Graham West has fished more matches than he’d like to admit. But what happens when things don’t go to plan? It then becomes all about how well you can change and adapt…
We join Darren Cox on one of his local stretches of the Warwickshire Avon, to show how important the right conditions are for bream fishing on the feeder.
Five-time world champion Alan Scotthorne visits the mighty River Trent to demonstrate how to target river roach on the feeder.
Roach can be difficult fish to catch from stillwaters on a feeder and trying to tempt these clever fish on a river can be even more taxing. Add a tide to the equation and it becomes an even greater challenge!
This is what I am facing today on the tidal River Trent at Laughterton, in Lincolnshire. This is a river I started my angling career fishing and it has a large stock of quality roach among other species.
Rob Wootton returns to the venue that can only be described as roach soup!
After a really successful feature for Pole Fishing a couple of weeks ago I decided to book into the pairs league on the river Welland that runs through the town centre of Spalding. This place becomes rammed with roach all through the winter and it’s been somewhere that I’ve ignored in the past but after loads of good reports I just had to give it a go and several others from my neck of the woods agreed. Last sunday five or six anglers from Leicester including my travelling partner Sam Merry were mingling at the draw, asking about the form of the venue and catching up with mates that only get senn once or twice a year.
All the talk was of how coloured the venue was, me and Sam had a quick look before the draw and although the sun was still firmly below the horizon we could tell that there was plenty of extra water on the venue.
After last weeks poor draw at woodlands I was really looking forward to getting back up there and was looking for a good draw. There were plenty of anglers on the match so Kamasan points were on offer and also I’m doing well in the County Champs tables so was looking for a few points. I drew peg 15 on Skylark, HAPPY DAYS. This has been a consistent area all winter and the main shoal lives in that area.
Last weekend I managed to get out on open matches both days. Saturday May 7th I went to the beautiful Partridge Lakes. With more than 80 anglers booked on, it has to be one of biggest open matches in the country.
I drew Peg 51 on Covey 3.
Last weekend I managed to get out on open matches both days. Saturday May 7th I went to the beautiful Partridge Lakes. With more than 80 anglers booked on, it has to be one of biggest open matches in the country.
I drew Peg 51 on Covey 3.
On Saturday it was back to one of my local venues, Blundells Fishery, for the open match. After six weeks away from the place, I knew the fishing would be slightly different from my last match on the venue.
It has a rover match across all the lakes. With about 40 anglers on it you need to draw a low number to get on a decent peg.
Well Saturday was the big day for my Ultimate Barnsley Blacks team as it was to be one of our most important matches of the year. Semi finals are always tense affairs and with this one being at Woodlands Nr Thirsk it was always going to be a peggy match to say the least! All we could hope for was a decent draw and a good team performance. We got the good draw that we needed and one that we were confident of qualifying from. I got massively luck and actually drew Skylark 15 AGAIN! I was almost embarrassed when Lee handed me my draw but I had a job to do and with the pegging being very tight I didn’t think I would need a big weight to win the section.
This week has seen me have a fantastic weekend! I really do put a lot of effort into my fishing so it’s always nice to get some good results!If any of you have followed my blog so far you will know that the final round of the Sensas/Garbolino was to be fished this week at Woodland View. After the practice match the week before we were heading into the match very confident, and felt that we could get a good result. We had a slender four-point lead over Daiwa Dorking, so every point that we could score would be vital. Lee Kerry was to draw our pegs and put three of our five anglers on end pegs, High pool 27 was to be my home for the day.
Webb’s World
Dan Webb has been counting the pennies this month, and is not convinced his investment in the worm market has been paying dividends…
What can £30 buy? One-half of a meal out with the wife? A pair of shoes for the kids? A good night down the pub? (If that’s not enough, you need to take a long hard look at how much you drink!) A trip for two to the cinema? For most people (excluding Pete Goodman), £30 isn’t to be sniffed at! It’s affordable but at the same time not the sort of amount of money you want to give away too often! I love my fishing and I don’t mind paying for good bait, but when £30 only covers the price of fish food, that’s when I start to get upset!
As I’m writing this, I’m just days away from my next credit card statement where the normal diesel, floats and McDonald’s coffee bills have been grossly inflated by masses of bait after practising and fishing the Drennan Knockout Cup at Tunnel Barn Farm (thanks very much for the invite Tom, I hope you didn’t mind the subtle hints)!
It’s that time of year, around spawning time, when those picky commercial fish just want to start gorging on a worms. A kilo of worms causes a noticeable dent in the wallet but add to that four to six pints of casters in case they come shallow and suddenly thoughts of remortgaging come to mind!
Spending money on bait is a consequence of going fishing, but when it costs more to feed fish for five hours than the wife at a restaurant, that’s when it gets too much.
I feel like I’m putting a pound coin in my Cad Pot every time I ship out. I get a twisting, swirling sensation in my stomach that’s aggravated every time I miss a bite.
With my busy schedule with work and with the Dynamite Baits festival coming up at White Acres, I decided to have a bit of time off this weekend. I did however manage to sneak a couple of hours in last night after work. I decided to have a short session at The Banks fishery at Barby, Jon, Tom and I had a walk around last week and I was really impressed with the venue. It is a 106-peg snake lake that is very diverse, there is a long straight that used to be an old canal and then the fishery turns into a very twisty snake lake with lots of little arms.
