Pages for under 18 anglers
December 9th 2008
Andy May on the Dane
Today I
fished the river Dane at Cotton Farm, along with my
good mate and Ultima angler Andy May. We initially intended to target
Grayling but ended up having a cracking Chub session, which just goes
to prove fishing at times is never predictable.
Andy and I opted to trot the river
on stick floats, using double or triple maggot
as bait, and
steadily
moving from peg to peg. We fished most of the swims from the old Ox Bow
above the motorway to the footbridge below the motorway and took fish
from most. Andy fished a 5 BB stick with a wire stem on 6lb main line
to a 4lb bottom and a size 14 hook, I fished a standard 3 BB stick to
8lb line with a 6lb hook length and a size 14 fox hook.
The weather was overcast and
raining, with the river roughly 15 cm above normal height and holding a
little colour, but this was obviously dropping out as we had not had a
significant amount of rain for a couple of days.
The two best fish
of the
day
weighed in at 4lb 11oz and 4lb 10oz with Andy taking the bigger of the
pair and as such doing me by 1 oz to the best fish of the day. We did
however both have several fish all over the 3lb mark and Andy in
particular taking 5 chub all over 3lb from one swim alone.
As the day wore on the rain
increased dramatically until at about 3pm surface water was flowing in
from the motorway and coating the
surface of the
river with
an oil
slick. This surface iridescence eventually started to coat the lines
and hook bait making fishing nearly impossible and so effectively
finished the day off for us. However it was nearly home time and we had
both caught some wonderful fish, so it did not detract from the days
fishing.
Andy will be doing a feature on the
Dane shortly so watch the angling press, I am certain it will contain a
few good tips for all. Oh, and if you read this Andy I want a re-weight
on your fish, I?m sure mine looked bigger and it was certainly prettier.
Dave
December 5th 2008
Junior match series presentations
Well done to the winners of the
Junior match series.
The series was a closely fought
contest with the overall winner not
being decided until the final match. However in order for there to be a
winner others must have taken part, so a huge well done to all the
anglers who by entering made this competition possible, and without
who?s efforts a winner could not have emerged. You have all been a
credit to Get Hooked on Fishing and to Bay Malton AC, thank you.
The final results were as follows:
- Under 17 Michael Fenner
- Under 14 Bobby Tomkinson
- Under 11 Hollie Smith
- Angler of the year Ben
Maddison
- Overall series winner
Bobby Tomkinson
Dates are already being sorted for next year, so watch the site for
more information, I am looking forward to seeing you at next years
matches.
Dave
December 2nd 2008
Update from Dave
Recently I have been very busy, with lots of coaching and meetings and
not a great deal of time for personal fishing. However all the meetings
and coaching have opened up a vast amount of potential events and ideas
for 2009.
In the last month I have been down near London making a programme for
?Onlinefishing TV? and also spent another day with John Wilson plus
Hollie and the Get Hooked crowd from Lincolnshire making a DVD for Get
Hooked on Fishing.
Work is underway to arrange a special charity event during May 2009
that will bring many famous carp and match anglers to the border site
for a weekend of fishing fun. The angling press and Online TV will
cover this event, so you may well see yourself on the Internet or the
angling media. There are also discussions taking place that will see
cameras attend the Border site to create a programme around our junior
anglers.
I am still looking for juniors to create features for the web site,
send me an Email and we can do these over the next months. Talking of
angling features, Andy May will be doing a feature on the river Dane
shortly so watch the press for details of how he went on. I am certain
it will be full of good tips on how to fish the river.
You can view Online TV at
You can see how we went on near
London and also the catfish challenge
that many of you have been asking about.
Dave
Picture is of Hollie with a River Wensum Pike during the filming with
John Wilson.
November 1st 2008
BMAC/GHOF Junior angler Hollie Smith has joins the Nash Tackle team.
Hollie age 7 who is a student at Sandford Hill Primary School has been
turning in some fantastic catches this year from the Border site. She
has won the under 11 match series and also produced some large nets of
fish from Gibbos Pool, Three Islands and the Specimen Lake.
Hollie met Nash director Gary Bayes at the Tackle and Gun show this
year and following a chat Gary gave Hollie some artificial bait to try
out. Hollie then sent Gary the pictures of her catches on the baits
plus a few pictures of previous nets and Gary put the wheels in motion
to get her on the Nash team.
