After what has been a rather testing week, I was looking forward to getting back to my happy place. With my juniors.
The week started earlier than usual with a work party at Sharnhill to make it a little more ‘user friendly’ than it was. With such a wet spring, vegetation growth has been on fast forward and any attempt to cut it back has been met with total contempt by the lake.
I personally smashed a new swim into the reeds to take the total usable pegs to 12. It took me nearly 90-minutes of cutting, pulling, sweating and cussing to cut enough growth back and pull all the roots out. Imagine my dismay when I couldn’t even see where my efforts had been wasted when I went to put out the closure sign…
I must thank Jerry Bracey, Chris Ward, and Chris Painter for their time and effort to make Sharnhill suitable for our juniors to fish on Saturday. But would the lake appreciate the pampering? Read on to find out…
Along with all the cutting, hacking, wading, and strimming, we tried to rake out the bottom growing weed that I can’t remember seeing at Sharnhill before. As I put out the peg numbers, I was satisfied that we had done enough to make all the swims fishable.
I could not have been more wrong.
Weed that had not been visible during either the work party or early in the morning, presented itself clearly once the juniors arrived at their pegs particularly at the far end of the lake. I genuinely could not believe my eyes! It looked like no work had taken place at all and left me feeling bad for those affected.
We had not used the lake for a while, and it had been left to overgrow. My fear was that the small Crucians, goldfish, Carp and Tench would not be there in the same numbers as before, because of the reports I’d had from anyone who had fished there lately.
The sun was out and bathing us with its warmth, but with the threat of rain and possibly even thunder/lightning hanging in the air, your juniors for today were as follows:
Peg 1: Alec ‘Jelly Legs’ Campbell.
Peg 2: Jack ‘Twiglet’ Copp.
Peg 3: Harry ‘Harry Harry Harry Harry Harry Harry Harry’ Willmer.
Peg 4: Vacant.
Peg 5: Josh ‘Hughes Clone’ Roe.
Peg 6: Ollie ‘Aquaboy’ Smith.
Peg 7: Jack ‘T’other Jack’ Cryer.
Peg 8: Kenzie ‘The Iridium Alien’ Toulson.
Peg 9: Josaih ‘His Lordship’ Wells-Parkes.
Peg 10: Austin ‘Rambo’ Scott-Kennedy.
Peg 11: Harry ‘Windchime’ Cryer.
Your ’Snatch’ (The correct collective noun for a group of four angling coaches) of coaches for today were:
John Lennon – Graham Howard
Paul McCartney – Tim Broughton
George Harrison – Nigel Kemp
Ringo Starr – Jon Bass (because he wasn’t there at the start!).
Peg One:
Alec Campbell:
I really fancied peg one. It’s arguably the peg that gets fished the most (It’s nearest to the car park!) and it just looked fishy to me. Reeds everywhere for lumpy hippos to rest in.
But that was not the case, so it seemed. I though Alec started well on a short maggot fed pole line. Absolutely nothing happened to his float.
He tried closer in. Nothing.
Replumbed the depth. Nope.
He even spent 2-hours fishing a long pole to the reeds on his right-hand side with nothing to show for his efforts.
There was no reward for Alec today and sadly he would be chalked up as a DNW (did not weigh) today.
I’m sure he was cheesed off with a blank, as anyone would be. But we did have a proper laugh when he was using his pole. After a while his legs started to twitch. Then shake, and in the end had developed a full-on tremor which made his pole elastic rattle loudly! This caused fits of uncontrollable giggles which became infectious to everyone close by.
Better luck next time…
Peg Two:
Jack Copp:
Confidence has never been Jack’s weakness and he started his match with a flurry of small fish and looked well on his way to harvesting a large weight to dazzle us all with at the end. But, like everyone else today, Jack was forced to scratch for each bite for most of the match. I would go as far as saying that he spent most of the match trying to out-psyche his dad for the match at Todber the following day. There was definitely fighting talk in the air.
Jack managed to save face with a late margin Carp for a weight of 7lbs 13ozs, just missing out on a podium place.
He will probably catch what he caught today in the first 2-minutes at Todber!
Peg Three:
Harry Wilmer:
If I heard my name once today, I heard it a million times! It didn’t help that everyone else around the lake joined in too! Harry likes to have Graham on tap and, because he probably does know the other coach’s names yet, mine is the only name he calls. I just wish it wasn’t every 15-seconds. (It wasn’t, but that’s how it seemed!).
Harry was in a good peg and, had he have stuck it out to the end, could possibly have gone home with a voucher today. But his patience failed him, and he decided to ‘bounce’ about halfway through. 2lbs was a good weight of silvers for just a couple of hours fishing. Well done…
Peg Five:
Josh Roe:
Josh was to be the second of our 'blankers' and was the victim of the worst of the invisible weed growth. I was genuinely stunned when I saw his peg. It was solid with weed close in, but there were areas to fish to further out. Sadly, these areas contained no fish, or at least no fish that wanted to be compliant. Because the lake was full, there was nowhere else to move him to, other than the peg we left out because it was too shallow!
