Viaduct Fishery Teams Of Five (Round 1) All Lakes.

Well I was quite looking forward to this popular league again this time around fishing under the team Mosella Bathampton banner, Are team consisted of Craig Trig' Edmunds, Shaun Townsend, Vince Brown, Paul Beaver' Elms & Myself. The day started with breakfast at the Royal Pub in Somerton which was quite nice, I arrived in plenty of time for a decent parking spot before everyone descended at the fishery, Eighteen teams fishing this year so a good turn out again, Their would be some good draws & some unfortunate dire ones which we all hoped to avoid, It was down to trig to draw as his hand seems to be sent down from God' Or so we hoped? When he returned it went like this, Cambell Lake, Paul, peg 130, Shaun peg 99 Cary, Trig peg 69 Lodge, Vince peg 50 match, & Me  peg 18 Spring, Not a bad team draw, My peg can be a good area for silvers but after the first few Wednesdays silvers matches it seems to have switched off a bit, I was fortunate enough to have an island chuck & with conditions in are favour with no wind I had plenty of options, first up a bomb rod to fish over to the island with bread/meat, A waggler also to fish across & slightly shorter if need be, A 0.2g float set on 0.15-0.13 & an 16 F1 Pellet hook to fish at 16mts to the left with meat, & finally a 4x12 wire wonder float on 0.13-0.10 & an 18 F1 pellet hook, to fish at 13 in front & 14mts slightly right, It was around 4 - 5ft at 13mts & around 6 inches shallower further out.

I started the day feeding three good balls of G/bait casters & some dead pinkies at 13mts & one ball at 14mts with dead maggots added, I began the day on the bomb across to the island on popped up bread as did the pegs around me, I gave it 40mins also trying meat on the hair but not a tremble on the tip", I switched to the waggler again with meat to start with, I worked my way closer to the island even trying off the deck, I could get the rig to land within inches of the far bank but nothing was happening at this stage, After 90mins of trying to catch across none of us had hooked a carp & it wasn't looking good' I had a quick look on the pole with caster or red maggot on the hook but the float just sat their", Gareth Lennox next to me on peg 17 had now switched to a small G/bait feeder with hair rigged corn chucking quite tight to the island & it seemed to work as he soon had some better sized skimmers, Ile follow suit then", Well I gave it about 45mins but not even a liner, yet Gareth was getting indications & coming back with a fish most casts, Frustrating but they didn't want to move that's for sure, Neil Clark on the other side of me was also struggling & he couldn't catch across either but did start to put some small silvers in his net once he went on the pole, Things were looking grim. Roland Lucas who had drawn last weeks winning peg 16 on this lake was also yet to catch, It was approaching the halfway point before I had my first bite which came at 13mts on maggot, It felt a decent fish until after a few seconds it shed the hook! thankfully when I went back in I had a skimmer around 10oz so finally I had something in the net' I added a few smaller samples & a couple of chunky roach before I felt the need to top it up, I had a quick look on the 14mt line but nothing here yet & nothing on the 16mt meat line at this point. Gareth was still putting fish in his net so I had to try again on the feeder, - Nowt" I just couldn't get the fish to travel my way, I had been pinging the odd piece of corn over & even tried the waggler at depth off the island again but not a bite, back on the pole I had another run of smaller stamp skimmers & a bonus 8oz roach but with the water being clear they were easily spooked so had to keep resting it, I kept trying the bomb back to the island with bread in the hope of a wrap around from a carp which was looking to make decent points the way things were going, It wouldn't happen & it appeared they just weren't present. I kept dropping back in on the pole at 13mts catching the odd smaller skimmer to keep putting something in the net, Gareth's peg had slowed a little but he was still catching the odd decent skimmer but rich next to me was struggling with just the odd fish on the pole, going into the last hour Roland finally caught a carp on the bomb & bread which prompted me to try again but still not a sign, I managed a few more skimmers late on the pole with a couple around 10oz but did bump a better fish at 14mts when I potted in a decent handful of casters & left it for a while but that was it, I never had a bite at 16mts on the meat & on the all out thought I had around 7lb of silvers, First to weight was Glen Calvert on peg 20 who finished with 7lb of waggler caught roach, Rich had 4lb odd of bits before I was put 10lb 1oz on the scales which was more than I thought, Fair play to Gareth who finished the day with 23lb of feeder caught skimmers before Roland's one carp went 8lb odd, I didn't follow the scales around but after Chris Sandford on peg 15 had 68lb of carp dobbing bread down his edge to the tree he looked likely to easily win the lake, Back at the results it turned out there were a few blanks on are lake so my 10lb ended up earning me 12pts from a possible 18 so good for the team in the end, It turned out we had all done ok, Shaun came back with 12pts, Vince had 13pts, Trig had 15pts & Paul finished 2nd on Cambell Lake with 102lb which put him 4th on the day overall so well done to him, this gave us a total of 69pts from a possible 90 putting us 2nd on the day behind Colmic who finished on 75pts so a good start for us, As far as the winners went top weight on the day was Trev Senior who was next to Paul on peg 131 finishing with a massive 214lb" all on the bomb & meat & over on Cary Lake Martin Preston finished 2nd with 155lb of big carp on the waggler with meat, As far as the silvers went it was super star silvers ace Des Shipp who took the spoils with 25lb odd from peg 118 on Cambell catching on casters over caster, Back next week for the second round when its my turn for Cambell Lake & I wouldn't be disappointed to see us with the same team draw as the carp on this lake seem to be balled up in this area at the moment so would put me in the right area".

Full Results -

1st Trev Senior (Wyvern Anglers) peg 131 Cambell, 214lb 7oz.

2nd Martin Preston (Colmic) peg 78 Cary, 155lb 3oz.

3rd Steve Tucker (Thatchers Vets) peg 77 Cary, 145lb 1oz.

4th Paul Elms (Mosella Bathampton) peg 130 Cambell, 102lb 14oz.

5th Nick Chedzoy (Thatchers Vets) peg 111 Cambell, 91lb 14oz.

6th Jason Radford (All Stars) peg 94 Cary, 82lb 5oz.

Silvers -

1st Des Shipp (Thatchers Gold) peg 118 Cambell, 25lb 1oz.

2nd Gareth Lennox (M5 Angling) peg 17 Spring, 23lb 3oz.

3rd Tim Ford (Thatchers Silver) peg 103 Cary, 19lb 8oz.

Teams -

1st Colmic 75pts

2nd Mosella Bathampton 69pts

3rd Thatchers Vets 61pts

4th Wyvern Anglers 60pts

5th 2nd Time Lucky 60pts

6th M5 Angling 59pts.