Nash Consultant Dean Macey has followed Hollies angling exploits and
sent her this Email when he heard the news.
Hi Hollie
First off, it's great to have you on the Nash team.
Your dad has been keeping me up to date with all your recent catches.
Well done, it seems you have a natural ability to catch fish in all
weathers.
I'm looking forward to following your fishing career through the years,
and hopefully we will run into each other on the bank some time. In
which case, I'm sure you will proceed to show me up! But that's ok.
Enjoy what you have left of the school holidays. I'm sure it wont be
long before I?m looking at another cracking picture of you with some
more monster fish.
Well done again and keep up the great angling.
Tight lines.
Dean Macey. X
Well done Hollie keep up the great angling, Oh and nice one Gary, Dean
and all at Nash, your support is brilliant. www.nashtackle.co.uk
Final match
The final match of the Junior series will take place on Sunday 23rd
November on the Specimen Lake.
Draw will be at 10am fish 11am to 2pm.
There will be a junior anglers presentation following the Match.
You must book in with Stewart to fish the match.
Junior Features
We are looking for Junior members to do a series of features for the
web site.
Anglers can plan their feature and Dave will be on hand to get some
photographs and give a little advice. The features will appear on the
site throughout the coming year and help to show how junior angling is
developing within the club. It will give other junior members an
insight into how the waters are fishing and what tactics are working.
Simply contact Stewart or Dave to arrange your feature.
October 23rd 2008
Dave and friends
On Wednesday 22nd October my good
mates Neil Machin and Pete Goodman along with two friends popped out to
Border to get to grips with some of the fish in the specimen lake.
Neil fished on peg 19 alternating
between the method feeder, pellet waggler and a shallow 12m-pole line,
and ended up having a total weigh of 96lb. Neil?s bag was made up
mainly of carp with a sprinkling of chub, all caught on maggot or 8mm
halibut pellet purchased from the shop.
At the end of the day the group had
landed a total of 187lb of fish with Pete Goodman spending the day pole
fishing for silvers and turning in a respectable 38lb of entirely
silver fish from peg 18. Nice one Pete, you certainly caught the
greatest number of fish but Neil topped the weight stakes.
We decided to put Rooster in charge
of the weigh in, and guess what, he just had to get in on the act by
posing with the group for a picture, showing some of Neil?s catch.
Although I was fishing peg 9 for
the day I did pop round to take a few picture to put on the web site
hope you enjoy them. Dave
August 26th 2008
Dane Barbel
Mandy and I decided we would fish the Dane today, as Mandy
wanted to hook up a Dane barbel.
We
first called into the Border site so Mandy could chat to Stewart, and
gain an insight into where the best pegs were, and which pegs were
producing fish. Stew said he had not heard any definite reports and had
not fished the river for over 12 months, so potluck seemed the best bet.
We
decided on Cotton farm and drove under the motorway bridge and parked
at the far car park. Walking downstream we decided to fish the swim
just after the Oxbow at a point where the river goes through a left
hand bend just above the fast water. Here there was a small sandy area
with an upstream eddy on the near bank.
Mandy
opted to put a bait at the head of the eddy where it flows under a near
side overhanging willow, before rejoining the main flow. She laid down
a carpet of hemp and 3mm halibut pellets and then she rigged a running
open-end feeder to a 30cm hook length with 2 grains of hair rigged
corn, fishing this on her heavy feeder rod feeder rod.
I
by now had set up my Masterline trotting gear, my Bob James centre pin
reel and a 13-foot John Wilson trotting rod. Fishing a 3bb stick float
rubbered top and bottom to a size 14 VMC hook on a 4lb hook length and
feeding maggots constantly into the swim.
I
fished the same swim as Mandy initially casting upstream and to the far
bank of where she was preparing to fish. My first drop saw a 2lb
Brownie in the net followed shortly by a reasonable grayling and a few
small chublets, Mandy by now was ready to put her first cast into the
water, so I stopped trotting the swim and wandered of downstream, to
continue my fishing.
By the end of the day
Mandy had landed 2 chub, one around 3lb and the other around the 4.5lb
mark but the fish that made her smile most was her one barbel of 5lb,
not a monster but it was what she had gone out to catch.
