Lewy's Lines

The final round of Ricky Baxters silvers series at Sumner Match Lake and what a beautiful day we all woke too. My results in this league meant I was nowhere however it was tight between the top 5 with them all having a chance at taking the crown. It would be an interesting day! The Draw Permanent peg 4… I always seem to draw in this area! Only fishing the other side once in all the matches I’ve had at Sumners late last year and this year. Set-Up As simple as possible today. Line were: Waggler at around 14 metres Whip line at 3 metres Left hand margin Bait was all natural, mainly casters, hemp, maggot and some worms. I bought some Fin Perfect silvers groundbait from Andy G at the Big One on Saturday so mixed up a small quantity of that. All-In Kicked off the margin swim with a ball of groundbait and started to flick some casters in on the whip line and fed twice on the waggler line before flicking the waggler out. The float buried and I was into roach from the ...

Now the final day of the festival is a leveller for all of our skill groups. We would no longer be fishing our section as we had completed the lake rotation. I had managed to get into the 3rd group, so one up from the numpties. Today was also a special day for Big Ben, it was his 40th birthday so we all sung Happy Birthday and Jo had kindly got him a lovely cake and some balloons... they never went to the peg with him... The Draw Which lake would we be on? Well Clive W drew for us as I had been banned from drawing and we would be back on Beatties. Not too bad I thought and herbie had removed peg 6 as it simply did not fish that well during the week. So I ended up still in the shallow area again, this time on Peg 8! Set-Up Pole at 14.5 metres to the island Pole top two and two on my left Waggler to fish towards the break between Beatties and Tanners Feeder rod as the island was too much a target not to fish All-In Cupped in two balls of groundbait with chopped worm ...

Everyone survived the Curry night with just about everyone on the festival attending. No naan breads on John Beesley’s head, 76 Trombones challenged the chefs to cook him their hottest curry (silly boy) and Darren Fisher (cannot draw for toffee) tried his first cu rry dish! The Draw Beatties today, a lake we have never fished in the silvers festival and it had been throwing up some mixed weights. It was clear though that nobody wanted the shallow end pegs 6 or 7. So, there was no surprise for me to be sat on peg 6, at least I had Alan Mac as my neighbour. Setup I seemed to be following Jamie Howarth around drawing his pegs. He told me not to even bother with the pole as it was just too shallow and to grab my wellies as it would be easier to sit in the water to clear the cast from the trees. So it ended up quite a simple set-up, one waggler rod and one feeder rod. Waggler was plumbed up in the deeper water at around 20 metres. The feeder rod I search around and found dee...

Now I’m not doing very well in the competition, two days in and I’m most definitely earning my division 4 ranking! Today I’d be on the lake that is my nemesis, Woodpecker and I was hoping for a good draw. The Draw So I decided to take the final peg in the bag today and I ended up with Woodpecker Peg 12 with Big Ben and Richie Farrow for neighbours. The masked bandit Rob A a little further up the way. Set-up The weather was bright sunshine, very little wind and flat calm on the water so perfect for the waggler and pole. Waggler would be fished between 16 and 20 metres, pole lines were: + 8 metre pole lines – groundbait on the left line and pellet on the right line + Margin line on the left – slop worm and groundbait All-in After chatting with Chris Martin who mentioned that he had some proper bream close in towards the end of yesterdays match I decided to drop three balls of groundbait on the left hand line. The right pole line just a small nugget of micro pellets, stead...

The lake rotation for my section meant that we would be on Pines today. Again the MFS massive gathered in the tackle shop ready for the draw. The Draw Peg 5, the bridge peg for me today. Jamie Howarth won the lake from here yesterday fishing just off the bridge, so no pressure at all ;-) Neighbours for the day, Big Nige on the left side of the bridge and Pete Merce on my right. Set-up Pole lines Across about 2 metres from the bank To the bridge above the middle stanchion To the bridge below the middle stanchion Inside margin line to the bridge The bridge lines where deep at almost a top two and with the wind blowing quite strongly I opted for a 1 gram rig. Bait was Pellets, caster, worm and maggots. All-In Today I decided that negative feeding would be the way forward so kicked off the far bank swim with a small nugget of chopped worm and the bridge swim a small amount of micro pellet starting with a dead red on the hook. The first hour I put a few fish in the...

With the arrival of 2019 another visit to Stafford Moor for the MFS silvers festival comes around. Organised by Herbie, our intrepid leader supported by Kenfish and Hathers. I had arrived early on the Saturday morning having suffered some sleepless nights in excitement for the week ahead and had some opportunity to practise on both Woodpecker and Pines. Over the weekend the weather report was shaping up for a cracking week considering 2018 we suffered from the “beast from the east” this week promised to be totally the opposite and around a 20-25 degree C difference in temperature! Monday morning soon came around and we all gathered at the JoOp, “the tackle shop with everything” ready for the start of the MFS Stafford Moors Silvers. The Draw Today would be an open draw across all the lakes, Woodpecker, Tanners, Pines and a new addition for this year Beatties (the specimen lake). It would also determine the section we would be fishing in for the next 4 days. Tanners and Pe...