Sunday 14th August - Clevedon Club Match, Durleigh Res

 I have not been able to fish this annual fixture for some time due to league commitments but a free summer this year changed that and I was looking forward to it.

Durleigh is well known for it's vast shoals of bream and large carp but there is also some very good roach fishing to be had as well.

Even though I had not fished it for some time I was aware of it's current form as there is a league on the venue this year with some regular posts on social media on how it has been fishing.

I spoke to Mark Bartlett on the Saturday when I was over at Acorn Fishery getting some bait. Mark had been fishing the league and he confirmed my thoughts on what the approach should be the following day. Mark was also running the match for us as Rob Fogg had other commitments.

It was still going to be a hot one and I planned to wear a pair of old trainers and shorts to wade out into the water, set up the rigger with my box on it with feet in the water to stay cool.

I arrived at Durliegh in plenty of time, 18 were booked in but 19 turned up ... lol ....so Mark had to squeeze in an additional peg.

After dipping the nets the draw got underway and a dip into the bucket after the mad dash saw me pull out peg 7, my favourite number which is permeant peg 5 on the lake.

A fairly short walk brought me to a nice open peg with Matt Vowles on 8 and Mark Birdseye on 6.

The lake was flat calm and some green algae on the surface.

I set up as planned and it was very comfortable.

It was a bit like an Ireland set up to be fair and good practice for my Irish Festival campaign in September.

Everything I needed was out there..........

2 x 6 metre whips, 1 feeder rod (which I never used).

3 kilo of mixed Sensas Gros Gardons Noire and Black Lake.

2 pints of hemp, 1 pint of caster, 1/2 pint of dead reds, 1/2 pint live reds, 1/4 kilo of worm.

On the "all in" I put in 2 medium sized balls of ground bait with hemp, caster and dead reds. Mark next door put a method feeder out about 60 metres with one of them bandit thingy's or wafter on the hook. I thought he might have a long wait but then again if I wasn't fishing that far out or Nigel on peg 5 he would have that line to himself.

Out went a small 2AA waggler on my trusty Sensas 175 record whip. I had a maggot on the 18 wide gape hook (B560) and it soon sailed away but it was only a 1 oz roach. Back out and the same again.

A change to caster on the hook soon had me netting a small skimmer about 12 oz.

I quickly got into a rhythm feeding small nuggets every few minutes and the fish responded. Lovely roach some of which I netted.

An hour must have passed and Mark next door was into a bream, not a bad fish at around 4lbs. If they rocked up in any numbers I'd be in trouble but thought I was ahead of him at this point. Matt next door on 8 was catching but mixing it between the feeder and waggler so not getting fish as quickly as I was, I couldn't see anyone else.

Things were going well for me and then Mark on 6 had a few more bream.

Hybrids turned up in front of me which were good little weight builders but seemed to force the roach out but feeding a little heavier brought them back.

About an hour to go my waggler rig got trashed, all knotted up so picked up the other whip which only had a 4 x 14 on it. 

I was fishing about half a metre shorter now but it didn't make any difference.

At the end of the match I was covered in slim and algae but enjoyed the day.

Mark ended up with 5 bream and a couple of skimmers.

I walked up along the bank to meet the scales, the bank telegraph suggested that Dan Dymond had 10 bream but that was a wind up.  I saw Mark (Bartlett) weigh a lovely net of fish going 28lb 15oz. Mark said he saw me out in the water swinging in quite a few fish and asked did I count them, I never do that. That was the best weight from 19 to 12.

Mark Bartlett

When I pulled my net out I knew it would be close, it was, I weighed 29lb 12oz.

A great day

So that put me in the lead but Mark B next door was to weigh next. His bream bag went a level 20lb.

Our own "Top Gun" Mark Birdseye

The pegs after that weighed less so I came out top overall. It was great to beat bream nets using the whip.

Here is a photo of Dan Dymond with 8 bream less in his net lol but he won his section ......

Dan with some lovely fish 20lb 06oz.

1st Ivan Currie 29-12

2nd Mark Bartlett 28-15

3rd Dave Nash 23-09

4th. Adie Baker 20-10

A section Mark Birdseye 20-00

B section Paul Smith 15-13

C section Dan Dymond 20-06

Evesham again this Wednesday for the final match before the BH Festival and then the Glossy on Sunday with Chris Hook for the Angling Trust Canal Pairs qualifier.

Sunday 30th July - Clevedon Club Match Durleigh Reservoir

With no league match on this weekend I decided to support my Clubs Match on Durleigh Reservoir.

