Specimen fishing tips | Beat the weed with this rig

This ‘weed beater’ tench rig with its popped up hookbait is tangle-free, as streamlined, inline feeders are less prone than most to getting caught up in weed.

The Korum ICS feeders I use are 45g, weight-forward designs. The position of the weight helps with the bolt effect of the rig so fish will hook themselves. Should the mainline break, the fish can easily pull free of the feeder.

Unlike some anglers, I don’t use tubing on the rig as I’ve found that my bare, 12lb mainline cuts through the weed much more effectively.

I use live maggots in the feeder – generally red with a few whites mixed in – as they will crawl out and into the weed, helping to keep tench grubbing around in the swim.

MAIN Dai with pop up tench rig.jpg

Use a short hooklink

The business end of my rig features a popped-up hookbait, and I’ve found buoyant baits are best presented using a fine braided hooklink. I tie this to a light but strong size 10 or 12 Korum Specimen hook.

Tench can eject small baits more easily than larger ones, and a short hooklink of 3ins-4ins definitely converts most pick-ups into unmissable runs.

Make my pop-up hookbait

Rig foam and fake maggots lift the hooklink vertically. I will try two or three red ones on one rod and a combination of red and fluoro grubs on the other.

Red and either yellow or orange often get more bites early on in a session but tench soon wise up to them, so don’t be afraid to change.

Step 2 Add the fake maggots.jpg