Stourport River Severn Sunday 20/11/11

This weekend saw us on the river Severn at Stourport for a Halesowen club match on the BAA stretch at Newalls Meadow below the bridge and a few pegs above the bridge on the Littleton water, I have not fished this stretch for around 25 years so it would be a bit of a blast from the past for me. If you catch the river conditions right weights of 20lb+ of Roach & Dace are on the cards but as the river has been running clear lately the open matches run on the upstream Littleton water have been won with weights of 10-15lb, most of the weights are taken on the stick float, waggler or bolo there is the odd bonus Chub, Bream or Barbel but sticking your neck out on the feeder can end up with you catching very little. I drew out peg 14 which was down towards the bottom end of Newalls Meadow and for company I had Shaun Waite next to me on peg 13 who was chasing me for the clubs averages so we could at least keep an eye on each other, what we did notice on the way down was that the pegs at the top end of the stretch seemed to have a lot of room in-between them some had 2-3 pegs each. I made a comment to Shaun as we walked passed these top pegs saying that you watch when we get to our pegs there will be no room in-between them! We got to our pegs and I put my barrow down and shouted to Shaun "I told you so" the bottom 5 pegs had all been put in all in a line GREAT I thought but then it got worse Stu had drawn peg 15 below me all of about 8 yards below, basicly this was going to be a float match and I had no room to run the float down????????????????? I don't normally moan about pegging but this was taking the piss some of the guys had miles of room while we had been all packed in like sardines, I went and looked at the rest of the pegs which all seemed to have around 15-20 yards in-between them mine was the worse of the lot. Now I know that pegging out is a thankless job but it looked to me that the bottom 5 pegs had been put in the the other 6 on Newalls had been spread out once they had realised there was a lot of room left, I was fluming at this point with with smoke coming from ears ranting and raving I get one day a week to go fishing and I had just been f****d up the a**e before the start. I felt like going straight home and not even set up if I could have got my hands on the w****r than had pegged out he would have gone swimming no messing, I had to fish as I was in the running for winning the averages so after I had calmed down a bit I began to set up as the pegg'er out'er was a mile away above the bridge I couldn't do anything about it.

I set up the stick and straight lead as the waggler would be out of the question due to such a short run down I would have been on top of Stu before the shot had settled, I went for a 6 no4 in 5 1/2ft of water around 2 rod length's out stick shotted with strung out no6's and two no8's near the hook on a 13ft light stick rod and a closed face Abu 706 reel, Mainline was 2.6lb with a 20 B520 hook on a 0.08 hooklength. The straight lead was my Shimano Beastmaster 11/9ft rod with the lightest tip in set at 9ft a Shimano 2500 super gtm reel with 3lb maxima mainline, a 18 B520 hook with a 0.10 hooklength I put just 2 swan shot on a paternoster rig. I had brought 2 pints of bronze maggots and 1 pint of hemp for bait plus a few worms if I had to scratch around for a few Perch, I had set up and had a fag & coffee before the all in still trying to calm down after my earlier rant.

At the all in I began feeding a dozen maggots as far upstream as I could throw them which was easier said than done as there was a overhanging tree above me stopping me from throwing them as far as I would have liked and a few grains of hemp straight in-front of me, after a few runs down it seemed there was a bit of weed on the bottom covering the hook-bait at one spot some 3/4 of the way down the peg so I had to hold back the float hard to get over the obstruction, it took some 30mins to get my first bite which was a small 2oz Perch from virtually right underneath Stu's keepnet which I was allowing to run down as far as possible as Stu had started on the waggler. Next run down produce the same out come and another 2oz Perch then I went around 10mins before my next bite a 3oz Dace which came from a lot higher up the peg, another couple of small Dace and a solo Roach was the sum total of the first hour's work for around 12oz. Hour 2 followed a similar pattern with just odd fish here and there saw me struggling for bites without me being able to get the fish into some sort of pattern with around 1 1/2lb in the net I was going nowhere fast then I hooked a nice 4-5oz Dace right underneath my rod top by accident! I was having to reel in and feed with the rod in the rests and the rig in the water pick up the rod and cast underarm due to the tree to my left I couldn't do the usual side cast, it was while doing this that I hooked the Dace on a line that was some 12 inches shallower than where I was fishing so I decided to have another go at it. Putting the 1ft extension in-to my rod making it up to 14ft to get over the marginal weed I repositioned my rod rests and messed about with the shotting and depth to lay the rig on holding the float back hard, the next 10mins produced 2 more Dace and a Roach for around another 8oz which was a little better then the bites dried up on this line I think due to how clear the water was the fish were spooking. This seemed to set the pattern for the rest of the match you would catch 2-3 fish then they would back off due to the clear water then you would go bite-less for around 10-15mins before they would come back, I am sure that had there been a bit of colour in the water that we would have been able to keep the fish coming for longer. I had a frustrating period in the match with about an hour to go until the end I started hooking Dace right under my rod top hooking around 10 fish in quick succession but only landing around 4 they were twisting off despite me going up in hook size to a 18 I had tried a 16 hook earlier but failed to get a single bite with the bigger hook, that was the best period of the match for me which I failed to capitalize on and soon enough the match came to an end with Stu below me struggling all day for half a dozen fish I thought I had got around 5-5 1/2lb and with on one walking around I didn't know how the others around me had got on. As I got up bank starting to pack my gear away Shaun above me appeared who I couldn't see due to the trees in-between us saying he had got around 5lb and so did Dave Wood on the peg below Stu so it looked like it was going to be close at this bottom end unless they were all liars? The scales soon came down and Bob the bosun on peg 17 was the first to weigh with a level 5lb then Dave on peg put 6lb 6oz on the scales, Stu on peg 15 had just 12oz for last in the match? (sorry mate) I put my fish on and scales-man gave me 6lb 4oz just 2oz short of Dave, then Shaun above me put 6lb 20z just 2oz short of me so it had been close on the bottom 5 pegs were we had been packed in like sardines. Up the top end of the stretch there was a 8lb dead and a7lb 6oz & 7lb 4oz topped off by John Billingham on the first peg 7 in the bay with a great 15lb 14oz, above the bridge there had been a 7lb 2oz and another 6lb+ weight. Well done to John for winning the match a good angler on a good peg! Not taking anything away from John but he had got 3-4 empty pegs below him and no one above him for until above the bridge some 200-300m above him! All the top 3 came from above us at the top end of Newalls where there was a bit of room in-between the pegs so if that doesn't tell you the storey then nothing will, I was done for the section by Dave with that 2oz extra and the only good thing was that I managed to beat Shaun by the same 2oz margin to stay on top of the averages by 10 points with just one match left to go! I caught up with the pegger out'er in the pub after the match and gave him a piece of my mind along the lines of him needing a white stick and a guide dog (or words to that effect minus the swear words?), he did apologise but that's always easy after the event.