#method fishing

After our great first session at Plantations Fishery on Friday, Steve and I decided that on the Monday we would head back to the match lake for a friendly competition between ourselves.

We set off early and set up at the same peg as Friday both with our tactics similiar, once again using the method feeder and Steve on the pellet whereas I thought I'd give some sweetcorn a go as I'd not caught on corn before. I dyed the corn with red colouring and spiced it with some chilli flakes, the result was a strong smelling 'flame' coloured corn that I was sure would attract a bite or two.

After setting up it wasn't long before Steve was catching, a nice mirror brought to the net fifteen minutes into his fishing time. A good sized skimmer followed along with a lovely 3lb common shortly after. I had my work cut out and had nothing on the bank yet. There had been a couple of decent fish on but both dropped the hook.

Finally after half and hour I got into a nice common of about 2 lb, I was back in the race but Steve had other ideas! The next hour saw four more fish from Steve, including a lovely ghost carp and a common almost touching the 5lb mark. With all this action going on I changed to pellet and it had an almost immediate effect, a couple of mirrors for my efforts.

Steve however just kept on catching, I've got to admit his casting was on the money with almost every cast plopping a fresh feeder full of food onto the bottom in exactly the same spot. This resulted in ten more fish in a couple of hours as I failed to connect with anything! The afternoon was more productive as my swim came to life and I finally hit double figures with ten fish for the day weighing in at 22 lbs. Steve topped out at 30, with a combined weight of almost 50 lbs so the pair of us bagging around 75lbs between us. What a day, Steve probably needs a rest from fishing for a while and I need to get out some more and sort out my casting! Another amazing day at Plantations though and a great day of sport, well done to Steve who despite ledgering with a match rod, having 'Ray Mears' fashioned rod rests still fished like a pro to take the victory.

The winner

An exciting weekend of wet nets just completed. Plenty of fishing firsts, some cracking late Autumn weather and even a friendly little competition thrown in too!

It all began on Thursday evening as my good friend Steve came down to Clevedon to visit and the plan was hatched, we would go and fish a new venue and once again I'd try my luck at a commercial fishery. There are plenty near by but I'd heard a lot of good things about Plantation Lakes, in Kingston Seymore. So with venue decided and tactics sorted, it was time for an early night to prepare for the day of fishing ahead.

Before I continue it's worthy to note that Steve is also an inexperienced fisherman like myself and whilst he fished a little bit many years ago it's been a long while since he's had a dangle so with both our limited skills to call upon it was shaping up to be an interesting day.

Upon our arrival at Plantations we were dismayed to discover that the car park was almost full. Whilst honing our skills we didn't want lots of other anglers watching - perish the thought! Our nerves were unfounded as we discovered upon walking around the coarse lake and finding a great mixture of young and old, match and pleasure anglers who were all very friendly and helpful. There weren't many pegs left on the coarse lake so we headed for the Match lake which was a lot quieter and set up our swim.

I was trying out the Preston method feeder with mould system and it was an absolute pleasure to use, very simple and quick to re-load. My bait was 6mm halibut pellet fished with a hemp, breadcrumb and method mix groundbait. Steve who was borrowing my old match rod was fishing the waggler with a mixture of baits; maggots, corn, luncheon meat and casters.

We got off to a slow start with bites proving hard to come by in the first hour but eventually Steve struck into the first fish, a little skimmer bream that was a welcome sight on the bank.

Now I'd read a lot about using the method feeder and how important accurate casting was, I'm working on it but so far it's not as good as I'd like but I'd also read about the fierce bites and rods sailing into the water. Well I was just about to find out how aggressive the bites can be. I was daydreaming, a little bit peeved that Steve had caught the first fish and then 'POW' the rod tip ripped round, rattling in its rests, I quickly grabbed it and lifted into the fish. Another powerful charge and the clutch on my reel screeched into life, I was onto my biggest fish yet, the power was immense and constant, pumping the rod as the fish dived into the depths. I was sure it was a carp and a few minutes later I got it to the surface, a beautiful lightly coloured mirror, it looked huge and still wasn't ready for the net just yet with a swish of it's tail it disappeared again. Finally, with me shaking like a leaf, Steve scooped it into the net and I had my first carp!

   Twenty minutes later, Steve fishing with double maggot struck into something big. His rod wrapped around and the battle was on. After a good five minutes the fish swirled on the surface, it was a big carp, just as we were guiding it into the net it slipped the hook! The fish were biting and with Steve now fishing the method too (on a match rod!) we both started seeing a lot more action.

Steve had his first carp, a chunky little mirror and then hooked into a better fish. After another great scrap a lovely common came to the surface and into the net, just I was helping Steve with his catch, my rod made a dart for the lake. Luckily my baitrunner was on and Steve quickly grabbed the rod whilst I gave him the landing net to unhook his, I was onto another hard-fighter! After a frantic fifteen minutes we both had two super fish to show for our efforts.

The day ended with each of us banking about seven fish each, ranging from about 1-4 lbs. What a spectacular day.