Willow Marsh Sunday 8/8/10 pm

Hi folks, this weekends match saw me and Satv back out with our Cradley lads for an afternoon match at Willow Marsh on the Dragonfly pool, the draw was set at 1.30pm fishing 3-8pm. I have only fished this place about 2-3 times before one of which was Halesowen club match on here last year which i managed to come 3rd with 97lb on corn & paste, since then the pellet ban that was in place then had been lifted so i asked a few of the lads who fish the opens on here how best to attack it. The main attack still seemed to center around fishing the paste short & down the margins but you have to find some way of catching a few early before the carp started to feed avidly, they don't normally start to feed until 5.30-6pm then it's bag- up time as they have some very big weights from here and the carp run big with lots of 10lb+ & some 20lb+!. Now paste fishing & me don't normally get on, i have caught fish on it over the years but after fishing a lot of venue's where it is not allowed has made it not a normal plan of attack for me. The other plan of attack i was told is to feed heavily with corn and fish either meat or macaroni over the top, both these baits are allowed but on the hook only.
As this was a late match me & stav had decided to go for a pint & a carvery instead of the normal fry up before the draw, after we came out of the pub both me & stav felt bloated as we had eaten to much dinner & felt like going to kip on the grass instead of fishing. At the draw both of us were still puffing a bit with big belly's and most of the talk was which lucky sod was going to draw the flier which is peg 12, the pool has 43 pegs on it and has a point( peg 12) which is almost a horse shoe shape. There were 20 blokes booked in for the match which sounds good on a pool with 43 pegs but because of the shape of the pool there are 5 corners which you need to leave out so it cuts the pegs down a bit + peg 42 in the shallow bay doesn't exist? the pegs go 40, 41, 43 then 1, 2 and so on? The friday afternoon match had been won with 97lb the lowest winning weight of the summer so far ( the cradley curse strikes again), normally there are a few 100lb+ weights with young James winning a match here a few weeks ago with just short of 200lb. The open boys said the the best place all summer had been along the dam wall in the mid 20's until Friday when there were next to no fish caught off it and a draw in the 30's better, i was pleased with my draw peg 36 opposite peg 12 & Stav had a good draw in the shallow bay on peg 2 with 3 spare pegs to his right!
I set up two pole rigs both for paste fishing, one for 3m out in-front and the other for my right hand margin. Rig 1, set 2 1/2 deep at 3m a preston self cocking pb paste 1, o.20 silstar to a size 10 pr27 hook. Rig 2, a j-range margin cocker with the same line & hook as the other rig set just over 12" deep, both rigs were hooked up to red hydro. I had also set up a pellet waggler rod to try and catch an odd fish or two before the paste line kicked in, my wagg set up was a 3ssg stryo wagg, 5lb maxima line to a 12" hook-length of 0.20 to a 12 pr27, 12ft Daiwa tourney rod and Shimano 2500 super GTM reel.
On the bait front i had made my own paste from soaked 2mm pellets, 2 bags of 4mm & 1 bag 8mm fishery pellets and 6 tins of corn ( i had done some 8mm pellets for the hook but left them in the fridge at home? plank!) & some 8mm cubes of red meat.
On the whistle i fed both pole lines with pellets & corn then started on the pellet wagg at around 30m, by feeding 3-4 pellets 3 times a cast and re-casting every minute or less it took my around 20 mins before i had my first fish a 5lb fish. Despite working hard for the first hour i couldn't get another fish changing depths & altering the feed pattern, meanwhile Satv & Ritchie up in the shallow bay seemed to be the only people catching with around 3-4 fish each. The whole pool seemed to be living up to what we had been told by fishing very hard early doors with only odd fish being hooked, trying both pole lines & back on the pellet wagg i only managed to land 1 more carp on the 3m line on paste a 8lb fish. There were a few people foul-hooking fish especially The Boson in the next peg he managed to break 2 pole sections while playing the 1 fish don't ask me how he managed to do it i don't think he new either, this was all of course met with the usual howls of laughter mainly from Ollie the other side of him, i did offer him a sticky plaster and told him that we sold a full range of new poles in the shop. Before i knew it we were 3 hours into the match then as we were instructed the fish turned up and boy did they turn up, i stared to get bites every drop in on the 3m line. The fish started to boil when i fed a few pellets or corn hooking some but missing more bites than i was hooking and pulling out of more than i liked, i couldn't catch down the margin despite fish boiling down there from time to time. It looked like i wasn't the only one loosing fish as all around the pool you could see guy's loosing as many fish as they were getting out, Stav, Ritchie and now Dave Wood next to Ritchie were all catching well as well as Mark on the point peg who was now having a few fish on the feeder by throwing at the aerator ( yes the same aerator i could have thrown to if i had bother to get the feeder rod out of my bag?). In the last 2 hours i had managed to extract a total of 13 fish but loosing as many in the proses if not more, i had been pulling my hair out at one point loosing 6 fish on the bounce? All sorts of reasons were going through my head as to why i had lost so many fish, was the float right with no shot on the line?, was the hook to big or the elastic to strong? but at the same time everybody who had caught had lost a lot of fish but this is a pet hate of mine i don't like loosing that many fish. The 3 guys up in the bay were all admitting to around the same amount of fish 12-13 but as usual some of them lie, the dam wall had fished very hard with Barry winning the section on there with 20lb odd? Stav put a good 109lb on the scales and was far the best weight until we got to Mark on peg 12 who put 121lb of fish on the scales of mainly feeder caught carp, as i have said the weights were then bad along the dam until we got on to or bank in the 30's Ollie having 50lb odd, Boson having 2 fish & losing 13! my fish went 100lb 12oz and Shaun to my left 50lb odd. Dave on peg 39 had caught well the last 2 hours down the edge and just missed out on beating Stav with his first ever ton with 108lb ( not bad for a canal angler), Ritchie on corner peg 40 put 101lb on the scales beating me by 1lb and knocking me out of the frame! Shit i was 9lb off Stav and second, weighed 100lb only winning the section loosing around 15 fish more than i had got in? ( shit happens, could be worse, could have drawn the dam wall???). Well done to Mark for winning the match, all the lost fish were re-lived for a short time in the Dog at Harvington over a pint or two of Stella & a bag of scratchings. Hope we can sort it out for next week as were have got the same venue same time next week.