Dai Gribble's Specimen Secrets revealed
1) Use small hooks for big roach
If you spend most of your time fishing for species such as barbel and perch then you’re likely to be using hooks of size 12 or bigger.
As a result, if you start fishing for roach with double maggot on a size 16 it looks extremely small by comparison.
However, don’t be fooled into thinking that a size 16 is tiny and that roach won’t be put off by it.
Ask any match angler and they’ll tell you that you’ll get a lot more bites the smaller you can go.
This is due to the weight of the hook and the fact that roach are delicate feeders, quite able to detect something is not quite right even with a size 16 hook.
Yes, you’ll fool the odd fish but drop down to an 18 or even a 20 and you’ll get far more bites.
Smaller hooks have thinner wire and less of it so they weigh less, which means the hookbait reacts more like the free offerings.
Take your time when playing the fish and you’ll certainly end up with more on the bank.
2) Soft cheesepaste for chub
Chub can be caught on practically any bait you can imagine, from maggots to kids’ sweets, but few are as good for catching bigger fish right now as cheesepaste.
Perhaps the biggest mistake anglers make is that they make cheesepaste that is too firm and then cover the hookpoint when mounting the bait.
One of the main reasons for this is that they make their paste in a warm kitchen. Then, once taken outside into the cold, it becomes much harder. Whenever I make cheesepaste I always put it in the fridge afterwards to check the consistency when it is cold.
If I find it’s too hard I add a little margarine, while if it’s too soft I add liquidised breadcrumbs from a fresh white loaf.
I err on the side of it being soft. Most of my chub fishing involves short casts, and I find that I can bury the hook inside soft paste and cast very gently. For longer casts use a small bait cage on a hair to help keep the bait in place.
3) Keep warm... fish longer
Catching big fish is often a game of patience – and few things are more certain to break your resolve to sit it out for the bite from possibly the fish of a lifetime than getting cold.
In the past I have found that it is generally my feet that get the coldest, but there are a couple of things you can do that make a real difference.
Unlined wellies and waders should be avoided – if you really need them, go for a pair with a neoprene lining.
Make sure you pair them with good wool hiking socks. These give a massive boost to your well-being, but be sure you don’t then undermine their thermal properties by wearing them over other socks that are not made of wool.
4) Travel lighter for chub
When roving for chub you don’t need lots of end tackle. In fact, I carry mine in a really small tackle box.
There is no point in taking tackle that you won’t use, so leave the feeders and large leads at home and take just the essentials – SSG shot, float stops or leger stops, a few beads and links and hooks. Just add a pair of scissors and a disgorger and you’re good to go.
By only taking the minimum of tackle you will be far more likely to walk further, and that means you will fish more swims. That in turn means you will almost certainly catch more chub.
All you need to know about the fishing rod licence 2019
Here is everything that you need to know about getting a fishing rod licence in 2019. From where to get one all the way to the different types of rod licence and how long they last for we will be covering all bases so that you know what you will be getting when purchasing one.
Angling is one of the most popular participation sports in England. With a million fishing rod licences being sold in 2017/2018 raising £23 million. In the last full year, sales of rod licences funded 350,000 fish being restocked into rivers, responding to 797 fisheries incidents and installing 37 fish passes amongst other things.
Where to get a fishing rod licence
When it comes to purchasing a fishing rod licence there are a few ways in which you can get one. The first is to visit the official government website and purchase your rod licence online via https://www.gov.uk/fishing-licences/buy-a-fishing-licence
This is the only place online that you should be purchasing a rod licence from. The other two ways for you to obtain a fishing rod licence for 2019 is via the post office and going in person to order your licence, the final way is to purchase one over the phone by calling the environment agency on 0344 800 5386
The rod licence options and pricing
There are a few different licence types to look at and decide which best suits you for when you go fishing. There is a Trout and coarse 2-rod, Trout and coarse 3-rod and a Salmon & sea trout rod licence. All three of these licences can be purchased at four different price ranges that change depending on how long you want the licence to run for, with juniors (13 and under) being able to fish for free however for juniors between the age of 13-16 they will need to apply for a junior rod licence which is still free.
See full list of prices below...
Here are the 2018 rod licence prices
When you will need a rod licence
You need a rod licence to be able to fish for salmon, trout, freshwater fish, smelt or eel in
England (except the River Tweed)
Wales
the Border Esk region of Scotland
You must follow national and local rules when it comes to fishing with a rod and line in England and Wales
A 12-month rod licence will last for a year from date of purchase
Make sure that you have your rod licence on you at all times or else you could be prosecuted and fined up to £2,500 when fishing without a rod licence. With the EA checking 63,000 licenses in 2016/17.
Rod Licence Cover Art
This year renowned angling and wildlife artist David Miller painted the images which will appear on the new Environment Agency issued fishing rod licences with the bream on the 2 rod coarse and trout licence, a mirror carp on the 3 rod licence and a sea trout on the salmon and migratory trout licence.
If you want to see more about this year's rod licence then you can check out the the government website here: https://www.gov.uk/fishing-licences
Roach Fishing Tips | Fish two lines to catch more roach
Often overlooked in favour of carp, roach in commercial fisheries can provide a great day’s sport. Commercials can hold quality roach that have grown to a decent size on high-protein carp baits. And, unlike skimmers, roach are reliable feeders.
England and Daiwa ace Cameron Hughes knows the value of these fish on winter commercials. They’ve provided him with double-figure match weights on days when going for carp or skimmers would have drawn a blank, as he explains...
Picking your lines
“I’d have a main pole line at 13m or beyond, where the fish will settle and feed confidently, and I’d expect to catch skimmers here too if the lake holds them.
“However, you always need a second line to rest the main one. Mine would be at around 6m, depending on the depth. Around 5ft of water is perfect, and I’d expect this spot to come good in the final few hours of a session when the roach move closer in.”
Laying the rig in
“Many anglers lay the rig in one way all day. That’s okay, but mixing it up will pick off bigger roach. On one drop I may lay the rig in and then, on the next, slowly lower it directly down to the bottom. Another good trick is to flick the rig out past the pole tip on a tight line, holding the pole halfway down the section.
“Then as the rig settles, push the rest of the section out. This maintains a tight line and can work for the bigger roach.”
Changing lines
“I reckon that even in coloured water the roach won’t be keen on moving into this shallower water early on. I’d certainly have a look on my short line after an hour, and if I was getting bites, I’d stay on it until it faded.
“If nothing happened, however, I wouldn’t think about coming back here until around 90 minutes of the session remained. Hopefully by then, it should be solid!”
Light and heavy floats
“Varying your presentation throughout the day can have a big effect on your catch. Just because you’re getting bites on one rig doesn’t mean that a change to a lighter set-up won’t improve things. For the long line I’d set up two rigs taking Carpa Gloucester floats of 1g and 0.75g.
“The bigger float is my starting rig, and this is shotted with a bulk and three No9 dropper shot, whereas the lighter rig takes just No9 shot strung out in a tapered fashion to give the bait a slower fall in the final few feet of the swim. This is the one I’ll change to if I am missing bites on the heavy rig, as this change in presentation can make a world of difference.”
Feeding for different fish
“The two lines are fed differently, as I’m aiming to catch different fish from them, so the long pole swim is fed with four balls of groundbait to create an area for the fish to settle over, while the 6m line only sees loosefeed. I’d expect any skimmers or bream to feed further out, hence the groundbait, while at 6m roach will be the main fish.
“My mix is 50/50 Sensas Super Canal Black and Gros Gardons Noire mixed on the damp side to get down quickly without giving off any particles. Into this I add a few red maggots and around a quarter-pint of casters – enough to hold roach in the peg while keeping any skimmers happy too.
“Around 15 to 20 casters are fed short every minute. If there are lots of fish about I’ll feed less often, but with more casters to keep the fish on the deck.”
River fishing tips with Dave Harrell
Top river angler Dave Harrell has been answering some of your most burning questions. Take a look at see what you can take out onto the bank with you this weekend.
BLOCKEND OR OPEN?