Many
anglers often ask Mandy and I why we do not use the more hi tech baits
such as pellets and boilies as hook baits, as these do tend to produce
good catches. So I will take this chance to explain. Many of
the
junior members we coach cannot afford lots of hi tech baits, so Mandy
and I fish with the baits they can afford ie Corn, Maggot and Bread, by
doing this they can use the same approach we do and hopefully mirror
our catches.
Finally in the last paragraph I
mentioned, ?bread?. Towards the end of our session I stopped fishing
and went for a walk along the Dane, stopping and throwing bread onto
the water at the head of a few long slow flowing runs, good fish
readily came to the surface and took the free offerings. I think my
next trip will be a bread-fishing day I will keep you posted of the
outcome.
Dave
August 15th 2008
John Wilson visit
Well done to the junior members who attended the John Wilson
visit, you were a credit to all involved.
For those who may like to know what
happened, here is a short thumbnail of our visit:
- We travelled down in two cars,
Mandy drove one and I drove the other
- After 5 hours we arrived in Norfolk where we stayed
overnight at the Bridge Inn
- We met John on his private lakes at 7am
- John met us by his fishing lodge and after shaking hands
with all he told us what he had planned for the day, explaining the
tackle, bait and method
- John then took each angler to his peg and took time to fish
with each junior member
- We fished until 12.30pm when we stopped for lunch
- We took John for lunch at the Bridge Inn, where we all sat
around one table chatting about fishing and eating our food
- We returned to the lakes at 1.30pm
- Again John walked the bank stopping and chatting to all the
junior anglers
- We fished on until 5.30pm
- John presented all the juniors with prizes, posed for
photographs and chatted to all about the day and finally signed some
autographs.
- We said our farewells to John and returned to Border at
11.15pm
From my own point of view it was a wonderful trip. The
behaviour and
team spirit of our members was magnificent. Mandy and I were able to
have a chat and laugh with John outside of the work environment (as we
usually meet up at the shows and are very busy). We were also able to
discuss how Get Hooked on Fishing was going and how BMAC as a club and
fishing in Cheshire were developing.
All the juniors spent time with
John and caught at least on of John?s
pristine carp and gained an insight into running your own fishery. It
was magnificent to see them chatting to John and asking questions about
their own angling issues.
Well done to all involved and thank
you on behalf of the juniors to the
club for facilitating the trip.
Dave
July 26th 2008
Details for the Visit to John Wilson
These are the young anglers who will be going.
Match Winners:
Michael Fenner
Boby Tomkinson
Jamie Taylor
Nominations:
Tom Purkis
Chris Gilbert
Mark Shoebottom
Leave from Border at 3pm on the 10th
August. Staying in the Bridge in Saturday Night Returning to Border at
11pm on Sunday 11th August.fishing with John from 6.30am Sunday till
12.30 pm then go for some lunch with John. Back fishing till approx 5pm
Stewart.
June 9th 2008
John Wilson Matches
Following a keenly fought series of matches three of the six
places for
the visit to John Wilson?s private lakes have now been finalised.
The winners were as follows:
-
Over 15 Michael
Fenner
-
Under 15 Bobby Thomkison
-
Under 11 Hollie Smith
However as Hollie is my daughter and she has met John on
several
occasions in the past, it was agreed that the second place in the by
far largest group, the under 15 section should take her place, so Jamie
Taylor will replace Hollie, when we visit Johns lakes.
Well done Jamie, for those who may
wonder why Jamie fills this place,
he fished 1st, 2nd, 2nd, 2nd in his group a formidable achievement,
Bobby however managed 2nd, 1st, 1st, 1st, a tremendous show of
consistency and this must surely be a good omen for the future of BMAC
match angling.
I can only pass on my
congratulations to all who fished this series of
matches, it would have been wonderful to take you all, as many of the
competitors have distinguished themselves in many ways and have grown
as anglers as a result of the competition. When I look back at the
first match, and recall how all competitors kept a distance from each
other, and then recall how on the final match you were all in one group
swapping ideas and looking forward to the event, it makes me realise
that our goals have been met. We now have a group of young anglers who
despite the match results share a common bond, and will hopefully
continue to do so for a long time, and ultimately move the club
forward.
Important
Three places still remain for the
visit to John?s home, these places
will be filled by nomination, if you wish to nominate a junior member
then do so via the web site or by ringing Stewart with detail. The
final decision on who will visit John?s home will be made solely by
BMAC/GHOF senior members and be based on their appraisal of the
individual and their contribution to junior angling.
