Sunday Sweep - Magiscroft's Top Pond - Jan 29th

At last, a day with no wind! But it was damn cold!

This was to be only my 3rd match on the Top Pond so I wasn't too bothered about drawing any specific area, as I don't really know what area holds the fish at this time of year. I pull P5 which I don't fancy much as it's at the start of the top bend which is the shallow end of the pond, but who knows….I've been drawn with James 'Woody' Woodrow to my left with Neil Champman to my right.

Surprisingly, there was no ice this morning, so the all-in is called bang on time at 10:30. I have decided, based on my last match on this water, to fish on the far shelf and for the first 2 hours it works perfectly, with bites coming fairly regularly, if a bit slowly. And no F1s! All the fish are Common and Mirror carp which means the bites have been pretty positive.

Woody has caught at the same sort of pace, but to his left, Stuart Dalgleish is catching at a fast pace, and looks like he will be hard to beat.

I've become used to the fish switching off at some point, and around 12:30, it happened, not just for me but for everyone I could see, except Stuart.

So for the next couple of biteless hours I try every bait in my box at various points on the far shelf, at the bottom of the shelf and down the track (the middle). But they just seem to have stopped feeding.

To my left Woody has managed to find a spot that seems solid with fish and it catching really quickly - I reckon he took around 18lbs in the last hour - and I started getting indications again on the far shelf and manage to pick up another 4 fish before the all out. I even manage an F1! I say that because all my other carp were Commons or Mirrors, which are not supposed to feed much in the winter.

By my reckoning it's between Woody (P6) and Stuart(P7) and it is, with Stuart taking the win by just over 3lbs with 35lbs flat ahead of Woody's 31lbs - 6oz. Alan Welsh(P8) was third with 18lbs+.

Full results can be found here.

A freezing cold day when the temp never got over 3 degrees but despite the cold, over 110lbs of fish were caught!

Wednesday Jan 25th - Magiscroft Open Sweep

As seems to be the norm in January, the forecast was for another day of blustery wind, although the temperature was to be an unseasonal 10 degrees!

And the forecast was right on both counts, but with the wind blowing from the south west, it looked like the Island pond would be reasonably sheltered.

At the draw I pull P24, which has produced consecutive blanks in the B Division and the Sunday open , which doesn't auger well - but no matter, I plan to try something a bit different today, so let's see what happens.

Today's plan is to feed from the all-in (higher temps) - Bait wise I have my usual Oxo pellets and the Thai fish sauce pellets that worked so well last Wednesday. For feeding I will use Magiscroft's own micro pellets.

I have plumbed up my 2 lines - the far shelf and I found a sort of trench around 12M out, so that's the other one I set up for. After Sunday, I also setup a mid water rig for silver fish - just in case.

My first round of casts take me through both carp rigs without any indication of fish, so I stop the planned feeding. The second round completes with the same result. To my left Alan Hird has had much the same, and is now targeting silvers, with some success, but I decide to stick to plan.

At around 12:15, after 1hr 45mins, I get my first bite and a nice mirror carp of around a pound, which is followed by another of similar size 10 minutes later. I hoped that these would be the start of a run of fish, but it stops there. So as per plan, after another 15 mins I go back to the far side where I manage to get a very positive bite which results in a 6oz 'stockie' carp.

It's now 13:00 and I'm a bit puzzled - normally fish move in shoals, but the lack of bites suggests that they are either not feeding much or the fish I've caught are in small groups. As it is I've had 3 bites/3 fish…

So I go back to the 12M line and get a couple of F1 carp around 1.5lbs in the space of 40 mins. But I'm now starting to get few tiny indications which I think must be small roach, so I adjust the mid-water rig to cover the depth at 12M and pick up 5 small roach in 10 minutes - but the bites are really positive, so I'm now thinking (hoping!) that the tiny indications may well be larger F1s.

I've had a few folk ask me , what's an F1?

F1's can occur in nature but in this instance these fish have been bred as a cross between a common and a crucian carp. This gives a very hard fighting and hardy fish that wont grow much above 5 pounds and is ideal for commercial fisheries.

The F1 is also immune to the Koi Herpes Virus (KHV) which can destroy a carp population in a matter 15-20 days.

