Silver fishing my way to success at white acres

For the last week I have been fishing the White acres garbolino spring classic, this is a 72peg, 4 day festival. Those who know White acres festivals will know that you draw a section and follow that section around the lakes each day, I was in D section which meant I would be starting on high numbers at trewaters, then low numbers twin oaks, low numbers trewaters and then finally high numbers twin oaks.

Seeing as I'd never fished the lakes before I figured on the Sunday practice day I may aswell practice on the lake I was starting on, which was high numbers trewaters. 

Being there a tad late with several pegs in use, i opted to sit on peg 44, which had wind blowing towards it and looked like it might be alright! I decided to try a few things out and had no plans on bagging, I simply wanted to see what I could catch on certain baits and areas. I decided to start at 5m on pellet and caught a 3lb carp straight away, and f1 and several skimmers, which at the time I thought were a nuisance! I caught for an hour and it then went iffy and slowed up which seems to be fairly standard on a lot of places I fish. I then decided to fish the feeder, I opted for a micro pellet feeder, I caught a few fish on this but still it wasn't great, and the bites certainly coming fast enough for me to fish the confidently in the match, I'd rather be busy in a match putting something in the net. I'd been feeding caster down the edge and decided to have a look, it was absolutely solid with roach and skimmers. I only fished this for 20-30mins and it was by far the best way to put fish and weight in the net! My team mate had fished 2 pegs away from me and concentrated on feeder all day, it was quite apparent that bites mostly came in the first hour and last hour. With this info I was set for the match, I would start at 5m to see if I could catch any early bonus fish, have a look on the feeder and then go for the roach, maybe looking for carp late if I had too.

Day 1 trewaters peg 47

Drawing close to where I had practiced was a bonus, although on arrival I noticed my margins where Barron with no sedges at all, I was unsure if I would be able to bag on the silvers like before, the wind was also horrendous so there would be no long pole options for anyone today.

I started the match at 5m a couple of hand sized skimmers in 15minutes wasn't quite the plan, so out went the tip. 

I was using a micro pellet feeder and it was very much apparent that if your feeder didn't 'kiss' the bank you didn't get a bite! I managed 3 carp on this early for about 5lb. Not quite the required stamp!

At this point I was doing as well as anyone in the section so decided to take a look for roach. I'd been feeding caster and maggot either side from the start, action was hectic to begin but it only took 45minutes or so to slow, I managed to keep fish coming by alternating between left and right margin but they were not the required stamp from the day before, and as not a lot was being caught I stuck with this till the last hour, I picked up a carp and a couple of f1s on the tip in the last hour, I ended with 21lb 2oz for a section win, 10lb of which was roach!

Day 2 twin oaks peg 11

After drawing this peg and seeing it was last in section with 17lb the day before it didn't exactly fill me with confidence, but looking at the results they seemed to just get better the further down the lake you went, with my section being peg 7-12, I still felt I was the right end of the section.

Arriving at my peg I found Simon gould on peg 12, which had won the section the day before with 61lb.

I decided to start the match on a method across, feed a 5m line with meat and feed a roach line again as a back up. There would be no long poles or wagglers out today as yet again the wind was howling.

I started on the method and caught 2 fish for 14lb in the first 30minutes. Simon to my right then caught his first fish, a 15lb carp! He then proceeded to catch another and a couple smaller ones while my tip just sat there! I was behind and up against it! After an hour Simon said here comes the witching hour, he had stopped catching, I was no longer getting liners and I decided to look for roach! This proved a great move and I managed 150roach in the next hour for approximately 20lb by this time though this line was unfortunately starting to slow so was certainly not a feasible way to catch 60lb+. In this time no one to my left caught a fish and Simon had just caught a couple of f1s. It was only when Simon brought in another Munter that I decided I really needed some more myself and chucked the feeder out again. I'd changed to a pellet feeder and was really cramming the bait in, this seemed to work a treat and bites were far quicker.

I caught odd f1s and frustratingly smaller 4-5lb carp compared to the ones Simon caught, we were probably fish for fish at this stage of the match and I really didn't know how I was going to overtake him. Unfortunately I had an issue with a snag, lost 3 fish, 9 hook links and 2 feeders in it! A bit of a mare really and even Simon said I wasn't getting a lot of luck! Coming into the last hour my catch rate increased, I'd been pinging pellets 3/4 all day and also managed 2 lumps on this. Unfortunately Simon did the same and found another huge double!

