Canberra, Teams of 4

The end of November seen our annual NSW open and NSW teams of four match taking place on Lake Burley Griffiths in Canberra itself. This year our team was made of Neil Dourish, Shaun Redmond, Ivan Mitchell and myself. All ex UK pats. now living in Austraila and all being led astray by myself, the only Irish angler I know of in NSW at the moment. Myself and Ivan left early on Thursday morning to have a little session on the venue as Ivan hadn't fished it before.
We had a few fish but I selected to fish the feeder more where as Ivan stayed on the pole and ended up with well over 40 kgs in a couple of hours.

The weather was very unsettled with wind and even a heavy thunder and rain storm as we packed up.
The NSW open Match on the Friday is run as an open individual with a random draw and we done well to get 3 of us all fishing in different sections as it gives us a good idea on how things go for the team event. Once again I drew back in what was the old D section but was C section this year as a new section has been pegged on the far side of the lake. None of the four of us manged to draw there so would have to wait until the team draw to see how we go on there. I always seem to draw this section but don't mind it too much as it is usually an all out feeder section. Two years ago I drew the same peg 3 days in a row on this section !


Anyway c3 was to be my spot for the day and it was 2 pegs away from the feeder canal the runs into the lake. The hot pegs on this section are 10 and 11 in most matches and they seem to produce fish much earlier than the others so most times you are fishing for 2nd if anglers catch there early in the match. The 2 pegs either side of the canal can be good with lots of fish usually hanging around but it also can be very snaggy. There is a fence or something that runs along the lake bed for a few pegs at 25 to 30 mts and then when the heavy rain comes any crap that washes in the storm canal usually gets caught up in it. Most try and fish the feeder further out and get the fish off the bottom fast on these pegs but when searching around with a bomb before the start I didn't have any snags on my peg that I could find. Ralph from the Sydney AC was to my right on C4 would be in the thick of it thou.
It was quite windy again today but not much signs of rain. I set up an open ended feeder to start with and also had a method feeder to switch over to later, plus I had a 4 gram and 2 gram pole rigs set up to try at some stage. For bait I keep it simple for Canberra and had corn, maggot, some bread for an 8 or 10mm punch plus I had a few worms in my bag to sneak out a perch or two for the team matches Saturday and Sunday for a few section points if it's hard. My usual plan on here is to feed a bit on the pole line first, then 6 or 8 balls on the feeder line and start on the open end feeder but keep a ball of crumb going in every 5 mins or so. I have found on this big water even though it's not fished much it doesn't take them long to start coming into the sound of the groundbait going in and then switch over to the method feeder once there are a few fish are around. I don't put any feed in the groundbait only in the initial balls and thru the feeder. After the first hour and 20 mins it was very slow and no one seemed to be catching. I didn't even have a liner on the feeder and decided to drop a worm on my pole line to see if any perch were around and within 2 mins had a carp about 4 lbs in my net. It took the worm on the drop...! Despite fishing it for the next 40 mins I never had another bite and it was getting harder to fish the pole as the wind was picking up even more so went back on the feeder. Ralph had just lost a fish on the feeder at this stage. It was well into the fourth hour before I had a bite and fish number 2 was in the net. Ralph next to me was now getting into fish regularly but not getting many to his landing net as his peg proved to be a real snag pit. I switched to the method feeder and started to get a few fish mind you the first 3 I hooked all swam to my right and snagged. The last hour I only managed 2 more fish and lost 4 more all again to my right despite doing my best to keep them away from it. I was a bit frustrated with this but wasn't too worried about today's match and then felt much better when Ralph told me he lost 14 fish in his peg and even better when I had beaten him and the other side of my with 10.35 kgs. Pegs 10 won the section with 35 kgs and Neil was on 11 and was second with 22 kgs
Overall today the match was won by that man again Alan Woods (winner from Mildura a few blogs back)....from the new section with 48 kgs. There is no stopping him over here at the moment. Ivan had also finished 2nd in B section today with 13 kgs
We all headed to the pub for the team draw that night as we draw the sections the night before and then pegs on the venue in the morning. Most other years we have placed ourselves in our sections but this year we decided to do it via the random draw as none of us had fish the new section and we were all pretty familiar with the other sections. Even with a random draw I ended up back on C section again for Saturday morning but wasn't complaining...
I wasn't even too bad after I had drawn C 4 in the car park in the morning even thou I knew it was snaggy...Having watched Ralph on Friday, he was casting short so my plan was to go a bit further out and hopefully get there heads up fast. As the wind wasn't that bad when we were setting up I also took out a slider rod to fish over where Ralph was casting at which was about 20 mts out and maybe keeping the line up would keep some fish from the snags
C4.........Day 2.......!pegs to my left....

The day started badly for me when I had just finished setting everything up, plumbed my slider up and all was good I had 5 mins to spare before the all in and decided to have one more chuck with the slider to make sure it was good, It settled perfect and then snagged in whatever it is that's on the bottom in this peg... I snapped it off so threw the rod down and started to feed a feeder line about 50 mts out on the all in. Half an hour in and I had a fish on but hit the same snag again on the way in...feeder number 1 and fish number 1 gone...! For the next 2 hours I was the only one getting bites and hooking fish on my side of the canal but still had a dry net... Nine feeders and nine fish was now the count lost in the snag and no matter what I did, keeping the rod low, keeping it high, going left, going right , I even stood up on the seat of my box for 2 fish they still found a snag. I was quite sure by now there is a little more than a wire fence in this peg.
The pressure was really piling up when I talked to all the rest of the team and they were all doing ok in there sections and then 2 anglers to my left had fish on as I left my phone down. I tried feeding another line my side of the snags and clipping up a feeder on it at about 18 mts...this was easy as my slider was still sitting and bobbing in the water to mark it !...I could not get a touch on it for the next hour so had no choice only go back out again. The next 2 hours I once again had 11 fish on but just got 2 into the net was going to be out of method feeders soon at this rate. I then had a quiet last 45 mins and tried the pole but not a sniff, when the funniest thing happened. My last 2 casts on the feeder I had 2 fish as soon as the feeder hit the bottom and both came in with not a problem..no snags, nothing and I hadn't done a thing different... I was so glad to hear the all out today and had left over $60 of feeders in the lake. I finished 8th in the section with 10 kg even. The section was won from C9 with 18 fish for 36 kgs and C11 was second with 30 kgs. .......18 fish...!
I felt much better when I got back to the cabin and found out Ivan had won his section, and both Neil and Shaun were 3rd in each of their sections... It got even better at the pub that night we we found out our team was winning the day but we had Woody's team on our heals just 3 points behind us. This will be the third year in a row we're leading on the first day. We all decided that night to stick with our sections again for Sunday.
It was nice, calm and sunny at the car park for the draw in the morning. I decided to sit back and wait till the end to draw my peg and am certain the clouds just appeared as I put my hand in the bag with only 2 pegs left.........yup C4 was on the disc I took out...I could even swear it was at that moment the wind got up too.....by the time I got to my peg it was blowing hard across the lake into us