Q) Which is the best sort of feeder for chub fishing in the winter? I’ve got blockend and open-end but I am never sure which to use.
A) I would go down the blockend route with maggots while it’s cold. Chub love maggots, and if they’re hungry they won’t be able to resist! Use a long tail of around 3ft to 4ft if bites are slow.
ARTIFICIAL MAGGOTS
Q) Is it worth trying artificial maggots? They look so realistic but I’ve yet to use them as hookbait.
A) They’re well worth trying if you are being pestered by small fish, as you know there will always be something that looks edible on the hook. I’ve caught a lot of chub and barbel on pleasure sessions with this tactic, using one or two artificial maggots. Bear in mind that artificial baits are banned in matches but allowed in pleasure sessions.
RIG PROBLEMS
Q) I keep getting tangles when I use Bolo or Avon floats. I use three or four shots below the olivette but it’s frustrating, as the line ends up in a bird’s nest as often as not! What am I doing wrong?
A) You need to change your shotting pattern for starters. Just use an olivette 2ft from the hook with one dropper fixed 10ins above the hook and it wont tangle.
If it’s windy, always cast off the side that the wind is blowing to, as this, too, will eliminate tangles.
BEST PERCH BAITS?
Q) I fancy doing some river perch fishing before the season ends. What baits should I use?
A) Perch are greedy fish and they will eat all livebaits, but for best results use chunks of lobworm or even a whole one. Perch love them!
CANE OR HOLLOW TIPS?
Q) Am I better using painted cane or hollow tips on my Bolo floats? I always thought that cane was supposed to be the best.
A) I used to use painted cane tips, but don’t carry any now. Hollow tips are the best, as you can see them so much better, especially if there is any sun on the water.
WILL I CATCH BARBEL?
Q) I’ve been following water temperatures on the River Severn matches Facebook page and it’s been between 4°C and 5°C recently. Will I be able to catch barbel with it as low as this?
A) While not impossible, I think you could be in for a struggle trying to catch barbel until the water warms up. You’d be better off targeting chub while it stays cold, and going for barbel when it’s up to at least 8°C.
SPECI WAGG OR TRUNCHEON?
Q) I fish a lot of fast-flowing rivers but I’m confused about waggler choice. Should I use a Speci or Truncheon design?
A) If your swim is fast and shallow (3ft to 4ft) you should use a Speci Waggler, as the short design is perfect for these depths.
If your swim is over 4ft and up to around 8ft deep the Truncheon Waggler is better because it is longer and easier to control, especially if it’s windy.
SHOULD I TRY TARES?
Q) I love catching big roach and had a lot of success with seed baits in the summer. Is it worth using tares on the hook in the winter?
A) I, too, love big roach and have caught loads on tares in the summer months but not in winter. I think you’re better off using maggots or casters when the temperature is down.
WHY SOIL?
Q) I’ve noticed that you use a lot of soil in your groundbait mixes. Why is this?
A) I’ve used soil in my groundbait for many years. It gives the mix weight, which is important if the river is flowing quickly. I add about three pints of soil to two 1.5kg bags of groundbait.
Carp fishing tips | How to bag up on carp in the cold
I have to admit that as I drove up the M6 for my latest session at Barston Lakes I feared the worst.
Temperatures had plummeted overnight, and the amount of frozen water I saw on the journey wasn’t exactly filling me with confidence.
However, I was heartened by the sight of the fish in the pond at the fishery swimming around, rather than shoaled up in one corner, and I thought that there might be a chance.
What I certainly didn’t expect was that in just a few hours’ time I’d have taken one of my biggest ever winter catches of over 130lb of carp, F1s and skimmers, in temperatures which never got above 2ºC.
I elected to fish peg 83 on the grass bank area at the far end of the lake, where at least I’d have the wind off my back for a spot of feeder fishing.
Just lately I’ve been having a great run of results fishing the feeder on venues such as Barston and Boddington.
Some might think that feeder fishing in the cold is ‘chuck it and chance it’ and it’s all about drawing on the fish.
In part I’d have to agree – you do have to be on fish to win at this time of year because you can’t catch what’s not there.
But if you are on fish then there are a few little tricks which can make all the difference.
Here are seven simple steps which helped me to my big weight…
Go for small hookbaits
At this time of year every bite is a bonus. With this in mind, I like to keep my hookbaits small, 4mm and 6mm wafters.
I feel that when it’s really cold a smaller hookbait has more appeal. Skimmers, in particular, are great weight-builders and love a mini wafter.
With the water being so clear everywhere, yellow baits take some beating. On top of these I also like to have a few dead maggots with me. As a change bait they can often produce a bite, even on the Hybrid feeder when all else fails.
An example was the recent Golden rod qualifier on Barston Lakes. In bitter conditions the carp and F1s shut up shop but I managed 11 skimmers for 17lb, all on 4mm or 6mm yellow wafters, to win a 20-peg zone and qualify for the Larford final later in the year.
Pellets early, groundbait late
In the cold it’s all about taking whatever comes along – at the end of the day all the fish get weighed in!
In the last few weeks I’ve noticed that the bulk of the fish that get caught are taken early on in the match, whereas I would say that the last hour at this time of year is more often than not the worst.
Taking this into account, I have been varying my Hybrid approach a little.
I still like to fish pellets early as I feel they are a more positive bait, but the last hour, when bites are at a premium, I’ve been switching to groundbait in the feeder.
On venues that contain a number of skimmers this seems to produce a bite or two from them to boost my weight when others have stopped catching.
Clip up and move
At the start of a match I always like to clip up.
In the cold, carp and F1s like to shoal up, so if I cast and get a bite I like to go straight back to the same spot. Chances are there will be more than one fish there.
Once bites dry up, though, I see no point in repetitively casting to the same spot waiting for the fish to come back. Nine times out of 10 they won’t, and so I’ll look to fish a different spot.
Initially, if room permits, I’ll have a look to the left and right of my original spot, before moving further out.
When moving out more often than not you don’t have to go far – a metre is often enough to nick a bite.
When the new spot tails off I simply move again and hopefully follow the fish.
The secret is to find ‘new water’ that’s not been disturbed and where the fish are likely to feel safe.
Carp are easily spooked, and if I’m not catching I will always look for new water as that’s where the fish are most likely to be.
Light elastics
When fishing mini Hybrid feeders it’s important to think about what elastic to use in the feeder, as I need every fish I hook to end up in the net!
As a guide I will always kick off on the black, heavy elastic because if I am going to catch a carp or two this normally becomes apparent very early on.
However, if I start to catch skimmers I will drop down to the white, lighter elastic as I feel I get fewer hookpulls as a result.
Don’t think you can’t land carp on the lighter of the two elastics, because you can – I just feel the black is more suited to carp whereas the white is better for skimmers and F1s.
Use measuring sticks
I have said this many times before, yet it never ceases to amaze me that anglers still repeatedly cast a bomb to get clipped up at the required spot.
All this does is spook any fish that might have been in the swim and send them dashing for cover at a rate of knots!
I do appreciate, though, that clipping up is important, which is why I use measuring sticks.
Using the sticks I can clip up at the required distance quickly and efficiently with no disturbance to the swim. This way my first cast that hits the water will be my first cast of the match.
A little tip here is never to clip up at your maximum range to start with if you’re fishing into open water.
Try to leave yourself enough room so you can move out two or three times as the match progresses. This way you might get two or three goes at the fish as opposed to just the one!
Big hooks
While I’m a fan of small feeders and hookbaits, I’ve recently discovered that bigger is better when it comes to hook choice, even when fishing for skimmers.
For this reason I’ve been hair-rigging my mini wafters on size 10 QM1 hooks!
My reason for this is that I feel the fish find a bigger hook much harder to deal with when they suck the hookbait. This results in more bites and, importantly, even better hookholds.
I just think we’d be amazed how many fish suck in the hookbait and blow it back out with us being none the wiser!
With a bigger hook I feel this happens much less and I put more fish in the net as a result!
