Tuesday 24th January Fish for a tenner open Acorn Fishery Kingston Seymour

The Tuesday fish for a tenner opens at Acorn have been running all through the Winter and are organised my Mike Chapman from the SW Disabled and over 55's Angling Club. Not sure why they are advertised 'fish for a tenner' as he took £12.50 off me! I later learned that £2.50 was for the Silver Pool. Starting off from home at 08:15 for the 09:00 draw the weather was ok temperature wise but there was drizzle and a bit of wind not too strong but it would be worse on the moor where the fishery is located. I arrived at the cafe on site at 08:35 and there were quite a few anglers already there tucking into breakfast. This is the first Tuesday match I have fished here, a quick look around and soon identified a few familiar faces (roll on retirement, some of these guys fish 3 times a week). I came across Andy Smith who I had not seen for years, Andy used to (not sure if he still does) run the old Severnside League made up of Post Office and Telecom employee's but later became known as the Avon Commercial League, in the main fishing the Avon above Bath and up as far as Melksham plus the odd match on the Gloucester as well as the K & A Canal, I was surprised to seem him on a venue such as this as he used to be an out and out river angler. Today there were 19 anglers in total.
Into the draw bag and out comes ping pong ball number 18, not brilliant to be honest but 19 anglers across 40 pegs would give everyone a spare peg so you never know.
I was going to walk but given the rain I decided to drive to the peg as did everyone else, I could use the car to shelter from the wind which was getting quite strong. I set up 3 rigs, one to fish at 10 'clock and 2 o'clock at the bottom of the far shelf approx 11 meters out and 5 foot deep, one to fish up the shelf straight in front at 13 meters with 4 foot of depth and one down the track 6 meters out with about 6 foot of water, all rigs had 0.10 hooklength to an 18 maver invincible. I intended to fish a variety of baits on all lines but feed only a small amount of micro with a few casters via a kinder cup. There was a match the previous Sunday so a lot of feed would have gone in. On my right on peg 16 I had Andy Smith who appeared to have only set up a waggler rod (told you he was a river angler), I didn't know the guy on my left but he had a bridge peg which are sought after this time of year.

View from my peg

The whistle went at 10:00 and I fed all 3 lines except the one at 2 o'clock, I went over to this line first with just a single maggot to see if anything was about. Keeping the line out but dragging it slightly from side to side I had a bite after 15 mins but did not connect. I went out again and put a few micro's in the pot which produced a bite almost straight away and a 6oz skimmer was in the net, back out again and nothing, re-feed as before and again nothing. I put the 6 meter down the track rig out with maggot and it sailed away first time, another small skimmer, next put in I hooked into something big, felt like a big carp which as foul hooked and came off, bugger. Net over on the shelf with corn which produced a good skimmer about a pound, nice, then a small pasty carp then it went dead again. I did try the 10:00 line but it did not produce a bite all day. I put a few maggots in the kinder pot and tried the 2o'clock line again, the fish responded and I started to put a few skimmers in the net with a couple of tiny roach but there was only an hour left. I had a decent last hour but was probably too late although as far as I could see no one had really bagged up.

At the weigh in I had 6lb 9oz of silvers and my carp went 1lb 2oz, I beat the anglers either side of me and I was top in the silvers at this point with about 6 to weigh in. I asked Mike how many he was paying out for silvers he said just the one due to having under 20 anglers. Three from last to weigh in was the Somerset Legend that is Charlie Barnes, Charlie weighed in 7lb 2oz! I was one skimmer away.

Top weight on the day was that man again Dave Wride who had 10 carp for 38lb 10oz, that's 3 pick ups in a week.

1st Dave Wride 38lb 10oz

2nd Mike Owen 29lb 7oz

3rd S Belcham 29lb 6oz

Silvers

1st Charlie Barnes 7lb 2oz

2nd Ivan Currie 6lb 9oz

It was a hard day for everyone just wished I sussed the skimmers out earlier. There is a Bristol PO match on Rushcome Lake at Bullocks Farm on Sunday so I hope to fish it all being well.