I sat on my box for a long 10 minutes before I set up on the peg trying to decide what way to approach the peg today. I had thought at one stage of calling the police and telling them I just seen a body sink about 30 mts out and to send a boat with a chain and hook and would show them exactly where to pull it. After counting up what feeders I had left and got hold of the night before I decided to clip up on a line at 18 mts my side of the snags and fill it in at the start and hope to draw the fish away from what was down there. I was also going to fill in a pole line despite the wind as it may calm down later...or just drop a feeder over it if the fish turned up. I would leave the long feeder line for the first 2 hours with nothing going in to it and hoped I could get some fish to come in closer but had set up a rod with a long range open feeder for it just in case. I had Jason Ollenshaw on my left today and also we had their team just a few points behind us so it was another full on day ahead. After 2 hours and not a touch on my short feeder line or pole it was not looking good. Not many were catching around me and the wind was getting wilder. After another 1/2 hour and Jason now having a fish in the net. I had no choice only go out on the long feeder but just let 3 balls of crumb go in . I had a fish withing 15 mins and got it in no problem and thought here we go....yup here we go....for the next 2 hours I hooked 9 fish and landed 1.
I was convinced at this stage it's not a wire fence down there...It's a house and as I hooked a fish there were going in the front door and his mates were closing it behind him. The ones I got out were when his mates would slam the door in his face just for fun.....! I tried again on my short line and had 2 fish straight way but they also snagged up as soon as I picked up the rod and just on the clip. I re clipped a meter shorter but couldn't buy a bite. I stuck it out on the long feeder line for the last hour with what feeders I had left to land 2 more fish but again lose another 3..... altogether 14 fish and feeders lost today......I should have called the cops in the end just to report a robbery.....!
My 8.8 kgs managed to get me 7th in the section out of 11 and once again C 11 won with 42 kgs and C9 was second with 30 kgs. But Jason manged to take 2 points from me. The rest of the team all finished mid sections. For the third year running we suffered a bad 2nd day blow out to end up 4th team overall from 11 teams and also missed 3rd place by 1 point. Mind you we would have needed something really special this year to win it as Woody's team took the title with 3 section wins and a 4th on the second day and Alan himself winning all of the 3 days......well done again.....Next year maybe..if I am still here in Oz that is.. Our next big team of 4 event is the nationals which are on in March 2010
Team BGT Sydney...nope not hung over...it was just early in the morning for the pic.....!


Last Match of 2009

My last match for 2009 was a Sydney AC club league match which was back on the race course lake we had the winter league on. There was 17 fishing today but the levels have really dropped here now and most of the pegs are now all along the deeper dam wall side. I drew peg 19 which was the shallower side where the good weights came all winter and an end peg but now the water was out past the ledge so wasn't sure how it would go. Once again it was stinking hot in Sydney with the temps in the high 30's plus there isn't much shade around this lake at all.
I plumbed around to find about 2 ft of water everywhere in my swim except of one area about 2 mt square at 13 mts where there was a hole about 4 ft deep and just set up one rig for this. A .3 gram "Hillbilly critter" and as I had open water just used white hydro on a puller bung.I set up a margin swim also at 10 mts to my left and a small waggler to cast around further out. There were a few fish rolling all over the lake as I was setting up.
I spent the first hour feeding my pole line with a few bits of corn every few minutes while fishing the waggler but didn't have a bite and it seemed to be another of those hot days where the fish didn't seem to want to feed. Everyone was just getting the odd fish here and there except of GT, our Italian member who was on a peg right across from me that has a sunken Island. He was putting fish in the net regularly. I went on the pole and slowly started to get a few small fish but it was hard work and having to work the bait up and down. Most were small fish all under a pound. Some of the guys to my right had a few fish by now also. The 4th hour was my best spell and I even shallowed up well of the bottom at one stage and had 10 or 12 small fish one after another before landing a carp about 2 kgs while constantly feeding a few maggots. It seemed to then quieted all around the lake for everyone until the last 20 mins when fish were coming out from most of the pegs again.
I wasn't too sure how I had fared up in the end but was certain the guys to my right had bigger fish. After the weigh in I was surprised to see I had finished 2nd with 15.6 kgs. GT won with 21 kgs and Ivan was 3rd with 13 kgs. Today's result has now pushed me well up towards the top of the table and our next match in this league is a weekend trip back to Canberra for a sat and sun double header in the first week in Feb....Hopefully the dreaded C4 and that section won't be used and maybe this time I can get a few fish out........
15 kgs for second on another stinking hot Sydney match...........

On a Roll.....at last..!

Just two matches for me for this month and the first one was part of our CARC league here. The top 3 from this league go forward to a final early next year with a few anglers from the other states here for a $1000 winner take all prize. With the final being in Sydney this year and me not doing too good (well just getting the droppers out of the way first) I really need a good result today to follow up from my last one. The lake we were fishing on today is one I use to fish a bit when I got here first but now the local council have banned fishing on it mostly because of the local louts again and litter problems but luckily for us our club can get permission to fish it for matches a few times in the year but it's a shame not to be able to pleasure fish it any more...It is a small shallow retention lake but has a good head of smaller size fish, plus some right nutty ghost carp that go to 8 or 9 lbs



With just 8 fishing today we dropped pegs 10 and 11 from the draw as they were a little overgrown ...plus the furthest walk..! I left myself the last peg in the bag and peg 7 was one I was happy enough with as I had fished it a few times before. Also it was today's golden peg so there was an extra $75 going a begging.
With just 8 of us we all had plenty of room and options on every peg today and my own has a a few different lines to fish from. Straight out in front of me at 11 mts I had an even 3 1/2 foot of water at 11 to 14 mts and had a green J Range elastic on a pulla kit, .18 line to a .3 gram BGT "Shallow", .16 hooklenght to a tubertini 175 no.3. My plan for here was to feed light at the start on here and kinder for the match at 11 mts and probably fish at the back of it later on. At 13 mts to my left at about 10 o'clock I had about 3 foot of water and had a similar set up for here but used a Hillbilly "Grizzley" .3 gram and a B911 14. This line I was going to feed heavy at the start with 4 or 5 balls of crumb and alot of chopped worm and some corn and was leaving it for a while to see if any catfish turned up today. There are a few catfish in here and they average over 2 lbs so can be helpful during quiet spells. I have found you need to feed different here than for carp to attract them. Little and often or constant feeding over their heads always seems to push them away. I have found the best way to feed for them is by placing a bed of food down and leaving them a while to settle, you can pick up 3 or 4 in as many put ins before they back off and then top up. If no catfish turn up I can still use this line to rest my mainline later or maybe scratch for eels over it by the end if it's hard..! I had two margin lines to my left and right at 8 mts but sometimes they turn up here others not. With my peg being in the corner I also had the bank to my right and had another line to fish under a bush later into the match at 14.5 mts as it warmed up. It was already over 30 degrees and was only 7:30 am.......! I had 18 inches or so of water under the bush about 6 inches from the bank and was going to feed 2 full cups of corn, hemp and some meat there but spread it out abit. Rig for this line was on purple hydro to .18 line straight thru to an animal 14 with a "shady shallow" float getting a run around today. I set up a waggler and small method feeder also but hopefully was going to be too busy on the pole for most of the match to use them.

