with KINGFISHER

THE first round of the Octoplus Blackburn Winter League last weekend on the Leeds/Liverpool canal was a very interesting affair.

It provided not only some very good weights but, in typical winter fashion, some very difficult fishing as well.

There cannot be a canal angler out there who does not appreciate to some degree that all species, especially roach, can shoal very tightly during the winter months.

Just how many of you appreciate just how tightly is another matter, but the details of this particular should leave no-one in any doubt at all.

Nelson's Dave Wells, breadpunch expert, won the last practice match just a week ago with 5-8-0.

That, given a decent peg, would have very much been his, and others' target for the real thing. Little did they know just how different, yet similar in some ways, they would find it last week.

For a start some of the better punch fish, to around four ounces, decided to feed. Not only did they feed, but they did so in earnest producing some much better weights. Dave's 5-8-0 from the previous week would have got him into the frame - but only just!

It would, in fact, have put him fifth. The winner had a tremendous net of fish, from the basin at Clayton-le-Moors that went no less than 9-9-8. Dave Wells did not have to worry about making the frame however, for he was the winner again.

He fed a cup of liquidised bread into each of his chosen swims, at seven and 13 metres, on the whistle.

He caught from first put-in till last, switching swims throughout, topping up with feed only when the bites showed signs of slowing up. IN his net at the end, he reckoned, were around 400 fish and he had a great day.

He was not however, the only one. Three pegs away, on the red bush, was Springview's Sean Birchall and he also found his peg to be stuffed with fish eager to feed. His final tally was very similar to that of Wells, in fact only a few fish short with 9-4-7.

Still within the confines of the basin, but two pegs to the other side of Wells, the anglers had a rare old fish for fish battle, to decide third and fourth. Brian Whitlock, Lostock Tackle, was the victor at the end with 6-14-9 but only by two drams.

In the team stakes, Wells Tri-cast Rochdale Blue mates were unable to emulate his performance. They couldn't help the team into the opening frame even, with the match going to last year's champions, Tri-Cast Calder Black who totalled 22 penalty points. They had to share the glory however, with Highfield and Tri-Cast Calder Blue were third with 25.

So the match was different, with bigger and more fish, but it was also similar inasmuch as there were hot pegs, where they had shoaled tightly.

That the top four would come from a six-peg hotspot was unexpected however, but it should be something all you pleasure anglers take on board.