Back with the carp rig for the 12M line, I re-plumb and adjust the depth by around half an inch so that the float shows around 2mm with the pellet touching the bottom. This works well when the strengthening wind isn't producing a choppy surface, and/or pulling my pole and rig all over the place.

And it gets me fish! From around 14:15 I get maybe 8 tiny indications and from those manage to land another 5 F1's up to 3lbs , all taken from the area I fed at the start of the match. I'm pretty sure that with calmer conditions, I'd have managed a good few more.

There were only 7 of us today but I managed my 3rd win of the month with 16lbs - 4oz, with Colin Williamson second on 11lbs and Alan Hird third with 4lbs - 8oz of roach.

Full results can be found here.

So today's lesson, fish to the conditions and don't' panic if things don't go to plan easily on.

I spent a fair bit of time getting my pole rollers set up correctly - it makes a big difference as I managed to land every fish I hooked today.

It looks like I'll be working both days this weekend so I may have to wait a full week for my next 'fix' :-(

Sunday Sweep - Magiscroft's Island Pond - Jan 22nd

After yesterday's 'Perfect Storm', I managed to get all my kit and clothing dried out, and with the weather forecast looking reasonable, I arrived at Magiscroft around 9AM, to find the dreaded wind was still blowing pretty hard, though nowhere near yesterdays levels.

The match was to be pegged from 8 round to 23 on the deeper end of the Island Pond, and I drew the one peg I didn't want, P8.

Although the wind was bothersome, you could still just about present at around 14.5M on the far shelf so I set up rigs for there, the bottom of the shelf and a mid water rig for silver fish.

The 'all in' is called at 10:45 and I head for the far shelf, but after 15 mins with no touches, I switch to the bottom of the shelf where another 15 mins go by with nothing happening - and to my right Chris Hughes and Derek Brady aren't fairing any better. So I decide to give it 1 more minute and just as well I did as a carp of around a pound takes my pellet with no warning and at least prevents me blanking.

For the next hour, I persevere with various flavours of pellet at the bottom of the shelf with the occasional change to the far shelf rig, but not even a line bite! So, I decide that as I can only see one angler (Dougie Craig on P5) catching anything, I'll switch to targeting silverfish with maggot as bait. I know there are chubb that frequent this peg, so I hope to find one or two whilst targeting the small roach.

The roach are there and willing to feed and I ended up with 32 of them, but they were a max of 2oz and most were much smaller - but I did manage to snare one of the chubb which, by the time of the 'all out' has helped me weigh in 3lbs - 3oz.

Dougie has walked the match with 11lb+ of common/mirror carp and up until the last 5 mins, I was second, but Robert Dalziel (snr) managed to land a 3lb 6oz F1 5 mins from the end of the match (his only bite all day), so I end up 3rd.

Full results can be found here.

Compared to yesterday, the conditions were a walk in the park - it was just a pity that the fish were elsewhere for everybody - To my left in the shallow water, there were loads of fish moving, so I suspect they were there as the prevailing westerly wind blows towards that end.

After fishing in yesterday's atrocious conditions, today was quite relaxing and I even had time to feed one of the many Robins that frequent the banks of the Island Pond - they know us anglers have free food :-)

B Division Match 6 - Woodside Pond - Jan 21st

I was really looking forward to this Saturday's 'B' Division match, which would see me fishing on the sheltered Woodside pond.

I even managed to draw a supposedly decent peg, No 17 and despite the wind gusting way beyond the forecast 35mph, it looked like we might get a decent days fishing.

The 'all in' was called at 10:45 and I decided to try the far shelf first, as at this point, the wind was just about manageable - but 15 mins, and not a touch. To my right on P14, Scott McAulley was already into a fish, which at least gave me confidence that they were feeding. So I changed to my standard windy rig for the bottom of the shelf and within 5 mins, the float flew away and a small carp of around 12oz is in the net.

Scott by this time has 4 and Heather, to my left (and Scott's mum) has also bagged a small carp. But from then on, nothing - apart from Scott who continued to catch regularly until the wind gets up and carries Scott Laird's 'brolly into the pond where it wedges itself right where Scott M has been catching - The wind also lifts my 'brolly from it's pole, but I manage to catch it and forget about using it from there on in.