Four great specimen fishing tips from Dai Gribble
Fancy catching your target fish this weekend? Then check out these great specimen fishing tips from Drennan Cup winner Dai Gribble.
1) Seek out specimen roach
To track down big roach, look at match reports from the rivers or lakes you are thinking of targeting.
Match anglers invariably catch them if they are present, and unlike many specimen hunters most are free with information.
As well as match reports, your local tackle shop will provide valuable clues as to which stretches are likely to produce a magical two-pounder.
Knowing big roach are present where you are going to fish is a big step towards catching one!
Not being tied to the classical match fishing window of 10am to 3pm you can fish at dusk and dawn, prime feeding times.
2) Pack maggots for slow release
There is no better way of catching river chub than with maggots in a blockend feeder.
Ensure that the maggots are loosely packed so some exit the feeder on the way down.
These maggots will be swept downstream and draw fish in.
Later on, pack the feeder more tightly, so most of the maggots are still inside when it reaches the riverbed. They will then exit the feeder close to your hookbait.
Lots of maggots in a relatively tight area will drive the chub into a feeding frenzy and make them less wary of your hookbait. The shoal is also less likely to spook when you do hook a fish.
3) Smaller baits for day barbel
Barbel will feed all winter and any slight rise in river temperature is likely to turn them on. This is a good window of opportunity to target them, particularly on well-stocked fisheries.
Most of the weed in our rivers will now have died back, which means that unless you are fishing close to snags such as large boulders or overhanging trees you can scale down your terminal tackle and mainline.
This will almost certainly guarantee more bites.
Barbel have amazing senses and can easily find a small bait such as an 8mm Sonubaits Pellet O, even if it’s less obvious than a big boilie or a large lump of luncheon meat.
By using finer end tackle there is a good chance you can catch through the day rather than sit waiting for dusk in the hope that a much bigger bait will be taken.
4) Float your line on rivers
As the season draws to a close there’s every chance conditions will be ideal for trotting a float.
With most of the weed gone you can run a float downstream in swims where, for much of the year, trotting would be completely impossible.
No matter what species you are targeting, if you are using a float attached top and bottom, such as a stick or Avon, one thing is essential – your line must float.
A lot of popular floatfishing lines do just that, but all will benefit from a quick squirt with a silicone spray.
The additional buoyancy afforded by a spray makes controlling the float and mending the line far easier.
This in turn will help you trot your float through more fluently, which will lead to better bait presentation and more bites.
How to fish a weir pool
Well-oxygenated and containing a variety of fish species, weir pools are among the best features along any stretch of river – but at first glance they can seem daunting places to tackle.
Powerful flows generating white foam on the surface, unseen snags, weed and variable flows and depths all present a challenge to the angler, but the fish which live in a weir are pretty predictable when it comes to seeking out where they live.
1) Target ‘crease’ for Chub
Chub love to sit just out of the main current, ready to spot food items carried their way by the flow. ‘Crease’ swims, points where fast water meets slow, can be productive – chub will often dart out and grab a meal.
Try a static bait fished to the edge of the crease, using a bomb or small maggot or cage feeder and a sizeable bait that the fish can’t miss. A bunch of maggots is good if small fish aren’t a problem, otherwise a lobworm, breadflake or a 10mm halibut pellet will do the job. Use the feeder to get some bait down before you begin to fish. A waggler, stick or Avon float can also work, trotted past the slack.
You can loosefeed, but make sure it goes in well upstream so it hits bottom where the fish are.
2) Find Roach, dace and pike here
Roach and dace cope well with fast currents and can be found in the fast water run-off. Pike won’t be far away either, especially if there is a deep hole nearby to attract prey fish.
Use a stick float or waggler to catch the small fish, finding a clean-bottomed run to trot the rig 50 yards downstream. Keep a steady stream of maggots, casters or hemp going in every trot. You’ll soon work out where the feed is hitting bottom as this will be where bites come from.
On the hook go for single or double maggot and set the float to just touch bottom. Alternatively, a small maggot feeder will present a still bait if the pace and flow are too swift. This method can also pick up bonus fish such as chub or big perch.
3) Bream love slack-water areas
Just below the weir sill the water may look turbulent, but on the bottom it can be quite slow-moving. Big bream often populate these areas, getting away from the maelstrom of the main weir and picking off natural food.
A feeder will be the only sensible tactic, and bream love groundbait, so go for a cage model packed with crumb and a good helping of chopped worm, casters and/or pellets. A whole worm is the king of hookbaits for bream.
Pick a feeder carrying a loading of 1oz or more to start, and be prepared to go heavier, if needed, to hold bottom. Cast the feeder into the head of the weir and it will sink to the bottom where the slower water is. Fish with the rod in the air to keep as much line off the turbulent surface as possible.
4) Get tight to the weir for Perch and barbel
The two species most likely to be found directly under the weir itself are perch and barbel. Both benefit from the back eddies created by the pool that will bring food items their way.
For barbel, it has to be the straight lead using a big weight to anchor the bait in the flow. Give the fish a bait they can’t miss – a fishy or meaty boilie or pellet between 10mm and 16mm, or even an old-fashioned piece of luncheon meat or a lobworm. Use a safety lead clip system if possible, as this will allow a fish to escape should you lock up in a snag. Also ensure your tackle is up to the job – that means a minimum of 12lb line and a size 8 hook.
To loosefeed, a PVA bag packed with pellets and chopped boilies will ensure a patch of feed around the hookbait but be sure to thread the bag down your hooklink – simply nicking it on to the hook will see the bag ripped off by the flow long before the rig settles.
If perch are your target, then investigate back eddies or slightly slower water to the side of the main sill, which is a super ambush point for perch.
A legered lobworm will sort them out, but a brilliant way to locate the perch is to cast around with a lure rod and a small jig. This will locate any fish in the pool and you can then cast a legered worm, loosefeeding red maggots, to try to catch a specimen.
Top chub fishing tips to help you catch more
Chub are one of the best species to target on the rivers, especially when it’s cold. To help you land a specimen chub next time you’re out fishing on the bank, we’ve put this handy guide with great tips from top specimen angler Phil Spinks.
The real beauty of winter chub fishing is that it requires so little in the way of kit to be successful.
Travelling light with just a rod, a landing net, bait and a few items of tackle is such an uncluttered and enjoyable way to catch fish.
By staying mobile and hopping from swim to swim, it’s possible to search out all the best spots where the fish might be holed up.
To set you on the right path, this week we’ve picked the brains of specimen angler Phil Spinks. Here are the top spots he looks for when targeting chub.
Floating detritus
Rafts that build up against fallen trees or snags offer cover and free food to the chub.
slack water
The still area of water adjacent to the main flow is a classic hotspot. Being out of the flow, it is also easy to bait up.
Inlet
Anywhere a small stream or ditch joins the main river will be a regular hangout for any chub looking for an easy meal. They are drawn to the sound, movement and extra oxygenation.
overhanging tree
Any trees or bushes hanging over the water are always worth a cast. Chub always love a roof over their heads.
undercut banks
Undercuts can reach for several feet under the bank and are well worth exploring with a bait.
Deep holes
Depressions in the riverbed offer the fish shelter from the flow, and are also areas where natural food collects
Best Chub Fishing Baits
We went to bait expert Paul Garner to get his views on what the best baits for chub are. Take a look at what he had to say here
Chub Fishing Venues to visit
Want to know the best spots to go chub fishing this weekend? Then take a look at our fishing near me page which has loads of chub fishing venue guides.
River fishing expert Dave Harrell Q&A
River fishing pro Dave Harrell answers some of your burning river questions!
WINTER GROUNDBAIT?
Q) I fish a deep river where it’s hard to get loosefeed to the bottom. What groundbait mix would you recommend in winter?
A) I use groundbait a lot in the winter and my mix is simple. I use differing parts of Bait-Tech Pro Natural Original with molehill soil.
If there are a lot of fish, I mix 3kg of dry groundbait with 1.5 litres of soil. If the fish aren’t as plentiful, I use even more soil, as this will just get the loosefeed down rather than feeding them. My ‘difficult days’ mix is 1kg of Pro Natural Original to three litres of soil.
