After some disappointing matches on the River Mersey I decided to have a go at Partridge Lakes on a more regular basis.
I was hoping to get a better feel of the tactics required and catch some bigger weights.
In summary I still cannot get my head around fishing shallow with maggot or caster, and as a consequence during the warmer months my weights were low in comparison to the anglers who are good on this method. There are other methods to try but I struggled in the main. I have managed 2 section wins from peg 14 and 103, so sometimes I got it partly right.
Club matches with POHAS have been a little poor as well. We have traveled to some venues with good reputations but returns have been poor. My best performance was ironically at Partridge lakes catching 53lb of F1's and small carp on pellet to finish second off peg 167 Covey 6. As always the days out the POHAS bunch are a good laugh, the fishing always comes second.
As I write this at the beginning of November, although it has been mild for the time of year the weights on Partridge have started to decrease and shallow rigs are being put away for next year.
I fished the open today drawing peg 120 on Covey 5, not fished this area before but set up the usual rigs. 1 rig for dobbing bread, a pellet rig and 2 maggot rigs one for fishing at 3ft and the other for down the middle.
Covey 5 and 6 are newer lakes than 1-4 so therefore the fish are generally a bit smaller. With this in mind I did not expect to catch on bread, but the peg did have plenty of grasses and reeds on the far bank so I might get a few. I used a 6mm punch set 3 inches off the bottom. I caught 2 F1's on this, but after a while no matter which area I tried I did not get any bites. Next up was pellet set at 2 foot deep against the far bank sedges again after 2 quick fish this line died off as well. So it was time for maggot, fishing at 3ft with 10 metres of pole just to the right. After feeding 4 maggots I started to get bites and began catching a few. Not at any great pace but enough to keep going. I was missing bites as well.
I had been feeding maggots down the middle via a small pot every 20-30 minutes since the start and after 3 hours with 19 fish in the net I had a look here. After a couple of minutes I got my first fish again a small F1. Following this I caught quite well feeding just under half a kinder pot of maggots after every other fish. As per normal I missed a few bites and finished the match with 40 fish (38 F1's + 2 chub) for 32lb 12oz. This was second in the 5 peg section which was won with 44lb off peg 117. Generally speaking the fish I caught were on the small side, but that's how it goes.
In a couple of weeks time POHAS will be starting the Partridge Lakes teams of 4 Winter League. We have managed a few more visits between us lately so we are better prepared than last year and although up against some really good Partridge regulars we are hoping to finish better than last years last place.Also this year we have had more interest from the club members who want to be part of the team, which is great news but does make picking a team a bit more difficult.
Tight lines.
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