Ash Ponds – 22nd October 2023

On Sunday we were back at Ash Ponds for the latest Stoke match and would be on Ponds 2 and 3 again. Both lakes are rammed full of fish but weights on the former tend to be a little lower and there is a better head of silvers while lots of keepnets are required for the latter, hence me hoping to draw Pond 2.

We all met at Cartgate for breakfast before doing the draw and Norts announced the payout would be the top two and silvers on each lake. After doing me proud lately, my drawing arm had a bit of a blip when I pulled out peg 14 which was on Pond 3 and one away from where I was last time. After driving down the boneshaking track, I checked all my fillings were intact before getting my gear to the peg. I was in great company today with Rob ‘Oscar’ Wylde on my right and Andy Saunders on my left, so a nice day with plenty of laughs was pretty much assured.

With two matches to go (including this one), I’m currently in pole position for the new Silvers Bowl trophy so would be trying my best to avoid the carp which would take some doing on this lake! I set up a little 0.3 gram Guru Carbon Slim with a size 16 SFL-B to 0.13mm plus a little Drennan Crystal Dibber (not used). The side tray was nice and simple with lots of maggots, Bait-Tech Special G F1 Dark plus some 6mm pellets in reserve.

We got underway and I fed some loose groundbait and maggots at 11.5 metres and top two plus two before starting on the longer line with double maggot on the hook. The rig never even had chance to settle as a 4oz rudd took the bait on the drop, I had another next chuck and there were obviously loads of fish there. All round the pond, people were already into carp and it looked like I was the only one fishing for silvers.

Trying the short line it was a bite every put in, lots of small rudd with the odd better one and if the rig actually got to the bottom I was getting the odd nice roach and silver bream. I’ve caught really well for two hours before it slowed so I tried potting in some more groundbait which didn’t really have the desired effect when I hooked two carp in quick succession. To be honest it was all a bit academic with everybody else fishing for carp so I just carried on catching in spells and ended up with over 200 rudd, roach and pommies plus a few carp.

As we packed up, it was obvious the weigh in was going to take a while as there were keepnets everywhere! Bagger Burton on 16 had 155lb 3oz and then Andy S weighed an impressive 244lb 10oz, my accidental carp haul was a much more modest 65lb 3oz before my silvers went 12lb 12oz. Rob W went into the lead with 245lb on peg 13, Cliffy had 109lb 8oz, Neil P on 11 weighed 156lb 13oz and then Derek B had 136lb 11oz. Last to weigh on our lake was Terry ‘The Toast’ who’d been bagging all day, after all his nets had been added up, his total was a huge 316lb 8oz.

Over on Pond 2, Vic Bush had the top weight with 145lb 6oz from peg 7, Roy W was second with 138lb 5oz and Nick P had the best silvers weight with 12lb 6oz.

Pond 2
1 – Vic Bush (Stoke) – 145lb 6oz
2 – Roy Worth (Stoke) – 138lb 5oz

Silvers
Nick Payne (Ilminster) – 12lb 6oz

Pond 3
1 – Terry Morgan (Stoke) – 316lb 8oz
2 – Rob Wylde (Stoke) – 245lb

Silvers
Jamie Rich (Against Men and Fish) – 12lb 12oz

At breakfast, the Grand Wiz and Andy Burns both very kindly donated £3 each to the Nugget-O-Meter taking it to a fantastic £401 which just surpasses last years total, with a few more matches to come, hopefully it’ll go up some more.

There’s still a great offer running if you fancy treating yourself to some new fishing gear, use the exclusive discount code AgainstMenandFish10 to get 10% off when you shop online at Somerset Angling

Also I still have copies of my book available from eBay here or Amazon here

And if you could spare five minutes to leave a nice review on Amazon, it would be very much appreciated.

Next up – Revels

Coming soon – Lots more match reports

Check Out – My last match

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