Daves Dozen, Bristol Docks 31/5/12

Things are slowly getting better as the weather warms up, Thursdays evening match was the best for a while despite the clear water and the breezy conditions.

Top rod was Pete Ellis who had 2 bream and some skimmers for 15lb 4oz, caught on the pole with groundbait and red maggot. Pete is using a sweet groundbait containing sensas magic, fishmeal based groundbaits dont seem to work on the docks. Second and continuing his great form is local legend Pete Sivell who caught 10lb 15oz of skimmers and roach, again pole groundbait and maggot was the deadly combination.
Adam Caswell was third with 7lb 14oz of skimmers caught with a groundbait feeder and maggot. Rob Garland was fourth with 6lb 4oz, 1 bream and some skimmers. 5th was Andy Curry with 5lb 14oz of skimmers and roach and Dave Clutterbuck had a similar catch for 6th place, with 5lb 8oz

Daves Dozen, Bristol Docks 24/5/12

Baltic Wharf is starting to hit form, the weather is getting warmer and the fish are starting spread into this area of the dock after spawning, a couple more weeks of this sunshine and the docks should be at its best.

Pete Ellis and Pete Sivell tied for top spot this week with 10lb 3oz, Pete Ellis caught a bream and some roach for his weight and Pete Sivell had a lovely net of roach, the best going 1lb 4oz, although the species were different both catches were made on the pole with groundbait and maggot, and they were from opposite ends of the match length.
Third was Jason Bird with 9lbs 8oz of skimmers and roach, all on the pole. Fourth was Dave Clutterbuck with 6lbs 15oz of roach on a short pole and Alan Healy was fifth with 5lb 11oz of roach and eels, Merv Sivell made up sixth spot with 4lb 12oz of roach and eels.

If you ever fancy a days fishing at Baltic Wharf the best time of the day to fish it is early morning or evening, when boat activity is less, the best pegs are towards the harbour masters office where the water is shallower than the majority of the length, dont fish too far out, a lot of fish can be caught on the pole less than 10m out and watch out for fish feeding off the bottom, especially skimmers.

Daiwa Trade Match, Gold Valley

This is always a popular day out for everyone working in the trade, kindly put on and sponsored by Daiwa, it was well attended by over 50 tackle dealers from the southern half of the country, the farthest traveller that I knew about was Scott Smith from Brum.

Gold Valley has been fishing its head off lately, Will Raison has caught between 140lb and 196lb in his last 6 matches with countless 100lb+ weights as back ups, it was a day I was really looking forward too.

On the day of the match the weather wasn't too kind, we woke to a light frost on the morning and with a cold north westerly blowing, I didnt expect to see Gold Valley at its best.

At the draw I found myself on new peg 22, about old peg 17, an area of the lake I was happy with and has good recent form. The winning approach to Gold is very simple at this time of the year, 2 rods, a pellet waggler fished as far as you can fire 8mm pellets and a method feeder cast to the rope, so that is all I set up, nice and easy.

I started my match fishing the method to the rope with 2mm pellets wrapped around it and waited, usually you get an instant response if there are some fish in front of you, but not today. After 2 hours I had only got 2 carp and the anglers around me were not doing any better, whilst I could see my Dorking team captain Steve Sanders and the bloke opposite him baggin up, perhaps the cold wind had stopped the carp from venturing up my end of the lake.

As the day went on I could feel the air temperature getting warmer and my hopes of catching was getting better, with 2 hours to go I saw a carp top where I had been feeding my 8mm pellets, so I immediately swapped to the pellet waggler, and on my third cast I had a fish, that was my match sorted, and before the end of the match I had caught 9 more fish for a total weight of 89lb 14oz.

Steve Sanders finished with 86lb and young Matt from Bordon Angling Center finished second with 87lb, all very close, but I had just caught enough.

There was a very good spread of prizes put up by Daiwa and I walked off with a Daiwa Connoisseur G20 and a couple of hundred quid, beats going to work.

It was a great day out for everybody, and a big thanks to John, Will and Ang at Gold for the catering etc and to Robin Morley and his crew, from Daiwa, who kept things running smoothly.

Gold Lake from the clubhouse

Preston On Box X3 Special, limited edition

Every now and again Preston come out with a real gem, this box is real value for money.

Everything you see in the picture is included in the price.

The Onbox X3 has been around a few years, there are loads in use on the bank, this special offer has £80 worth of extras completely Free of charge.

