Blythe Pairs League Sunday 17/4/11

Back to Blythe this weekend for round 6 of our pairs league, as it stands me and Stav my pairs partner are lying in second place 11 points behind the leaders and hoping for a good draw to see if we could impose ourselves on the leaders. Stav sent me up for the draw again and i came back with 29 on Bridge for myself and 16 on Cherries for Stav, my peg looks good with 2 small natural islands in-front of you with a gap in-between the two to cast into some 25m away plus a nice 6ft of water on the pole line and some reeds to the left of the peg down the margin it looked good! Stav's peg is on the straight half way up the right-hand side of Cherries but a long ship to the central floating boom on the pool which normally holds most of the fish. I sat looking at the water for a while trying to read the water and decide what to set up, i had spoke to Baz Robson who had come 2nd off the peg a few rounds ago while it was still cold with 17lb of f1's and he said there he had caught some fish in-between the islands on the feeder but it was very shallow. With this in mind i decided to go for a straight lead and pellet wagg attack up the islands as the fish are still not in full summer mode yet and i felt a softly softly lead might be better than a heavy method feeder, there were a few fish swimming around just under the surface in groups and some in pairs maybe they will be thinking of other things rather than feeding? I set up 3 pole rigs and 2 rods to tackle the peg.
Rig 1, on the deck at 13m for worm, 4x14 Maver Jona float, 0.18 line to 0.16 h/l to a 3 175 set with a bulk and to no10 droppers in around 6ft of water to 13 hollo elastic.
Rig 2, shallow rig for the same 13m line, 4x12 Maver Jurassic dibber, 0.14 straight through to a 3 175 and 13 hollo elastic.
Rig 3, margin rig 8m down the edge to some reeds, 4x12 Preston durra 10, 0.18 straight through to a 3 175 in 3ft of water with 15 hollo elastic.
Rig 4, 9-11 Shimano Beastmaster rod, 8lb maxima mainline, 1/2 Fox lead running free with a grippa stop behind it if i want to try a pop up boillie, 0.20 h/l to a 14 pr27 hook.
Rig 5, 12ft Maver Reactolite rod, 5lb maxima mainline, 3ssg pellet wagg, 0.18 h/l to a 14 pr27 hook.
For bait i had brought all the usual feed pellets from micro to 8mm, 1/2kg worm, 2 pints casters, 2 tins corn and some 6&8mm expanders. While setting up i found out just how much water was in-between the two islands i put a plummet on the pellet wagg and cast into the gap the float stood proud, i reeled in pulled the wagg right down to the swivel i use to attach the hook-length and re-cast the same again with only a 12 inch hook-length plus the length of the wagg around 3-4 inch i was on the deck. I don't think this will be a very productive method with less than a foot of water too fish into, while doing this Stav came around to grab his 16m Tournament extension ( i am using his spare pole at the moment) i wouldn't need need it and with a short no4 in too stiffen his pole he was just short of the boom he was going to fish at 17m! he's going to feel that in the morning!
On the whistle i potted some corn and 4mm pellets down the edge at 8m to some reeds, a pot of worm and casters went in at 13m, i threw the lead out with a lassoed 8mm pellet on the hair to the gap in the islands and started to fire 8mm feed pellets over the top in 5-6's at regular intervals to try and put a good bed down. 2-3 casts later and around ten minutes into the match the tip flew around and carp no1 was trying to get around the back of the island and causing right commotion in the shallow water, applying the brakes and hoping the end take held firm with the stretch in the mainline coupled with a soft rod the fish soon turned and a 5-6lb carp was in the net. During the first hour i managed to land another 4 carp all on the straight lead all in the 3-5lb range so with all going well i rang Stav to tell him, he cut the conversation quite short as he was catching well shallow up against the boom so with both of us having a few fish it was looking good for our attack on the leaders of the league. Hour 2 went a bit slower with me only adding 2 more fish to my total and losing 1 which broke my 0.20 hook-length? But as the second hour wore on bites were getting less and so were the liners which i was getting in the shallow water, i was trying different hook baits in an attempt to get more bites like double corn and pop up fluro boilie with the latter accounting for 1 fish but it was time to try the pole. I had 10mins down the edge without a bite which i had been feeding with odd 1/2 pots of pellets & corn so out i went on the 13m line with a worm head on, fishing the deck rig i lowered the rig in and emptied the kinder pot of worm & caster over the top the float went immediately and a 1 1/2lb skimmer was netted, great i thought a few of these will do! Wrong that was my 1 and only bite on the deck i couldn't believe why there was a lack of bites on the worm not even any roach, a change to the shallow rig produced just 2 roach but as i was about to give up i hooked and landed a 5lb carp which gave me a bit more hope. With lots of fish cruising around in pairs and groups a lot of anglers were struggling to catch and because of the islands the main angler i needed to keep an eye on was Carl part of the league leading duo was out of sight on peg 3, with 3 hours of the match gone i was now scratching my head as what to do next. The last 2 hours went very slow with me only adding 3 more fish to the keepnet 1 shallow on the pole and 2 more on the lead giving me a total of 11 carp 1 skimmer and a couple of roach, i had been wondering why the bites had slowed up on the lead after a good start and all i could think of was a combination of the shallow water with the bright sunshine later in the match putting the fish off feeding and more thoughts of getting ready to spawn? With Carl the first to weigh in on peg 3 he put 68lb on the scales he said he had caught well in the last hour in the margins on paste with his last 2 fish being big double figure ghosties, i never had a bite down my margins? Dave on peg 7 had 40lb with the help of a 15lb carp on the pellet wagg, the rest of the weights on the pool were 20-30lb on average so i was pleased to put my 50lb 4oz on the scales for second on the pool although my main target Carl had beaten me by a point. Back at the car park i saw Stav who said he had won Cherries pool with 65lb and had beaten Carls partner by a few places but we would have to wait until the points had been totaled up to see how many we had pulled back on them, when all the points had been sorted we found out that we were now only 6 points behind with 2 matches left we had gained 5 points on them today. With it all to play for over the last 2 matches we will need a good draw on the next round to catch them up, well done to Stav for winning the pool and getting us within striking distance.