CLEETHORPES angler Roly Rusling is better know for racing pigeons, but on Sunday in the Carr Lane AC match he drew a flier of a different kind.
He drew the reed peg on Tripp Lake, at Messingham, and the conditions were awful – the wind at times made it impossible to fish the pole at any lengths.
But Rusling stuck it out on the waggler, casting towards the reeds – he caught a carp early on and, after an hour, he had two in the net when other anglers were struggling for bites.
Towards the ends of the match he lost bigger fish at the net but, in addition to his eventual win (with 6.6lbs), Rusling took £100 for landing the golden peg.
Next in was yours truly. I managed to catch silver fish on the pole before the conditions worsened. I then changed to the waggler, and ended up netting 4.15lbs.
Steve Croskill was third with 3.13lbs, while there were section wins for Jez Waters and Paul Easton.
Meanwhile, there was another club in action on the same pond – but only eight anglers weigh ed in as many went home because of the poor conditions.
In the Open at Messingham, it seemed that winter is finally over and, with the arrival of warmer weather, anglers can now expect a big improvement in the sport.
Steve Bingham, from Gainsborough, took advantage of the improved conditions to score back-to-back wins on the Islands Lake last week.
Taking a positive approach – fishing with luncheon meat and 8mm hard pellets – Bingham won the open from peg 21 with 92lbs of car.
On Sunday, he drew peg 24 and found carp, tench, chub and big skimmers keen to the bait and scored another good result with 108lbs.
Another of the shallow waters – the main Syndicate Lake – is also fishing well and steadily improving as the weather gets better.
Scunthorpe angler, Neil Graham, enjoyed a six fish haul in a single night session this week, landing carp from 14lbs to 23lbs.
Syndicate members, who have been targeting the Small Pond, have had some really good sport and Roger Wood started his session off in style on Monday, landing 3.5lbs perch on his first cast of the day.
Don Hudson spotted large carp feeding in the margins while fishing in the Wednesday Open Match on the Swan Pond.
Casting his bait in front of the fish, he attracted a 17lb bite – and the catch almost doubled his weight to give him victory over Alan Gregory, who took 32lbs worth of skimmers.
