This match was was on the small Orchard pool at the awesome Tirley Court with Staunton AC. I ‘d looked forward to it, as the last match I fished here was a good days fishing catching a tonne and I hoped for another tonne plus weight today. Strangely there was a low turn out today. So we pegged it all along the near side bank. I drew the first peg by the entrance gate and it was a full bagging day where I went on to record a NEW personal best match weight, 253lb 6oz. What a day!

The last time I fished the pool I’d caught well on a short pole with corn and pellets so I planned the same attack this time. But with no one pegged on the opposite bank, I thought maybe the fish would back off so as well as a couple of short pole lines and the margin into the corner I set up a method for fishing over to the far bank. It turned out I didn’t need to throw it out!

Plumbing up I found the silt started at a top kit +4 and I found a nice hard bottom at 2+3 to my left in 4 foot of water so I opted to start the match here with hard pellets while priming a shorter top kit +1 line in 3 foot of water to my right with corn and pellets. The margin into the corner also plumbed up well with 18 inches of water right in tight to the nearside bank. So the plan was to drop in there early if things weren’t going to plan. Every thing felt right today. The weather, dull and overcast, the end of September, No one on the far bank, an end peg with plenty of room until the next angler. I couldn’t wait for the all in !

Starting on hard pellets

So at the started off the match cupping in a full pot of corn and 6mm pellet into the top kit +1 line and started fishing 6mm banded pellets on the other line feeding just a few 6mm’s over the top to start with. It took 15 minutes to hook and land my first carp but still around 4-5lb in weight and this was followed by several more in the next 40 minutes so a good start and I felt the fish were in a feeding mood and so I upped the feed hoping to catch more but my catch rate was slowing down now and I was beginning to get a few foul hookers as the fish were coming off the bottom. I was wasting time with foul hookers. All the other anglers seemed to also be catching well. So the next decision was to come in on the top kit plus one line with corn.

Corn & pellet short

This match was becoming a fish race, everybody was catching well. I needed an instant result on this short line and luckily I only had to wait 30 seconds for the elastic to stretch out with another 5lb fish. Great I thought but then nothing. Something wasn’t right. I re-plumbed up and I was actually just of the bottom. I re-set the float depth to bottom of the float body and began to loose feed grains of corn and pellet by hand. I was soon back fishing and catching Carp with the corn hook bait. Most were 4-5lb in weight and great weight builders. I’d now clicked to 50lb on my first keep net and with only just over an hour gone I was bagging and that tonne plus weight I had hoped for at the start was in easy reach. The 2nd hour was just a good if not better on this short line. I’d filled two keepnets now and had clicked to 100lb with 3 hours still to go. Then it dawned on me……. I’d only brought one keep net bag (I have two) and I only had 4 keep nets with me today. I’d left the other keepnet bag in the garage. (school boy error) Was I going to run out of nets? I thought surely these fish will stop feeding at some point. Another hour pasted and my 3rd net was now full with no signs that the fishing would slow down. The fish were really having the feed today and by this time I was really feeding the corn and pellets heavily and this continued for the 4th hour and I was now at the point of running out of keep nets with an hour to go.

Sending out an SOS for a spare keepnet!

At this point I saw the next angler walk back to his car for a new keep net. He was obviously also catching well and I shouted over to him, “have you got a spare keepnet I could have” This was only a friendly club match and I am sure if he had one spare, I could use it but to be fair to him he was catching well and maybe he thought he’d need all his keepnets so the answer was no sorry. So of I went bank walking and luckily for me one of the other anglers had two spare one’s in his car. He said yes to great relief to me and I could use one, but he also asked me to give him the other spare one. So he was also bagging then I thought! So I returned to my peg put the other keepnet in and continued to fish. But the short line wasn’t the same, my catch rate really dropped off. I’ve been gone from my peg for 10 minutes and so no feed had gone in. It wasn’t the same. Time for that margin line then.

Into the corner margin.

I’d wasted 20 minutes trying to get that short line to work after the 5th keep net went in. So into the margin I next went. 40 minutes were left in the match now but I’d not primed it in anyway, so in went a big pot of corn and pellet and I fished it straight away loose feeding corn and pellets by hand over the top to create some noise. I hoped this would drag in some big edge dwellers and if I could catch a couple I would be happy. I’d still had a great day anyway. After 5 minutes the float buried and the elastic stretched out with a 10lb carp. Great I thought as I lowered it into my new borrowed keepnet. But I hadn’t secured the net properly and as I lowered my landing net holding the carp into the keepnet I pulled the keepnet free and the big edge dweller was lost! I quickly grabbed the keepnet from the water and I luckily I didn’t loose any fish that were already in it. So I just lost the big carp. Feeling gutted with the 2nd school boy error of the day I went into the corner margin again and hooked another !! This time I made no mistakes and it went safely in the keep net. We were now into the last few minutes of the match and I added a couple more smaller carp and then the all out came.

Weighing in

I had five full keepnets and I was the first to weigh in. I already knew I had beaten my match best weight of 184lb easily. I’d had a great days fishing and hoped to break to 250lb barrier today. My five keepnets went to 253lb 6oz and I was over the moon but I never picked up anything. Due to the numbers fishing which was low they only paid the top 2. The match was won with an awesome 324lb also a PB from the other end peg down at the bottom of the pool and 2nd was 274lb. I had to settle for 3rd place and no pick up. There can’t be many anglers who have weighed in 253lb and won nothing!!

Best rig of the day

This was the short pole line where I caught 200lb of fish on the same rig and the same hook length and it still looks as good as new ! This was a 4×14 Preston online Diamond set up on 0.19 mainline with a bulk of stotz’s above a 6 inch Preston XSH 0.17mm size 14 ready rig. set up on Preston 17 yellow dura slip .