The box comes complete with the nylon groundbait bowl on a hoop which fits on any leg of your choice, this is very popular for positioning your groundbait or pellets when method feeder fishing.

2 small keepnet arms are included so that you can position your nets on each of the front legs.

The box has a padded pole seat for maximum comfort whilst your fishing, on good days you dont notice an uncomfortable seat but on bad days it always seems worst.

Preston large side tray is included so that you can position all your bait at the most comfortable height .

The box has an ultra stable non-slip footplate, this is essential when fishing a long pole, you dont want the box wobbling around while you are holding 16m of expensive pole and the non-slip finish is great on wet and muddy days, all the legs have a non-marking system on them so that they grip better and the screws dont make marks on the legs.

The front legs are telescopic so you can level the box on sloping ground, getting your box as level as possible is essential when fishing a long pole if you want to avoid a bad back.

The box has 1 deep side tackle drawer unit, great for all your bulky bits and pieces, and it has 2 winder units which come fully loaded with winder trays. There is 1 x 13cm tray which holds 20 winders, 2 x 18cm trays which holds 30 winders and 1 x 26cm tray which holds 10 winders, making a total of 60 winders, more than enough for most people.

The rrp of everything is £329.99, but we are selling it for ONLY £224.99.

For more information go to http://www.matchtackle.co.uk/preston-onbox-2012-limited-edition-seat-box.html

Daves Dozen, Bristol Docks 10/5/12

Rain, rain and more rain, and we are in a drought area. With all the rivers in the area in full flood it was no surprise that the docks was heavily coloured for thursdays evening match. Strong winds made presentation difficult and the chocolate water meant the fish weren't in a mood to feed.

Making the best of conditions, at Baltic Wharf, was Pete Sivell who caught 4lb 14oz of skimmers and roach on tthe 10m pole line using groundbait and maggot. Second was John Macey with 3lb 14oz of skimmers and roach on the pole with groundbait and maggots. Dave Clutterbuck was third with a level 3lb of roach, dace and perch, Rob Garland was fourth with a mainly eel catch of 2lb 13oz, the last few weeks a few more eels are starting to show, the last few years they have been very few and far between. Fifth was Jason Bird with 1lb 13oz.

The Gloucester Canal is another water in the area where eel numbers seem to be on the increase, the number of people who go elvering around the Severn Estuary area has dramatically  reduced in recent years, perhaps this has led to higher eel numbers, it would be nice to think that eel numbers are back on the increase, do you know any waters where the numbers are going up?

Daves Dozen, Bristol Docks 3/5/12

This was the last match to be held at Welsh Back, before the matches move to Baltic Wharf and thursday night was typical of the weather recently, wet, wet, wet and windy. Dirty water from the Avon had worked its way through the docks system into Welsh Back but still the skimmers fed.

Top rod on the night was match organiser and recent series winner Dave Clutterbuck with a very respectable bag of 17lbs 3oz of skimmers and roach on the pole with groundbait and maggots. Second was Pete Ellis with 4 bream for 15lb 3oz caught on the pole with maggot and groundbait. Third was Andy Curry with 15lb 1oz of bream and skimmers on groundbait feeder and red maggot, Pete Sivell was fourth with 12lbs 6oz of bream and skimmers on the feeder and Alan Healey had 8lb 12oz for 5th.

Next weeks match moves to Baltic Wharf, usually the early matches at Baltic are slow and things improve with the warmer weather and regular amounts of bait going in, watch this space.

Maver Satanic X Carp Pole

This New Satanic X Carp pole from Maver is due in stock any day, it has been designed by the design team at Maver UK. The design team know exactly what UK anglers need from a pole that is going to be used on modern UK commercials, in fact a lot of the field testing was done at Larford Lakes, where large catches of hard fighting carp really put the pole through its 'paces'

The pole has been manufactured from high modulus carbon to give it a slim profile yet still retain the necessary strength and balance we need.

Although this pole has the strength for 'baggin up' it is equally usable on a river or your local 'cut'

The package includes 3 power kits plus the one on the pole making 4 top kits in total, the top kits are rated up to 20 elastics. Each pole comes with its own pole holdall and an informative DVD.

The pole sells at £399 for 13m, watch out for the advertising as its a Devilishly Good Buy

To visit our website for more information  http://www.matchtackle.co.uk/maver-satanic-x-carp-13m.html