Having tried various pellets, I switch to maggot to see if I can tempt any silver fish (roach, chubb etc) but I only get one slight indication in an hour - but then I get lucky! The wind by this time is hitting over 50mph and the driving rain is making things pretty unpleasant and as it once again drags my pole, and the rig 10m to the left, a greedy chubb of 4oz or so grabs my bait as it flies across the surface.

The 'all out' is called early as it's pretty much un-fishable with the wind getting stronger by the minute. There's a fishing cliche that a bad days fishing is better than a good day at work - well not today! - it was no fun at all and if I'd not been fishing a team competition, I think I'd have packed up after 2 hours!

Young Scott has won our section and the whole match with 10lbs - 12oz - despite being in the cafe for over an hour with Scott Laird second in the section with 3lbs and me 3rd with 1lb flat from my 2 fish.

But no matter, I'm sure it'll be fine tomorrow when I'm fishing the Sunday open on the Island Pond…………..:-)

Wednesday Jan 18th - Magiscroft Open Sweep

After my last 2 matches on the Island Pond, I was hoping for a better draw for this week's Wednesday match. The ice from Sunday finally cleared on Tuesday and the overnight temps had reached 8 degrees, so I hoped the fish would be a bit more spread out. However, on arrival at the fishery, there was a strong westerly blowing and the water looked fairly choppy. It's never easy in the winter.......

So, to the draw, which saw me get P22 - which I'd never fished. Kind of in the middle as far a water depth goes, so I was hopeful!

I've been using expander pellets soaked in water with an OXO cube for a few weeks now, so given the temp had been (correctly) forecast to be a fair bit higher, I decided to try something new, by adding Thai Fish Sauce to the water instead of OXO. But I did take some OXO pellets left over from Sunday just in case :-)

Once at my peg, it was fairly obvious that fishing the far shelf was a non-starter due to the strength of the wind, so I opted for the bottom of the shelf, and managed to find an area that was an inch or so deeper that the surrounding bottom. I also plumbed up a rig for the far shelf as the wind was forecast to reduce as the day wore on.

I had my first fish after 10 mins, an F1 of around 1.5lb and this continued for 3 hours or so with a bite every 10-15 mins - I missed a few, and lost 3, one of which would have been a PB tench of over 4lbs, which rolled just as it came to the net and the hook came out :-(

But, I didn't have time to worry about it as at that time, bites were still coming.

Every 3rd fish, I'd try the OXO pellets, but I didn't get a touch on them all day, despite the temp dropping to 5.5.

So, with 2 hours to go I reckoned on having 25lbs in the net. Bites became a lot harder to come by from then on, and I managed to get a rig onto the far shelf when the wind dropped, but nothing doing. Reverting to the bottom of the shelf, I managed another 5 fish to finish the match with 33lbs - 14oz - my second biggest match weight and my 3rd 30lb+ in 3 weeks.

There wasn't much action either side of me but I could hear Derek 'Deek' Brady and Barry Lindsay exchanging banter on the far side of the island and knew that Deek was the guy to beat - he had loads more fish, but they were much smaller and he came second with 29Lbs - Barry (or should I call him Lindsay?) was 3rd with 24lbs+. Full results are here.

I'm not sure why Barry ------>

has been given his weekend name - I'm sure someone will enlighten me.....

It's now 10 weeks since I got my pole, and I've managed 5 wins, 2 seconds and a third as well as my fist blank :-) I'm still learning, with today's lesson being that time spent searching out lake bed 'features' (like the dip I found) is essential to finding the fish.

And just for fun, I then went to Scotkart in Cambuslang for 40 minutes of practice on their new surface, which has much less grip, with 7 other guys from the place i'm contracting at the moment. All in all, a fun day!

Sunday Open - Jan 15th 2012

After having to scrape ice from my car's windscreen on Sunday morning, I expected to find some ice on the Island pond, but not the 1/2' that greeted us :-(

But, with a small boat and some willing helpers, the ice was a least broken up by the time we drew our pegs at 09:45. With the water cooling so rapidly (it had been 6 degrees on Friday) I expected that the fish would once again congregate, but the question was where? A betting man would have picked the deeper end of the Island pond, but I hoped he would be wrong, as I drew Peg 9 - a great summer peg, but not ideal when it's 2 below!

