Warrington Teams of 4 League.

Hello Once again.

After settling down after loosing focus again after the Division 1 national, I decided I needed to get back on track and try to concentrate on my fishing a bit more.

I was lucky enough to be invited to fish in the teams of 4 league by Bob Campbell that runs through winter on the canals in the area. The team is imaginatively called Bob's Lot.

Round 1

The first match was fished on the Bridgewater Canal near Statham. I was pegged in A section peg 3 near Ditchfields Bridge. This was an area I was not keen on, as the better pegs are higher in the section back towards Statham. The usual methods were used, breadpunch caster and some worms for perch. At the start I tried a large punch to try and nick a skimmer, but none showed, so I had to revert to catching very small roach. After a couple of hours it was a real struggle, bites had dissappeared on bread and I only managed a couple of small perch on worm. I did get a couple of caster roach near the end, but nothing decent. I weighed in 1lb 12oz or so. It was only enough to beat one in my section. Sure enough the weights increased in the higher peg numbers. The match was won with over 10lb of skimmers and roach on caster. So not the best of starts.

Round 2

The second match saw us desend on Middlewich Town centre to fish the Trent and Mersey Canal. In the past this section of canal has fished well with double figure weights. I was drawn on B section peg 1. This placed me in a narrow section of canal close to the main road bridge. However in the middle of my section was a basin, so I was up against it, especially I was told that the pegs in the narrows were rubbish. The usual rigs were set up, bread and caster as well as a light squatt rig for fishing across and a caster rig for down the track. The squatt line was to be fed with 2 balls of groundbait with a few squatts in and left for at least 2 hours to hopefully allow the fish to settle over it.
I started on the punch and caught small roach and gudgeon. I tried the caster line down the middle and caught the odd perch, roach and gudgeon, but nothing to get carried away with. After a couple of hours I tried the squatt line and caught some roach straight away. I had a bit of a nightmare with this line as I totally trashed several rigs when they got caught in the overhanging vegetation. This line did produce though, so food for thought for the future. I did manage some more roach on caster, both down the middle and across. I had caught steady, but the weights from the basin were far too good. I weighed in 3lb 12oz to finish as predicted last in the section. I was feeling a bit down with my results as I was not helping the team much. However I could not compete with the basin which had weights from 6-11lb come from it. There was a silver lining in that team mate Bob Clough won the match with over 12lb of Roach and Rudd on caster.

Round 3

This match was fished on the Macclesfield Canal around Congleton. I was drawn on peg 5 in A section near Henshall Hall drive. The peg looked promising as there was an overhanging bush and reeds along the far bank. Whilst setting up a couple of large fish rolled close by, these might have been big perch. As it turns out the bush was a noted peg for perch as several big weights had been recorded in the past. As usual breadpunch, caster and a heavy worm rig were set up. I planned to fish the bread about a section short of the far bank and at at angle to the right in fronts of the reeds. I also had a heavy chopped worm rig for fishing under the bush as well as the normal caster rig for across as well.
I started on bread and caught some small roach and gudgeon, it was not fishing that well and the roach were a lot smaller than expected. A did manage to get a good roach on caster over the bread swim, but no more showed after that. I tried the chopped worm swim at regular intervals through the match and caught a few perch up to 8ozs. I topped up after died off and rested the swim for 20 minutes each time. I still managed to catch on bread in between trying the worm swim, but again the fish got no bigger. Caster caught a few roach at the end as well. I could not tell how well I had done in the section, due to the overgrown banksides. I weighed 3lb 12oz again which was good enough for 4th in the section. So my results were starting to improve. Again the better weights came from the early pegs in the section. Team wise Phil Cross won his section with over 6lb.

Round 4.

The Trent and Mersey canal was scene for round 4 at Broken Cross near Rudheath. I drew the end peg of the match in D section peg 7, which was just by the entrance to a small basin near the School Road access point. The swim looked good to say the least with a small tree on the far bank and rushes all along the far side and into the basin. The main problem was the wind which was gusting quite strong and could make presentation a little tricky. Rigs were the usual, bread, caster and worm. I planned to fish the bread at 10 metres towards the basin, hoping to attract some skimmers, as well as caster down the middle and across and a chopped worm and caster line under the small tree on the far bank.
I started on a big punch, but could only catch roach and gugdeon as usual. I tried caster over the bread line, but caught the same size fish, after a missed bite I lowered the rig in again and struck into something much bigger. I was convinced it was a skimmer, as it did not fight much. I had one hairy moment when I had to keep the rig low as a boat went past, but once the fish came close in it started to fight a bit more. The fish surfaced near the middle and to my surprise it was a very big perch. In the end I got it in the net without to much fuss and I guessed it to be about 2lb.
After this I carried on switching between bread and the chopped worm line. I caught a few more nice perch and odd roach on the worm, as well as more roach and gugdeon on bread. I left the caster line until the last hour and caught some nice roach regularly. At the weigh I got 6lb 5oz, which was more than I thought due to the small roach. The perch was weighed separately and went 2lb 7oz. Easily my biggest perch to date, but not for the first time I forgot to take a picture. The match was won with over 7lb by Helen Dagnall who was also in my section. So I finished second in the match and the section. This was certainly helping my confidence as my results were getting better. But it would have been a bit embrassing not to do well off such a good peg. The perch was a complete fluke, caught on single caster 18's hook over the bread line and landed on No. 2 elastic. That probably explains why it did not fight as much as if would if hooked on heavy gear.