HOW MUCH LOOSEFEED?
Q) When floatfishing on rivers in the winter I struggle to keep bites coming. Could I possibly be overfeeding the swim?
A) In the cooler months two to three pints of feed is usually more than enough on most venues. I have fished matches and fed every cast but still not used a pint. A rule of thumb is feed light to start and feed to the response thereafter.
Chub and dace will eat a lot more feed than roach, so species also dictates how much to put in.
Try to ration yourself by measuring out half-pints into your bait tin rather than having all your bait out from the start.
What size hooks for chub!
Q) What size hooks should I use for chub? A friend told me I’d catch more on a size 20 than a bigger hook!
A) Chub have very big mouths. While I’ve caught them on huge baits intended for barbel, I’ve caught many more on a small hook with maggots. Always match the hook to the bait. For single maggot use a 20, for double maggot an 18 or 16, and for three or four maggots use a 14 or 12.
REEL & LINE?
Q) I want to do some feeder fishing for chub on the River Thames. Can you recommend a good reel and line combination?
A) I’m a big fan of Daiwa reels, and I use a TDR 3012 for this sort of fishing.
Use it in conjunction with 8lb (0.24mm) Pro Feeder line. This is a sinking line, which you can get down under the surface quickly.
How do I plumb the depth on a river?
Q) How do I plumb the depth on moving water? I struggle because the float keeps getting dragged under!
A) Plumb before you put a rig on. Fix a small top-and-bottom stick float or balsa on the line and tie a heavy plummet or bomb to the line.
With only the one weight to work with you’ll find the depth much quicker. Try walking downstream, plumbing up every couple of yards. Do this for at least 30m and you’ll find just how deep the swim is.
WHY DO I KEEP LOSING FISH?
Q) Over the past few months I have been bumping loads of grayling off. Can I do anything to stop this happening?
A) Lost fish can be a real frustration at times and, unfortunately, it’s very rare to hook a lot of river fish in a session and land them all. The problem is, the fish use the current to their advantage and twist themselves off the hook.
A few things you could try include finer wire hooks, bigger hooks and softer rods.
All these things can help you to land more fish.
Top specimen fishing tips with Dai Gribble
Specimen fishing expert Dai Gribble gives out four of his best specimen secrets from using the birdlife to help you catch pike all the the way to trying just a single hookbait!
1) Choose your targets wisely
At this time of year it pays to target fish based on prevalent conditions.
Certain species are much more likely to feed in the cold. On rivers this means grayling or chub when the rivers are low and temperatures are near-freezing.
Grayling above all others will provide good sport at such times. In the past I have had to pack up because of ice forming in the rod rings with grayling still feeding.
If you’re made of stern stuff, applying glycerine to your rod rings with a cotton bud should stop them freezing, but personally I find when it gets that cold a good book or football on TV are more appealing.
2) Grebes will help to find pike
Great crested grebes are one of our most iconic birds on stillwaters. Not only are they beautiful, but because they feed almost exclusively on small fish they give the angler a big clue where bait fish are in a lake.
If a family of grebes keep diving in the same area it is a sure sign that there are plenty of small fish in the vicinity. The good news for the angler is that if the grebes have found them, pike and perch will have done so too.
It’s not foolproof, but if you’re not catching where you are fishing a move to the area grebes are feeding is well worth considering.
3) Try a single hookbait
Fish are cold-blooded and slow up the colder it gets. This means they need less food, so you need to feed more cautiously.
If the fish you want to catch is only going to eat one item, be sure it’s the one with a hook in it!
Unless a river is in flood and heavily coloured, fishy will generally be aware of something appearing in their environment fairly quickly, if not instantly.
Take advantage of this by giving loosefeed a miss and casting out a single large, smelly hookbait – cheesepaste (above) is best.
As ever, be as quiet and stealthy as possible and often your rod-tip will pull round in a matter of minutes or even right away.
If you get no action you can introduce two or three small pieces of cheesepaste and come back later after trying other swims.
4) Keep an angling diary
Keeping a diary may seem like hard work, but it’s worth it. You don’t have to go into a lot of detail for every trip, but the more you record, the more you will get out of it.
Recording catches, weights, bait, conditions, rigs, swim details and memorable moments will serve two purposes.
First, it is great looking back at a diary at a later date, and second, it will help you build up a picture of the waters you fish. This, in turn, will almost certainly lead to improved catches.
I referred to my fishing diaries a lot when writing my book recently and I was surprised how on some occasions I had remembered things wrongly from years ago – I have to assume I wrote things correctly at the time! It’s only natural that you will forget the small details.
Perch fishing tips | 7 tips to catch more perch
Perch fishing has grown massively in popularity over the past few years, to help you stay on trend and make the most from your perch fishing ventures we have put together seven top tips to help you catch more perch. Take a look at the tips below and see what you can implement on your next session.
1) This species will react to movement of the bait so if your fishing a static bait, keep twitching it because this will often induce a bite from a perch.
2) Attract silver fish and big perch will follow. Try introducing a few maggots or a couple of balls of groundbait before making your first cast. Perch love to investigate and the sight of feeding silverfish will peak their interest.
3) Don’t use a rod that's too stiff in the tip. This species will shake their head under the rod tip. you will also want a tip that's very responsive as perch can be very finicky when it comes to bites.
4) Perch have bony mouths so use a big, strong hooks because hook ‘pulls’ are often the main cause of lost fish and will shake their head while hooked.
5) Drop shotting is a devastating tactic for catching big perch. This will often get you a bite when all other methods fail. It has become a very popular tactic in recent years and makes going out for a couple of hours very easy as you don't need much kit to be able to catch.
6) When fishing worms in coloured water try cutting two lobworms in half and hook four broken pieces. This gives you maximum attraction from the release of the baits juices.
7) Try using flavourings and colourings to make any small deadbait stand out.
Top carp fishing tips | The bread punch
Without doubt one of the most effective methods on small commercial snake lakes when it goes cold is a tactic known as ‘dobbing’ bread... and it’s working right now!
At this time of year you’ll find that carp and F1s will shoal up into sometimes quite large groups and show very little interest in moving far to feed on your baits.
However, if you can ‘dob’ a bait right in front of their noses they will often just suck it in, as it’s an easy meal they don’t have to work very hard for.
The hard part, though, is finding the fish to start but once you do, they’re generally not too difficult to catch due to the large numbers of fish there can be in a shoal.
Punch size
This depends a lot on the size of fish I’m looking to catch. If it’s all carp I might start off on a 10mm punch because I believe a slightly bigger bait is easier for the fish too see. Carp tend to have big mouths so a 10mm piece of punch isn’t that big.
If I’m looking at a mixed bag of carp and F1s then I’ll kick off on an 8mm piece of punch as a good starting middle ground. If I start to miss bites I will quite happily drop down to a 6mm punch. F1s have small mouths so dropping down a punch size can make a big difference in terms of the bite-to-fish ratio.
Once you start fishing and find a few fish the first thing you’ll need to do is work out what depth they are sitting at.
Normally, at the start, I will have a quick plumb up of the areas I want to fish prior to fishing to get an idea of the depth in front of me.
Finding the right depth
Once this is done I mark the depth on my pole and then take 4ins off the depth of the rig by sliding my float down.
This then means when the float settles I’ll be fishing 4ins off the bottom. I always prefer to start off fishing relatively deep as this way I can cover more water as the rig falls through the layers.
Today I’m at Guru Makins and I started 4ins off bottom, eventually finding the fish thanks to a few indications.
Unfortunately the first fish was foul-hooked and so I shallowed up the rig by another 4ins and went back into the same spot.
Sure enough, the next fish was hooked properly and, after a couple more fish from the same area, I felt I’d found the depth they wanted to sit at on the day – sometimes it really is that quick!
If I’d still been getting indications and no proper bites after changing the depth then I would have shallowed up further until I found the fish.
Starting your session the other way around – starting shallow and then going deeper to try to find the fish – doesn’t work, because the deeper rig is the key to helping you spot indications to start with.
