SUNDAY looks set to witness a rare event on the Ouse this year - a fishing match.

After seemingly endless flooding, that always peaks on a weekend, river levels have dropped sufficiently to allow the York Amalgamation Winter Open contest to go ahead.

The Donkey Woods, Fulford and Palace Ings sections are all allocated for the contest and with interest likely to be high I suspect a sell-out field will line the banks below the city.

Expectations should be tempered however. The onset of winter this week will have sent water temperatures plummeting and the fish are unlikely to be in feeding mode.

The deeper pegs always tend to be favoured when the frost is biting and the pumper area at Fulford and the pegs opposite the Archbishop's Palace at Bishopthorpe are likely to be favoured.

The recent unfavourable conditions can, however, be turned to the pleasure anglers' advantage.

Flooding, followed by arctic conditions, will result in the fish being shoaled up in deep, steady water. The Foss Basin and areas around the confluence with the Ouse are likely to be crammed with roach and perch with pike in close patrol.

Similar conditions can be found further downstream at Naburn where the canal cut provides a calm winter refuge for fish seeking shelter from the raging flood waters.

On the commercial scene, carp action is likely to be much slower this weekend as the fish's metabolism falls with the mercury. Venues that hold good stocks of silver fish are a safer bet.

The coarse fish pond at the Poole Bridge Farm complex between Wheldrake and Crockey Hill is worth a visit as are the Willows where Goldrush lake holds a vast array of ide, orfe, chub and roach. It is advisable to call first to check which pegs are free of match bookings Plenty of fish other than carp can be found residing in the Laybourne Lakes complex. There is a match booked on some pegs on Marley Lake on Sunday.

Both the Selby and Aire and Calder Navigation canals have been in good recent form. Some excellent bags of roach have been taken from the sections between Burn and Brayton bridges in recent Selby open matches.

The adjacent sections under the control of York Amalgamation should produce similar results.

Bread punch, squatt and pinkie are the top baits with caster sorting out the better roach and occasional skimmer.

On the Aire and Calder, the deeper section below Pollington lock is in brilliant form with some good catches of quality roach falling to a pole and caster approach. A small ground bait feeder fished with maggot or pinkie will also catch well if the canal is flowing hard.

Weekend bookings Tomorrow - None.

Sunday - Donkey Woods/Fulford/ Palace Ings, (YDAA Winter Open match); Laybourne Lakes (Marley, pegs 37 - 53, (Huntington WMC AC and pegs 26 - 34).