Summerhayes – Open – 23rd November 2025

It was back to Summerhayes the following day but on Longs this time and after my drawing arm had misbehaved yesterday, I was hoping it would buck its ideas up for this one. My name was near the top of the list and when I got called up, I was well happy with peg 31, a brilliant area for silvers.

My drawing arm behaved itself for once!

I set up the normal rigs for top kit plus two, 11.5 metres and across to the island but while I was having a plumb around, I found a deeper hole about the size of a dinner plate at top five, it was nearly double the depth of the rest of the swim at approx 4 ft. On the whistle I fed the top four lines and 11.5 metres before starting short but rather worryingly I couldn’t get a bite. After half an hour, I’d only had one tentative knock while Glynn down on 26 had already landed two decent silvers fishing across.

Toby on my left had kicked off fishing tight over and had a frustrating start when he’s hooked several carp, only for all of them to come off so probably foul hooked. I didn’t want to go on my longer lines too early so decided to have a quick look in the deeper hole, I fed a little loose groundbait and some pinkies via a toss pot and went straight over it. To be honest I wasn’t really expecting much and after ten minutes without an indication, I was just about to give it up as a bad job when there was a little dink and then the float sailed away before I landed a decent skimmer around 12oz.

I was getting a few smaller skimbobs around 2-6oz with most bites being tiny little dinks or lifts and I was really enjoying it. Glynn had slowed up after his good start and nobody was catching much in the way of carp or silvers, Dan Squire in his new Nytro colours over on peg 13 was catching the odd carp fishing long and Bill ‘The Paste’ on 33 had great little spell landing several carp in quick succession. In amongst the little skimmers, I had very handy bonus tench of a pound.

As we approached the halfway point, it slowed up so I had a look long but no bites but the rest had done the top five swim some good as I had a lovely 12oz crucian, a couple more skimmers and a 6oz tench. Nick wandered up from 21 and said he was really struggling and going to pack up early, he also reported that Oscar on 15 had caught some decent silvers as well.

Despite several looks on the longer lines at 11.5, 13 and 14.5 metres, I’ve only foul hooked two carp (which was a common problem for everyone today), one came off and I landed the other as the all out was shouted. I finished up with 19 silvers (1 crucian, 2 tench and 16 skimmers) and I reckon the float had only actually gone under three times all day.

The weigh in wouldn’t take long today with several people already gone, Rob B on 39 only had one ide, Dan T weighed 4lb 5oz on peg 2 which included 1lb 10oz of silvers, Zooner on 7 had 2lb 5oz and then Dan S on 13 went into the overall lead with 23lb 5oz of carp. Oscar on 15 was admitting to 4lb and although I said I had around the same, I thought it might be a little more than that. When he pulled his net out there were several lovely crucians plus some skimmers and tench which went 6lb 3oz and I didn’t think I had that.

Dan Squire had 23lb 5oz of carp on peg 13

Oscar had 6lb 3oz which included some nice crucians

Tom Thick and Nick had both gone, McKenzie on 24 didn’t weigh and then Glynn had 1lb 14oz of silvers, Roy Hughes weighed 12oz, Steve C had 15lb 8oz of carp and then it was me, I still thought I’d be a little short of Oscar’s weight but the scales registered 7lb! Toby had 17lb 7oz which put him second but it only lasted until we got to Bill who had 20lb 8oz and that was it as Big Bad Bob and Kev ‘O didn’t weigh on 35 and 36.

I had a crucian, 2 tench and 16 skimmers for 7lb to win the silvers

Bill ‘The Paste’ was second overall with 20lb 8oz

1 – Dan Squire (Nytro) – 23lb 5oz
2 – Bill Hopping (Summerhayes) – 20lb 8oz

Silvers
1 – Jamie Rich (Bait-Tech/Colmic) – 7lb
2 – Rob Wylde (Summerhayes) – 6lb 3oz

I had a nice pick up of £64 for winning the silvers and it had been a really nice days fishing where I’d only lost/bumped two skimmers all match.

Oscar donated a pound and nuggets from Dan T and Zooner helped the charity total reach £47.

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