Hard fishing for the last of the Match Series, Membership renewals open at the AGM in April

Match 8 - the final of the series and hard fishing

Weather Forecast: Cold, due to a blustery NE wind that veered to ENE during the match. Five members gathered to fight the final match of the series: Chris Shepherd and Rod Langthorne for the Associates Cup; Andy Weavil, Roger Pilling and Steve Edge for the Parish Senior Match Series.

The competitors were finely balanced with nobody confident of securing their respective titles. So it was all to fish for and hoping the points awarded would be enough to declare a clear overall winner. That would be down to the Match Secretary to work out. The north bank by the Winchester Road was opted for because of the biting, blustery wind. The water had quite a chop but some swims were more sheltered giving calmer conditions. We thought the fishing would be hard and we were proved right.

Those who drew sheltered pegs opted to mostly waggler fish whereas Andy Weavil (swim 2) and Rod Langthorne (swim 8) persevered with a feeder tactic as they were more exposed to the wind. Both struggled to find fish. Rod was also battling with trees that hampered casting accurately. He weighed in 14 oz of roach after five hours. Andy had caught well the previous weekend and repeated his tactics. He fished towards the trees fringing ‘Fairlawns' but failed to record a weight when he weighed in! An interesting conundrum for the Match Sec. Andy did weigh in so does he collect the points for third place?

Roger Pilling fished his bread tactics on the bolognese rod and dallied with a feeder at mid distance into rougher water and to the trees from swim 3. He landed 2 lbs 10 oz to record first place in the Parish match. Steve Edge (swim 5) fished maggot and waggler in calm water but had little action to weigh in with 1 lbs 4 oz for second place. Next door was Chris Shepherd (swim 4). Fishing to the end of the trees and also further out with the waggler (and round the corner somehow!). He used maggot and a little ground bait and caught steadily to land a recorded weight of 4 lbs 14 oz of roach. I say recorded as we had a problem with the scales and may have not zeroed them correctly. A more realistic weight we think would have been about 3 lbs 12 oz. But he took the first place points in the Associate Cup anyway and had the largest haul of everyone on the day. Very good fishing in the conditions. Well done Chris, we enjoyed watching you!

Points Only and Pairs matches to complete the current competitions

Well that’s it, the end of the 2016-17 match series. We await the final points tally from Paul Collins, the Match Secretary. But it’s not completely over. Instead of a fat lady singing, the Points Only match is on March 5th which may be combined with the Pairs Match …if enough bodies turn up! Three hours of fishing at speed with a whip. Hence the term: every fish caught is one point. So catch fast and furious (we hope) as the more fish, the more points. And what do points mean?……..winning the Points Only Trophy!

Stroll on Spring and Summer fishing in sun!

Membership renewals start on 28th April

Following the success last year of having a membership renewal session before the AGM, we will be repeating it this year from 7-8pm on Friday 28th April. The membership year starts again on 16th June.

2017-18 Match calendar in preparation

The new match calendar is in the final stages of preparation and will be available to download from the website shortly. A new match has been introduced this year for juniors plus supervising adult.

April and May activities

The main activity in April is the presentation of trophies and the AGM, to be held this year on Friday 28th April in the Jubilee Hall. Our membership Secretary will be there from 7-8pm for renewing memberships and the trophy presentation and AGM will start at 8pm.

Joining the Club

If you are interested in joining the club please contact our membership secretary Cathy Naylor on 07934-895513 for an application form. Alternatively, applications can be made by downloading a membership form from the website (new forms available shortly) and sending, with an SAE, to our membership secretary (details above and on the web site). The membership year runs from mid-June.

Membership is open to anyone who lives in Bishops Waltham, plus a number of Associate membership places (for those living outside the Parish). Priority is given to Parish membership (especially juniors), but anyone living outside of the Parish wishing to join should contact Cathy for an Associate Membership space.

Club web site

For more information about the club and its activities, the club's web site can be found at lb

www.bwpfc.org.uk

Steve Edge and Barry Jerome