Durleigh Reservoir is just outside the town of Bridgwater (postcode TA5 2AW) and is 80 acres in size.
For those of you thinking of fishing it here is a link to paste giving you all the info you need. ( no keep nets for pleasure fishing).
https://www.wessexwater.co.uk/About-us/Community/...reservoirs/Durleigh-reservoir/

17 booked in so we were all pegged along the Lodge Bank. There has been a few matches on it lately with some really good weights made up of roach, hybrids, perch and decent bream. The last match was won by England Carp Team Captain Mark Bartlett with 36 bream for over 100lb.

I had fished it in the week and had 6 good bream along with some big roach on 8mm banded pellet on the pellet feeder. The water has a lot of big carp and the other fish have got used to the pellet and high protein bait going in.
The Reservoir is a lot shallower up the top end making the draw an all important factor. I thought if I draw a peg at the shallow end I would fish the pole / whip for roach.

On the morning of the match I was driving through a local village and killed a pigeon that flew into the van. Didn't like that and felt bad (not as much as the pigeon though). I thought to myself ''thats me doomed''.
Driving the down the M5 the temperature gauge was reading 11 degrees around Clevedon and towards Bridgwater it went up to 13.
Arrived at the Reservoir around 08:00 and saw there were a few who joined the Club just to fish the match (£20 to join the Club and £20 to fish) but no worries good for the Club.
Into the draw box and the draw gods paid me back for the earlier incident as I drew peg 4 right up the shallow end.

The mighty Durleigh my peg was bottom right just past 2nd lot of trees.

I walked up the bank with Rob Fogg who had Peg 3 passing the fancied lawn area were Sensas 88 angler Chris Parr was pegged. Up our end was roach slayer Steve Kedge on Peg 1, Andy Law Peg 2. Below us and the other side of the trees was Sensas 88 anglers Paul Purchase and Mark Bromsgrove (no mugs here then).

Well the plan of fishing the pole / whip went out the window. Why I do not know and instead set up 2 Feeder Rods. 13' 8'' dutch master for fishing a 45 gram hybrid feeder at 60 turns and my trusty drennan pro feeder for fishing the window feeder at around 45 turns. Both filled with micro hemp and dead reds mixed with fishmeal and a banded wafter or pellet at the hook end. How did fishing for bream end up like this?

I had traditional bream baits in the bag but thats were they stayed.

I think that the big weights taken on the previous match and Rob just setting up a feeder rod influenced me.

I started off on the window feeder with banded pellet and got a couple of early knocks but no proper pull arounds. Rob was casting a fair old way and his method feeder landed with a proper thud probably sparking out a few roach on the way down. Despite this he had the first fish after about 40 minutes on a red wafter. I followed suit n the hybrid feeder and had my first fish after about 30 minutes but Rob had also added another.

We could hear the guys to our right having some banter and could tell Chris Parr was having a great day on the bream.

We shared information during the long wait for a bite and had the odd fish in turn, big skimmers or baby bream around 2lbs.

A couple of bank walkers with around and hour and a half to go said most were struggling.

Towards the end Rob had a late run of 3 or 4 fish ending up with 9 to my 5. 

Rob ended up with just over 20lb to my 11lb.

Robs catch, well done mate.

Chris Parr done the business and ended up with around 30 bream for 63lb plus caught on open ended feeder chop and caster!

Mark Bromsgrove 2 pegs below me had a great day on the whip for 37lb odd and second place.

Here are the weigh sheets....

Great performance from Match Secretary Adie Bakers son Josh with 17lb of small fish.

Josh with his catch.

Super League Practice Match on the Bristol Avon at Newbridge next Sunday followed by the last two matches on the same venue.

Saturday 14th May - pleasure session DURLEIGH Res near Bridgwater

Did not decide to fish today until late yesterday afternoon. I had more than a pint of caster in the bait fridge along with half a pint of red and a tin of hemp, the compost heap provided plenty of red worm.

The Reservoir does not open until 8 am so half a breakfast on the way down the M5 in the Services. On arrival in the car park at the venue there were about 8 vehicles and after going up to the Lodge to get a day ticket (£7.50) I noticed there where a few swims across on the far side so made the decision to fish the first one immediately at the end of the dam wall.

On the way across a Canada Goose mum was out with her two chicks.

It did not take long to set up as I only intended to fish the Feeder. Ground Bait was a Sensas Lake base with Sensas Roach and Brown Crumb to bulk it out a bit. I also soaked some maggot to make them floaters for the hook. The peg was just as I like it and was able to get down in the water.

