Rod & Line

WITH the weights that have been coming out of Witherington Farm Fishery this summer it comes as no surprise that the fishery's match record has been smashed, and convincingly.

Dave Hambidge, fishing for Dynamite Baits in Sunday's Cormorants Match on Barnmoor Lake, pulled in a whopping 245lb 12oz using a floating pole and pellets. His weight beat the old record by nearly 50lb. In fact, the top six weights recorded a massive 720lb of fish with even the third placed angler catching 117lb 3oz.

It was not only Barn-moor Lake either that fished well last week. A mid-week match on Sell-wood Lake saw victory for Simon Barber with 92lb 9oz while pleasure angler Colin Sellwood, fishing a late afternoon and evening session on Cottage Lake, hauled out 27 carp from 3lb to 8lb in a few hours.

Saturday's open match on the Outer Snake was won by Malc Pepperill with 63lb 12oz with James Knight runner-up on 55lb 14oz.

There have been some big weights from the region's trout fisheries as well with double figure rainbows coming to the nets.

At Manningford Fly Fishery a 14lb was caught followed by two at 13lb, another at 12lb and plenty around the 10lb mark. Peter Cossburn has just stocked with some new trout one of which tops 18lb and could be close to 20lb - so there's a challenge for someone.

Dry fly fishing is going well or sub-surface patterns as the fish are swimming fairly high.

A 10lb rainbow on a damsel from Willow Lake and a 9lb 3oz rainbow from Club Lake tempted to a pheasant tail are the highlights from Avon Springs Fishery where may fly, pheasant tail and damsel are doing well.

Willow Lake is the best bet at the moment as it is shaded and the water temperature is slightly lower. A pheasant tail also tempted the best brown of the week from the river beat, weighing-in at 3lb 9oz. Black gnats are proving deadly on the river as well as sawyer bug.