It was evident that although the ice had been broken up, it was already starting to re-freeze, so with some creative use of a combination of pole and landing net, I managed to clear a meter wide strip all the way to the far side, which is around 13m on P9.

By the time the all in was called at 11:15, the ice that remained between me and the adjacent anglers (George Glen to the left and Jonathan Dalziel to the right) was already pretty solid and any thoughts of fishing outside of the narrow strip in front of me were quickly dismissed.

As I shipped out to try the far side, George was already playing a fish, which turned out to be foul hooked and he didn't land it - little did we know that there would be no more action for George……

So, after 30 mins or so on the far bank, with no sign of any fish, I changed to the rig setup for down the middle, where the water is at it's deepest. And within a further 30 mins I had landed a nice F1 of just under 3lbs and a common of just over 1lb. I then hooked and lost a fish in the space of 2 seconds - and for me, that was it - not another touch. I tried different baits, in varying places but it appears that they weren't there. And it felt like it was getting colder - The sun had gone behind the increasing cloud cover, and it wasn't much fun :-(

Bit of a rant now. Peg 8 is well known haunt of a shoal of Chub and Jonathan managed to land 3 nice ones in the space of an hour - even better, to his right, his brother had managed to land 4 nice F1s (and lost 3 more) - so what did they do? They went to the cafe!!!!!! Most of the juniors seem to be unable to fish a full match without going for a walk, or to the cafe……..I *know* that even if I'm sitting 'biteless', I stay put as there are loads of examples of fish suddenly appearing - that's why we are there! - Rant over………

The expected shoaling of fish had happened but it was around pegs 22,23,24 which produced the top 3 weights, with Wullie McAuley landing 28lb to just pip Chris Hughes with 26lb+ and The Old Fox, John P in third with just over 20lbs.

So from 24 anglers, I finished 12th with 4lb 4oz - Not a good day, but still better than working. There were 6 DNW (did not weigh), most of them to my left where it got even shallower, so I can't complain.

I'll be back on Wednesday when it's supposed to be back up to 6 degrees - time to break out the sunscreen :-)

Wed 11th Jan - Island Pond

With the temperature forecast to be a balmy 10 degrees, the Wednesday match looked like it might produce some good fishing.

There were 11 of us entered with Jimmy Hillhouse and Bryan Hewitt making their first appearances for quite a while.

I don't know how he does it, but John P again managed to draw a good peg - Anywhere from 4-9 on the Island Pond are normally reckoned to be potential winners. I drew Peg 30, which produced no fish during last Saturday's B division match, so I didn't expect too much.

I'm sure the thermometer doesn't lie, but it felt more like 3-4 than 10 degrees - Again we had a north easterly wind that strengthened during the match.

The water didn't feel quite so cold as it's been so I decided to start on the far shelf which I could just reach without the 16M section. And within 5 mins I had a 4oz 'stockie' carp in the net. This continued at a slow but steady pace for the first 2 hours with 15 similar sized stockies coming to the net, all on my own flavoured pellet from the far shelf.

And then I made a schoolboy error - To my right on Peg 26, Brian H had had a lovely carp around 3lb and to my left on Peg 2, Jimmy H was also catching some nice fish from the deeper water - so I abandoned a line that was producing fish, and put on a rig made up for the bottom of the shelf. And I had a small tench, a 1.5lb mirror and then a 2.5lb F1 in around 40 minutes - and then nothing - and of course when I went back to the far shelf, they were gone.

What an idiot!! - So I was then fishless 'till with 15 mins to go I hooked another F1 from the bottom of the shelf which I lost at the net, followed swiftly by another small tench. I was getting very weird bites in the interim, but the only one I managed to hit produced a 2oz Roach!

So at the weigh in, I only had 9lb - 8oz. Which gave me 5th behind winner John P with 31lb+, Jimmy H in second with around 28lb+ and Heather L in third with 21lb+ - all caught on my special pellets that she 'borrowed' from me :-) So at least I know if the fish are there, they will take them.

The Wednesday matches give me a chance to try things, which today I did - but I (hopefuly) learned a valuable lesson - If you are catching, even if they are small fish, keep doing what you're doing :-)