Ivan had drawn next to me on peg 5 as we had to drop peg 6 because of a coot or moorhen nesting there and we didn't want to disturb her. I couldn't see much more except just get view of "Sticky fingers" Health who was on peg 4. By the time the all in went at 9 am it most have been close to 35 degrees and there wasn't hardly a breeze. I nearly dropped my pole from my hands as I started cupping in my lines it had got that hot in the sun. I was thinking we should re name this league of our to the "extreme league" as so far we have had the full weather extremes for it. Wind, rain, heat and once again a struggle for a bite for the first hour and 35 minutes. Despite quite a few fish cruising and splashing around everyone was struggling to get bites. It was almost 2 hours before I got a small carp at 11 mts in front of me after trying all my lines and it came to a little bread punch and feeding a few maggots. I had one about 1lb on the waggler 20 minutes later and it seemed to be one of those days where you had to just keep moving from line to line and picking the odd fish here and there. They just didn't seem to want to feed at all. I done this for the next 2 hours and picked off 8 more fish but nothing over 1lb. A quick phone call to Sticky fingers and he only had 4 fish and no one seemed to be catching out there either. Ivan had 4 fish too and even with the Duck Brigade out practicing beside him and a few mouths slurping close to him was also struggling for bites. I couldn't even sneak an eel out from my worm line never mind a sight of a catfish. I re fed a ball of light groundbait on all my lines and a half a cup of corn and hemp on my long margin line but had been firing 2 cubes of meat over it every 8 minutes or so all match before then catching a small eel and another small carp on my 11 line. A quick drop in with some punched meat on my long margin line and I had a liner straight away. 2 minutes later a sharp bite and I had purple hydro stretching all.........of 6 inches..............an effing turtle hooked in the feet..claw.,, ?....whatever it is you call the little buggers mittens but as I lifted the nuisance to the surface I had a huge swirl and bow wave in my swim...this was definatly not from another turtle...it's lucky for this little fella turtles are protected here or he would have been drop kicked out past the lake into the car park. Usually the turtles move off when the carp show up so hopefully this was the only one there and back out I went but with corn on the hook this time and almost as soon as it settled had fish on. Even with just over 1 3/4 hours to go and maybe a little early to start plundering my shallow margin swim I decided after dropping a 3 lb carp in the keepnet to go at it for a bit. Nobody else seemed to be catching and if I could get 2 or 3 more it maybe enough for today.
It wasn't hectic or fast but up till the end I manged to get another 10 carp out of this swim with one close to 5 lbs but some smaller ones too on either corn or punched meat. I did lose one ghosty well over 8 pounds which I foulhooked and also had 2 small fish on my 11 mt line after that. I gustimated to have between 18 to 21 lbs as I wasn't too sure with the small fish. I was on the scales and walked around to pegs 8 and 9 to start. They really struggled here with just a few pounds of fish as did pegs 1 and 2 which are usually good pegs on this lake. John on peg 3 had 9 lbs of really small carp and then "Sticky fingers" himself weighed in 19 lbs even. I hadn't been watching him the last 2 hours as I was turned away to my right but he started to put a few small fish together so it was going to be close. Ivan had just short of 13 lbs and came over to weigh me in...
Phew..., that wasn't as close as I had thought..I ended up weighing in 23 lbs 12oz to make it my 3rd win on the trot here and more important second win in this league...plus a golden peg pot so have a few extra beer vouchers now for our trip to Canberra next week
23lbs 12 oz............

Our next "extreme league" match isn't till January but will be the height of summer by then so at least we wont have snow or ice....maybe tornado, a bush fire...who knows ? Canberra starts next Friday and myself and Ivan are heading down on Thursday for a quick session there so will write up a full account of how we got on when I get back

lucky draws ?.... or just a good run..........?

October turned out to be quite a busy month matchwise here for me. Between the Mildura Masters, a Sydney Coarse Anglers league match and then another of our own CARC league matches it was almost a match a week for the month...Now if we could get another club and league up and running here it would mean all the Sunday's in each month could be used for exactly what they were meant to be used for....

The first match was our CARC league match and was back on Glenwood lake where we had a tough first match a while back...Even though I have pleasured fished it a few times and hadn't less than 60 lbs of fish and more most times, it can shut down once there are a few anglers on it...There are only 9 anglers fishing this league and just 7 out today so we were hope full of a few fish showing...As I walked around the lake to peg it there was fish were splashing and rolling all over especially close to the island and it had me wondering if they were still spawning.Today was the third match in the series and I am beginning to think it has a curse on it...Our first match had very unseasonal heat, our next one had one of the windiest days I had fished in for a while, and today was very overcast and the rain didn't look too far away, plus the carp seemed to be in spawning mode..!

.

As I organise the pegging and draws for these matches I always take the last peg left in the bag and today's peg for me was 2 which was just to the right of the island and was happy enough. It had loads of fish rolling at the end of it as I set up. The Carp in here average 3 to 4 lbs and go a little bit nuts when hooked as the deepest swim on the whole lake is only about 3 1/2 foot. With this in mind I had 2 tops, one with Black hydro and the other with green J range on a pull kit both on .18 line to.16 bottom and some Hillbilly .2 gram critters. A .2gram BGT dibber for close to the reeds to my left on some purple hydro just in case.Then a small method feeder for out toward the end of the island completed my set up for today. All my rigs had tubertini 175 hooks but I had got my hands on some new Guru QM1 hooks for the feeder (If I could keep them out of my fingers that is...are they sharp or what ? ) For bait I 3 tins of corn, a little hemp, worm, half a pint of maggot and some bread in case the local duck feeding brigade turned up at the lake and get the carp feeding on nothing else.

I am beginning to think Australians are training so to start a duck feeding world champs, you would not believe the amount of it that gets chucked into these little suburban lakes here every day. Even before the start I took a walk around to see Ivan on peg 6 and some family had already thrown a full loaf in at empty peg 5 for all of the 4 ducks in the corner (plus the 12 or so carp I counted also on the surface). This was only 8 am yet. Then some other local "expert" will probably tell us later in the day it's the carp that are making the water that pea green colour in the lake all the time and we shouldn't be putting them back after catching them.. Evolution is, or will be good when it makes it to these parts......!

Anyway back to the match. I started by feeding two pole lines, one at 11 mt slightly to my left and another at 13 mts straight out in front of me with 2 balls of groundbait, some corn and a little hemp. It's been warming up here the last few weeks so no meat, maggot or worms in at the start today as those pesky turtles will be up and about by now. I had a few chucks on the feeder at 30 mts and kept a little nugget of crumb and corn going in every 10 mins or so but after 45 mins hadn't got a bite anywhere. Tony, A new ex pat that recently joined up with us had a good start on peg 1 next to me and had 2 carp and lost 2 by now on the waggler but only at 12 mts so I couldn't figure it out. Even Ivan on the dam end with all the bread hadn't got a fish yet. They were still splashing about and I had a few liners on the tip so was beginning to think our league definately was jinxed. Then to top it all off it started to rain quite heavy on the 50 minute mark and was one of those type of showers you know isn't going to stop till about 5 mins after the all out. 1 hour 20 minutes into the match, turtles or not I cleaned up 1/4 pint or so of worms and chopped it in with 6 balls of crumb and cupped 3 on each line and went on the feeder for a bit. Another 20 minutes or so and the tip ripped around and I had a carp about 2 lbs in the net but then went another 30 mins with nothing. Tony by now had 4 fish but was having enough of the rain as he hadn't come prepared for it. I went out on my 13 mt line with a single worm and straight away had a fish about 4 lbs. By the end of the 3rd hour I had 7 fish but it was hard work. I found putting a few pieces of chopped worm and hemp in my kinder pot ship my rig out but not tip the pot in till I got a liner or indication of a fish in the swim. If I didn't get a liner after 5 or 6 mins tip it in and go to my other swim. I had 2 more fish on the method but that was slow so stayed on the pole for the last hour and half and ended up with 16 carp altogether and all on a worm or piece of a worm. Tony next to me had enough of the rain earlier so had tipped back 4 fish and went home early but bet he had wished he hadn't as the lake fished hard and those that did feed heavy didn't catch. Ivan despite all the bread around him manged to get a few fish for second with 10 lbs and I managed a win today with 52 lbs 7ozs. At last a match that's not to be a dropper.

Sure as sugar as soon as we called the all out the rain stopped...the lake rose over 4 inches today during the course of the match. Also you may ask why some reports are in pounds and ozs while others are in kgs but the only reason it that the SCAC match scales and most others here are all using metric scales where as I have started organising the CARC matches and use my own scales...I am old fashioned and also only have a scales that reads in pounds and ozs.