I clipped up at a distance of about 50 yards picking the flag pole of the sailing club as my marker. You would think it would be fairly deep near the dam but I had no more than about 6 feet. First chuck with a feeder full of caster and hemp I had the rattle on the tip indicating small fish attacking the bait. I hit it anyway but did not connect. The second cast was more successful connecting with a small skimmer of around 4 ozs.  This continued for about 30 minutes and I decided to put 3 casters on the 14 hook which resulted in a nice steady pull round of the tip and I hit what I knew to be a bream. It was soon netted and a nice fish of about 3 lbs. There was a nice ripple on the water which was helpful as it was warming up a bit with the sun coming out behind the decreasing clouds. 

Bringing in a small fish the line went solid and I had a pike bite through the line after a short tug of war. This happened another 3 times during the 6 hour session (never had this before at the venue).

Fed up with small fish I put a double red worm on and this brought me another slow but sure pull around. Connecting with the fish it held bottom for  few seconds and then just moved very slowly. it felt a heavy fish and took its time to co-operate with me. When I got it near the net I could see its was a decent bream of between 4 and 5 lbs. Netting it I could see it had just finished spawning as it was very scabby and rough. 

Swapping hook baits and compressing the ground bait more in the feeder brought me a few more skimmers and decent roach up until about 13:00 and then the ripple went leaving the surface flat calm.

Decent fish were hard to come by but I kept adding 4 oz roach and skimmers up until 15:00 when I ran out of caster.

There was no one close by to take a pick of the catch so had to make do with this shot after putting them in the landing net.

Some more outings next week before the Bristol City Docks 'knock' up on Thursday and Gloucester Canal match on Sunday.

Sunday 24th April - Durleigh Reservoir.

I could have booked in for the Clevedon v Shiplate match down at Shiplate Farm Fishery but preferred to go somewhere more natural. Team mate Sam Johnson was interested in going somewhere as well but couldn't due to other commitments. I had already suggested Durleigh Reservoir just outside Bridgwater for some skimmer fishing and decided to stick to my plan. A quick check with the Ranger and it was confirmed no matches were on and keep nets permitted.
The gates open at 08:00 and I got there about 08:30. The car park had about 10 cars and vans already parked up so I thought there would be plenty of room on this 80 acre water. Pushing my gear up to the Lodge to purchase a day ticket (£7.50) I could already see anglers dotted across on the opposite bank and it did appear to be busy so decided on the Lodge bank. I was surprised to see so many carp anglers on this bank as well and although there was plenty of room at the top of the lake I did not fancy it as it's quite shallow. I took a chance and headed across the dam wall, it's a bit of a hike but from my limited knowledge of the reservoir the weights tend to be a lot better from the far bank.
I believe I was the only angler there who was not looking fishing for carp.
Once across the dam I stopped for a quick chat with the first carpy (and to catch my breath) to see what the score was in terms of depth etc on this side of the reservoir. He informed me that the next peg along (about 50 yards away due to the brambles) was vacant and there was a bar about 40 meters out and that he had seen some good bream catches over the years there. Encouraged by this I moved on and stopped at the peg. It had a nice low bank and I could set up in the water.

Spot on and I guess the closest to an Irish Lough from where I live.

I only brought two tip rods for the session, a 12' and my 13' 8'' dutch master. 

The 12' was set up with a 20 grm open ender with a 14 hook to 0.13. Plumbing up with a lead suggested there was indeed a bar about 40 yards out where it was about 4' and just over it I thought it was around 6'.

The dutch master was set up with a straight lead and a 0.15 hook length to a 14 with a hair rig for fishing a small white pop up boilie. I tried it a few times as the bream can respond to this set up but never had a bite.

Ground bait was a mix of Lake and Black Crumb along with a little Fishmeal to which I added the traditional caster, hemp and dead reds before casting.

It started off as T Shirt weather so the sun lotion came out along with the shades.

I cast out around 10:30 with a small red worm and dead red on the hook (class). i left it no more than 5 minutes and cast out again. On my 4th cast the 2oz tip went around very gentle and a positive thud was felt on the other end I knew it was a skimmer.

Happy days the first fish.

I had another the very next cast and then it went quiet for about 30 minutes. I still kept putting in the bait in and a real wrap around bite came more or less as the bait hit the bottom, felt a much better fish and put up a nice nodding fight closer to the net, a nice bream of around 3 lbs.

The 5 hour session was not hectic and the fish did back off from time to time but I believe I hit 90% of the bites ending up with just over 34 lbs according to the spring balance.

I walked up to the next peg and asked one of the carp lads to take the picture below.

A cracking venue but check with the Ranger whether or not there are any matches on prior to planning a trip.

Contact

Ranger: Paul Martin.

Bridgwater, Somerset TA5 2AW.

