Got up on the morning. Hurrah – it wasn’t raining. On the second cup of tea it started again. :( This delayed me a little loading the car up and I arrived 15 mins later than intended.
There was a depleted line up for this, expected as MGB and TK had rung around to advise of the fixture change and learnt of the comings and goings of the members. The depleted line up deserves qualification following a derogatory comment and quip or two made by one of the members………..
5 members were on hol – BB, RC,DM,JR & PH
4 members would miss because of injury/ill health – TC, MK, RP & LW
3 members usually don’t turn up – RD,MK & DP
Additionally whilst not sure what happened to GF as I expected him to attend, Cotti had booked himself into a Fri night poker game as an alternative to fishing the river. In fact on that theme two of the members in attendance on the day only fished it because it was switched from the river to the cut, and one of our guests obviously fancied another crack at it……………so numbers for the original match could have been far worse!!!!
Anyway, lone soldier KOD dropped in 16 pegs running from the back of the Kennels heading up to Grove Bridge. The colour of the cut near the low nos was a thick manky chocolate colour which didn’t bode well for this normally realtively ‘clear’ cut, but worsened into that slatey grey colour further up. A quick change of plan and pegs 7-16 were gathered up and re pegged the other side of peg 1 heading to the ‘new’ bridge. In fact, pegs 13-16 were the other side of the bridge which looked a different cut with just a touch of colour with inside weed cover and moored boats across. These would certainly be the pegs to beat today.
Back for the draw, TK reported you wanted a ‘high un’ today. Golden pegs 8 & 13 came out of the bag and pegs 5&6 removed from the draw. GP13 would be a danger today………..
An early dip into the bag and TK drew GP8, the ‘wrung un’ whilst Zorro was on the other.
Peg 8 wasn’t a bad looking peg under normal conditions, decent features and depth across, however……….
….to the left of it was an outfall pipe from the road which was gently pumping dirty water into the cut at the off. This worsened when it hammered down during the match resulting in water shooting ¾ way across the cut, similar to the pumping station at Ball Lane.
Anyway, less of the sob story.
Managed to avoid the dreaded DNW with a first fish, an ounce skimmer (if that big) at 11.40am. This was quickly followed by a transparent dreaded tommy ruffe, an equally see through stripey and ½ oz roach.
However action all seemingly over by 12.10pm :'(
Word drifted down the bank that the 4 the other side where ‘having a bite a chuck’
Went for a walk and scabbed a few pinkies – told you I wasn’t prepared – ps also thanks to Tigerbay who gave me half of his lickie before the off, although I knew in my heart of hearts it was gunna be too chocolate for that to work on that part of the cut.
Anyway, snared a couple of small skimmer later on thanks to those pinkie to bump up the weight from 1.5 oz to approaching the pound mark……….. :D
All in all, knew I’d done crap, but was relatively pleased at how unproductively tidy I’d fished………..
Anyway, lets cut the waffle and get on with the results.
PEG
4 KOD DNW
3 DAYLEWLIA 01.05.00
2 PHIL B 00.15.13
1 VESTE 04.02.05
7 BALL IT IN DNW
8 TK 00.14.09
9 YAMO 01.03.05
10 MILLIE DNW
11 TIGERBAY DNW
12 BIG GEOF 02.10.14
13 ZORRO 06.00.02
14 HAHA 01.11.03
15 MGB 02.04.11
16 GERRY L 03.04.06
So the GP was won. Other tales from the day was one of woe from KOD who played a beastie for 5 mins before he parted company with it, plus Gerry who got smashed up first put in on the punch.
Welcome back to the Gruellers for Millie who had a baptism of fire after being out of the game for a decade or so.
Also pleasing to hear after the match a member who’d visited the cut for the first comment that they hadn’t realised what a picturesque and nice looking bit of cut it was.
Shame he hadn’t seen it at its best – we tend to fish it in the worse conditions, particularly when it’s a change venue cuss of the conditions – but at least he’d had a few tugs on the way to winning nearly 100 sovs from the golden peg and is now aware of the potential.
No pickies this week – never charged the camera as part of my preparations………..
[reason]Typo[/reason]
