The Newsletter of the Staffordshire Predator Angling Group October 2009

www.predator-group.co.uk

Newsletter
It’s been a while. I think the last newsletter was in January of this year, this is due to a combination of me being really busy at work and me not receiving any newsletter material off anyone. If anyone has anything they would like to contribute (articles, pictures, stories, stuff to sell, etc and they will be included. My email address is at the bottom of this article.

Chew Valley
Anyway, hopefully you have all now begun your predator season, like most years I don’t bother with any piking until October and this year has been the same. My first trip of the year was on Chew and it was an eventful weekend. After dropping 2 fish off on lures, the second being clearly well over 25lbs I did manage to hang onto one weighing 23lb08oz, a pleasing fish but I found it hard to get too exited as I’d been very close to catching something substantially bigger…still, that fishing I suppose. My 2 day trip was cut short when my boat partner, Dave Kelbrick, had an accident whilst chinning out a jack for me. Having flicked the first treble out over the side of the boat the second caught his finger and the jack flipped, embedding a 4/0 treble deep into his finger. Fortunately I was able to separate the hook from the fish quickly with bolt croppers before any more harm was done but upon inspection it was pretty clear that there was no way of getting it out without hospital treatment, so our day ended somewhat disappointingly at lunchtime. Its an accident that occasionally happens with no-one to blame and it serves as a bit of a warning to those anglers like myself that chin the majority of fish so as not to damage them when the spin in a landing net. Just last year I had a 4/0 on an 8” replicant rip through my thumb down to the bone when lifting a 20lb+ fish from the landing net. It’s not a nice experience (obviously) but it does tend to make you act a little more carefully for the next few fish you chin.
As it happens I still have a few more days on chew so who knows, maybe there is a 30 with my name on it, one thing I’m sure of is I’ll enjoy fishing the place despite the increased angling pressure this year.

Blithfield
Due to postal strikes in the area tickets to fish blithfield reservoir have not been sent out, instead those anglers fishing will be given full details on the first Saturday (7th November), hopefully the majority of those fishing will have been informed of this via an email from John. Even though we got some unbelievably poor weather last season ‘blith’ still fished well and once again we were able to fill the boats pretty quickly. Get your name down early for next season folks because I’m predicting some big fish from there this year!

Pike cull
It was brought to my attention that a sailing club in the Midlands were planning a pike cull this November, with ‘anglers’ being asked to stump up money for a full English brekfast, before going onto the water to carry out the grotesque, and frankly pointless attempt at removing all pike from the water. To be fair on the owner he had been badly advised, and admitted he knew little or nothing about fishing, after a long chat on the phone he agreed to cancel the event and return the ticket money to the anglers in question. It just goes to show that sometimes a sensible and mature discussion can be all that is needed to educate some waters owners, no need to go in all guns blazing…

Presentations
I’m absolutely delighted to be able to report that the our Treasurer, Brian Banks has volunteered to do our December slide show, I know he’s had a lot of good, local fish and I just wish more members would take the trouble to present. With the new laptop and digital projector we have its pretty easy to do and good fun to boot. Anyone interested in having a go please let either John or myself know.

Membership renewals
Membership renewals are due again and there is an application attached with this mail. As ever you need to be a member of SPAG to fish Blithfield, and again to this there are no exceptions. Therefore if you do wish to fish next season it is imperative that you renew your membership either by attending one of the monthly meetings or preferably by sending your fees (a cheque made payable to ‘Staffordshire Predator Anglers Group’) to Brian Banks at 28 Newcastle Road, Congleton, CW12 4HJ. Once again could I please ask everyone to inform John of your current email address. Not only does this save the club money in postage and materials it also ensures you can receive newsletters and bulletins in-between newsletters quickly. Don’t forget when applying by post to send a stamped addressed envelope with your application to receive your membership card. I’ll just say that again, we are all busy people and an email address helps John and me enormously (and saves the club a load of money in newsletters). Please, please, please let me or John have your email address’. As well as for newsletters it does allow me to let you know quickly any availability of boats for places like Blithfield and Chew.

As you will read below our esteemed Chairman, John Davey has had a bit of fun with some oversize ratfish, but I’ll let him tell you all about that, I suppose I’d better offer him my congratulations but its his son Phil I feel sorry for, Johns painful enough when he’s caught anything decent but he must have been unbearable on this trip..no doubt Phil numbed the pain with a heavy supply of cheap read wine…I know that’s what I would have done !

Anyway – enough from me. I hope you have a great winters fishing and I look forward to seeing you at the next meeting.

Cheers Gary Knowles

Email : garyknowles69@hotmail.com

John Davey – Chairman of Staffs Predator Group

Well here we are again, another year almost ended. Hope you all had a good summer and have been catching plenty of fish.
My year has been a bit mixed. It started well for me on Blithfield in February with a few fish and followed by a 32lb 12oz specimen.
I then went to France in July for a week with my son Phil. Weather-wise we had a nightmare of a week; temperatures of 40 degrees made us feel like we were being cooked alive in the intense heat from the constant sun. We had to put up with snakes sun-bathing in our swim during the day and at night we were being kept awake by the frogs deafening croaking and wild boars fighting. If that wasn’t enough we were being eaten alive by the mozzies and even worse the lake was little more than a mass of floating weed resembling a giant lawn. I remember thinking this is just what you want when you have travelled 700 miles for a week’s fishing!
However, we did have some success. Nothing from Saturday to Tuesday night, but then Wednesday morning at about 10.30am one of my rods burst into life, the heavy weed now became a nightmare and after donning chest waders Phil went in armed with the landing net and did a superb job of the netting, It took 40 minutes of hell but it was well worth it as it resulted in a personal best grass carp of 63lb 10oz. I sat back in my chair, absolutely knackered and covered in sweat. After tidying up the area, sorting ourselves out we sat back to reflect on the capture whilst enjoying a nice cup of tea when my other rod rattled off.
Phil was still having a moan about recovering from the last fish and now it was back on with the chest waders to do battle with the net once again. It was the same story with a few scary moments and great work with the net but eventually the second big grassie was mine, albeit a bit of a baby at 61lb 13oz.

After the pictures were taken and the fish was returned we sat there exhausted and reflecting what had happened in the last 90 minutes, one of these fish would have been the capture of a lifetime but to get a brace was beyond our wildest dreams.

At that point the lake bailiff came round and asked if we had had any luck. “The chap two swims up has just had a 52lb carp” he told us. Phil replied “that’s *&%$£* nothing, my old man’s just had two sixty’s the jammy $&*&$£, 63lb 10oz and 61lb 10oz”! The bailiff replied “that must be a world record brace” (later to be confirmed by the Angling Times). Just to finish off I had two other small ones over the next two days, 51lb (photo above) and 44lb grass carp. Phil also did OK with 10 fish ranging from 25lb to 42lb, but no grass carp.

I hope my luck continues at Blithfield!

All the best, John

61lb – 13oz 63lb – 10oz