01278 424786

fishing@wessexwater.co.uk

Plan to fish the Bristol Feeder Canal on Tuesday and possibly the Docks evening match on Thursday.

Clevedon Club Match Durleigh Res Sunday 11th August

Match Secretary sent out a few texts concerning this match and was struggling to get the numbers due to people on holidays and others committed to the SW Super League on the Bristol Avon at Newbridge. In the end he managed to get 9 including 2 new members. The Ranger was good as well as he charged us £80 instead of the regular £120 for the Lodge Bank. I had gleaned some info prior to the match of James Gunter who won the last match a few weeks ago with 58lb of bream, micro and 4's by way of the method feeder with 8mm banded on the hook. It goes against the grain a bit with me fishing this way but hey ho. The other alternative was roach fishing, 52lb of roach was 2nd last time. On the day all 9 turned up, it was a fairly relaxed afair peg 1 would be just past the sailing hut and then everyone else paced out 25 meters after that, so plenty of room. I drew peg 9 which is a fairly good area, the res was very low and you needed to wade out and set a platform up or extend the seat box legs, the wind was up and blowing into the corner of our bank, theis coloured the water so was looking good. Kev Perry and Andy Hembrow were fishing, these guys fish here at distance but have the rods and reels to do this were as the rest of us use conventional river rods.Carp today would count as their true weight and those fishing at distance were expected to do well. I set up my method rig and a waggler rod, why I do not know when I planned to fish top 2 but on the day for roach, my thinking was to stick it out for bream, only the top two were being paid out. I had clipped up at about 50 meters using a 30 gram feeder and picked my far bank marker, this would be comfortable enough given the wind factor. On the all in I set about putting a bit of bait in first, 5 casts with no hook bait, on my 3rd cast with pellet on the hook the tip went round (I was surprised at this, mainly due to lack of confident in the pellet)and I landed a small skimmer about 8 ozs. I had a few more bites in quick sucession but was difficult to hit them, on reflection I should have used braid. Match Secretary Aide was next to me and he also was getting skimmers. I did catch quite a few hybrids some of them bumped off due to the distance being retrieved and on a barbless hook. I could also see new member (who new what he was doing) fishing the top 2 and getting a roach a chuck. At the halfway mark I shouted to Adie to see how he was doing, 'a carp about 6lbs and a couple of 3lb' was his reply, didn't see him catch them which proves I was concentrating! At the all out I was first to weigh, I thought maybe 8lbs but the scales went 12lb 8oz.

Ivan 12lb 8oz

Next to weigh was Adie, he had a nice net of silvers including some hybrids and a carp that was very thin, Adie said he came in really easy and he didn't know it was a carp until he got it near the next, he weighed 28lb dead.

Adie 28lb

New member and local lad Adam Palmer could hardly pull his net out, all roach, it looked like he had used a trawler, just a massive net of silver bars, mos to them around 3 - 4 ozs, it took two weighs for a fantastic 61lb 14oz, I did not get a pic as it was hectic and I was weighing in but here is the man himself.

Adam 61lb 14oz

The weights were as follows:

1st Adam Palmer 61lb 14oz

2nd Adie Baker 28lb

3rd John Page 24lb 9oz (nearly all roach)

4th Kev Perry 14lb

5th Mike Fairless 13lb 8oz

6th Ivan Currie 12lb 8oz

7th John (the duck) Wolstencroft 10lb 1oz

8th Rich Fogg 9lb 6oz

9th Andy Hembrow DNW (snag pit swim)

Durleigh has changed this year roach seem to be the better option than sticking it out in the hope of getting bream.

Press report for local paper as follows:
 ‘Adam Takes Command’
Royal Marine Commando Adam Palmer used all his local knowledge and skills to win the latest Clevedon Freshwater Angling Club Match which was held on Durleigh Reservoir just outside Bridgwater. Conditions looked good for bream but at the end of the day they failed to show in any numbers. Adam Palmer read the conditions right and took a bit of a risk going for roach at the outset and he was rewarded with a massive 61lb 14oz winning bag of them made up of fish between the 3oz to 4oz range, it is estimated he caught approximately 250 fish all at 4 meters fishing and feeding caster. Second was Match Secretary Adie Baker with a mixed bag of fish including a carp around 6lb for a total weight of 28lb, Adie fished at distance using the method feeder. Third was roofer John Page with a mainly roach bag for 24lb 9oz.

Sunday 21st July - Clevedon v Frys Durleigh Res

I had intended to fish this match but due to a heavy week at work plus having to go in on Saturday left me totally knackered and I needed some sleep.

When Adie Baker sent a text showing the results I regretted not going but another surprise came when he informed me the top weight was made up of bream and the other 6 top weights consisted of roach!!!

