Gary's day

Today was the monthly visit to Home Farm but on the Large Lake today. I was left with peg 13 opposite the island so a good draw and with room to my left - well until the pleasure anglers started showing up in the afternoon. Setting up there were a few carp moving around on top which looked encouraging and we were due for a much cooler day.

Rob got off to a quick start with a carp in the first few minutes. It was a bit quieter in my swim but soon there were a few signs where I had been feeding some 6mm pellets out at 5 sections. The float shot under and I completely missed it. A few more missed bites later a carp was in the net. I had a slow but steady run of bites but started foulhooking fish as they dug out the silty bottom.

Darren was also now catching a few carp fishing shallow out long. I had been feeding a few pellets near the island but nothing seemed to be doing shallow. Coming back short things had calmed down and I was now converting more bites into landed fish. Towards the top of the lake things were a lot less busy with Rob, Bob and Tony struggling for anything but roach.

With a couple of hours to go I fed the edge and it soon started colouring up. After a few more fish on pellets short and more signs down the edge it was time for a try. Despite lots more signs of fish all I could seem to hook cleanly were perch and roach. Some nice roach but not the target. After the match it sounded like I was not only the one frustrated by the margins today.

After staying down the margins for far too long without catching fish I had lost track a bit as to who was catching. Darren was having a strong finish but up the lake seemed quiet still. So it proved at the weigh in with the weights getting better as you came down the lake. Tony had 20lbs for third and then it was down to the last two with Darren and me to weigh. I had my weight at around 80lbs so, with Darren having three nets in I thought I had been overtaken. Darren ended up with 75lbs as some of the carp were on the smaller side and my 80lbs went 92lbs.