SCAC league match

My next match was the Sydney CAC league match and was back on Caddis creek. Myself and Ivan travelled together for this and between us being slow packing the gear and almost an hour drive were running late for the draw so were left with the last 2 pegs in the bag...19 anglers were fishing today, Ivan drew end peg 19 and I ended up on peg 2 at the other end. This peg I had fished before in last years teams of 3 match (on a previous blog here). I think I may also have sorted out my problem of drawing bad pegs now....just be late anymore and let everyone else draw first, hopefully all the crap ones are gone then....!

peg 2 again.......

It was really hot and sticky today and the sweat was pouring of me just as I sat on my box wondering what to set up at the start. This venue is really starting to have some weed growing in it now and I had plenty to my right out to 4 mts but luckily it was clear to my left. There was also a bit more room to my left as a few bushes separated Dave Woods on peg 1 and myself so decided to fish a line to my left at 8 mts about 3 mts out from the edge where there was a little shelf and about 2 1/2 foot of water. I had another line at 13 mts straight about 4 foot deep but also a rig for 14.5 mt where it was 6 inches deeper. I have found in a good few of our matches here the fish seem to stay at the back of the feed and hopefully would pick some of there later. I set up a waggler to fish out the middle and a small method feeder for the far side but never catch much on the feeder here. We were suppose to have some rain later today and as peg 1 has a storm drain beside it, when it runs off there you often see the carp come right in especially in this hot weather so was hoping it does and my 8 mt line would have some fish around it. As it was open water and no weed on my long lines I set up these rigs on white hydro today and again Hillbilly (unbreakable) critters one rig was a .3 gram and a few droppers spread out and another .4 with just a bulk and one dropper. I had a Grizzly .2 gram to black hydro for my 8 mt line and just a simple bulk 8 inches from my hook.

At the all in I fed light on my long line but dropped a full cup of corn and another of some chopped worm, hemp and a little crumb on the 8 mt line and would keep throwing some corn at it till it rained...hopefully, it would. I started on the pole hoping to pick up some early fish and kept firing out a few grains of corn on my waggler line every 10 mins or so. Two hours in and that dreaded "dropper" word was in the back of my mind as I didn't have a bite yet. Well one turtle, but the two anglers to my right had a few small fish and Dave to my left had 1 fish. I picked up the waggler and after 5 mins had a gold fish of about 1/2 a kg on 3 maggots so went again, 2 minutes late I had another but a smaller one. Then for the next hour I picked up 6 more small goldfish and then a carp about 1 kg before it slowed down...A strong breeze had now picked up and my waggler was starting to drag a bit with the tow. I was going for a heavier float to change it over when I felt a few drops of rain and decided to try my pole line first before I fed it with another cup of corn and hemp. No bites but it had started to rain heavy as I was tipping the cup in. I tried my lone line and had what is the smallest carp to date I think I have caught...it was about 2 inches long..it was lucky the corn had a hook in it as the little bugger may have choked on it had it swallowed the full grain. By now the water was flushing out the drain beside Dave and all sorts of crap coming out on the surface between us but still no bites, indications or signs of fish. In a few minutes the rain stopped as quick as it started and I was beginning to think I should go back on my waggler even with the gold fish being small and don't weigh much, I was getting bites and catching a few of them.

One more go and I put a big worm on first and withing 30 secs I had a carp on but pulled out of it. I got another one next put in and also seen Dave was now getting into fish too. We were both catching a few fish in the last hour and all around the 1 to 2 kg mark but towards the end I managed to pull away from Dave despite losing and foul hooking a few and had 4 in my last 4 put in's. Today once again all my bigger fish were on a single worm.

We were the first to weigh in and Dave had 13.3 kgs, those last few fish helped me to 18.6 kgs and the next two weights were 8 and 9 kgs but after that I hadn't heard how anyone else was doing so started to pack up and wait for Ivan. As we use 2 sets of scales from both ends he hadn't seen my weight on his sheet and when I asked how he got on as he pulled up he told me he won with 17.7 kgs and had close to 30 fish for that. So I just said well done I only had 18 fish so you can buy the Mac D''s on the way home, but our Match sec spoilt it for me. I didn't get any pics after the rain today as everything was wet through.

I have one more match this month with the CARC league then we're all of to Canberra where I fished the internationals last March for the 2009 NSW open and NSW teams of 4 for 3 days and hopefully some more good late draws

Lake Burley Griffths, Canberra

Finally getting back on track with a blog or five from the matches in Australia. It's been a bit crazy for me with work the last while here and being self employed means I end up also doing most of my quotes and paperwork in the evenings so haven't been keeping up with my blogs lately. I haven't neglected the fishing itself Just the reports and hopefully will have all up to date in the next week or so
With the winter league all done and dusted the Sydney Coarse angler's club league started in September and the first match was back on the venue we fished for the winter. The water levels had dropped well since our last match and the shallower end I drew before was now unfishable but the deeper side at the dam wall was now fully fishable and was where I drew this match. I plumbed around at the start and had 8 foot of water at 11 mts and a little flat spot and then it just seemed to keep sloping away from there...I set up a 1 gram rig to fish on this and 1.5 gram on a slightly longer line to fish past this on the slope later and also if the wind picked up (September is normally the month for some strong winds here in Australia)
I had a feeder rod set up and also a margin rig where I had 3 foot of water about a mt out to my right beside the bush but with 25 anglers fishing today and the pegging being tight again I didn't feel very confident in the margins today


After the first hour I didn't have a bite and it was slow in the pegs all around me. I could see fish being netted over the far side of the lake so just had to grin and bare it and hoped they would move around later. In the second hour I had 2 carp one after another and thought finally will get a few in the net but that was that. Despite trying all different rigs, baits, even an hour on the feeder I really struggled for the rest of the match ending with 3 more carp and an eel for 6.6 kgs and finished a lowly 20Th place. All the six pegs to my right except one struggled today but there was some good weights to my left and across the far side. 44 kgs won the match and plenty of 25 to 30 kg back up weights. Not the best of starts to the league but with 2 dropped matches allowed today's result was one used up. It's better I get those droppers out of the way first anyway...!

My next match for September was part of our new club's league and was on Mirabeena lake. With just 8 of us fishing this one we spread the pegging out over the lake and had plenty of room but it was another gruller of a day for me. The picture's I took below was before the start and even then the wind had started and it just got worse and worse as the match went on. I thought at the start I would have a good day with a nice breeze coming into my face but after half an hour struggling to hold the pole even at 6 mts I had to resort to sitting it out on the feeder for most of the match. I bumped of 3 fish but failed to weigh in as did 2 others. Paul (cant draw wrong) Health won from the sheltered peg to my right with 6 carp for 15 lbs on the waggler but in the end I was glad just to get away from the place with no broken pole sections

Yup I intend on getting my droppers out of the way early in this league too....!

