Summerhayes – Silvers Open – 10th January 2026

On Saturday I headed to Summerhayes for the silvers open and after yet another hard frost, there was plenty of ice on all the lakes so Pete said we could have a rover and decide where we wanted to go. Nine fishing today and I pulled out choice seven which wasn’t ideal! As people were called up and began choosing the pegs they wanted, quite a few I fancied went early but when it was my turn I was amazed to see 32 on Longs was still available so went for that one.

Roy was modelling his latest bobble hat courtesy of Bill ‘The Paste’

For company I had Nick on 34 but nobody to my right as that was where the ice started. The usual rigs were assembled for the short lines (top two plus three), 13 metres and across to the island. I was expecting it to be rock hard today with bites at a premium so it took me by surprise somewhat when I had a little indication first chuck and landed a small skimmer! It was a bit of a false dawn though and after a further half an hour or so, I hadn’t had another bite or seen anyone else catch.

Nick went out to 13 metres and had a couple of decent skimmers so with an hour gone I had a look on my longer line and after a few minutes I hooked a little skimbob only for it to come off at the net! When I had one next chuck followed by two more skimmers and a cracking roach, it felt like there were a few fish there but then typically I couldn’t get a bite again. Back on the short line I had a small skimmer, a decent roach and a little tench but once again it was short lived while Nick had another big skimmer across.

Nothing else on my long swim so I went to 14.5 metres and after a few minutes I missed a bite and then next chuck hooked a bigger fish that pulled out a load of elastic, thinking it was carp, I shipped back quickly and started using the pulla bung only for a 2lb skimmer to pop up. Then I had a bit of a nightmare where I’ve hooked three decent fish in quick succession and they’ve all come off!

I was getting regular bites and landed a few more skimmers, some nice roach and an ide although Nick was still catching well and apparently Big Bad Bob over on Sellicks peg 3 was bagging with quality roach. Just before the all out I bumped a fish and then had a lovely roach of 8oz or so but Nick landed a big skimmer on the whistle.

The weigh in didn’t take long as it had fished quite hard for most with Dan and Pete on Big 8 not weighing while Alex, Glynn and McKenzie on Longs had all struggled as well. My 21 fish went 8lb 3oz, Nick had 9lb 14oz, Roy struggled for 5oz and then we went over to watch Big Bad Bob weigh in, he had 42 roach and 2 little tench to win with 11lb 6oz, a lovely net of fish.

I had 8lb 3oz of skimmers, roach, ide and a tench

Nick had some big skimmers for 9lb 14oz and second place

Big Bad Bob had a lovely net of mainly quality roach to win with 11lb 6oz

1 – Bobby Aires (Summerhayes) – 11lb 6oz
2 – Nick Payne (Ilminster) – 9lb 14oz
3 – Jamie Rich (Bait-Tech/Colmic) – 8lb 3oz

So another close frame, I sneaked third picking up £26 and it had been another lovely days fishing.

A very generous £8 from Nick P, £2 from me plus a pound off Dan T saw the Nugget-O-Meter jump up to £154.

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