Clevedon angler (and a person who loves fishing for silvers on natural venues) James Gunter was drawn on the far bank on peg 5 caught steady throughout the match on the tip for a match winning 58lb 4oz of bream.

James Gunter

 In second place was Fry's stalwart Merv Sivell who was on peg 5 with 52lb 4oz of roach on the whip.

Merv Sivell

The chasing pack all weighed in as follows.....

3rd peg 19 - Warren Bates Frys 44lb 12oz (roach)

4th peg 16 - Derrick Coles Frys 42lb 7oz (roach)

5th peg 15 - Paul Faires Clevedon 39lb (roach)

6th peg 6 - Rob Fogg Clevedon 37lb 2oz (roach)

7th peg 4 - Ray Cooper Frys 35lb (roach)

What a match.

Sunday 10th June Clevedon Club Match Durleigh Res

It's been a few weeks since I have gone coarse fishing and I was really looking forward to the match on Durleigh Res which is just outside Bridgwater. It is a massive venue with good stocks of roach and bream, there are also a lot of carp into high double figures. Carp would only count as a pound in order to make the match fairer as some anglers turn up with dutch master feeder rod and reels capable of casting 100 yds which in the past has paid off. I woke up to what looked like a reasonable day and arrived 20 mins before the draw at 0830. Usually by the time I get there it is already busy with anglers unloading but as I pulled into the car park there was only 6 cars, Steve Bonwick our Chairman was organising the day and said there were only 15 fishing. Just before the draw I looked around and there were a few new faces mainly Sensas Thyers guys who were quite happy to pay the £5 club memebership fee on top of the £20 entry in order to fish the match, most of them would have been familiar with the venue and they are a very capable squad. At this point the weather was still holding up. Looking at the venue the water levels were at normal winter level, I had never seen it so high for this time of year. Into the draw box and out comes peg 13! Listening to what the venue regulars were saying it sounded a reasonable area (I only fish Durleigh about once or twice a year).
Got to my peg and it looked great but due to the water levels I had to wade out a little way to get level or just back from some margin weed, you really need chest waders here. Then the moaning started about the pegging,some anglers did not even bring waders and the suggestion was for all to move down one. I was not happy but in the end there were a few agreed swaps.
Here is the view from my peg, I was sat on the platform at one point and Glenn Calvert made the comment 'Ivan thinks he is in Ireland'

There are similarities as here is a view from my peg on Lake Garidice last Sept.

Anyway I set up 2 feeder rods, one for fishing at approx 40 yds and the other about 30 yds. A mix of Green swim stim and bream 3000  with caster mirco and chopped worm added. Hook bait was to be dead maggot, worm and caster etc with usual combinations. First cast on the long line the 3/4 oz tip went right round and a 3 oz roach was in the net, a few more casts and I added some more small roach, an hour passed and no one was catching (you could hear the various remarks to confirm this). I did add a few skimmers but they were small. An hour into the match the rain came down and did not stop for the duration of the match. The winner was Chris Parr (Sensas Thyers) followed by Mark Bromsgrove (Sensas Thyers) and then Paul Purchase (Sensas Thyers), Weights were not that great though, I didn't get a picture of the winner but here is a pic of Tony G? a decent mixed bag on the day. I think he weighed in just over 10lb.

I done rubbish and only weighed in 2lb 15oz but there were others who done worse and packed up early.

Here is the press report with the full result.

Durleigh Reservoir just outside Bridgwater was the latest venue on the Clevedon Freshwater Angling Clubs match programme. Competitors were keen to target the large bream and roach population during the 6 hour match but high water levels and persistent rain turned the fish off and the majority of anglers struggled. Chris Parr made the most of a good draw and from peg 16 used a combination of fishing the feeder at distance with chopped worm and caster then later in the match waggler rod to catch a respectable 22lb 10oz of bream and roach for first place. Second was Mark Bromsgrove who from peg 9 fished the pole at 14 meters for a mixed bag of small fish for 10lb 14oz using similar baits. Third was Paul Purchase who was not far behind with 10lb 8oz of peg 4. If you would like to know more information about the club please visit http://clevedon-fwac.webs.com/

1^st Chris Parr peg 16 22lb 10oz

2^nd Mark Bromgrove peg 9 10lb 14oz

3^rd Paul Purchase peg 4 10lb 8oz

Further to the comment Glynn made about me thinking I was back in Ireland Paul Faires said at the end of the match 'it is like Ireland with all this fXXXXXg rain lol.

My brother who was over with me last weekend sent me these pics today of his work mate and sons who bagged up on bream in N Ireland last week, now this is more like it.



Tight lines.