The proposed itinerary for the day
with John is as follows:
-
August 10th leave BMAC @ 5pm
-
Stay overnight near Johns home.
-
August 11th Meet John at 6am on his lakes
-
John has designated six pegs for use on the day.
-
The group of 6 juniors will be split into two sections of
3 anglers.
-
The morning will see section one fish for carp and
section two fish for
roach and rudd.
-
The groups will change pegs at dinner, which John thinks
would be nice
to have in his local, giving him chance to chat to all.
-
The afternoon will see section one fish for roach/rudd
and section two
fish for carp.
-
John will be spending the entire day in the carp section,
so each
junior will get one on one carp tuition from John.
-
Mandy and I will fish with the roach/rudd group.
-
Prizes from John will b end the day.
-
Return to BMAC @ approximately 10pm.
More information on the visit will
follow as we have it.
Additional Junior Matches
Following pressure from all bar non of the junior match
anglers, a
series of additional junior matches for the newly initiated ?Club
Junior Match Trophy? will now be scheduled. Watch this space for dates
and venues, and Hollie tells me if she wins a trophy in this series of
matches then there is no way Jamie will get it!!!!!
Mick Bob and Hollie
Mick Bob and Jamie
May 26th 2009
Updates
The junior match series for the John Wilson visit is well
underway, and many young anglers are still in contention for
places. Three Islands has produced some good nets of fish and
even more smiles.
GHOF/BMAC junior Hollie had a good
day of
tip fishing on the specimen pool and ended up with a mixed bag of
chub, roach, rudd and carp fishing from peg 2 .
The Wednesday evening coaching
sessions
are proving popular, in fact some top angling stars have turned
up to pick up a few tips. Needless to say young Thomas was
willing to help out when Garbolino ace Neil Machin needed a
little help, and came along to one session. Lets hope that
Tom?s valuable advice helps Neil to qualify for the 2008
Fishomania final.
A group of
smiling juniors
Neil Machin helping out
Junior member Hollie
March 26th 2008
Kemball School visit
Recently we have seen students from William Stanyer School
and Kemball School attend coaching days on Gibbos pool. Many of
them caught fish, with silver fish being dominant but the odd
carp did put in an appearance. After the Kemball session I
carried on fishing from peg 2 on the stage.
Tip
I Fished seven sections of the pole (around 8m) with a 12 x 4
body down carp float and the shotting arranged in a shirt button
pattern on the lower length of the line, with a size 16s Kamasan
911 wide gape eyed hook finishing the rig. Feeding was kept
minimal, a few micro?s and two 6mm expanders every second
drop, saw small fish originally, but better fish eventually moved
into the swim. After an hour I had landed 3 mirror carp, one
common carp, 2 chub and a small barbel to end the session.
Remember to keep watching the web
site for
details of the trip to Stoneleigh (April) and details of
additional coaching dates.
Dave
March 16th 2008
NEC visit
Today as promised the club arranged for Bay Malton Juniors to
visit the Go Fishing Show at the NEC Birmingham. The group
arrived at 9.30am and had a wonderful day. We knew from past
experience that there are always vast amounts of people wanting
to meet the stars and get their autographs, and the queues to
meet the top anglers are very long, and much of the time at the
show can be spent queuing, so we cheated a bit.
I went round on the Saturday
twisting a
few arms and calling in a few favours and made arrangements with
angling stars like John Wilson, Matt Hayes, Steve Ringer, Bob
Nudd, Dean Macey, Martin Bowler and Keith Arthur to meet our
group. This meant that on Sunday we were able to just walk up to
the stars and they were good enough to come straight over to us,
we got to chat to them and have pictures with them without
queuing.
This meant the group now had plenty
of
time to wander through the show and view the latest tackle and
equipment as well as pick up a few bargains as they went. Stewart
told me they were all buzzing when they arrived back at Border,
so it looks like the day was a great success.
I must also say thank you to
Stewart and
the adult members who gave their time to make the day a
possibility, without your support the trip could not have taken
place.
Dave
Junior members enjoying the visit
to the
NEC Birmingham
18/02/2008
Gibbos Pool
We can now announce that a 30-metre junior/disabled coaching
platform has been erected on Gibbos Pool. The Environment Agency,
Get Hooked on Fishing, Bay Malton AC and Border Fisheries funded
the project at a cost of £10,000.00.
