Witherington Farm Teams of 4- 6/12/08

Saturday 6th December saw me heading to Witherington Farm for the teams of 4 winter league. This is a venue that I have only recently started fishing, despite living in Salisbury for over a year since graduating last summer. I have already fished two rounds on Sellwood,and found myself on there again for this round. Our team 'Total-Fishing.com' were in 5th place out of 8 teams going into this round,mainly due to the fact that we haven't had the same team twice so it has been hard to develop any continuity and understanding. I arrived at the venue at around 8 o'clock to find that despite a sharp frost the lakes were ice-free. Our drawer-master extraordinaire 'Nicky-the-Bricky' drew the pegs,placing me on Sellwood peg 1- in the corner next to the areator. Not a peg I would have chosen as I don't like being 'hemmed in' in corners,especially during the winter. Nonetheless fish have fins and all that, and I tried to approach the peg with a degree of optimism. I opted for a three-pronged approach- a pellet line at 13m, a corn line at 14.5m slightly to my right and a lead swim towards the island. I found a slight hole around 3 inches deeper than everywhere else for my pellet line at 10 oclock. The rig consisted of a 4x12 KC carpa chimp,with 0.14 silk shock to 0.12 silk shock hooklength and a 18b911. The Corn rig was the same set up but was around 6 inches shallower so a separate rig was assembled. Both rigs used a number 10 latex. The lead rig consisted of a preston carbonactive 10ft rod,Daiwa TDR reel loaded with 8lb matchwinner to a 12-inch 0.18 silkshock hooklength and an 18 PR36 with a pellet band hair-rig. The match started at 10am and I cupped around 30 micro pellets and six dead maggots at 13m, with 30 grains of corn going in at 14.5m,as I planned to completely leave this line for atleast the first three hours. Out went the lead rig with double corn to the island,but without even so much as a liner after 30 mins I brought it in and cast out with a pellet cone this time to see if that would spark a response. 30 mins on this and still without a liner I brought in and put on a 2ft hooklength of 0.14 to a 20 hook and double maggot and cast towards the island again. By this stage one or two fish had come out,but the three of us on my bank had not had a bite between us. Another 30 mins on the lead and without a bite it was time to look on the pole line. Baiting up with a single 4mm expander I expected to catch as there are lots of skimmers to go at in Sellwood,but despite 10 mins of lifting and dropping I was still biteless. In went another 10 micro pellets and three dead maggots and it was back on the tip. This time I changed to an 0.10 hooklength and lengthened it to 2ft, and put on a small drennan maggot feeder. In went 6 maggots and after around 5 minutes I had a tentative pluck on the tip,which I struck at and was relieved to feel a fish on the end. It was a small skimmer around 8oz but it got me off the mark and put me ahead of the four remaining anglers blanking. It proved to be a false dawn however, as no more bites were forthcoming,despite regualrly ringing the changes. By now the bloke on peg 15 had caught 3 decent carp on the lead and double corn,and the guy at the opposite side of the lake on peg 9 was catching small skimmers one a chuck and also had a bonus carp. The two guys to my right were still biteless,and it was clear there were very few fish in front of us. Around 3 and a half hours in the guy to my right had a micro perch at 3m,so had also avoided the blank-leaving just the chap on peg 4 without a fish. The remainder of the match was spent going through the motions,and I failed to even get a bit on either pole line. I had two more skimmers in the last hour on the tip and double corn but never felt there were carp in front of me. The all out was called and I was glad it was over, although being on peg 1 I had the joy of conducting the weigh-in. After packing up in double quick time I went to see how team-mate Nick had done on cottage 15,and he reckoned he was around half way in his section. My 3 skimmers went 2lb exactly. The chap to my right had some proper skimmers show up on his pole line in the last 20mins,and caught 5 fish for 9lb odd! The guy on peg 4 managed a single skimmer for 1lb. The weights got progressively better as we went round the lake. Kev (dont know his surname) won the lake from peg 15 with 6 carp on the lead and corn for 37lb. I came a very disapointing 7th in the 8 peg section,so all in all a day to forget!