Well with windy September now out of the way my first match for October is the Sydney coarse anglers league match 2 and 3 which is fished as a double header on a sat and sun. The venue for Saturday's match was back on that crappy lake in the international rowing center close to Sydney where it fished very hard last year when we were on it (there is a report on it on a previous blog here). It was penciled in for both days but depending on how it would fish today the committee would decided then on Sunday's venue. There was just 13 anglers fishing today as most had decided it was a waste going there. I drew one peg from the end but to be honest there is nothing in the difference in the pegs on here with depths,etc so was really bothered where I drew. Also with it being so tough the last time we fished here I wasn't expecting much and had decided to fish just 1 pole line at 12.5 mts, 2 feeder lines, one at 30 mts and also a slider to fish over it in case there was still a few gold fish left in the lake and the other at 60 mts or so and see if I could get a carp. Two biteless hours in and no one around me had a bite either but had heard a few around the other end were on a fish each. And to think two years ago I loved this venue !Going into the 4th hour and the nine or so anglers I could see around me still all were fish less I decided to get a top kit out with a light elastic in it and scratch for some little Aussie Native minnow/Smelt pairs of eyes which are in here. The club rules allows them even thou it would take 30 of them to make 10 grams but you get the angler each side to witness it and then you get the last points on the table that day before blanking...at this stage I worked out they were worth 4th place so went quickly searching my box for a small hook and starting dropping some slop in the water. First drop in with a single maggot on a 20 hook and the float buried....missed it, and the next, and the next 10 after that...the little buggers couldn't even fit a maggot in their mouths....I hadn't fished like this for a few years but eventually after several more missed bite I cut a maggot in half on the hook and presto got one of the little things out......yippee....got both anglers each side of me to see it and was on the points...I then settled to finish out the match on the long range feeder and in the hope of getting something that would actually weigh in on the scales and with 20 minutes to go my tip slowly pulled around and I carefully played and netted a catfish which had me ending in 5th overall with 1.66 kgs but only 2 more below me weighed in. After a quick bank side meeting the venue is now officially scraped of the list (for good I hope) and tomorrow's match is back on Caddis creek. Shaun (part of our team of 4 here) won today's match with 3 carp for 10 kgs but again over half the field blanked

We had rain all the Saturday night and the venue looked a manky colour as we got the draw over and I wasn't expecting it to fish that well at all. I've always struggled here straight after heavy rain. I drew Peg 10 but with 2 no shows had a free peg to my right so was happy to have some room at least. Having fished on here alot over the winter I have found white hydro or J range yellow with a pull kit has been fine but the last time I fished since the weather has warm up the fish are starting to power up a little and I really struggled to keep them from the clumps of weed which have started to appear so with this in mind I step up my rigs today on a loose black hydro and also a green J range with a pull kit. I took the careful route with feeding at the start and just dropped a single ball of groundbait into each swim and take it from there. I fished a small method feeder for the first 45 mins and only had 2 little knocks but again it seemed to be a struggle all along for everyone. I switched to the pole at 11 mts and started to kinder in some chopped work and a little hemp and finally got a bite and a little carplet out but then proceeded to bump off the next 3 little fish I hooked on the black hydro which was very annoying as no one around me seem to be getting anything. I tried my margins for a few minutes so as to resettle my long line (and resettle myself) but never had a bite so made the decision to set up a rig on a top kit with some white hydro instead and go back out. I had 2 more small fish in the next 30 mins but was getting a few liners and the gentle feeding approach seemed to be doing ok as still no one near me had a fish. Then I hooked two better fish in a row which I lost, both in weed and I started to curse myself for changing my elastics. I cursed even more for the last 2 hours as I struggled along with everyone else to add just 2 more small fish and weighed in 2.12 kgs for surprising 4th place. Then to sum up my day 2.50 kgs had been 2nd and 2.20 was 3rd so those 2 lost fish cost me a few points today. The winner had 15kgs from the end peg at the deeper dam end and this end always seems to fish well when we have extra water thru there but the whole venue itself never fished this hard before in a match

Well hopefully that's the last of the struggle matches over with now as my next outing is down to the Murry river for the Midura Masters and Murry cup in the last weekend of October. It's an interstate event with anglers from all parts of Australia turning up to fish there for the 3 days. It's a full 11 hour drive for us from Sydney but well worth it just for the craic there and to meet up with all the guys from all over. We all stay there in the one camp site in cabins and this year there is myself, Mark York and Sticky fingers Health himself making the trip together. There is some huge weights of fish caught in this event and last year I finished 2nd overall so am hoping to go one better this year

Mildura Masters

Our journey saw us leaving Sydney at 10 am on Tuesday with the plan being to stop of at Narrandra (6 hours from Sydney) overnight and try and have another fish on that irrigation canal we had fished a 2 day match on a few months back or have a scout around and see what else was there to fish. The wind was terrible on the road down and even worse when we got to the canal itself late afternoon...I should have taken my surf board instead of my pole. We all agreed not to bother fishing today, throw some bait in, go for dinner, a few "sociable" beers and return in the morning for a fish instead. Between the even stronger winds that met us the next morning and the three of us have quite a "sociable" hangover each the idea of fishing on the canal was cancelled and we decided to get on the road and continued on to Mildura, get there a day early and fish there instead.

The journey itself to Narrandra isn't that bad and the scenery is quiet pleasant and still green, however it is from here on you can start to see how the drought has really affected parts of Australia. We stopped at what use to be a big lake where I had always planned to have a fish at some stage as there use to be reports of tench being in it. You can see from the pictures I don't think they are still there.....it was fully dried up....! even last year it had water in it....



The rest of this Journey is quiet boring really as it's all thru bush and desert mostly but you do get to see lots of kangaroos (some even stuck on the bull bar) and wild emu's and also the huge merino sheep monument that is set up at the truck stop...? what's all that about, am not yet fully sure but I do have a few welsh friends back home whom am sure could fully inform me or will know something about the history of this huge sheep worshipping statue......!

But once you get close to Mildura the country side starts to get green again and the town itself is big and has everything in it...including a few good bars and restaurants

There was just the 4 of us sharing the cabin this time and Shaun was to arrive on the Thursday evening so we would have plenty of room when we got all our gear unpacked ( there was 7 of us in this one last year...!) The cabins are almost on the river bank, not the match stretch but you could still go down and start catching fish from the back door. But we decided to be sociable again the first night and check out the local pubs and wait till the morning for a good practise session.

We fished for a few hours in the morning just downstream from the cabins but the wind again was unbearable and we had some heavy showers of rain. Once thing I had noticed was how heavy the weed was in the margins compared to what it normally is here and hoped it wouldn't be as bad on the match stretch which was a few kms further downstream. After the third heavy rain shower we packed up and made the easy decision to return to town for some refreshments......
The Friday match is just an open and is used mainly to get some bait in the swims and line some fish up for the main sat and sun 2 day event..My Friday draw put me on A 6 which is a peg I have fished here before..it's quiet a deep river and doesn't have much flow on it although it is controlled by locks and can move left and right a little at times...Again there was alot of margin weed which was thick out to 10 mts where I had a drop off to 11 ft of water. From there it gradually kept sloping away and on the feeder line at 40 mts or so I had a count of 18 before a one oz bomb hit the deck

peg A6 Day one

I set up 3 pole rigs, 1.5 gram and 2 gram both on top 5's to fish at 11 mts and a 3 gram rig on a top 6 to fish slightly further down the slope but also to use on my 11 mt line as a bagging rig should the fish really fire up later in the day...Mind you the first day can be hard in some areas and you normally need an end peg to do well, then they spread out more on day 2 and 3 once some bait goes in. All my rigs were on .20 line with an olivette stopped on a small swivel with .18 hooklenghts to some fox S2 extra strong or animal 12 hooks...elastics were middy shockcore 18 to 22 and preston 19 h....
I did have some heavier rigs and some tops with red hydro on standby but I usually treat the first day as a muck around session unless I really start bagging up and then switch over. I had both an open and method feeder rod also set up.
The match couldn't have started better, after I dropped my rig out and the 5th of my 10 baby heads hit the water the elastic was shooting out my pole.... A 1 kg fish was a nice start and I had 3 more in the first hour but also lost a few in the thick weed. But from there it just got slower and harder. I had to use my lightest rig to get bites and ended up with 12 fish for just over 10 kgs..even the fish I got were much smaller than the average size for here...I even had one about 3 ozs which I have never seen here before. I did somehow manage to lose another 12 or 13 fish in the weed and it was a real pain in the ass. Having talked to a few after it seemed everyone around me had the same problem and most only got half of what they hooked in the net. I did notice that I landed more fish on the softer stretcher middy elastic by letting them run out abit and playing them to the top so at least something was learned from today...now I just had to find a weed rake for tomorrow.
Overall the day was won by Tony Howard with 40 kgs from D section and 26 kgs was 3th so I think I was at least in the top 15 today . I had Tony's young son Dylan on the next peg to me but luckily managed to keep my scalp from him today...he has taken it before and many others on some of the bigger matches we have here
Dylan Howard..