The
stage will be designated for junior
angling/coaching and disabled angling, and to this end the
restraining barriers on the leading edge of the stage are
finished in two colours. Junior anglers may fish behind the
lighter coloured barriers leaving the darker barrier area clear
for disabled access.
This area although now complete
will not
be fishable until early summer, as grass seed needs to be sewn
and given time to establish, before access is fully granted. I
would therefore ask that if you fish Gibbos Pool, you do not
access the stage or walk across the area until such time as the
site is officially opened.
The construction has been a major
undertaking and although it is not my practice to single out
individual persons, I feel that George and Henry along with
juniors Chris and Thomas need to be thanked for their effort and
commitment in the building of the stage. Without their input
things could not have been completed so speedily.
Thanks lads you have been
marvellous.
Mick Glover also had a major input
with
some fantastic ideas, and suggestions that ultimately saw the
project finished to such a high standard.
08/02/2008
Today I spent the afternoon fishing
Stacey?s Pool with top match angler Neil Machin. Neil will
be making a DVD from the Border site in March and wanted to get
in some practice.
We had a strange day; fish were
hard to
come by initially with Neil fishing corn on the method feeder
from Peg 12 out into the centre of the pool and me fishing the
pellet on the shotgun feeder at the same distance from peg 10.
Both Neil and I had continually fed inside lines in addition to
the feeder lines and after 4 hours of fishing the long feeder
lines had only produced small bream and roach. Neil changed to
the inside line tight to the left margin and almost instantly
produced a carp. I also changed tactics and fished single maggot
on the drop presented on a small waggler 15 yards out. Neil
continued on the inside line and steadily caught carp, the fish
were mainly around the six pound mark, however the best fish was
undoubtedly a mirror well into double figures, that saw Neil
smiling once it was in the net. Myself I had a constant flow of
bites on the waggler producing quality roach and rudd, but sadly
no carp to compete with Neil?s specimen.
The moral if there is one to this
story is
to always be prepared to change and adapt your fishing;
eventually you will get your reward.
18thDecember 2007
Today saw a group from the Sir
William
Stanyer School Crewe fish on Gibbos pool, there was still a
little ice on the surface initially but slowly this disappeared
during the session.
The group fished 4m whips to hand
using
light pole floats and size 18/20's hooks, to present a maggot
bait. Fishing proved hard initially but slowly fish came to the
baits and bites were more frequent. Double maggot fished one inch
over depth produced the best results however some fish were
caught on the drop towards the end of the session.
Remember that when winter sets in
fish
feed less aggressively, so reduce the free offerings, keep loose
feed to a minimum and be prepared for small sensitive bite
indication.
Dave
16 December 2007
River Dane (Cotton)
Mandy (my wife) and I decided to fish the Dane at Cotton, we
drove down to the river and feeling really energetic (as normal)
Mandy decided to tip fish the swim by the car park. However as it
was our first visit to the venue I opted to just trot the river,
spending a short while on each swim. The water level was dropping
and still contained a little colour following the recent rains,
the ground was slightly frost covered but this burnt off during
the morning.
I set up a 13
foot (John
Wilson) trotting rod, attached a 4BB stick float and fished a 14s
hook to a 4lb hook length. The shot was bulked 16 inches above
the hook with one #1 shot acting as a dropper 8 inches from the
hook. Mandy used a Shimanno medium feeder rod (2oz tip) with 6lb
line straight through using a small swivel to act as a stop for
the lead and then added a 12 inch hook length with a size 14 hair
rigged hook.
We always try to use the baits that
are
readily available to young anglers, such as bread meat and maggot
these are inexpensive and within the affordability of junior
members. Mandy opted to sit it out on corn while I was using red
maggot and bread.
The result of the session was that
Mandy
took a while to get the fish going on the first swim upstream of
the motorway bridge but eventually started to catch chub upto 2lb
fishing the inside line of her swim. I fished the first 3 swims
upstream of Mandy and the first 3 three swims below the bridge.
My results for the day were fish from all swims in total 6
grayling all around the 10 oz mark and 14 chub to 4lb.
This venue is good for young
anglers but
remember it is flowing water and some swims need caution when you
approach them so always fish with a partner, be safe and
sensible. If you need more information you can contact me via the
web site.
Dave