Commercial Fishing Tips | When to use which bait colour? - Steve Ringer
If you’re anything like me, you’ve got tubs full of hookbaits in a range of colours – but how many of them do you actually use?
Which colour hookbait to use is down to water clarity
Confidence in a hookbait plays a big part and it’s easy to keep picking out the same one, working on the assumption that you caught on it last time, so why would it be any different this time round? Nothing wrong with that, but bait companies make different-coloured wafters and hook pellets for a reason – they all have a time and place!
Which colour to use is down to water clarity. In coloured water, some colours can be seen better than others. On the flip side, gin-clear winter swims call for a different bait that stands out easily.
Take the Ringer Baits Chocolate Orange Wafter. This has caught me hundreds of carp and bream, but it won’t always be the one I go for. First I will find out what colour works best at the fishery I’m visiting. I’ve had too many sessions where a yellow bait outfishes all others.
I’ve broken the options down into my four main colour choices, but do experiment.
A bright green bait that’s been sat in a tub for months might just catch you one a chuck when nothing else is working!
Fluoro yellows & whites
These are the ones to go for in clear water or in winter. Yellow is especially good, as it’s the same colour as corn, another top clear-water bait.
Yellows and whites are a great clear-water bait
Fluoro pinks & oranges
These are best on heavily-coloured fisheries, mainly for the silhouette that they make. The shadow is easy for fish to pick up.
A flouro pink or orange is best in coloured water
Natural
Natural brown hookbaits work in summer when I’m feeding a lot of pellets. A plain hookbait ‘matches the hatch’ of my feed.
Dull browns work best in the summer months
Washed-out
These baits are very dulled down to look as if they’ve been in the water for ages. Washed-out yellow wafters are a real winter favourite.
Washed-out yellow is another winter winner
Carp Fishing Tips | How long should you glug baits for? - Steve Cliff
There’s no single answer to this – it all depends on what it is that you are glugging. You can over-glug pop-ups with certain liquids.
Glugs such as Sticky L-Zero-30T are naturally quite heavy, so with pop-ups I would either give them a little coating of the thicker liquids, or a healthy amount of bait spray.
Sprays are ideal for pumping extra attraction into your hookbait as the thin liquid penetrates right through to the centre.
If you are planning on glugging freebies, there really isn’t any limit! I stick to natural liquids such as Pure Krill Liquid, the more the merrier, as fish love it.
The only other liquid I use is oil, predominantly Hemp Oil, adding only a light glaze to baits. This tends to be enough for it to do its job.
Hemp oil is great for adding a light glaze to your baits
Carp Fishing Tips | Bait for post-spawning carp - Simon Scott
Spawning is a highly energetic and physically demanding event for the carp. Females will have been through an incredibly stressful few days, as their ovaries go through the last stages of preparation for ovulation and then they actually spawn, releasing their eggs. It is common for both male and female fish to lose scales along their flanks and to scratch themselves during the rough and tumble of spawning.
Spawning is a highly energetic and physically demanding event for the carp
These physical injuries mean that their ability to regulate their internal salt/water balance may be compromised. The injuries also create holes in their bodies, which could become infected.
So spawning is a potentially dangerous time for carp and after they have finished they will need to rebuild their strength and heal any damage. Because of this they are often really hungry, and they commonly feed hard in the weeks following spawning in order to regain strength.
After spawning carp will be very hungry!
To capitalise upon this big feed-up it’s best to use a high-quality bait to give the fish lots of nutrients – for example, high-quality fishmeal boilies or pellets. These will be very popular with the fish which will, of course, all benefit from the quality of the feed.
If the weather is not too hot and the fish are clearly feeding hard, don’t be afraid to give them a fair bit of bait – they will thank you for it, and you might just catch a fair few along the way.
High-quality fishmeal boilies are best post-spawning