Saturday
I was hoping to draw in the 30's or 40's today (C and D) as I had some good weights from there last year and some pegs had fish in them yesterday too but was somewhat miffed when A7 was stuck to my hand from the drawbag. Glen the guy that fished it yesterday had the same amount of fish as me from there but it was a little more snaggy, along with the thick margin weed it also had a sunken tree to the left. It was also a new swim just cut out in the reeds so I had a little landscaping and weeding to do to get set up.......
Peg A 7

After clearing all the deadly snakes, killer spiders, man eating lizards, and the usual wild life that live in these parts from my peg I eventually got set up. I just set up 2 top 5 rigs today at 11 mts(2 gram & 4 gram) but went to my .23 line rigs as I could see part of the sunkin tree to my left, plus a method and open feeder rod. I just cupped in 2 small balls of groundbait and some corn at the start as there is usualy a few fish around first and would feed after according to my bites. I let 6 balls go on the feeder line and put 6 more feeders of corn and maggot over it at 35 mts before dropping my 2 gram rig in and straight away was getting some liners but the water was moving thru..with it being Saturday I realised that the locks are proberly opening more for boats so switched to my 4 gram as I was not getting bites letting the lighter rig run thru. After another 10 mins of liners and knocks the float went under and before I had time to think about keeping it away from the tree and weed I had another problem to worry about.......how to water ski on my rive box...!...I ended up very quickly adding my 12.5 mt section on, was stood at the end of my footplate and had my pole and arms at full stretch (not to mention 6 or 7 mts of elastic gone mid river by now) before I got this fish to slow down and turn it around....after a long 10 mins or so I played the fish to the top with 9 mts of pole and netted it just at the edge of the weed....it was close to 5 kgs so was a nice start. I re-fed another cupfull of crumb and corn and went back out again with a single corn and maggot. Two minutes later I back was in the same position and could feel the back legs on my box tipping up this time.....another 10 minutes I had carp with the biggest mouth I have ever seen in the landing net and again close to 5 kgs...45 minutes in and had 10 kgs in the net so was doing ok. Yesterday the fish were too small and today after two my arms were knackered........For the next 2 hours I was getting a few fish in the net but all were much smaller than my first two but once again was losing a few in the weeds as were those around me from the shouting I could hear. The bites had started to slow and even upping my feed didn't seem to switch it on. after a biteless 40 mins and nothing on the feeder I decided to feed heavy with some maggot to see if it would get some fish back.
We don't normally feed much maggot on here as it tends to attract lots of silver perch (Aussie native bass like fish) into the swim. They are a nice fish to catch on the pole and can go over 2 kgs but with there being a strict no take limit on them we can't even retain them in a keepnet here so they don't count in matches on the Murry river. I have noticed thou the last few times on here if it goes quiet and you do start spraying maggot in, once the silvers turn up the carp usualy come back and muscle they way back into the feeding activity...It's just a case of putting up with landing silvers first till they do. It took a full 25 mins of loose feeding maggot and about 10 silvers (prob 12 kgs total or so) before I hooked a carp again and then had them right till the final whistle but still lost half what I hooked in the weed.
No Bull but i could put my whole fist into this carp's mouth.........80 mm bollies next time maybe..?

I had 21 carp for just over 29 kgs in the end but was disapointed to find out it was only enough for 6th in my 12 man section. The section was won with 51 kgs from A1 and a few 40's and 30's after it but again all the talk was about the amount of weed in the pegs and I think everyone had lost what their weights were also. The lower C and D sections had fish good and top overall weight today was Welsh ex pat. Mark Turner with 93 kgs of C 34. It was back to the cabin to sort out some bait and gear for the morning and then we hit the town again that night for a few beers
Sunday
With my chance of a top 3 almost out now I just hoped today for a decent draw on a few fish and maybe get into the top 10 at least. I ended up drawing Mark's peg from yesterday C34 and was feeling pretty hopefull of getting some fish at least.
C 34...my last day peg

I didn't get a chance to talk to Mark at the draw to find out how he fished it but had heard he caught on the pole. My mind however was soon made up to start on 6 mts of my old black magic to hand as soon as I plumbed up...I had a drop off about 1.5 mts from the bank, hardly no margin weed at all and at 6 mt I had 12 ft of water...then it sloped away from there to about 16 ft at 11 mts...oh the fact my plummet had trouble finding the bottom with fish hitting the line no matter where I put it made my decision alot easier too. As the river was moving a bit again this morning my plan was to start at 6 mts, 4 gram rig, .23 line and red hydro. As the sun came up and I expected the fish to push out later also I had a 5 gram rig on a another top 6 and would add sections as needed to keep with them...I threw a handfull of corn well upstream on the all in and fired 8 balls on a feeder line as a back up. First drop in and withing 30 seconds I had a fish on and couldn't go wrong for next hour landing 10 fish and had about 15 kgs in the net..I did bump a few that were foulhooked and had stopped loosefeeding and started dropping smalls balls of crumb and corn in. After 2 1/2 hours I had 21 fish but the bites had started to slow and I was out on my 10 mt line now too...to keep bites coming. The next 45 mins it died altogether (why does this always happen when I add a second keepnet ?), plus by now John Foxall on the next peg had started to put a few fish together on the feeder. Despite getting a fish almost straight away on my feeder line it was slow there for me also..I could get a fish every 15 to 20 mins but John was now catching alot faster and was getting close to me in fish numbers. Having already used 5 cans of corn I opened up 5 more cans and added a full 3 cans to 8 balls of crumb and let it go on my pole line at 9 mts...there was 1 hour 50 mins to go so and I was going to spray maggot over this for the next 20 mins while I tried the feeder a few more times. I was hoping this time the maggot would fall to the lower end of the swim with the depth and keep the silvers there and some carp would make their way back up. With 1 1/2 hours to go I had 4 silvers on the trot on corn before I hooked into a carp and continued to catch fish right till the all out again...I even had the last 4 carp back on my 6 mt line again...I ended up with 41 fish for 73.3 kgs and finished 2nd in the section with Mal Cannop weighing in 88 kgs from C 29 , but there was a few 60kgs also...John had 64 kgs for 4th in our section. Overall Alan Woods won today with 99 kg from the lower D section and went on to win the overall 2 day event on weight difference (160kg total for 2 days) the top 3 all had 3 points and were seperated by weight countback. I finished 8th overall so was happy enough and still had a great time meeting old and making new friends again...Overall there was 2600 kgs of fish caught by 48 anglers on Sat and Sun, I don't have the totals for fri but when you think that carp are not stocked here..infact Aussies don't ever return anyone they catch there must be some head of fish in there. I talk to two anglers who stayed on the monday and tues to pleasure fish since and bother days they were just tired of catching carp after 4 hours...Well thats it with the murry river till next year maybe for me.....Next month (Nov) we have a 3 day teams of 4 match/NSW open back in Canberra so hopefully some good weights again plus I have a few club matche reports to catch up on in the next week or so

A mirror from my 73 kgs weight on the last day
Woodsey does it again....four times now in eight years I am told...well done

Final winter league match

I wish I had more to write about from our last winter league match but with me drawing on the shallower section of the lake I was really against it from the start of getting anywhere in the match. We had a ground frost the night before and with a few extra anglers also fishing it meant the pegging was even tighter on the side I fished. The Lake level has now also started to drop as the race course club have started to use some water from it to keep the tracks soft and there hasn't been much rain in Sydney for a while.

