Hallcroft - Canal Pond Monday 31st

Well it had been a while since i had been on this pond. The previous session i have had on the Canal Pond had seen me go well over the 100lb mark on most of the days and only several of the pegs and different areas of the lake, so i thought it was time for a change and go back to it!

When the day came i really fancied the middle stretch of it. Its a C shape lake and the winter was blowing straight down to the straightest part. So i fancied either two bends. There wasnt many fish showing anywhere and it was dead clear but i did still want to draw there!

Unfortunately my luck wasnt in and i drew peg 1. Now, on most days i would of loved to draw this. As its the first peg and surrounded with Reeds and ledges, but today wasnt one. It was full with floating natural debris and this was to make it very difficult to fish my 14.5m line to the far bank.

The lines i opted for where:

1. 6m Line just after the last ledge, this was going to be my paste attack. Using a Preston PB22 .5g twinned with .13 Powerline direct tied to a 14 Animal. Pretty much my every day rig for paste but slightly tweaked and turned down a little due to time of year. This wouldnt be a rig i would expect to bag up on due to the wind but it was a good insurance policy to have. I set this up 3 and a bit feet deep just an inch or so over depth. My Paste mix was to be just as ordinary but in smaller amounts. As usual i would be feeding anything other than what i was putting around my hook.
2. 11m Line just before the far bank ledge, this was going to be my Dead red attack. Using a Colmic goldie .3g float twinned with .13 Powerline direct tied to a 18 B911 fished with between 1 and 3 dead reds this was going to be confirmed through the day which approach would be the better one. I was planning to feed a mix of Dead reds and 2mm pellets on this line to keep them interested but only feeding on a feed per fish ratio as i thought it may well be difficult today. I plumbed and found 3ft of water and set it up just so it was touching the deck but left a bit of additional line on incase the wind took a turn for the worse as hallcroft can tow like a train! I also made sure my 5 no.8's were no more than 5 inch away from the hook bait. I havnt seen many people using these floats and i dont know why! They are pretty much the strongest pole float i have ever used and in the different sizes can be used for most fishing situations! Its perfect for far bank situations, the stem isnt as long as it appears either!
3. 13/14.5m line were to be just for the far bank. I didnt actually feel as though i could fish this confidently as the natural debris was just all over the place for about a metre or so after the far bank it was clogged by reeds and leafs so it could get frustrating! But still i did make a rig and plumbed up and found 1ft of water, i made it 2 inch over depth, with again the option to go upto 5 inch over depth if need be. This was pretty much the same rig as above but i opted for .2g Colmic goldie in the place of the .3g one and instead of a bulk 5 inch from the hook i opted for 1 no.8 an inch away from the hook and 3 directly below the float.
4. My Paste margin line was to be just off my top 2 the rig was basically a shallow version of my 6m rig, using the same float but only change was a bulk of shots directly below the float as i was only fishing in 2ft of water. The paste it self would hold the rig on the deck enabling me to fish almost dead depth. I chose to fill this margin in frequently with Pellets as i always do, but only try this if other things fail.
5. My Other marginal rig was to be a negative fished rig. This was to be fished top 2 + 3 into my corner. I Plumbed up well and couldnt find anything with any feature to it so i decided to opt for a line about 3 ft off the margin its self. My rig for this was .15 Powerline tied directly to a 16 B911 and fished with a dead red approach with once again a Colmic Goldie .2g float. I was going to feed this very little with just maybe 5 dead reds chucked in every 30 mins or so.

That was my lines sorted. I really did hold most of my faith in the dead red approach for today, but it isnt a good idea to turn up to a venue with preconcieved ideas unless you know the venue and even then, it can lead to failure.

The whistle was blown and i went straight for the 11m line and fed little of my dead red a pellet mix. It wasnt long before i was in my first fish (About a minute).

An average stamp of fish for the canal, but it really doesnt take much to get a good weight with these. They are also considerably heavier than they appear. Note the debris on the water behind it! I figured i had put around 30lb in my net within the first hour and a half.

 It did start to slow down considerably and it ended up with not getting any indications at all. I decided to abandon swim. I wasnt going to feed anymore into it if i wasnt getting any indications at all as this is one of the better rules in fishing to learn and one that i do tell people when coaching. After my 11m line went dead i opted for the 6m Paste line which resulted in a fish straight away.....

............. and then nother else in the ten minutes it was in! I then went straight for my dead red margin line and was instantly in again this time they kept coming until the last 30 mins of the match. I had done around 40lb of fish in the 2+3 margin and was happy with that. When that then went dead i tried my paste approach in the margin and was probably getting a fish every 5 minutes with added 6 fish to my total weight. They are always slightly bigger on paste in the margin and some push the 5lb mark now. So every bonus fish counts. They really do scrap in the margins they go like steam trains for the size of them, its porbaly down to the depth and lack of.

Top 3 at the end of the day was.

1.Nathan Johnson 89lb 2oz
2.Mark Foy 81lb 7oz
3.Ian Turner 79lb 9oz

Weirdly the weights between 3rd and 7th came from middle of the lake which i had fancied. But it was a good result with a few fish. The weights are getting smaller and the fishing is getting harder. Cant wait:).

Nathan
@ Fish4Though