Tips

Read many a typical match report and you’ll see anglers say ‘I put in six balls of groundbait on the long pole line’.

This is only telling half the story, though, because it raises a lot of questions if you really want to get down to the nitty gritty.

For example, what was the groundbait? What colour was it? How big were the balls? What was in them? The answers to these can be wide-ranging depending on the venue, the head of fish, water colour and temperature – and that’s just for starters.

Groundbait is essential for silver fish at any time of year but in winter it’s vitally important to use it correctly. Getting it wrong can wreck a swim before it has a chance to get going, so this week I’m taking a look at how throwing in a few balls for roach and skimmers can vary so much…

Ball it in!

The best way to get a lot of bait into a swim fast is to throw in several large balls, known as ‘balling in’. You’ll see this a lot on big, deep, natural venues where small fish are the target. A massive hit kicks the swim off quickly, but the big decision to make is how many balls to throw in.

There’s little point scrimping in this situation so I’d go for 10 or 12 large balls and throw them in on the pole line over an area a metre square. This also makes a lot of noise to pull fish in, but the groundbait has to be on the wet side to hold together and not break up in mid-air.

Loose groundbait

There are times when cupping in groundbait loose and not squeezing it into a ball is better, and this is in very shallow water of 3ft or less. I find that a loose mix gets things underway much faster, as the groundbait is already broken down. It is important the mix is wet, though, so it has the weight to get down quickly and stay put on the bottom without any danger of drifting off.

Adding goodies

Groundbait alone is not enough to keep the fish in the swim, and because you want them to eat the hookbait, you have to add the same into the feed. For me that means dead pinkies and dead maggots and casters where silver fish are concerned. These will be my three main hookbaits.

In the opening balling in of feed there’s next to nothing added, and it all goes into those rich balls that are potted in.

On a hard day this amount may be just a sprinkling, but on a mild day with colour in the water I’ll pile it in, packing each ball to the maximum.

Dead pinkies are especially good as they are soft, highly visible and small enough to get the fish really grubbing about.

Ball size

I’ve already talked about the opening balls being proper two-handed jobs, but any top-up should be much smaller. This is normally a single-handed squeeze to produce something that resembles a sausage.

Topping up is done to get the fish back to where you want them so the groundbait is just a carrier for the particles, which is what the fish will be hunting for.

Loosefeeding over the top

There are times when groundbait alone isn’t enough to keep catching – firing in loosefeed over the top keeps the swim simmering along nicely.

Picking up the catapult gives you two bites of the cherry, in that you can get bites over the groundbait but also as the hookbait falls in amid the loosefeed at a range of depths.

How much and how regularly you feed is governed by how many fish are in front of you so, in a solid peg, I may even ‘double pouch’ (fire in two lots every time). But as a rule it’s just the one load and only 10-20 maggots or casters each time. Maggots are good for a range of fish sizes but quality counts in a match, and I’d always go for casters to find a better stamp of roach or skimmer.

What about loosefeeding on its own? If I knew the fish were already there and I didn’t need to add any groundbait at the start, then this would be viable, but I always feel groundbait gives you a quick start and pulls fish in immediately, whereas pinging bait in is more of a slow burner.

Pot in a richer groundbait

The pole pot comes into play once I’ve thrown those big balls in. That’s because the opening hit gets fish into an area, but I then want them to move and concentrate on the spot that I’m going to be putting my rig over.

Five more balls go in with the pot in the same place, but these are ‘richer’ in that they hold more particles.

All things being equal, the fish should come to the balling in noise and then find those rich balls and stick around. When they do back off, they won’t go far and it only needs another rich ball potted in to bring them back.

Potting is also advisable on very hard days when bites will be at a premium and you need to wring every last fish out of the peg.

I will also use a pot as opposed to balling if there are a lot of pike about, as the balling pulls small fish in and the pike follow.

We’ve had a funny winter as far as fishing on rivers is concerned, with no real floods and the extra water that comes with it, combined with short spells of mild and then freezing cold weather that adds up to testing conditions for the angler and a less than enthusiastic response from the fish!
Roach in particular have some weeks been ten a penny and then absent a few days later but one fish that’s always willing to have a go, even in clear, cold water is the skimmer. On some venues they’re a bonus but on others, they are your main weight-building fish and can give you 15lb to 20lb in a match – provided you fish correctly for them of course.
Winter skimmer fishing on a river is nothing like summer when you can bosh the bait in and fish very positively with rigs and big baits. Scaling down is needed and a different approach to how you feed must be adopted but you’ll still need a fair bit of groundbait. The idea is to tempt the fish into having a go every time you feed as opposed to introducing a big bed of bait and fishing over this all-day.
The River Ouse through Ely Town Centre is stacked with skimmers and although it isn’t a match venue as such, it bears a strong resemblance to many deep, slow flowing town centre venues that are popular in winter. With over 15ft of water on the pole line and a variable flow, it certainly isn’t a river for fishing on auto pilot as can happen when going after skimmers in warmer weather!

