Greenhill Farm Open ( Jim's Pool ) 27/7/10

Hi folks, Today's match is on the new pool at Jim's and only about the third time i have fished this pool over the years, they have some big weights from time to time here so i was looking forward to a good day's fishing. The match was being run by a mate of mine Jim Greenaway who i used to fish with at Woodlands View on a Tuesday which is normally my day off from work but this week i had the whole week off! yep he! There was one or two more old faces that i new so i didn't feel like a total stranger like Macca Cox, Ernie Tilley and my mate Dave ( Crack-off the legend ). There a few strange rules at Jim's like, no pole cups or leadgering from April to October, no hair rigs, no swim-feeders at all? On the bait front there is no pellets, meat only on the hook, casters, maggots, corn & worms. The main attack seems to be feeding heavily with corn and fishing meat over the top or feeding loads of maggots.
I drew out peg 8 which put me on the opposite side to the car park about 4 pegs down from the top corner ( we used our own pegs i think it was permanent peg 29 ) peg 7 was Mr. meat cutter himself Ernie Tilley and on peg 9 was Dave Crack-off the Legend so at least we could have the crack if nothing else. Now my mate Dave has not been fishing long and is always willing to learn but seems to always be stuck up a tree, losing fish or generally breaking things. In the short space of time he has been fishing he has become something of a local legend has Dave and already has a full collection of DVD's for sale with some top title's such as HOW TO PULL THE ISLAND CLOSER, HOW NOT TO ELASTICATE YOUR POLE and during filming today the release of his next dvd HOW TO GET DONE UNDER THE PALLET. LEGEND!
Right back to the fishing if i can stop laughing.
I set up 4 rigs for today.
RIG 1, 4 x10 preston durra 10, 0.16 line to a size 3 turbetini 175.
RIG 2, same float but 0.18 line to a size 4 175.
RIG 3, 4 x 12 maver jona, 0.18 line to a size 4 175 set around 3 1/2ft deep at 6m ( this is the shallow end of the pool)
RIG 4, 4 x 12 maver Jurassic dibber 0.16 line to a 3 175 for shallow work.
On the bait front i had about 8 tins of corn, 4 pints casters and some meat cut into 8mm cubes for the hook some plain some dyed red.
I planed to feed casters and corn down both edges at around 3m but feed just corn on the 6m line and on the whistle i did just that. After around 10 mins the float shot under with cube of red meat on, the fish felt quite good but didn't pull much black hydro out and within 20 seconds a 6lb common was in the net Bingo! On close inspection i soon found out why the fish had put up next to no fight, it had got no tail fins a bit ugly to look at but i wished the all fought like that! While fishing at 6m and feeding the margins around 30 mins in i had seen a few silvers intercepting the casters down my left-hand edge, then i started to see odd carp swimming in the shallow 1 ft deep swim. There was the odd fish being caught down the bottom end of the pool in the deeper water down by the car park but not a lot up our end, after ringing the changes with baits and depths on the 6m line i failed to get another bite so after only 45 mins it was time to have a look down the edge. I could see odd carp swimming about in the area of my hook bait but couldn't get one to take it, when i feed casters the rudd were first to them so i put some on the hook. After around 10 silvers roach, rudd and perch i decided that these were not worth fishing for as normally need 100lb+ to win a match on here. With the first hour gone i was still stuck on 1 carp and after another 30 mins at 6m i was going no where fast, Ernie had got 3 carp and Dave 2 so we were all struggling for bites the guy's opposite Alan & Charlie were in the same boat. Things didn't really improve until around 2 1/2 hours into the match when i started to notice odd carp coming down my left hand edge, i managed to hook odd carp down there but they seemed to spook very easily when one was hooked. With around a hour of the match left i had my best period of the day with four fish i four puts-ins but no soon as i started to think i was going to sack up then the fish disappeared again. What i was noticing was that when i fed casters the silver fish were on it like a flash then the carp moved in underneath, when i stopped feeding casters and fed just corn the carp were very reluctant to come into the shallow water it was like the carp were waiting to see if the coast was clear before they felt that it was safe to feed! I had odd fish from the margin until the whistle went but i knew that we were miles off the pace of the match as the guys in the deeper pegs had caught well. When the scales arrived the bottom corner peg had weighed 119lb but the rest of the bank had struggled to my surprise, Ernie to my right had 46lb and i was shocked when my fish went 67lb 12oz. Crack off to my left had 38lb but had lost a few and the guy in the top corner peg on our bank had 54lb putting me second on our bank! On the opposite side the fared a little better with three 70 + lb, the weights were getting better as we got down the bottom end Macca Cox the first to break the ton barrier with 136lb. Macca was saying that Jim on the next had got more and he was right as Jim put a great 154lb on the scales, now i was starting to sweat as Jim had told me that he was paying top 3 and 2 sections so with me second on my bank the guy with 119lb was lying 3rd with 1 left to weigh in the bottom corner. As he pulled his nets out it was going to be close very close, luckily he fell just short with 112lb and winning the section on his bank leaving me with the far bank section. I was well pleased to have got something out of the day as i thought we were well out of it due to the reputation of the fishery, so all's well that ends well so to speak.