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
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