I weighed in 81lb and Simon had 110lb, I'd come second in the section and although I felt like I'd fished a good match I still felt it should have been closer. Yet again those roach had boosted my weight and made 2nd in section far more comfortable. Fortunately Simon framed so I picked up section by default.

Day 3 trewaters peg 31

This peg looked like a good peg in the section, the wind was blowing this way down the lake and I felt like I had a good chance. My team mate had been on 34 the day before and had found the lake fished very hard, with most carp caught almost straight away before people sitting bite less. On the day he fished maggot short for bites and amassed a lovely 38lb bag on roach and skimmers for a section win.

Armed with this information I saw no reason why the lake would fish any better than the previous day, the wind was similar and it still felt very chilly.

I decided to start on a micro pellet feeder cast millimetres from the island, this is something we worked out too, if it wasn't close, you wasn't getting a bite. Fortunately it didn't take long and the tip went round with a small carp followed by 2 small f1s in the first 30minutes. In this time I'd been feeding one side of my keepnet with sloppy groundbait and maggot, and the other with caster. I felt it was time to change so on with a maggot and I flicked the rig to my right. The float went under immediately and I was into chunky roach one a bung, after 20 minutes or so I found a bonus 2lb skimmer. 30minutes later and the roach started to get smaller and I was catching odd small perch, a change to the left hand caster line produced good roach straight away, I had a good 15minute spell before that also started to go iffy. I then found myself in a rhythm, fishing one side for 10-15minutes a time and it seemed a perfect way to keep in touch with the quality roach, both lines also produced another 5 decent skimmers, and a couple of f1s.

Coming into the last hour I'd not seen much caught at all so I was pretty confident I was leading the section, bites became iffy in the last hour but this was probably down to the fact the big fish were starting to move around, I actually hooked something that tore off and snapped my 0.8 bottom, I stepped up to 0.10 and interestingly sat bite less for 10minutes, I'm sure those carp and f1s are incredibly line shy on these high pressured waters. Back down to the 0.8 bottom and in the last 45minutes I managed a few more roach, along with 5 decent f1s and 2 carp, one of which was 5lb, I was using double 5 preston slip elastic and a game black hook, it's amazing what you can get in on gear like this! I ended the day with 385roach 5-6skimmers 5-6fs and 3 carp. My total weight was 57lb 10oz of which 49lb was my silvers net all caught on a top kit! I'd won the section by over 20lb, finished 2nd on the lake and had a fantastic days fishing along the way! 

Day 4 final day, twin oaks peg 19

This was easily my best draw of the week, and I couldn't have asked for a better peg today, this peg had been first or second every day this week, and I needed to catch a big weight if I was going to win the festival, this was probably one of very few pegs I could do that on this lake, as with every peg in it was fishing incredibly hard. I decided on a very simple approach, pellet feeder tight across, long pole up the margin, the maggot roach line in front of me as a back up, and a short margin line if they would come that close late. All week it had been fishing very hard with almost every fish being caught on a feeder tight across, hence why I didn't even bother with a 5m or shallow pole line today, I really just wanted to concentrate on positive methods that were working.

I started the match on the feeder and had one 3lb carp in the next 30minutes I had loads of liners in this time, but after 30minutes they just stopped, the fish were very much not obliging at this point. The guy on the peg next to me who I forget his name also had one fish, while everyone remained bite less. Even Simon gould on peg 21 only had a small roach at this point!

Now in a peg like this I really didn't want to be fishing for roach, but I had to get the section win before I could start thinking of sacking up, and with the tip completely motionless and nobody catching a fish, I decided to go for roach, I caught 86 roach on maggot in front of me on a topkit for approx 10lb as I had a bonus skimmer and a 1lb roach in this, unfortunately the last 15minutes of that hour was hard to get bites, this also coincided with the guy next to me catching an f1 on the tip, so out went mine and up the bank went the roach gear! It's worth noting at this point I fed some grounbait long up the bank to my right, as I felt I may nick a fish or two here during the next few difficult hours.

I cast my feeder out after catching those roach and it flew round almost immediately, I had an f1 of my own! Over the next couple of hours I sat on the tip catching odd f1s and small carp, this kept me ticking over nicely, especially as no one else was hardly catching. Probably an hour and a half I saw some signs on my long margin line and managed to catch an f1 and small carp on worm here, I topped the line up but unfortunately not another fish turned up here all day! This didn't matter too much though as the tip was gradually getting better. With an hour and half to go I started throwing small nuggets of gb to my right short margin, with about 40 minutes to go I saw a huge tail waving at me, so on went 2 worms! I lowered the rig in where I assumed the head of the fish would be and the rig just carried on, I wondered if I was under depth and the worms pulled it under, when I went to lift the rig it was solid, before a head started to nod and the fish wallowed out into the middle of the lake, big lump on! After a 10minute struggle I finally caught a glimpse of what was a good 15lber! Amazingly though just as I went to net it, the hook pulled and I watched it slowly swim away, proper gutted!

