Carp with a passion for fruit is caught

HUGE bags of fish and some notable individual catches make up the news this week as anglers continue to enjoy excellent sport.

Witherington Farm Fishery had a massive match-winning haul on Sunday, Waldens Farm Fishery reports a huge ghost carp of 21lb plus a pineapple-loving 19lb common while there are unconfirmed reports of a 21lb carp caught from the Avon at Downton by an angler fishing for barbel.

The big match weight came from Witherington Farm's Sellwood Lake when the fishery hosted the Nigel Turner series of matches. Richard Yeo won the contest with 137lb 4oz, but even second and third placed anglers weighed-in 110lb 6oz and 68lb 8oz respectively. Cottage Lake was also used and this produced a top weight of 93lb 13oz.

Pleasure anglers fishing the margins are catching big bags of carp using floating baits many of them well into double figures.

Salisbury angler Lee Wood-house won Saturday's open match on the Inner Snake with 74lb 12oz followed by Brian Shutler (63lb 4oz) and Mark Cannings (41lb).

Top news from Waldens Farm is the capture of a 21lb ghost carp from Abbots Lake which took a floating crust.

The most unusual bait of the week goes to Mark Cook who put on a piece of pineapple and promptly landed a 19lb common.

From Bishops Lake came the heaviest fish of the week, a 24lb 10oz common which took James Smith's hair-rigged meat over loose fed pellet.

He took four fish to register a total weight of 66lb 10oz.

Sarah Bentley fished Monks Lake using soft pellet float fished and caught a lovely 1lb 8oz roach which was among a bag of roach and rudd all around the 1lb mark.

Monks Lake is producing good bags of tench, skimmers, crucians and carp with chub to 4lb from around the island.

Deacons Lake continues to fish well both on the surface and on the bottom. Sunday's match held by Test Valley AC was won with 40lb 11oz. Cliff Carbis and Ted Rose shared the honours, but Andy Palmer should have won. One carp jumped out his net just before weighing leaving him three ounces behind in second place.

An invitation match on the picturesque Fred's Lake at Bishopstone, owned by Tom and Sue Atkins, has given a boost to the coffers of Coombe Bissett Cricket Club's new pavilion fund.

Some 27 anglers competed for the White Hart Cup which eventually went to S. Brown for his winning bag of 28lb 9oz. The junior cup went to M. Cole who caught a bag of roach weighing 8lb 11oz.

The match, fished in far from ideal conditions which put paid to the planned barbecue, raised £230 for the fund.

Good weights were also enjoyed by members of the Harnham Kingfishers in their last match.

Benn Cooper won the under 12s section with 25lb 2oz. Jake Dean was second (21lb 10oz) and Joe Dunne was third (11lb 6oz). The 12-16 group was won by Chris Hazzard (21lb 4oz) with Ed Purvis second (19lb 8oz) and Glenn Lake third (11lb 2oz).