Summerhayes Fishery Open.

Traveling on my own today I decided to take another trip to Summerhayes for this latest Sunday open, Their was a good turn out today with 31 booked in meaning the match would be spread over Sellicks Lake and 10pegs on Lily Pool, the weather was still rather chilly with the north easterly wind in the air again and It would be hard to tell which lake the winner would come from? into the draw and it was peg 11 on Sellicks for me which I felt would be alright as it was a corner peg giving me a bit of room for me to fish long down the edge as well as it only just being 13mts to the island, Rig wise I set up a 0.3g AS1 float on 0.13-0.11 and an 18 808 hook to fish tight over were I found a flat spot in 3ft of water, a 4x10 Chanti to search along the inside bank in a coupe of places on the same line/hook and finally a 4x12 Chanti to fish down the track with maggots at 6mts in 5ft of water on 0.12-0.10 and an 18 PR434 hook, which would also double up as a line further down the peg in the open water where I planned to feed corn and fish the same on the hook, For company I had yesterdays unlucky loser Paul Homewood on next peg 12 who was around from the point of the island.  

I started by feeding half a pot of corn down the peg in the open at 12mts water and fed a few cubes of meat at 13mts into the corner, whilst I began to feed a few maggots down the track I started the day tight over with double red maggot on the hook just feeding a few micros via a cad pot attached to the pole, after 30mins it was obvious that thing were going to be hard as I hadn't seen a fish caught' a try down the track failed to produce as did a quick look on the corn swim, I didn't want to try down the edge to early in fear of spooking any fish which hadn't settled so just kept switching between my other lines, I did lose two carp across to the far bank both of which were foul hooked but it took me 2hrs before I had my first fish which came down the track on double red maggot being a near 2lb skimmer followed by a 3lb carp next put-in then I couldn't get a bite which was a bit weird? I now had to have a look down the edge but was surprized when I didn't have so much as a liner anywhere, things were looking grim already but apart from the odd fish nothing much was being caught on are lake from those I could see.

My first fish off the far bank came on a 4mm expander but again nothing followed, with over half the match gone I was really struggling to find any fish despite starting a new line across and rotating between the lines I had already started. with 2hrs to go I got my hopes up when I had another look on the corn line in the open water as the float shot under and I soon netted a 5lb common before yet again nothing followed, the last time I fished this lake I had a good run on the maggot in the last 45mins down the track so was hoping for the same thing to happen this time around? one more small carp out of the blue from the far bank was about as best as it got but from my end of the lake it seemed we were a in the same boat. There did seem to be fish present but they weren't interested in feeding as most were being foul hooked , I couldn't believe the inside bank seemed devoid of fish as I never had a sniff there all day and the same applied to Pauls inside line, the hope of a late run on the maggot down the track only produced a couple of chunky roach with no more bites from the corn line all I added was another smaller carp from the far bank before the match was over.

At the results it turned out Lily pool produced the winner on the day with Steve Jackson ending the day with 20 odd small carp from down the edge and on the waggler in the open water for 48lb odd, a few fish were caught from the far bank of Sellicks with a 40lb and a couple of 30lb weights making the frame. A really hard days fishing and apart from beating the pegs around me I don't think there was much more I could of done to induce a few more fish.