Pole V feeder
The first thing to consider is whether to fish the pole or feeder? You’ll catch on both of course and is such deep water, it can be tempting to pick up the rod but taking on 15ft-plus isn’t as hard as it seems provided your rig is heavy enough and the groundbait mix is stiff enough to get straight to the bottom. The pole also offers far superior presentation, allowing me to cover more of the swim and inch the float through the peg gently, tempting the fish into taking the bait. In contrast, the feeder only lets you fish the hookbait in one spot and I think you miss out on a lot of baits my limiting yourself this way.

Finding the right spot
I wouldn’t bother messing about with fishing on a shelf or a slope in winter. Bream and skimmers always prefer a flat bottom in the maximum depth and at Ely, there are two shelves before you find the main depth. I then fish just past this final shelf where the flow is at its steadiest.

Floats - go as light as possible
So in deep water, you think it’d be right to fish a big float, say of around 3g but that’s actually not the case! I’m a big fan of fishing as light as I can get away with because I think this not only produces better presentation and offers less resistance to a fish when holding the rig still but you also miss fewer bites than using a heavier float. So in my Ely peg, which has a reasonable flow, that means a 2g MP Roach using an olivette and four No 11 droppers underneath strung out to cover the final few feet of the swim. If the river was flowing more slowly, I may even consider dropping down to a 1g float.

How far overdepth?
River bream fishing does involve setting the rig overdepth but not massively in winter when bites can be very shy. I’ll plumb up and then slide the float a couple of inches up the line and that’s about it. This then allows me to inch the rig through the peg without it dragging under every time. If I was wanting to go any more overdepth, then I would be essentially aiming to hold the float dead still and I think you’d be better off fishing the feeder or a pole feeder in this instance.

Canal-style hooks
There’s a bit of a nod to canal fishing with my hooks, lines and elastics and the first element is the hook, a Kamasan B511 in size 16. This is a superbly fine, light hook that’s still capable of landing a bonus perch or bream and provided that the pole elastic is soft enough, there will be no dramas from bumped fish or bent hooks! I rig up a No 6 Matrix Solid elastic through the top three of the pole and set it soft so that plenty comes out and it acts as a great shock absorber. Likewise, line is 0.14mm Matrix Power Micron to a hooklink of the same material in 0.10mm. Using a big float doesn’t mean that you have to use big hooks and thick lines too! I then have around 1.5m of line between float and pole tip to let me run the float down the peg when needed.

Cup in – don’t ball it!
Let’s look at groundbait now, perhaps the most important part of any type of skimmer fishing. Before I explain the mix, I think it is important to impress that cupping the balls of feed in rather than throwing them is vital. Throw several balls in and you cannot say with any certainty, how accurate you have been. This is fine in summer but not on a cold winter’s day. My aim is to create one spot where all of the groundbait ends up and from this I can then work around the area, either holding the rig tight on top of it or running it below or above the spot.

The magic skimmer mix
Now onto the mix. This needs to be heavy enough to go straight to the bottom in 15ft of water and I go for Dynamite Baits Frenzied Hemp Black, Silver X Roach and brown crumb in a ratio of one part Hemp Black to half a part of the other two mixes. The finished groundbait is not mega sticky to the touch but if mixed wet enough, will hold together and go straight down. To this I add a smattering of casters, dead pinkies and hemp, which skimmers love. Hookbait is simply double dead red maggot with one hooked through the flat end and the other through the pointed end.

When to top up
At the start I will pot in five balls of groundbait and from there I see how the fish respond. When the bites fade I will pop in another ball of if nothing is happening, another goes in after 20 minutes and this then sets the pattern. You can get through a lot of groundbait this way so I mix up at least three kilos for a match. What I have found in winter is that you get an initial flurry of bites from that opening hit of bait before it then goes dead. The fish are still there but they’re not feeding with any amount of positivity. You need to give them another ball to get a few of them to move back over the feed area and have a go. Typically, you can expect to catch two or three skimmers or get half a dozen indications before you need to feed again.

Work out how the fish want it
Hold the rig still or run it through? There’s no definitive answer to this and it can change from day to day. I begin by inching the rig over the groundbait area very slowly at around half the pace of the flow as this tells me immediately where the fish are in the peg – they could on top of the feed or well below it. If I catch on top of the feed then the sensible thing to do is hold the rig back on top of it but if I get a few fish below the feed area, then running will be best.

Don’t wait for the float to bury
I leave all of the float bristle on show so that I can drag a bit of line overdepth but when the water is cold, bites are never full-blooded affairs. The only indication you may get will look more like something from a little roach – they’re not though! Skimmers can be very, very shy and often with the set-up I use, the float will lift a little and then the tip sinks a fraction. Either strike at this or if holding the rig still, let the rig go slack and run for a few inches before striking as this allows the fish to get hold of the bait confidently.

Fish with Polly!
If you fancy brushing up on a bit of canal roach fishing or perhaps learning a completely new method, Mark offers fishing days on a range of venues. From group sessions to one to one coaching, birthdays or corporate days, he can offer the lot on any type of venue and any method. Bait is supplies – all you need to bring is your kit!
To book a day with Mark, give him a call on 07557 052053 or e-mail him at info@markpollardfishingdays.com and he will be in touch. Check out his website at http://www.markpollardfishingdays.com/ for more information.

Commercial Fishing Tips | Get your groundbait right for winter silvers with Adam Wakelin