Cob House Knock-Up Wednesday 27/7/11

Had to swap my day off to fish this one organized by two mates of mine Matt & Shaun on Wyatts pool at Cob house fishery, i had traveled down with my chauffeur Stav (aka uncle fester!) and after the usual belly-buster breakie in the excellent Mayfly cafe we made our way to the pool side to do the draw. It soon became apparent to us that it would be a harder than normal match as we had 16 blokes fishing and another 14 peg club match on the other side taking up all 30 pegs up on the pool!, we even had to pinch one of there pegs from the other side as there is only 15 pegs on each bank on Wyatts. So with every peg in i thought that a light feeding regime might be the order of the day and after the usual mickey taking and good banter it was time for the draw, i pulled out peg 12 and Stav got peg 5 which normally doesn't make any difference on this pool as it is solid of fish on every peg. After setting up my platform in the water which is allowed on the fishery as the pegs are quite high off the water due to the low water levels all the pools and rivers are experiencing this summer i set up my rigs as follows-
Rig 1, on the deck at 3m for pellet, 4x12 Maver invincible pellet pencil, 0.18 mainline to a 0.16 hook-length with a size 2 Tubertini 175, set just touching bottom in 3 1/2 feet of water with all the shot bulked up 8 inches from the hook.
Rig 2, shallow rig for the same line, 0.30gr Maver Jurassic dibber, 0.14 line straight through to a 18 Preston pr27 hook with a lasso for hard 6mm pellets set 18 inches deep with all the shot under the float.
Rig 3, margin rig down my left-hand edge to some grass cover for maggot (i only tend to feed 1 edge here so i can put my keepnets the other side to keep them away from my short line?), a Preston durra 10 float 4X12, 0.16 line straight through to size 3 Tubertini 175 hook set 2 inches over depth in 18 inches of water with all the shot bulked 6 inches from the hook.
For bait i had brought 4 pints of 4mm fishery feed pellets and 4 pints of dead maggots to make up my 8 pint limit of feed but with every peg in i was now looking to feed only around half of this amount, for hook bait i had brought 6mm expander's and hard pellets, some corn and a 1/4 of a pint of live maggots.
I started the match on the 3m deck rig feeding pellets in 6-8 at a time while starting feeding maggots down my margin line for later in the match as the last time i fished this pool i had some of the bigger stamp on this line, most of the carp in Wyatts range from 8oz to around 4lb with the fish averaging 1lb-1 1/2lb. I started catching the odd fish on the deck and while not setting the world on fire by the end of the first hour i had managed 21 fish which i thought with every peg in was OK, if i could keep it up and end up with around 100 fish this would give me around 120-130lb which should be enough for a top 3 place today with as-well as all the pegs in the sun was out 25'c and the pool flat calm from any breeze. Just as i thought everything was going swimmingly the bites started to go from hittable to UN-hittable and i started to foul-hook a lot of fish, i tried cutting back on the feed but this stopped the bites altogether so i had to feed to get bites but they were not on the deck anymore and after loosing around 6 fish on the bounce i reached for the shallow rig. I was catching odd fish shallow but i think that the amount of pressure on the pool was talking it's toll but the fish i was catching up in the water were of a slightly bigger stamp, by the end of hour 2 i had only managed another 12 fish so my 20 fish per hour had gone out of the window!

That was the pattern for the rest of the match I would have odd fish on the deck but it made no difference to my hooked fish ratio weather or not i fished soft expander's or hard banded pellets, after a time the bites would become almost impossible to hit so i would switch back to the shallow rig for a few fish and to be honest this is were i caught most of my fish. I had a couple of looks on the margin maggot line which only produced a couple of fish as with every peg in i felt that the fish would not settle on the feed properly, this thought was mirrored by a mate of mine Scott Jones a that works at the fishery and he knows the place inside out so I didn't pursue this line for very long. I ended the match with 76 fish which i thought would give me around the 90lb mark and hoped that would be enough for a frame place in today's hot and pressured conditions, a quick walk down the bank and chat with Stav reveled he had got 95 fish and was looking good for a top spot but he said that the guy on the end peg 1 had also got a few fish. After packing the gear away we started the weigh-in at peg 1 who put 109lb on the scales, Stav put 124lb on to take top spot so far, there was a 82 & 93lb weighed in before it was my turn and my bag went 105lb 4oz which put me 3rd with the guy on the opposite bank in the corner having 90lb. So well done to Stav for the match win which i think fished fantastic with every peg in, i know that most fishery's normally shut up shop with that much pressure, not this place, it's Solid! I was happy with 3rd place with a few fish in the net is better than a day at work anytime, me and Stav were talking on the journey back home about how the fish in Wyatts have packed some weight on in the last 12 months since the last time i fished it Stav's fish averaging 1.30lb and mine 1.38lb so roll on next week when we embark on our fishing week which we have booked into 2 opens at Cob house which we are both looking forward to.