The best bait – bread!
I’m often asked why bread is such a good hookbait for dobbing. I think it’s mainly down to colour. The water on most commercials tends to go very clear in the cold, so white bread is very easy for the fish to see.
I think texture is massively important as well. Once bread has been in the water a minute or so it becomes very soft, which makes it easy for a fish to slurp in with minimal effort.
When dobbing bread I get very few instant bites – say, within 10 seconds of putting a new piece of bread on – yet as soon as the bread becomes soft I get that bite.
Fresh is best
Having tried most bread on the market, if I had a choice it would always be Warburtons Extra Thick – the one in the orange bag.
I always try and get the freshest loaf possible, too, because this way it’s softer and extremely rubbery, which helps ensure it stays on the hook long enough for me to get a bite.
I used to mess around microwaving the bread to make it more rubbery, but now I just prefer to get a fresh loaf and use that.
The only time I’d consider microwaving bread would be if I couldn’t find any fresh and had to use a loaf that had dried out a bit.
Avoid the hotspot
Where you start fishing is crucial to success, and there is always a temptation to go straight to the most likely-looking spot for a fast start.
The problem with this is if this spot isn’t straight in front of you then you risk pushing the fish straight out of your swim.
Therefore, I always prefer to start off straight in front of me and then work to the left and right of my area, which I’ve found gives you more goes at the shoal.
What tends to happen is you find a pod of fish and catch a few before bites slow up because the shoal has become spooked and has moved.
It’s really all about finding them again and normally they don’t go far – one metre or two metres at most.
How to catch more carp on micro pellets when fishing
Additives and flavours – do they work or are they a waste of time? Anything that gives me more chance of getting a bite has to be worth investigation.
Much of my winter fishing revolves around the feeder, and in coloured water I work on the principle that if I can get the fish to find the micro pellets around the feeder then they should take the hookbait next to it. To achieve this, I pack a couple of flavourings in my bag – Ringers Chocolate Orange spray and stick mix liquid.
Flavouring pellets
Once my micro pellets are perfectly dampened for wrapping around a Hybrid feeder I’ll douse them in a five second squirt of stick mix liquid.
The end result is pellets that smell lovely and which will put out a scent for the fish to locate. My hookbait is straight from the tub – if I can get the fish to find the micros, they’ll soon take the bait!
Top hookbaits
In coloured water it has to be a bayonetted Ringers Allsorts which are fluoro pink, yellow and white. I also have a tub of the old faithful Chocolate Orange wafters on the go too. I throw one of each into the water at my feet, see which one is the most visible, and use that.
Generally, this means pink or orange. For hookbait sizes, an 8mm will catch everything but if I was after only carp, this would change to a 10mm or 12mm bait
Groundbait
Using groundbait around a Method or Hybrid feeder has fallen out of fashion but it does give you another way of putting more smell into the water and it can be very good for getting a pull when the fishing is hard.
I use a ratio of one third groundbait to two thirds pellets and go for Ringers Original fishmeal mix in dirty water, changing to Ringers Dark if the water is a little clearer.
Eight great fishing tips to keep you catching!
In the colder months it can become much harder to catch while fishing. To give you the best possible chance of catching we have gone to Dai Gribble who will reveal the best ways to maximise your fish catches during the cold spell.
For more great tips from top anglers head to this year’s The Big One Show
• Be Prepared
Days are short so you need to make the most of your time on the bank – and that means things like setting rods up at home are a must-do at this time of year.
It’s far easier than trying to thread the eyes of your rod in the half-light of dawn when you should be focusing on getting a bite at what is often the key time for big fish.
By keeping rods set up and ready to go you are also in a better position to take advantage of good conditions.
If everything is in a heap in your garage you may decide it isn’t worth the effort and you won’t benefit – simple!
• Maximise time
Many species feed best at first light and again as light levels begin to fall towards dusk. If you can, plan to fish at one of these times rather than in the middle of the day.
Often you will find one species will feed more at a particular time of day on a particular water. If you fish the same venue regularly you might spot a pattern, such as getting more pike runs between, say, 10am and midday. Make the most of this by ensuring you are set up and ready in advance.
• Be ready for everything
One of the best pieces of advice I can give for all-round anglers looking for specimen fish is to always have the right bait ready to go. This means investing in a bait fridge/freezer.
Maggots and worms will last for weeks in a fridge, while deadbaits for pike will last all season in a freezer.
Having good bait for different species readily available enables you to target the species that is most likely to feed under conditions on the day (or night).
• Use a weather app
Weather can have a big impact on winter fishing, and it makes sense to target a species that is most likely to be feeding.
There are loads of weather apps for phones, and long-range forecasts are easily found on the internet, so use them to your advantage, especially if you’re fishing on stillwaters which are prone to freezing over.
• And river levels...
There are a number of websites and apps that allow you to check river levels, and this is something I tend to do every day.
The ones I use the most are GaugeMap and the Environement Agency’s website. GaugeMap is great, as you can go back more than the past five days to get historic info on the venue.
It’s vital that you don’t just look at the one nearest to where you are planning to fish, though. Look at the ones upstream to get an idea of what is heading your way.
Once you know the likely level you can determine which species is best to target.
• Baiting up
Remember the old adage that you can always put more in, but you can’t take it out – and think about your baiting strategy carefully.
Fish are cold-blooded, so their metabolism gets slower the colder it grows, which means they eat less.
The good news is that most species respond well to a slight rise in temperature... and even the smallest of temperature increases can trigger feeding activity, so make sure you’re ready with the bait.
• Get on the move
It often pays to move swims regularly as then you will almost certainly be presenting your bait to many more fish, and the chances of a bite increase.
On stillwaters, for example, pike can be quite sluggish other than during short feeding spells, but you can often trick them into taking a bait outside their prime feeding times if you cast a bait very close to them.
Be prepared to recast baits around the swim rather than casting out and sitting with baits in one place for a long time.
• Keep warm
Winter fishing isn’t much fun if you’re cold and wet, but these days there’s no excuse for going badly dressed.
There is a lot of really good clothing available from both angling companies and outdoor shops.
Temperatures often plummet when the sun sets, and you don’t want to leave just at prime time because you are cold.
In extreme weather, when the rivers are full of snow-melt and stillwaters are frozen over, then my best advice is to stay at home! This is when you can spend some time gleaning vital info for your next trip. Did I mention I’ve just launched my new Beyond Dreams book…
Four top targets for the months ahead
Winter has crept over the threshold and the next few months won’t see much respite from the cold.
So is this a time to stow the tackle away, light a log fire and dream of better times to come?
After all, what chance have you got when the river bursts its banks and floods the surrounding farmland? Even when it stops raining, frost seems to suck the life from every lake and stream, exchanging nature’s colourful palette for gloomy monochrome.
Despite winter’s extremes I happily rise to the challenge. Only snow melt keeps me indoors in the warm. Match your fish species to the conditions and there’s no reason why you should fail – and there’s the added bonus that your quarry is putting on weight in readiness to spawn. Now, more than at any other time, comes the chance of a personal best.
So whatever the winter brings, it will still be worth casting a line. The biggest challenge is probably leaving home and the TV!
Now let’s take a look at four species, and how they will put a bend in your rod this winter.
For more great tips from top anglers head to this year’s The Big One Show
Target 1: Perch
The beauty of a shoal of sergeants is that they can be found anywhere – from rivers and streams to lakes and canals. So whatever the conditions you’ll have a chance of finding fish in fine fettle.
My biggest tip is to make sure you fish during the short feeding period that occurs every day, regardless of temperature. If the water is clear this will be from 3pm to dusk, but all that changes if there is a tinge of colour in the water similar to that found in commercial fisheries. Then, early afternoon is best and sport tails off as darkness approaches.
Why is this so? Well, in my opinion light levels are the trigger for perch to feed, and three factors are involved –the amount of sunlight, the clarity of the water and its temperature. Nothing in nature happens accidentally, and even if we can’t understand it, this doesn’t mean it’s a random occurrence.