My peg for the final winter league match

On plumbing up at my peg I couldn't find anything deeper than 2 1/2 ft anywhere on the pole up to 16 mts..chucking a bomb around up to 60 mt also failed to find a count of more than a second anywhere so my confidence was really high at the start today of getting some fish...not...!

To cut out all the boring details I fed swims at 13, 14 and a 16 mt line at different angles, fished a waggler at 35 to 40 mts and a small feeder further out to end the match with 7 carp for 7.4 kgs. It was frustrating as I didn't have a bite the first 2 hours and then when I did start getting indications would hook a fish on one method, land it and have to wait at least a half hour or more before they would come back on any line again despite switching around. They just seemed to spook so easy in the shallow water, then the tight pegging and cold night didn't help either. Anyway that's the Winter league out of the way and now have the SCAC club Championships to start next month. With the extra anglers now coming out of winter hibernation am not too sure how this venue will go for pegging. With the levels dropping and now probably at least 25 fishing it will be a struggle to get all on...plus after going through all the results it is the same area the big weights come out of each match it may be a draw bag venue for matches unless they move about when it warms up.

"Tickle me Yorkie" on the next peg.....I could have tickled him with a 9 mt pole from my peg........!

And "Tickle me Maurice" on the other side...almost 10 mts need to prod Maurice during the match and keep him awake...He had a tough day with one fish from a peg that had 33 kgs last time. Hopefully we have seen the last of Sydney's frosts.

"Brummie" Paul (or "sticky fingers" now is what I am calling him) ended up drawing a new hastily added end peg today on the deeper dam in and had half the lake to himself. Well done to him and he make no mistakes and weighed in 38 kgs to win today's match and overall league with 2 wins and a 4th. Bill Childs was second with 33 kgs from the favourite peg on the far deeper side and all the weights from that peg went 28 kgs, 25 kgs, 20 kgs down to 9 kgs almost in a line to where it shallows up. My day was made more frustrating by the fact that when sitting watching my motionless float I was facing over to these pegs and could see landings nets flying all around the place from the first 5 mins of the match. I did have the heaviest weight from the 7 anglers on my section with 3 kgs being the next weight to mine. Overall I think I finished 9th or 10th in the league but I think there was just 1 point separating the top 3 to 10 places so it was a pretty close league still but Please hurry up warm weather!

"Landing net wars" on the far side all day long.

Chatting to Paul after he did 'modestly' say he had been lucky with the draws and drew on fish in both matches he won and had them straight from the start. Looking through the results he said I was unlucky with my draws also. But well done to him and also as its his first match series here since moving to Oz. When I got home I decided to try and sort my drawing problems out and slammed the tackle shed door on my right hand........at least 20 times, so hopefully drawing with my left hand from now on will improve things for the club Champs !

Our new club also has a new league starting on the 23rd of this month and we have decided to run 6 matches with the top 3 fishing in a final against the top 3 from the Victorian league for close to $1000 winner take all prize money so this will be a pretty competitive league. There are still some minor details to be sorted but at the moment there are 12 anglers booked in from NSW which also means we can fish some of the smaller fairer waters we pleasure fish on and hopefully should have some good weights of fish. Our First match is on Glenwood where I had the big eel in the last blog and some of the others fished it last week and had 100 lb bags also so will be looking forward to this. Plus the fact "Sticky fingers" has now started working here means his midweek practice sessions have been curtailed from now on....Ha ha.....he started working in the Coco Cola plant last week so I have now added several litres of coke to our weekly shopping list at home just to make sure he's kept in there all week !

Tomorrow a few of us are back for a knock up on our new club lake here and also meeting with some members of another park committee at the lake to let them see the sort of fishing we do and hopefully gain access to a few park lakes that we have been trying for a long time to get in and fish. I have seen lots of carp in these particular lakes before and if you throw in some bread it's like a feeding frenzy on a fish farm but sadly because of a few idiots fishing is banned on there. Also the fact they are close to the city and its quiet a big public park it can't be bad for any sort of promotion of coarse fishing should we get access.

The temps are to hit 29 degress tomorrow here in Sydney so Come on Summer, your almost there !

Spring is in the air....!

Well there are some signs of spring around the corner in Australia but not sure if these ducks have started their breeding nookie a little early just to try to keep themselves a little warmer here...it has been bleeding freezing most nights !

I got this picture only last weekend at a new venue we fished here. It's a venue some of the older anglers use to fish years back but has had fishing banned from it for a number of years now mostly because of the bad habits of a few native anglers leaving litter and leaving a hook in a swan at one time. Finally after some discussions with the local Council we have gained the sole rights to use it for the members of our newly formed club here in Sydney. We have also secured permission to fish another huge waterway just a few minutes from my home in the middle of a golf club that has never allowed fishing. It is stuffed with carp, some huge koi's as well as native fish and we're just waiting for all the paperwork to go through before we can get in there. You would not believe the paperwork needed just to go fishing here in Oz. Insurances, permit for this, permit for that, Health and Safety this, Health and Safety that............................anyway...

"NSW CARC" (Coarse Angling Research Club) is the name of our new club here....sounds really scientific doesn't it....?

Having noticed how many of the venues are getting closed from angling here because of the disregard for the local environment from mostly local anglers and the twice a year type anglers we decided that a 'fishing club' doesn't sound the best when applying to fish in the waterways with the authorities. A fishing club here in Australia is more seen as a bunch of blokes out swigging a few beers here on a Sunday and messing around, then leaving the empties (plus what other rubbish they have in their cars) behind on the bank before going to the local for the rest of the evening....Many of the lakes in local suburbs and parks are controlled by the local councils and over the last few years it seems it's cheaper just to ban fishing from them than trying to police it. There is just the one Coarse fishing club in Sydney or was, now there is two. As they only hold one match a month and a few of us were a little keener to fish other weekends as a group and have a few knock ups we decided to set up another proper club, get a members insurance cover and all the other legal stuff needed to avoid any problems with councils and also maybe show them that most coarse anglers are responsible on the water and not litter louts. We are still all remaining members of the Sydney club, but it does mean we can now have a few extra matches and already have 15 members joined plus now have a club venue to fish any time hassle free. We have just set up a new website in some hope of getting the sport a little more promoted here and are setting dates for a new club league. So far 3 other exiled UK anglers and a Croatian match angler living here recently joined that didn't even know there was any fishing here.

The more the merrier.........

http://www.nswcarc.com.au/Index.htm

It still needs some work but over the next few weeks it should be going proper and we are currently working with some dates and venues for a club league starting from next month.

Now back to some fishing.