I had fed a few nuggets of groundbait down the edge while I was playing this fish, and there was another waiting for me, so in went the rig and I had to sit and wait frustratingly for a good 5 minutes before the float buried, this time I had a baby edge dweller of only 8lb! Although it was still best fish of the day at this point! This fish had caused a fair bit of disturbance when I hooked it, and as a result there was no tails waving at me after I'd landed it. I topped up with a pot of gb and went out on the tip.

It wrapped round with a 5lb carp, I then went out again and had an f1. There was 5 minutes left on the clock, and there was a tail waving at me, not a double but not far off, I now had to make the quick decision if I fish for it and potentially not get a bite before the whistle, or chuck the tip out for an almost guaranteed bite from what would probably be a smaller fish. I chose the feeder and it turned out to be an inspired choice as I caught 2 carp for 14 lb in the last 5 minutes! What a finish!

I ended up winning the lake and section with 78lb 10oz, a great days fishing as the next best on the lake was 40lb! Yet again I felt like I'd fished a great match, by catching plenty of silvers in a time when the bigger fish simply weren't feeding!

Unfortunately though I knew I was 60lb behind Harry billing going into the last day, so he only needed a section win and 18lb to beat me, this turned out to be the case as he won his section with 50lb.

I'd finished 2nd in the festival with 23 out of 24 points and a weight of 241lb over the 4 days, over 85lb of that was silvers! They played a massive part in the week for me and I would have been nowhere in the festival without them!

At this point I'd like to thank all the white acres team for a really well run week, and more importantly my bills tackle team mates for the great info they provided me each day! They all had up and down weeks themselves, all having some really tough draws, but also I think they all won there section or framed on the lake at least once too, including banksy who managed to pull himself up the leaderboard with a section win on the last day after a 'slow' start to the week!

Congratulations also to Harry Billing for the win and Danny Edwards for taking 3rd spot!

I had a great week and will definitely be back for more!

My latest fishing fortunes

The last few months have been very rewarding for me, I framed in my one and only fisho qualifier of the year, finishing third, I won the first round if the essex inter club league at southminster pits, came 2nd at colemans cottage on a 36pegger on wood lake, I also added another evening league tital to my name, all in all I've seen lots of brown envelopes!

Il start with the fishomania qualifier, I started the day 46th on the reserve list, wondering if I would even come close to getting on, talk at the draw as usual was you wanted to draw copse, you have more room than anyone and it's not usually match fished every week so the fish are always ready to feed, otherwise having abut of knowledge of the venue, I knew wood could throw up a weight but didn't expect the other lakes to compete. I was fortunate to get onto the match as about 20 people didn't turn up (I think) I just about squeezed in and couldn't believe it when I saw peg 8 copse, this is a good peg (supposedly) and I was very happy to draw copse because at least I had abut of room. Despite the fact I have fished the venue few times in the last year, I've never fished this lake as it's not big enough to hold an open match. A quick chat with Paul the tackle shop owner and he told me Chris vandervliet(who drew just before me in the que) conveniently drew peg 17 on copse with the wind blowing into it, and Ross Harold was also on a decent peg, Paul told me they were both better pegs than mine so I new I would have a challenge on my hands to win.

I got to my peg very late, seeing as I had to wait for 120 anglers to pull pegs out, then wait another 30minutes In case any one turned up late who had tickets, this meant I arrived at my peg with 40minutes to get ready, which wasn't ideal.

I decided on a margin swim to my right which was abut like a 5m line as it had a spit going out with reeds that looked lovely, a swim to my left in shallow water next to some over hanging sedges that looked very inviting, and long pole to the island, although on setting up it was hard to hold in the wind. 

