Gary's day

Today was a trip back to the Stort's Backwater and another stormy but mild day was forecast. Out of the bag came peg 16 for me. With everyone having a bit of room and only the better pegs in the bag we all had a chance today.

With not a lot of colour but some flow it was the usual approach for me of breadpunch to get some bites and then hopefully a couple of perch near any cover. With most of the depth in my swim being my side I tried a short line down the bank and one over by the boats with worm for the perch.

It was a slow start with a few roach on breadpunch but not very big ones before it faded. A try by the boats on worm gave me a few odd bites I could not hit. The mangled worms revealed the culprits - crayfish. A try on the inside was marginally better with a small perch followed by a 6oz pike. Then nothing more.

Back to the punch line and a sail away bite on the drop led to solid resistance on the strike before it moved. A couple of minutes later pike 2 of about 2lbs was in the net and another walk to peg 18 to release it well away from my peg.

And so it continued. A try on worm on the inside found another pike of about 3lbs and then a struggle for a bite. Another pike on maggot down the middle and then more hunting for a bite.

Mark on peg 14 was also having some pike issues but also getting some decent roach and the odd perch. With Phil on peg 12 (again) also getting a few good roach. The last couple of hours was a real struggle with micro roach plaguing the punch line and only the odd fish worth catching coming to pinkies fished hard along the edge of the boats where the fish must have felt a bit safer.

With us spread out down the river it was going to be tricky working out how everyone had done. 1st Mark Halverson 5lbs 5oz with a couple of good perch boosting his weight, 2nd John Todd 3lbs 13oz and 3rd Phil Whitmill 3lbs 1oz. Winner of the Stort Cup was Mark on weight with Mark and John both having 4 points.