Fair play to Josh, like Alec, he stuck it out to the end (pretty much).
Peg Six:
Oliver Smith:
I think it’s fair to say that Ollie seems to have lost his edge this year. But, having said that, we were on a lake that couldn’t handle the pressure, so it was hardly surprising that concentration levels were at an ebb. Ollie was opposite the deep tree and, with no one on peg four, he had the skills to get very close to the tree where fish might be hiding.
He managed to drag just one out and, with a smattering of smaller fish, to weigh 4lbs 3ozs by the end.
Peg Seven:
Jack Cryer:
Jack would end up as the first of our ‘framers’ and was the first (I believe) to catch a Carp about halfway through the match. With the small fish absent, the Carp had sent a murmur of anticipation along a, by now, seemingly redundant lake. It was a good fish too and without it, Jack may have been beaten by someone who had already gone home!
Jack finished the match weighing 8lbs 15ozs, most of which was a Carp. This good enough to take 3rd place on the day. Good job.
Peg Eight:
Kenzie Toulson:
Tina had already beaten a hasty retreat to the car twice because of the perpetual shade the Toulson’s found themselves in. No sunshine in this peg today. That didn’t stop Kenzie from sporting his swanky pair of Iridium coated shades that made him look like he should be ‘on the piste’ rather than by a murky pond on Dorset. (careful how you read that!).
Not much sun and not many fish either, so it would seem, as Kenzie was only able to tip a handful of tiny bars of gold in the shape of Crucian Carp on the scales by the end. He weighed 1lb which was scant reward for his efforts.
Peg Nine:
Josiah Wells-Parkes:
Talking of effort to reward. Jo had set his stall out for Carp today, which was an extremely risky thing to do. Had it have paid off and he’d caught a couple, he would have been sitting pretty. Sadly, this wasn’t to be, and the gamble evaporated before his eyes. It probably didn’t help being ‘pinched’ from anglers on both sides, which always a problem on a small venue like Sharnhill.
No cigar for JoJo today, but I’m sure he will be back next time.
Peg 10:
Austin Scott-Kennedy:
Austin is turning into a fully rounded angler this season. Even if his method choice can seem a little erratic at times. I heard Jack Copp opposite almost pleading with Austin not to ‘release the Pellet waggler’ on such a narrow lake. They were almost fishing in the same peg, which was a problem for two anglers that like a bit of space. Not to mention their rivalry for the championship. It was between Austin and Jack for most of the match as they went fish for fish with the smaller offerings. But as the lake fell quiet, it was down to which one of them caught a Carp, the biggest Carp, or just more than one Carp by the end.
As it turned out, it wasn’t either of them! But Austin did grab the points advantage over Jack with a second-place finish and a weight of 10lbs 13ozs.
Peg 11:
Harry Cryer:
When trying to help someone ‘Avoid the blank’, it is vital that they are actually LOOKING at their float when it finally goes under after three hours of trying!
Harry had been struggling in a peg that I would have quite fancied today.
A broken (and taped up) pole didn’t help much, so I loaned Harry one of our float rods and started to feed his peg to at least encourage some bites. The bites came and went, but Harry was examining his feet at the time.
Nothing came of this area in the end, but I take my hat off to him because he found TWO Carp in the last hour to become the only junior to catch more than one proper Carp. This gifted him the win, and rightly so.
Weighing 12lbs 1ozs was enough to give Harry and his feet 25 sweet points, as well as a £15 voucher for Alan’s Angling to go with his brother’s £5 voucher. A payday for Paul perhaps?
Top five in the championship now look like this.
119 points, Austin.
107 points, Jack Copp.
104 points, Ollie.
101 points, Jack Cryer.
87 points, Harry Cryer.
No change in the Silvers Champs obvs…
It would seem that our success in numbers has outgrown venues like Sharnhill Lake. A tiny farm pond with such low stock cannot withstand the pressure of a full lake of anglers, let alone anglers with one or two keepnets. Add to that people constantly walking around and you have a shut down situation like we experienced today.
All future events scheduled for Sharnhill Lake will be reconsidered for the rest of this year. But please do not let it put you off visiting this pretty little venue. When quiet, I cannot think of many places I’d rather be than there…
So, that’s it from me. I’m off for a well-earned break so I can make an honest woman of Trudie. The next time you will see me I will be nervous, stressed and lacking self-esteem.
Wait…That’s no different to the junior events! Other than the inclusion of a little liquid bravery! (I would never get married under the influence of alcohol!).
The other coach’s will be running events in my absence, but there will be no change in the booking of events on Spond.
I wish you all the very best of luck!
Mega thanks to Tim Broughton, Nigel Kemp and Jon Bass for their sterling work on a tricky day for everyone.
Take care and tight lines,
Juniors Sec…
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