Although lure fishing is still all the rage I rarely do it these days. The fact is it’s been done to death, and the perch aren’t daft enough to keep eating plastic. If you find a virgin water, great, but if not, stick to real food. Provided the water isn’t like pea soup a livebait takes some beating. Fish it on 5lb line, under a Drennan Loafer float and a size 4 Kamasan B983. If you’re unable to catch any, or rules dictate you can’t, don’t worry – I’m supremely confident with a worm, caster and red maggot combo.
Finally, if small fish prove a nuisance, try a prawn and always remember to use a resistance-free set-up in your pursuit of perch, ‘the biggest of all fish’.
Target 2: Barbel
Barbel love a warm, flooded river. In a raging flow tactics are more akin to cod fishing but trust me, below the turbulence the fish will be feeding.
In such conditions a big lump of paste wrapped around a boilie takes some beating, a good back-up being a lump of meat. I fish these on a size 4 or 5 Cryogen Gripper hook and 3ft of 20lb Tungsten Loaded coated braid. The rest of the tackle needs to be just as robust, especially if you’re using 5oz to hold bottom. Leadcore is great in snaggy situations – my favourite is 18lb Syncro XT.
Where, though, do you cast such tackle when faced with a maelstrom? Look for creases formed by bends, cattle drinks and cribs, as well as what I describe as ‘glass water’. This is a calm section amid the turbulence and will probably indicate a smooth gravel bottom.
Provided the temperature is high, barbel will feed in clear conditions just as enthusiastically as in a big flood. For this scenario maggots in a big feeder, cast regularly, can’t be beaten.
Come on… surely the thought of a rod hooping over in the rests is enough to make you leave the sofa?
Target 3: Grayling
Sub-zero temperatures and a clear river will put off many anglers, but these conditions are the signal for grayling to feed. Unless the water has actually frozen over you’ll have a chance.
Nor is the species for just the lucky few who can fish a chalk stream. Even the Trent holds these beautiful fish, so do a bit of research and there’s a fair chance that you’ll have an opportunity to catch grayling close to home.
Maggots and corn form the basis of the attack with a 13ft or 14ft float rod and 4lb mainline.
The mono must not sink and you need a big, buoyant float to stay in control. I would then bulk-shot at three-quarters depth with a couple of dropper shot below that. For corn, a size 14 hook is perfect, or an 18 with maggots.
Putting your hookbait in the right place and feeding correctly are what count, and I wouldn’t be without a little bait dropper. Often, feeding by hand is fine but when the water deepens I want to be more accurate. This is when I reach for the dropper.
Stay mobile and try to cover plenty of water. However cold it is, rest assured there is always somewhere a grayling will be willing to feed.
Target 4: Chub
If any fish can get you out of jail it’s the chub, and a whole host of tactics will catch them.
I prefer a clearing river, but a big smelly bait in a flood can also produce the goods.
I enjoy trotting a float and spraying maggots, but for this the water has to be on the low side. Trotting works best when a shoal is targeted. So unless I’m certain what’s in front of me I’m more likely to be roving with a quivertip.
It’s important to use a rod with interchangeable tips, and to choose the lightest one possible. Remember, too, that once you’ve got on 3oz or more to combat the flow there is far too much pressure on a glass tip and you’ll be wasting your time. Far better to switch to carbon and cast slightly upstream, putting a bow in the line.
Use just enough weight to hold bottom and look for drop-backs.
Both bread and cheesepaste take some beating and can be used in a number of ways. I’m more likely to use bread with a feeder to give the added attraction of liquidised particles. With cheese I will use a link-leger and rely on the hookbait or introduce extra bits of paste by hand.
Either way, in my book, a day spent roving for chub takes some beating.
Top 10 pole fishing tips!
For more great tips from top anglers head to this year’s The Big One Show
• Sprinkle in the feed
Pole fishing in the cold is all about trying to get fish to drop down onto the bottom to feed and there is no better way to do so than with a sprinkle pot.
The beauty of a sprinkle pot is that you can feed very small amounts of bait on a regular basis without having to keep shipping back in and out to do so.
The idea with feeding just one or two maggots or five or six micro pellets is that any fish in the area see the bait falling through the water and then follow it down to feed.
F1s in particular respond really well to this approach. Quite often if the fishing is hard I will fill the pot full of micros and just keep tapping a few out every 60 seconds or so. This is a great way of making something happen as opposed to waiting for it to do so.
• Feed with accuracy
Pole pot position is, without doubt, one of the most important things to get right when fishing for F1s.
It never ceases to amaze me when I see anglers who just slide a pot on and start fishing.
F1 fishing is all about feeding small amounts of bait and keeping everything tight, something you can’t do if your pole pot is 6ins back from your tip!
If your pot is 6ins back then every time you feed your hookbait is at least 6ins away from the loosefeed. While you might get away with this when carp fishing, you won’t when targeting F1s.
The optimum position for a pole-mounted pot is right on the pole tip. This way you know you are feeding right on top of your float and concentrating the fish where you want them.
• Use a ‘half-ex’
When targeting carp and F1s in the cold a really effective trick is to start new swims away from my initial area.
Often I’ll catch five or six fish from a spot before it dies, usually because the fish have spooked and moved. The problem is that they rarely come back and so you need to go chasing around your swim to find them. This is where half-extensions, or dolly butts as they’re also known, come into their own.
When fish move they don’t go far, so moving just 0.5m is more often than not far enough to put you back in touch with the shoal.
A half-ex allows you to move quickly, efficiently and accurately.
• Keep your rig moving
Winter polefishing is all about making the fish ‘have it’ as opposed to sitting and waiting for a bite.
If you sat behind me polefishing I think you would be staggered at how much I move the hookbait. I do this primarily by lifting and dropping the rig.
Lifting and dropping basically involves lifting the float anything from 3ins to 12ins clear of the water and lowering it back down again slowly. This movement causes the hookbait to rise and fall in the water, something which fish often find impossible to resist, and bites tend to come just as the float settles again.
Quite often you can sit without a sign with a motionless float, only to lift and drop and get a bite immediately, that’s how effective that little bit of movement can be.
• Look for cover
One thing is for sure, when the water goes cold and clear, any sort of cover – especially rush beds, aerators, or even structures like bridges – will hold carp and F1s.
When it comes to targeting them, I always fish just off the cover to start with and try and pick up a couple of ‘easy’ fish.
Once the early bites stop I simply move closer and closer to the cover, picking fish off as I go.
When I say you have to go tight to the cover, I do mean tight – this often means resting your float against an aerator for instance.
• Consider colour
After spending a lot of time maggot fishing for F1s it became really apparent was that hookbait choice made a big difference, and two maggots on the hook always seemed to be better than one.
Most anglers, however, tended to just fish two red maggots whereas I always found adding a little bit of colour made a huge difference, and seemed to get more bites fishing a red and a white maggot.
I’m sure that in the clear water the white maggot stood out that little bit better than the red but by combining the two I was getting the best of both worlds so don’t be afraid to mix it up with your bait colours in the winter.
• Maggots & pellets
A trick which has served me well when F1 fishing is to take both pellets and maggots, and always start by fishing with pellets.
Pellets are very much an instant bait for F1s and will give you a fast start. I’ll usually stick with them for chasing fish around up to the three hour mark, before making the important switch to maggots.
The difference with maggots is that the fish always seem to feed properly on them, as in they get their heads down and you won’t need to move around your swim.
It therefore makes sense to fish maggots late as that’s when the F1s tend to want to feed, normally as the light starts to drop.
• Try going long
As far as open water pole fishing goes, the best bit of advice I can give you is that if you’re struggling for bites then ‘go long’!
When the water is cold and clear and the carp don’t really want to feed they will push out from the bank to where they feel safe.
When I used to fish Makins Phase One in the winter when it was rock hard the best way to catch a carp or two was always on the long pole, normally 16m if the wind allowed.
When I went long, I’d feed just enough bait to catch one fish and wait, then repeat the process.
• Always feed a short line
A line I always like to put in at this time of the year is a short pole corn line. In the warmer months this would be a meat line, but at this time of year it is all about corn.
