All members please note that Larry and Ted will be seeding the New Lagoon area this week, so please refrain from entering the area until further notice to allow the seed to take and not damage the ground. Signs will be put up and the area will be taped off clearly.

To all members,
Our Membership Secretary, Martin Hill is organising a charity match in memory of our former Secretary who sadly passed away recently. Ken Marshall was a keen match angler and very well liked amongst the club match anglers. This match will be at the Old Ballast Pit on Sunday 5th March, meeting at 7.30am to draw at 8.00am. Martin will be organising a raffle on the day so any donations will be very much appreciated and it was agreed by the regulars that all proceeds will go to Ken’s partner. The Friendly Fisherman has already made a donation and there are a few more bits still to come. All members are welcome, so if you were thinking of getting involved with our friendly match lads, then next Sunday would be a great start. There is plenty of friendly banter and lots of tips and help on hand on the day. Any donations can be made by calling Martin on the club number or myself (Austin) on 07974488040.

Any anglers doing an overnighter on Saturday, please make sure you are off the water by 7.30am Sunday morning. Notices will be put up.

Thanks in advance to all.

One of the recently introduced Redmire Commons has already been caught and hopefully this will prove to be a hungry fast growing fish.

The Pike fishing has been exceptional in the last 10 days with several multiple catches with individual fish to 18lb. I decided to have a go on Sunday morning and was rewarded with 3 fish in 40 minutes with the biggest going 10lb 14oz. All on deadbaits. I then went over to the river and managed 2 more fish to 9lb. A very productive morning and made even more interesting to find out that after moving to the river, another angler went in the same swim on Barden and had Pike of 16lb and 9lb. I have received reports of 11 different double figured Pike being caught on deadbaits and lures, so it’s well worth a visit at the moment before they start spawning.

A couple of healthy looking Pike, a welcome visitor and a couple of not so welcome visitors. It’s not all about the fishing.

Ted Bryan has been grafting away getting the swims near completion on the Lagoon. We just need to finish them off with some nice woodchip in the next couple of weeks. Ted and Larry will be seeding the banks around the New Lagoon this week, so would all members refrain from walking around this area until further notice to allow the seed to take and get a good start. We will be marking off the area and signage will be put up to tell members of this. Keep up the good work Ted and Larry.

Once again the Society are pleased to announce that we took delivery of over 300lb of small silvers for the Ballast Pit recently. These were mainly Bream of 4-6″ and 6-8″ and other silvers of the same size. We know a few will be predated naturally but we are also sure it will bump up the catches for the pleasure and match anglers in the future. This was proven within a week with one of our regular visitors having a good day catching small silvers throughout the day.

We also took delivery of 15 stunning large Tench for 76lb (average 5lb+) 8 males and 7 females, again from COARSEFISH UK – hopefully some of these fish will become double figure in years to come.

THe Society are pleased to announce that we recently took delivery of 4 quality big Carp from COARSEFISH UK for Barden Lake. There were 3 Redmire  Commons of 19lb, 18lb 12oz and 18lb 8oz and a Mirror of 25lb. These fish were all photographed, chipped and recorded before introduction into the lake and the Society would like to thank all those who helped on the day and thank you all for your continued support. Thank you Aaron & Scott from Coarsefish UK for supplying these cracking fish.

The Society recently received the sad news that two of our long serving Committee members had passed away. Bill Mitchell who had served on Committee for several years and was a keen match angler and Ken Marshall who until very recently had been serving as Society Secretary and was also a part of our club match setup, will  be sadly missed by fellow members and Committee.

We took delivery of our latest stock for the Old Ballast Pit last week. We hand picked 16 C3 Mirrors ranging  from 5lb 8oz to 8lb 8oz, as you can see, there are some real stunners. We also received 5 C3 Commons ranging from 11lb to 13lb, these fish are really quick growers as they were harvested at the same time as the Mirrors. All these fish were tagged, weighed and photographed and then entered into our record books. We also received some clonking Perch to 3lb 8oz which were for the New Lagoon.

The last week saw Larry Howard, Olly Howard and Ted Bryan continuing with the landscaping  work on the railway side at the far end of the Lagoon. With the water levels expecting to rise with all the expected rain, we took the opportunity to build up the bank and level it off to a good height above the water level. The inlet pipe from the ditch in the back field was strengthened and tidied up as well. The bulk of the work was completed by Wednesday but then the rain stopped play and work should continue very soon. The new drainage at the car park end seems to be working very well although on inspection we noticed that the top board will need to have two inches taken off of it so that it will then give us the perfect maximum level.  The new willows we planted have taken well and there are even some new buds showing already.  We have some seating with tables on order and some more planting and seeding will be done as the weather warms up.

With the conditions changing from cold and dry to mild and wet, the river was expected to fish better but Vexor Bridge is not usually known for big match weights, which is possibly why only 8 members turned out for this one. It was mainly Chub that showed and they were of a good size too and a few Roach and other silvers were caught up by the road bridge but were of a small size. Lee Wakeman took top spot with one Chub for 3lb 10oz, in 2nd was Mick Smith who worked hard for his mixed bag of smaller fish for 3lb 8oz and in 3rd place was Dave Lee with a Chub for 3lb 4oz. There were other Chub caught of 3lb by J Cowburn and 2lb 15oz by Martin Hill.