I started on my right hand swim with the idea of kinder potting, the left hand margin was big potted and long pole left alone unless I fished it. I had a good start catching about 30lb in the first hour, more than anyone else I could see before bites slowed up, a look down the left resulted in a good run of better stamp fish to get me upto about 60lb before yet again it died, at this stage I considered going long but on first attempt I almost took off with the wind so quickly the pole came back in, I considered chucking a tip over but the angler to my right had caught about 3fish all match and it was clearly not that great, he was also only about 3meters away from where I would have been chucking, so I discarded this and went back to the right margin. To cut a long story short, I kept a steady run if fish going by swapping between right and left side until the last hour when I only managed 4fish, this was frustrating, but after the match it seemed everyone on the lake had exactly the same thing, so I didn't feel I did much wrong.

I finished weighing 103lb, I won the lake beating Chris vandervliet who had 97lbi sh I think! Talk was that I had won it, but my hopes were dashed when a weight of 129lb came from pathfield, very unexpected, I was then relegated into 3rd after Gary bull weighed 145lb of peg 38 on wood.

Although I hadn't won, I was chuffed to frame in a big match like this, and even more chuffed to win my lake against top opposition. The feeling when people were saying I had won it was indescribable, and it's left me craving that feeling again. Next year I'm applying for more tickets and il be back to go that bit better!

My last big match win was at southminster pits, which was a 60 pegged. This is my third visit to the venue as I only go once a year on the inter club match, last year I was sat on a featureless peg watching every peg on the other side of the lake sack up in carp next to reeds in corners, it looked brilliant over there, I managed 13lb of roach for 5th in section that day, which was realistically as good as I could do!

This time however my fortunes had changed and I drew a corner peg on the same lake, it looked fantastic, loads of room and fish topping in the corner whilst setting up. Last year this peg had about 40lb and the match was win with 70lb so I fancied my chances. I spent a good 20minutes plumbing every inch of my right hand margin, and finally settled on 13meters down the bank, just past a little bush and more importantly a relatively flat bottom without tree roots, the rest of the swim was horrible and full of roots and snags which would have made fishing a nightmare. I fed a cup of groundbait (this was 50/50 sonubaits krill and sonubaits sweet f1, a margin mix that works everywhere I go and have complete faith in) with some dead maggots here and chucked a tip down the corner, after 10minutes I'd had nothing so thought I'd see if I could mug an early carp on the pole line, the float flew straight under and a short scrap later a nice 6lber was in the net, I went straight back in and had another one, by this time only 25minutes had passed and I had already matched my weight from the year before, not too shabby!

I topped the swim up with more groundbait and maggots and went on my roach line as there are some cracking roach in here and felt I could catch these until the margin was really ready. After 2 minutes and 2 decent roach I saw a tail sticking out the margin. I proceeded to catch 3 carp in 3 put ins and then topped up again. I decided this time to go straight back over the top, and had another withing minutes. I got into a nice routine catching 2 or 3 carp off a pot of groundbait with a few dead reds. I had a slow spell in the middle of the match, but otherwise caught very regularly. I finished with 26 carp for a match winning143lb, beating the 'reed' peg who came 2nd with 78lb.

I had a great day and was really pleased to win by such a great margin, I had got the feeding pattern spot on all day and hardly lost a fish!

The rig that did all the damage was a  Nick Gilbert margin float, I used a heavy 0.4g as the swim was about 2.5 foot deep these also feature a 2mm bristle which helps the float stay up when you get liners, personally I am completely converted to heavy margin floats for carp, regardless of depth, I'm happy to use a 0.4g which is about 4x14 in less than 18inches if the target is carp. I see no reason to fish any lighter, I have all the shot above a 4inch hook length, so my 10 maggots are on the bottom and not going anywhere, we all know how positive margin carp take the bait aswell so there's no reason to make life hard for yourself, after all what's the point in feeding accurately with a pole cup if you fish a light float that's going to waft about when a fish comes in!

I also came 2nd a colemans cottage the other week on a 36peg match on wood lake, I weighed 154lb which would normally be enough to win with this many people on it but I got pipped by Gary bell with 164lb. I won't disclose my tactics for this match just yet as the maver match this is coming up next week on here, but more importantly my team bills tackle are in the semi final of the bait tech supercup in 2 weeks where we will be trying to make out way to the final for a second year running.

These results also mean I have 7points after the first 2 weeks of the anglers mail/preston innovations matchman of the year, which is a great start! Although I am under no illusions that I could win this competition as I fish team matches all year round, if I'm to score points it will be venues I fish once or twice a year that can be very Peggy, this is much harder than fishing 2 or 3 local commercials that run big matches in my opinion. I also don't fish a Saturday and Sunday so will most likely fish half the matches if many! Hopefully though I can score a few points and keep my name on the leaderboard a little while longer.

Thanks for reading

I will be back with more!