With the water being clear I feel that corn offers that bit more visibility, making it a lot more effective.
The secret to the short corn line is the feeding and I won’t start putting any bait in until two hours to go. Even then I will feed it purely by hand if possible.
Little and often is the key and I’ll flick four to six grains out every two minutes, working on the same principle as the sprinkle pot, banking on the bait falling through the water drawing the fish in.
Most people make the mistake of dump-potting corn in, and this just isn’t as effective once the water goes clear keep it dripping in.
• Use fluoro
Over the last few years I’ve become a massive fan of fluorocarbon in cold, clear water as I believe it gives me an edge, especially when I am targeting notoriously clever fish such as F1s.
I use a 4ins hooklength of 0.10mm Pure Fluorocarbon and this is attached loop to loop to my mainline of 0.13mm Guru N-Gauge.
Hook choice for maggot fishing is a size 18 Guru F1 maggot hook which is a lightweight pattern perfect for this type of fishing.
Improve your watercraft and catch more!
There’s no point in having the latest kit and top-quality bait if you turn up at your peg and end up fishing in completely the wrong spot to begin with.
Watercraft is what angling success boils down to at this time of year and even on relatively featureless-looking commercial fisheries, there’s still plenty going on under the water to dictate where the fish will and won’t be.
Faced with a large expanse of open water and little on the surface to base your attack around, how can you work out where to target your attack at a time of year when the weather can change drastically and alter the feeding habits of the fish?
Let Matrix-backed triple Fish O’Mania champion Jamie Hughes be your guide to keeping the bites coming as Christmas is knocking on the door – it’s really not as complicated as it may seem at first glance!
For more great tips from top anglers head to this year’s The Big One Show
What to fish
“Faced with open water, the first problem you may encounter is tow caused by the wind. Wide exposed swims are prone to this and it can render the pole line unfishable in terms of presentation.
“If this was the case then the feeder or bomb would come to the fore but provided conditions are not too bad, the pole has to be the No1 approach for precise feeding and perfect presentation. I’d certainly always set both up because the wind can change during a session and increase tow.”
Where to fish
“You may not have any fish-holding features on the surface so your best friend will be a plummet. Most lakes have changes in depth and these may be a matter of inches but they can make a big difference.
“I’d spend a good 15 minutes plumbing around the swim on the pole to find these depth changes and would think nothing of going out to 16m to find them. I’m looking for an underwater bar that offers a substantial depth change. On the feeder, this isn’t as important as I’ll be using the rod to cast around as opposed to building up a swim in one spot.”
The bait to bring
“Maggots are good for F1s and silvers, but if you’re after carp, nothing beats pellets – even in cold weather. Hard pellets beat soft expanders every time, so I’d bring some 4mm and 6mm hard pellets and a bag of micro pellets. That should be ample for a winter session. Changing hookbaits is key so I’d throw in a tin of corn and some bright wafters for the tip.”
Casting around
“Unlike in summer, I’m not trying to build a peg up with the feeder. Instead, I’ll cast to different spots around the peg. When I catch a fish I then chuck back to the same spot but if nothing else happens, I’ll be on the move again.
“How long I leave the feeder out depends on if anyone around me is catching on the tip. That could mean waiting up to half-an-hour before winding in. I’ll revisit spots that I’ve cast to earlier in the day as the little consignment of pellets that went in beforehand may just be enough to draw in a few carp.”
Pole baits
“I’d begin fishing with bread dobbing about at half-depth to try and catch fish that aren’t that interested in feeding but would only give this 15 minutes using an 8mm piece of breadpunch.
“If I’ve not caught then I fall back to fishing pellet, a hard 6mm banded on the hook with micro pellets fed via a small pot.”
Get on the pole!
“Should the weather be good then I’ll always go for the pole. Where to fish is all about what’s underwater and at my local fishery Mill House, there’s an underwater bar at around 16m on every peg – and that’s what I’m looking for. There’s no guarantee that the carp will want to be on top of the bar so I hedge my bets to fish both this shallower water and the deeper spot just in front or behind it.
“When you’re talking distance there’s no point trying to catch short because the fish will be reluctant to feed here and 13m would be as close to the bank as I’d go. I’d kick off here in the deep water for reasons of comfort as much as anything else!
“When to fish the shallower bar is down to if anglers around me are fishing here and catching, but also the air pressure. In high pressure, the carp seem to prefer sitting in the shallower water on the bar ,but in low pressure, they’re in the deep water. That’s the rule of thumb I subscribe to.”
Go for The feeder if it’s windy
“If the wind is too bad to fish the pole properly, the tip is your only sensible option and this gives me two options – bomb or feeder. In very clear water I’d go for the bomb, but if there’s still some colour in the lake then the feeder is better.
“My feeder is a Matrix Alloy Open Method, but this is in the smallest size available to introduce just a dozen micro pellets on each cast. Roughly, I want to feed on the feeder the same amount that I’d be putting in if I was fishing the pole. Tackle is still sensible for carp, with an 0.16mm Power Micron hooklink to a size 16 KKM-B hook.
“As for hooklinks I try to use as short a link as I can, often just 2cm long. This gives the fish less chance of ejecting the hookbait.”
Let the bait fall slowly
“At Mill House the carp seem to watch the bait and feed fall and then take it just as it settles. I’ll trickle in a dozen micros and lay the rig in over the top, expecting a bite within 60 seconds.
“If not, I lay the rig in again and wait another minute before shipping in and repeating. My rig features a strung shotting pattern with a Malman Roob float taking between 4x12 to 4x16 dependent on the wind.
“The lighter float has strung shot but on a heavier rig, these are spaced slightly closer together for better presentation, leaving around 2cm of float tip showing. I also never fish overdepth because you can miss a lot of bites from carp.”
Commercial perch fishing with a pole
Commercial carp are slowing down in the lower temperatures, but there’s one species you can always rely on for bites – the perch.
Most fisheries hold good stocks of these predators, some of which grow to phenomenal sizes. Often they are encountered by chance, but by adopting a tailored approach it’s possible to make the most of these often untargeted fish.
Angling Times news reporter Freddie Sandford visited Buttonhole Lake near Wisbech, Cambs, and outlined his simple approach for commercial stripeys…
For more great tips from top anglers head to this year’s The Big One Show
Perfect Presentation
“The most important factor in my approach is the way I present my hookbait, and this varies depending on how the perch are feeding.
“The first bait I always try is two casters impaled on a size 16 hook. A light rig with strung-out shot allows the casters to fall delicately through the water alongside loosefed offerings, and I expect bites just as the bait hits the deck.
“If no indications come within moments of my float settling this tells me that the perch aren’t intercepting my bait on the drop, and are likely to be mooching around on the lakebed, watching over my loosefeed. In this instance I change to a worm hookbait and bulk my shot towards the bottom of my rig. This puts me in direct control of my hookbait, allowing me to jig the worm to induce a bite.”
The Session
“On the day I caught the majority of my fish on casters, but later in the session a small worm jigged through the swim picked off a few larger fish that were settled over my feed.
“Give both these baits a try to keep catching in the cold.”
The Margins
Perch love to lurk over the marginal shelves in search of prey, making the edges the perfect place to target them. I like to find the bottom of the nearside shelf and fish one line in front of me and another in the margins.
Fishing two swims helps to keep bites coming throughout the day, as this gives the fish somewhere to retreat should they become spooked on one of the lines.
Perch Baits
There is no need for a complex bait tray when targeting perch, and I look no further than a few pints of casters and a small pack of worms.
Both swims are initially fed with a few chopped dendrobaenas and a pinch of casters, and throughout the day I like to flick a few casters over both lines. I never feed large amounts of bait as, in my experience, this can bring in lots of unwanted small fish.”
Waggler fishing tips for your local commercial
We all know how deadly the pole is for catching, offering unrivalled accuracy in feeding and hookbait presentation.
For more great tips from top anglers head to this year’s The Big One Show
But, as the water on commercial fisheries begins to clear a little, waving carbon over the heads of the fish can be the worst thing you can possibly do!
