Gary's day

It was the second leg of the Stort Cup today on the Backwater. Another rainy week meant it was heavily coloured and pushing through: fishable but were the fish catchable?

It was peg 18 for me, a good peg but the big question was how quick the water was coming through from the weir. A bit too quick was the answer for fishing anywhere but the far side of the middle. The inside was boiling and also full of branches.

The plan was to be positive, a couple of big balls of heavy groundbait and then maggots over the top. An hour in the plan was not working as I had not had a sign. A random 3oz roach then showed up but it forgot to tell it's mates.

Down on peg 14 Phil seemed to be catching a few and seeing him swing a couple of 3oz roach confirmed this; these are usually netters on the Backwater.

Time for a change. In went the rest of the groundbait and a short walk to chat to Phil and John whilst I ate my lunch. The fish were either going to be queueing up on my return or I would have killed the peg. A quick run of 3 small dace on my return got the hopes up but then they disappeared. A try at 14.5m to the boat a bit downstream proved hard work for 2 tiny fish and a lot of sticks.

The River had started to slow a little so I changed to pinkies as loosefeed and this helped. Not many fish but the quality was pretty good. It was a surprise 1lbs 7oz on the scales; 1lbs 4oz more than I was expecting half way through but I had found them too late in the day. A few big pike strikes near the end cleared up why the fish kept disappearing.

1st Phil Whitmill 4lbs 14oz, 2nd Mark Halverson 2lbs 2oz and 3rd John Todd 1lbs 8oz. Phil wins the Stort Cup this year on weight with 4 more ounces than John and with Mark also on 4 points. Picture today is the view from my peg to the weir in full flow.