I didn't have any match since my last blog with the Sydney coarse angling club as the next winter league match isn't till August 9th, but have had plenty of pleasure session with a few of us going out together here

The first one was at Glenwood lake were I had fished a month or so back. There was just the 3 of us but we decided to draw for 3 pegs, $10 each and see how it went ( it's hard to keep that competitive nature from match anglers...!) I had been running late that morning and called ahead telling Paul and Yorkie to go ahead and would fish whatever peg they left for me. Both had just started fishing when I got there and Paul was into a carp as I was still setting up. The J range elastics I had ordered from the UK had arrived midweek so I was keen to see how they went today. Its a shallow venue here (only about 3 ft at 13 mts) and the average size fish is 1.5 to 2 kgs so had the pink and yellow stuff in my tops to try out.

After taking about 40 mins to get set up and settled in I fed 2 balls of groundbait and a cup full of chopped worm and hemp at 11 mts while Paul who was beside me was now netting his 3th fish. I fed a margin line also but hadn't much confidence in it as the nights had been all clear skies and really cold. After 20 mins or so I had the odd liner and after another 10 mins got my first fish in the net on a piece of worm on the 11 m line. The next 2 hours I had 6 fish and pulled out of 3 foul hookers but the last hour and a half it picked up and had 8 more fish while Paul's swim seem to die on him. At the end I weighed 43lb 12ozs to Paul's 26 lbs. (that will teach them to give me the duff peg next time ......!) I had all my carp on a piece of worm or bread punch which are usually the top baits here in the colder weather. Also the yellow J elastic seemed to work perfect with a pull bung all day

Myself and Paul also had another midweek session on Caddis creek where I had fished some matches a few months back and with a big head of small fish it was perfect to give me a chance to try out the pink J elastic in my pole. Once again the cold nights slowed the fishing down somewhat but both of us had a good 25 to 30 lbs each of small carp in 3 or 4 hours mostly again on bread punch or worm although Paul did lose a few fish and rigs in a snag in his swim and packed up a little earlier than me as he was having one of them sort of days by the look of it..............After a big fish snapped his white hydro, he then snapped a hinge on his box while getting a new rig out so he reckoned it was safer to pack up or next he could see a pole section going in half.........!

Caddis creek...always a good venue

Our next session was on the new lake in the park that we got permission to use from the council for our new club. There are about 15 pegs on the main lake and it doesn't need any work at all as it's in the middle of a park and gets maintained weekly by the local council. Our new club has also offered to help with litter clean ups when we're on there. I still can't get over the way people leave so much crap behind them in the parks here in Australia. The lake itself has Carp, wild goldfish, eels, mullet and bass (and it will be getting some new little baby tench this year in the spring.., I know that for definite as I've got a few pairs in my pond ready for breeding !)

It's a cracking looking venue with a series of 2 small lakes with about 8 pegs on them all connected to the bigger lake with 15 or so pegs on it. Most of the depths average from 2 1/2 foot to 4 foot on the pole range and from 5 to 7 foot towards the middle of the lake. We haven't had a look at the smaller ponds yet for depths but would expect roughly the same. The day we fished was overcast and we had a few rain showers but it was cold, probably one of the coldest days I have fished in Sydney yet. Four of us fished and we all got off to a good start with plenty of bites and fish coming out but as the rain arrived the temps kept dropping and the fish seemed to stop feeding.

To make things worse with it being so good at the start I think we all made the same mistake of over feeding thinking it was going to be one of those baggin days. I also had another day of foul hookers after a great first hour at 6 mt I lost 4 fish in a row and then it died for me. I pick up a few later when it got hard on a small method feeder and ended up with 6 carp and 3 goldfish. Brummie Paul made the most of the first 2 hour feeding spell and continued to pick up the odd fish most of the session to finish top rod on the day with almost 40 kgs. Yorkie also managed to get a few mullet in his net with another 8 or 9 carp. Mark Dean our 4th angler on the day didn't start till later but also had 5 or 6 before it switched off. We will be back on here soon enough once the weather warms a little and it does seem to have a few fish in it

Paul with his biggest fish of 26 fish he caught that went almost 40 kgs in total

As I am just after finishing a project with work and not starting the next one for another week or so I had Friday free this week so decided to head back to Glenwood lake for a few hours. Another new club member just back from his holiday in the UK , Andrew was also fishing today. Paul had a job interview so couldn't fish but came down for a chat later and took some pics for me. I decided to fish the corner near the dam end that I had never fished before and Andrew set up next peg on my left. The depth again is uniform with all the rest of the lake I have fished so far being about 3 ft between 11 and 13 m. I had a nice even 2 foot deep in the margins both sides 1 mt or so from the bank and had brought some luncheon meat to try there at 6 m to my left later. It had been cold the previous night but the day was to warm up so after I fed my pole lines out went the bomb with punch bread for the first half hour or so. I just fed one ball of groundbait on each swim, a half cup of chopped worm, hemp and corn at 13 m and a full cup of meat and hemp in the margins and continued to throw in 2 or 3 bits of corn over it every 5 mins or so. After half an hour and just a few liners I could hear some splashing from the left of me and Andy was getting a few fish on the pole. From the few times we have fished this lake the average size of carp seems to be about 3-4 lbs. Both my rigs were . 3 grams on .16 line both to a 16 B911's and again I had my J range elastics in to try out with the green for the margins and yellow for the long line. First 3 drop ins on the margin line with a piece of corn and I had 3 liners and then had a fish almost rip the pole from my hand next drop in. After 5 mins or so I had a fish almost 8 lbs in the net. Nothing for the next 10 mins so I re fed half a cup of meat,hemp and corn there and went out on the long line for a bit.

I kindered in some hemp and worm for the first 3 or 4 put in's and then hit a fish on worm that went half way across the lake before I could slow it down. That yellow elastic don't half stretch ! After a long 10 minutes I had another fish closer to 10 lbs in the landing net. Over the next hour I had 6 more carp in the net all around 3 to 4 lbs and pulled out of 3 but was struggling a little with the yellow elastic as it seemed the cold nights hadn't slowed these fish up one bit. I wasn't losing many it was taking ages to get them in even with a pull bung. Also the wind was starting to pick up and my swim was starting to have a strong tow now to my right to I set up another top with some black hydro and a .4 gram rig. The next hour and half I had 12 more carp in the net all the same stamp size again and all on a worm head or full worm. Andy was getting fish regularly next door at this stage now as well. I was dropping a few pieces of corn in the margins all the time hoping to get a few there later and after putting my 20th fish in the net decided I had to try it. I had some liners straight away and thought this will be good. After 2 or 3 minutes of liners the float disappeared and I hit what was a snag which then started to move around slowly in circles. Another ffff...ing foul hooker I thought and tried to just move it from the swim as fast as I could.

After about 10 minutes I had moved all of about 12 inches and at one stage I thought it most be caught up in something. Eventually after another 10 minutes I started to make some headway with some elastic slowly coming back thru the pulla bung and as I got it close to within netting range could see it was a slightly biggish eel hooked in the mouth. After a struggle I finally got it to stay in the landing. It was over a meter long and weighed almost 7 lbs. I had only about half an hour of fishing time left after all the eel wrestling so went back on the long pole and got 4 more carp before I had to pack up but the swim was still full of fish at 13 m.

In the end I had 24 carp and the eel for 119 lbs in 4 1/2 hours of fishing and Andy had just over 60 lbs. This is one of the better venues here at the moment. I haven't had less than 40 lbs yet anytime I have fished it and its still winter. When you think its all natural and wild fishing it makes you wonder what the fishing would be like here if it had some sort of decent management over it.

I may just have to sneak back on here this week again for a few hours.

Some of the fish we caught ... I had tried to hold the eel up for the pic but it tried to snap on my fingers a few times so decided it was better leave it in the net......!


Am back on the racetrack venue for the final leg of the winter league next weekend so fingers crossed I get a good draw there and a few others have some tough ones........