19th June Swanlands Chesnut

[Leo Martin]

19th June 2021 Swanlands Chesnut Lake

Back to my home town for round 7 of the summer league which is rapidly turning into one to forget for yours truly. We welcome another of the Fox family in Robson Kerry, refreshingly more young blood and a nice well-mannered lad too who from his results also knows how to catch a few/ Also welcome back, Woolfie, Richard Cooke and Glen Turner as basher guests, nice to have you join us again.

Swanlands located on the South side of Thorne alongside the canal, memories of my last visit still bringing loads of fun and banter curtesy of a mallard, top kit, rowing boat with a hole in the bottom, you name it, bad day last time. Could it be any better, well only slightly. New owners, new bait tackle shop and lakes looking in nice presentable adsnd pleasing to the eye. Clean spaced out pegs, reed lines in places, grass verges to the waters edge and not too far a walk to the pegs from the cars. Chesnut has 45 pegs I think and is the larger of the lakes. We were sharing the lake with another club today ( which happens and we don't control) and this meant for seemingly tight pegging for most. I do think this influenced the results slightly. That alongside the fish not playing the game and feeding. A lot of carp were cruising the surface, some paired up so not sure if a second spawn is due, pressure changes effects, more aeration required or generally they didn't just want to play. Also Swanlands has a reported good head of silvers, there too were AWOL and if carp not feeding were a fall back plan for most but didn't deliver either.

Anyhow peg 2 was my office for the day sandwiched between Andy Woolfall on peg 1 and Big John Lanelly on peg 3. Reeds to my left hand margin, grass verges to my right hand side margin, open water with an island chuck across to a small lily bed and sedges.

Pole lines for corn, worm, maggots down track at top 2 + 4 about 4 feet deep, 1 1/2 feet deep margin to left against reeds and one to my left 12 inch deep to grass banking. Method chuck across. Plan was groundbait middle of track, fish over top and catch silvers and then hopefully carp move in. That was plan A, about 11am we were well down the planning alphabet.

Whistle from Glen and in we go, carp were showing across near lily bed so out with feeder and bait up track line to let settle down. Feeder tried for about half an hour and not a liner of nothing. Over the middle of track which was fizzing like crazy and through range of offering's for a small 4oz skimmer on 4mm hard pellet, then nothing. Meanwhile Mr Lanelly in peg 3 had Mugged a couple of cruisers which were in large quantity around our pegs in the sunshine. He would catch one they would go and come back.

I had gone down the planning list and no bites kept coming so also changed tactics and across I went right out to 16m but short of the lilypads. Took about an hour or so before I caught one but the cruisers but as the weather changed slightly the carp went off the surface. Anyhow that was bite 2 and fish 2 for the day which certainly didn't trouble Stevie Curtis our weighman. Margins devoid of fish, not one bite or swirl, only conciliation of the day was good company, we stayed dry, away from work ( apart from a couple of phone calls, grrr) and it was a pleasant if not frustrating day . Also no duck or top kit flypast so win win.

Woolfie to my right also had a frustrating day, lost a big lump mugged early on, few skimmers, few carp on bomb to his side reed line and then a few skimmers late on in margins.

John Lanelly, different gravy. Mugged several early on I track and across to reeds on long pole. Also lost a couple. Moved into his margins with my side devoid ( says a lot) and his right hand side redline very productive for John in both silvers and carp. Well fished our hero for the match win.

Special mention to young Sam who continues to blossom and excel. Managed to mug a few on light laccy and with words of encouragement and also advice (tinged with jealousy from the bashers alongside) he withstood the pressure and landed them. Good angling sir and close to a brown envelope.

Well done to match winner john, second Steve Curtis and all other packet pickers. Well done to everyone else for sticking it out and staying to the end of the match.

Thank you once again to Jasper for his admin and organisation of our matches, much appreciated. Thank you to glen for his whistleblowing and Steve for weighing in.

Very interested on other peoples views on the day / lake. I guess if the fish do feed it would be one hell of a match as it seems full of large fish. We do book our favourite and regular venues and its nice to intermingle with some variety as well. This policy works but we will hit off days occasionally.

Next match a favourite and hopefully a few more bites to be had Osprey. Still lots to confirm and pay on please.

[fishfinder]

Peg 19 my home for the day, on the shallow side of the arm always a difficult area,with tight pegging was not expecting much,plenty of fish on top but looked more like struggling for oxygen rather than feeding.pole across 14.5m a foot deep,middle was less than 3ft ,margin rig and method feeder,started on paste across and surprisingly getting a few bites from small 3-4oz carp was hard work keeping shipping back to replace paste for such small fish but no-one else round me was getting bites so stuck at it for a couple of hours  then had a couple of bigger carp one of which took me around the corner in front of max 5 pegs away,managed to luckily get it back,after the carp the peg died,did not know what to do next as nobody was getting anything on up in the water or edges or skimmer line tried them all but nothing,tried mugging all passing fish but not interested,decided to go back across couple of little dinks but nothing,was shipping my paste out dropped it in front of one for the hundredth time and it took it,5lb carp ,at a loss after that so decided on feeder,made the decision to pot it across as it was shallow and flat calm managed to get a few carp until the end,well happy with my fishing and don't think I could have got much more out of the peg apart from 1 lost fish which I think was foul hooked,my 2 neighbours really struggled to get any bites at all,so my 58lb was far more than I expected.

[steve]

Well done Mr Curtis - top dangling!!