Although you’ll still catch on the pole, having a waggler line up your sleeve can keep the bites coming. Such is its effectiveness in November and beyond that you may not even need to pick the pole up at all.
Rod and line allows you to cast around the peg to find the fish and present the bait at a range of depths, yet it’s a criminally under-used approach.
Norfolk matchman Robert Walton knows the value of the ‘wag’, however, and it plays a key part in the Matrix Wensum Valley Angling man’s cold-weather approach on his local Reepham Fisheries. Here’s how he fishes his float-and-maggot approach...
Why use the waggler?
“Fish will back off from the pole line so it is important to have a second line on the go. The waggler offers more versatility in terms of how far out you can fish.
“My pole line would typically be around 13m out. I then have my waggler line at around twice this distance so that I’m keeping both lines well apart. Fishing at this time of year – especially for F1s – is about getting bites regularly.
“Because of the size of the fish, you need to keep something going in the net throughout the day.”
Multiple swims
“I’ll begin on the waggler because this gives me time to prime my pole line and let things settle down. I’ll have two areas to cast to, roughly at angles of 10 o’clock and two o’clock in the swim.
“I’d give this between 45 minutes and an hour before picking a top kit up. Two lines also lets me experiment with my feed.”
Come off bottom
“Don’t think that the fish will always be on the bottom – especially F1s. These fish can come off bottom to get at the loosefeed or sometimes because they simply prefer to be here, and this will be shown by knocks as the bait falls, or by line bites.
“Fishing 1ft off the deck can result in a smaller stamp of fish, but it will keep you catching. The colder the weather is, the more productive fishing off bottom is, so it’s worth bearing that in mind.”.
Waggler rig
“The float is a 4g loaded Matrix insert waggler to a 5lb mainline and an 0.11m hooklink to a size 20 Matrix Carp Bagger hook to fish double maggot (one red and one white). This is set around 2ins overdepth with shotting down the line made up of four No9s set 4ins apart in the bottom half of the rig.”
Feeding
“Around 20 maggots every couple of minutes are catapulted in. By having two lines to go at, I can feed more on one of them to see how fish will react. To give them a bit of a kick, I spray the feed with Marukyu’s Scopex Amino Spray to give them a lovely bit of scent.”
Casting around
“Although I try to land the waggler in the same spot, it does no harm to cast beyond the feed or to either side to see if the fish have backed away. I do this if I’ve waited a while for a bite. My plan is to cast past the feed and wind the float back into the target area. This is where in that opening hour I’d expect to pick up a few carp and F1s. If the response is slow, cast past the feed and leave the float there.”
Top roach fishing tips and rigs
Ask any all-round angler and they’ll tell you there are few better sights in fishing than a big roach.
I’ve caught a few of these in my time, but nothing can ever prepare you for the awesome sight of a ‘two’ or even a three-pounder coming over the front of your landing net.
Most of us grow up catching small roach but when they grow to specimen proportions they’re almost like a different species altogether.
As with most big-fish angling, locating the fish you want to catch is paramount.
Fortunately for the roach angler they have a habit of rolling at dusk and dawn. At dawn, in particular, they will often roll while it is nearer to dark than light, but as long as the water is calm you can generally see the ripples they make, even if you cannot see the actual fish.
Quite often their rolling activity only lasts for a few minutes so it pays to be looking at the water as soon as dawn starts to break.
Although roach are more likely to show themselves at dawn and dusk, they can be caught throughout the day in winter.
I have found that a short burst of feeding activity can occur at any time and it pays to be organised so you can take advantage of any such purple patches.
Make sure you have spare hooklinks set up and scales and camera to hand so that you can maximise your chances when the roach switch on.
Generally, the colder the weather, the shorter the feeding spell. While overcast conditions are generally best in the winter months, I am sure roach will feed at some point in the day regardless of the weather, so don’t be put off if the conditions appear to be less than ideal.
Over the years I’ve used many rigs for roach but I’ve found one to be head and shoulders above all the rest at putting a specimen fish on the bank – a simple heli rig.
Here’s how to fish it…
A) MAINLINE
Casting heavy feeders puts quite a lot of stress on the mainline so I like to use a robust line such as Korum Xpert Reel Line or Gardner hydroFLO in 6lb breaking strain.
B) HELI SET-UP
The great thing about fishing these days is that there’s so much gear that’s ready to use from the pack. I’m a huge fan of the Korum Ready Heli Kit that allows me to set up my heli rig in seconds.
The kit is slid straight on to the mainline and comprises two rig stops and beads either side of a rotating quick-change link which I use to attach my hooklink to. This is covered with an anti-tangle sleeve to help kick the hooklink away from the mainline.
C) DISTANCE
By moving the rig stops up or down the line the distance between the hooklink and the feeder can be varied.
I start with it about 6ins away, and if bites are not forthcoming I will move it further away on one rod and closer on the other.
On some days the fish will show a distinct preference for one or the other but on other days it appears to make little or no difference.
D) SHORT HOOKLINK
This rig works best with short hooklinks of no more than 3ins.
Over the years I’ve tried many different lines and have found Preston Reflo to be the best.
I generally start with 0.13mm Reflo (4lb 12oz) as I have found this to be a good compromise between fine presentation and strength.
On occasion I will drop to 0.11mm Reflo, particularly in clear, shallow water and in bright, sunny conditions.
I used to tie my own hooklinks but nowadays I use Preston PR 355 hooks to nylon, in size 16 and 18, using a loop tyer to shorten the line to just 3ins.
It is then a simple matter of threading on a rig sleeve and attaching the hooklink to the quick-change bead.
E) FEEDER LINK
My swimfeeder is attached via an Avid Quick Change link tied to the end of the mainline.
I like to use a quick change clip for two reasons – it enables me to change the feeder easily and the feeder can be removed at the end of the session, which makes it easier to pack the rods away still set up.
F) HOOKBAITS
My number one choice is maggots. I like to use a mixture of red and white maggots and invariably start of with one of each on a size 16 hook.
If bites are not forthcoming I will try just red or white maggots and in really cold weather it’s even worth trying a single maggot on a size 18.
I never go below a size 18 as big roach are strong fighters that jag around a lot and I feel that a smaller hook increases the likelihood of a hook pull.
I’d rather hook fewer fish but have a better chance of landing them.
G) FEEDING
In many waters, big roach are thin on the ground so it is important not to overfeed them, or you can ruin your chances of a bite.
I usually only introduce bait in the swimfeeder and am wary of recasting too often and putting a lot of bait into my swim.
I want any roach present to pick up my hookbaits rather than fill up on free offerings, so typically I’ll only recast every two hours or so.
The beauty of this rig is that it very rarely tangles ,so you can be almost certain it is fishing effectively for that length of time.
H) FEEDER SIZE
The rig is best fished with a fairly heavy feeder to maximise the self-hooking properties of the rig and I use 50g Preston Quickload feeders in both medium and large sizes.
Roach fishing tips
Always use soft rods
Big roach are finicky feeders. My favoured rig incorporates fine hooks and lines, so it needs to be used with a soft rod to prevent line breakages and hook pulls.
I like a rod with a soft tip and a test curve of 1.25lb or less. Currently I am using Korum 1.25lb Neoteric rods which have a lovely soft tip but can still cast a feeder well over 50 yards.
Fish with tight lines
The bolt effect of the rig is enhanced by the use of heavy bobbins that keep the line tight.
Some bites can be very vicious so I like to use reels with a freespool system.
Alternatively, you can slacken the drag off on your reel to ensure a big roach does not break the hooklink on the take.
Playing roach safely
Big roach fight really well on light tackle with a distinctive jagging style. Play them with ‘soft hands’ and take your time. If you try to bully them they are far more likely to come off.
Experiment
This rig makes it easy to make changes, be they to the hooklink, hook size, distance from the feeder, maggots colour, the number of maggots, even the size of feeder. Give it a go and ring the changes to bring a big roach to your net soon.
For more great tips from top anglers head to this year’s The Big One Show