Match 3, The Cam, Below A14 to Baits Bite, 2nd July 2017

Firstly I omitted in the last report to thank our sponsors West’s for their generous donation of prizes for our OAP match, which was combined with the points match on Reach Lode. On behalf of everyone I therefore offer our thanks, all participants went home with at least a bag of ground bait and some swim feeders, the winners even more. Thanks also to John Pope for organizing everything, especially the prize ceremony with all goodies displayed along side the Upware bridge.

Now to The Cam. A fair number had managed ‘practice’ sessions during the week and with a couple of 50 lb bags of bream & eels plus many other double figure catches optimism was high. The rumours had encouraged a few old faces to try their luck, including no less than Harry Haslop and Brian Rumbles who had been reported missing for many years and also Rob Humphries. Ace Cam man Steve Palmer also made the effort and so all was set for a good match. While the conditions looked near perfect with a good water colour and only patchy weed there was also only a minimal flow, not the best omen and surprising in view of the rain only a week before.

I decided to go for the bream from the off and dropped some choppy and casters on two lines, one of which was showing evidence of something feeding on the bottom!! After only ¼ hour the first skimmer of ¾ lb was in he net and expectations couldn’t have been higher. Of course it didn’t last long, after another 1½ hours I hadn’t had more than a couple of small roach!

In went some more dropper fulls of everything fish love and almost immediately I had a good eel of well over 1 lb. Two more followed before another blank 2 hours, despite more droppers full of quality worm and casters. About an hour before the whistle the flow picked up a bit and this seemed to encourage a relative feeding frenzy as almost immediately I landed another good eel, followed by two more and then two ½ decent skimmers. I clearly had a swim full and now, with the eels out of the way, it was just a question of time before a good bream took the bait. Of course it wasn’t to be and just as I bumped a good fish Trevor found his whistle and dashed further hopes.

Several people had walked the bank during the match and reported that no one was catching much more than small roach, the only few decent fish all having been lost at the net. Even on peg 1, Jason, one of those reporting a 50 lb net a few days before, said he was only catching small stuff. Steve Palmer, a Cam master, had given up with the bream after being beaten at the net by an eel and was struggling to catch a roach. I was told Kevin, with the last peg near the lock, was only catching the odd fish, apparently still on the same tub of fluorescent electric-purple pinkies that he first revealed a month ago!

I had thought that The Mepal Marvel may have done well because he had loaded his swim with ground bait and was using his favourite feeder tactics but it wasn’t his day and he only managed 9th at the weigh in.

So, the winner this match was Jason, who while claiming to only having caught small fish failed to admit to having 77 of them for what it turned out was just over 12 lb. Kevin was second with 1 oz over 11 lb and Ken third with 9 lb 1 oz. Trevor Sturge is still confused as to why he weighed in shy of 5 lb for eleventh place considering he had peg 2 next to the bridge, a definite favourite, perhaps he should have raked?

Our next match on 16th July will again be on Reach Lode at Upware, hopefully it will be a lot cooler than last time. As usual please book your place via Trevor, details as per the club book.

Ian Claydon

Points match No. 3 Fished The Cam, Downstream of A14 on 2nd July 2017
NameWeightPoints
lbozdr
Jason O'Dell12113
Kevin Saunders111812
Ken Whitmore9111
Ian Claydon8710
John Reed6159
Harry Haslop6118
Rob Humphries657
Brian Rumbles646
Rob Turner5105
Jamie Bruce554
Trevor Sturge4133
Simon Deal4982
Rory Williams3101
Bill Scott2981
Becky Pope131
Trevor O'Dell1281
Mark Freeman1481
Steve PalmerDNW1