On Saturday it was back to Todber for the silvers open and after drawing in the middle for the last few matches, I was sure a peg at the near end had my name on it this week. After breakfast it was time to find out and as per usual Adrian Dew and me waited until there were two tickets left, Ade opened his and was on 65 and then I looked at mine and I’d only gone and drawn 70 which is exactly where you’ve wanted to be in recent matches!
We got underway and I fed down the edge at top kit plus one with a nugget of groundbait and casters while the 13 metre line was fed a bit more positively. I had a nice roach first put in on the short line and had several plus some smaller samples before it slowed. A few fish were coming out on the longer lines so I followed suit, maggot resulted in a few small fish so I put double caster on and had a better skimmer but was waiting ages for bites and pulled out of a decent fish.
Trying worm head was a similar story, a 6oz hybrid quite quickly was encouraging but then the float just sat there, eventually it’s gone under and I was into what felt like a nice fish, possibly a tench so I was taking my time with it only for a little 8oz catfish to pop up! Dropping in down the edge again, the float buried and a 1.5lb skimmer was followed by two around 12oz apiece to put me on around 5lb as we neared the halfway point. Guy came for his usual wander and reported 8lb was was the best he’d heard so it was fishing quite hard and I wasn’t a million miles away.
Back to 13 metres and after an age, a decent bite saw a pound skimmer leap out the water but thankfully it stayed on, over the next 30 minutes or so I only added a couple of small fish so had another look short. Three decent skimmers nearly doubled my weight but you’d only get a few fish before having to rest it again. Dave G, Graham P and Freddy to my right were starting to catch quite well fishing shallow and Graham even had a tench up in the water so I began loose feeding casters at 13 metres and shallowed up my little light rig to around 18 inches deep.
I had a couple of bites but it wasn’t really happening so I moved the float down to 12 inches and had three nice skimbobs plus quite a few around 2-3oz and some roach. It was really good but with around an hour remaining it began to slow up so I came back short and had several more big skimmers although I did pull out of a good fish. With ten minutes to go, I’ve gone out shallow again and managed one more decent skimmer before the all out. I finished up with 35 fish plus a few bits and bobs. Of course as soon as the final whistle went, the usual shenanigans began with Andy A and Ade saying they only had 10lb and I replied the same!
The scales started at the top end and Dan P weighed 8lb 14oz, peg 74 chucked back, Freddy had 13lb 6oz before Graham (the Todber Tench Tickler) went into the lead with 15lb, Dave G had 7lb 9oz and then it was my turn, I had hoped I might be close to Grahams weight but it was a bit more than I thought at 21lb 4oz. Photos courtesy of Todber Manor*
Dan P had 8lb 14oz*
Freddie weighed 13lb 6oz on 73*
I had some decent skimmers for 21lb 4oz*
Dave P weighed 4lb 2oz, Pete N had two little catfish in his 8lb 8oz and then Andy A was only slightly out with his estimate as he weighed 17lb 10oz which included a bream pushing 5lb, Tony G had 12lb before Ade also went to the extremely rubbish school of guesstimating as he had some big skimmers for 18lb 2oz to go into second place. Martin chucked back on 64 and Nick P on the end weighed 12lb 8oz.
Dave P had 4lb 2oz on 69*
Andy A was third with 17lb 10oz*
Tony G weighed 12lb*
Adrian had some big skimmers for 18lb 2oz and second place*
Nick on 62 weighed 12lb 8oz*
1 – Jamie Rich (Bait-Tech/Colmic) – 21lb 4oz
2 – Adrian Dew (Todber) – 18lb 2oz
3 – Andy Akehurst (Sensas) – 17lb 10oz
So a nice little win and a handy pick up of £80, close weights again with just a decent skimmer or two the difference between first and seventh place. I love catching big skimmers close in, exciting stuff when they come flying out the water!, also interesting that a fair few fish were caught shallow today.
After a couple of weeks of handing nuggets over to Adrian, it was a relief to get one back although he wasn’t too upset as he replenished his piggy bank with one from Tony!*
A big shout out to Guy Manton who very kindly donated £10 to the Nugget-O-Meter for my birthday, £2 each from Nick P and me plus Ade’s pound saw the charity total shoot up to £270.
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 – Summerhayes
Coming soon – Lots more match reports
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