 10mins left to go the float shot under and I was connected to a better fish I thought it was a Chub but at I netted it after a good struggle on no4 elastic it was a Tench around the 3lb mark a proper bonus fish. When the scales came I put 6lb 6oz on the scales with the Tench exactly half my weight at 3lb 3oz but with the fliers in the bay and 3 Chub pegs in 51, 44 & 43 I thought I might win the section, Brian Smith was the next best weight on peg 69 with 5lb 7oz but when we got back on the car park I found out that no one had caught a Chub and I had won the match???? That Tench in the last few minutes had won me the match and I was truely on fire with 3rd Cradley club match win on the bounce.

Hill View canals Sunday 3/6/12

This weekend saw us at Hill View which I had not fished for a few years we had got 3 of the 4 canals booked for a Halesowen club match, we had got canals 2,3 & 4 and the weather had took a turn for the worse after 2 weeks of glorious sunshine the rain had come back with a vengeance which never stopped all day with temperature in half from 25-28c down to 14-16c?
The match was hard for most with just odd fish coming now and again I drew canal 2 and just picked off fish from here and there for a modest 41lb but enough for the section/pool win, the top 4 weights all came off canal pool with Baz Robson winning with 66lb on paste and we were all happy just to get out of the rain. I can only put the low weights down to the sudden down turn in temperature putting the fish down?

Cob House Wednesday 30/5/12

Just 3 days after winning our club match down here and I was back with Stav for a knock up on one side of Wyatts which had been booked by a mate of ours Matt (baldy), Stav had missed the last couple of club matches so it was good to catch up. We had 15 pegs booked on the back side of the pool (16-30) the fish were up in the water all over the pool but as they were still spawning on here Sunday they might be just sun bathing in the 27c heat recovering, I drew peg 19 which didn't matter as there were fish all over the place.
I started and finished the match up in the water at 13m hooking a Carp first put in so there was no need to worry about them being shagged out, feeding 4mm's with a 6mm on the hook I ended the match with 112 fish with some of them a lot bigger than I had caught from this pool before. Right on the whistle Stav was playing a fish and as the all out sounded I shouted to him how many fish had he got 100 he replied I shouted he was F****d I had got 12 more. My fish went 191lb 4oz for the 2nd win in 3 days I was on fire!!!! Stav was 2nd with 144lb (must try harder?) and Baldy 3rd with 138lb (must get more hair!).

Cob House Sunday 27/5/12

Back to Cob House Fishery this weekend for a Cradley Heath club match on Oak and Laurel pools both of which I have not fished before, we were going to split the match in half in-case one pool fished better than the other. I was hoping for a draw on Laurel as after a bit of fishing around for info this pool seemed more likely to produce the bigger weights and after winning the last 2 club matches down here I was looking to make it a ha-trick, I got my wish and drew Laurel peg 19 the only problem was that the fish were or had been spawning this week so there was a 2m ban on to stop anglers fishing for them while they are doing there business.
I worked hard all day switching between all my lines to keep fish coming from up in the water between 13-3m picking off 2-3 fish from each line before they faded away, I had fish also from 2 deck lines both at 3m one on pellet the other on dead maggots at 10 and 2 o'clock. I had a good run of fish in the last 45mins from my 3m maggot line as I saw fish coming up off the bottom taking the maggots in mid water, so I cut off the hair from one of my 2 shallow pellet rigs and put maggots direct on the hook they took it sweet as a nut.
I finished the match with 72 Carp for 134lb 1oz and my 3rd Cob House win this season so I was well pleased with more beer tokens for the Bell pub up the road, Kev Clark was 2nd on the peg to my left with 98lb and Steve Robson 3rd with the best weight from Oak pool with 88lb.

Boddington Res Sunday 13/5/12

Hi folks sorry for the long period of non blogging but I have been decorating both the living room and my sons bedroom which has been taking up a lot of my spare time ( No I have not finished yet before you ask ). I have managed the odd club match in-between bouts of plastering and door hanging so I am going to run through these matches in brief to try and bring you up to date before Stav and I embark on our fishing week which starts next Sunday.
I had been looking forward to this match as I have not fished Boddington for 2-3 years but we all had a few concerns that the match had been booked a little too early in the year as waters of this size take a lot longer to warm up than your usual commercial fishery. We had the last 30 pegs booked down the right hand side of the Res to the bottom and the word was that you would need to draw the bottom pegs on the natural bank to catch a few fish, I drew 4 pegs up from the bottom so was happy with the draw.
To cut a long story short it fished absolutely crap with only 40 lb odd winning and half the field blanking I think there were 20 odd fishing and there was not even enough Carp caught to share them out one each! The bottom 3 pegs were 1st, 2nd and 3rd sadly the didn't swim around the corner to me I had 1 bite half way through the match on the method feeder for 10lb 2oz which done me no good at all with Ollie on the next peg winning the section as his 1 fish was 11lb odd?
Too say the lads were disappointed would be an understatement 120 mile round trip from home for that I don't think they will be booking it again.