Bailiff Comments

Week Commencing: Sat 18/02/2023

Decoys are out, Decoy is in….again!!

With Jean Claudes Decoy ducks away for the winter and the first set of 8 anglers for the year on the Road Lake anticipation was high! The fish have had some time to recuperate and been through a rigorous feeding programme that should see the continuation of impressive weight gains that we saw throughout last year! Lots of work has been completed on the complex over the winter including lots of marginal tree/snag removal on the Road Lake which will 100% effect the fishing this year as these were safe havens for the fish to live in with some of the tree systems in the margins were all the way to the bottom of the pond! After a quick walk around and banter flying around already the lads…and lady, were ready for the draw!

I have to start the week with Barry Kelly who got in his number 1 choice Decoy, he chose this peg due to it suiting his angling style, you are technically snag fishing in this peg so fishing locked up and being on your rods is a must! But nice and easy baiting up from the bank down towards the bund and the fish were certainly up for a bit of grub! Baiting with maize, crumbed boilie and hemp he got into the fish after a chat with me and a little tweak of positioning on his rods down to the bund. It was consistent all week bar a day in the middle of the week when it went quiet! T shirts and shorts were in order as we certainly had evidence of “false Spring” 17/18 degrees during the day but in the sun felt more like 25! Barry fished 2 at 16 ½ wraps down to the bund and one out in open water at 18 wraps. The bund rods produced the fish, falling to yellow pop ups on spinner rigs or loops and booms combi rig with a wafter and corn topper! Baz broke his P.B 3 times for the week ending the session on Friday with a ridiculous 111lb brace in the shape of “The Nose” at 62lb and “The Stalker” at 49lb! this was backed up by a couple of other 40lbers and few smaller ones finishing on 9 fish for the week! Top stuff mate!

Dean Lovegrove fished in Beach and had a few! Landing a mega glass carp called “Despo” at 29lb 8oz was probably the highlight of the trip, fishing spinner rigs at 21 wraps towards the bund with yellow wafters and baiting with a mixture of crumb corn and hemp! 

James Peet fished in T2 and had a couple of smaller ones fishing at 80 yards towards Turtles margin, combi rigs and a single grain of corn were his go to method but nicking a bite when the fish were down the other end for most of the week was good going! 

Last but by no means least is Lauren Stanford who after a mammoth European winter road trip finishing on the Road Lake, started of in T1 but as before mentioned it was pretty quiet infront of these pegs and very tough conditions, I fished in Bachelliers for a couple of nights and nicked a couple of smaller fish, Lauren saw a couple show after id packed my gear up to go home so got round there as quickly as she could deploying some rigs in the zone! This resulted in a fairly quick bite with a fish called the Sargeant at 41lb being the prize! This is one of the really cool ones in the Road Lake and one I dearly want in my net one day! Good angling mate!

Well that was it for the first full week back on the Road Lake! Lets hope this cold weather takes a back seat so we can get some warmer water temps and start seeing some crazy numbers of fish being caught every week! 

Until then,

Tight Lines,

Steve