Commercial Fishing Tips | Six tips to get the most out of soft pellets - Lee Kerry

November 16, 2020 Guest User

It's time to make the seasonal switch to soft pellets! Here are six tips to get the most out of them…

SOAK THE FEED PELLETS

My No1 cold water feed pellet is a soaked 2mm. Referred to as micros, I soak mine heavily, submerging them in a Pellet Wetter for three to four minutes so they dissolve as the fish eat them.

MIX UP HOOKBAIT SIZES

You can’t beat an expander pellet on the hook. A 4mm bait is the optimum size, but I have a mix of 3mm, 4mm and 6mm expanders on the go and change them depending on the size of fish I’m catching.

HOOKING EXPANDERS

I like to thread the hook fully through the pellet, getting as much hook into the bait as possible. This makes it less likely that the hook will pull out of the bait when you strike or lift and drop the rig.

Try to get as much hook into the bait as possible

THE RIGHT RIGS

When fishing pellets, you need complete control of your bait. I use a maximum of a 4ins hooklength so that as soon as a fish picks up the bait, the bite registers on the float, even if the indication is tiny.

You need the bite to register on the float as soon as the fish picks up the bait

BALANCE YOUR KIT

The lighter the hooklength you use, the more bites you’ll get. I love the Preston Innovations 9h Hollo elastic, with a stiff mainline such as 0.18mm Accu Power, but hooklengths down to 0.10mm if required.

The lighter hooklink you use, the more bites you will get

THEY MIGHT NOT WORK!

Sometimes soft pellets won’t catch that well. If you’re on a difficult water, then soft pellets are a good choice. However, if you are getting lots of fish you don’t want to target, go for a hard pellet or corn.

If you are getting lots of bites from small fish, try switching to hard pellets or corn

Commercial Fishing Tips | Ready your pellets with Steve Ringer

August 25, 2020 Guest User

Given the range of pellet sizes, shapes and colours on the shelves of tackle shops, it’s easy to see how anglers can get confused about which is the right one to use.

Years ago, life was a lot easier. We had plain brown pellets in just a couple of sizes but now we’ve got micros through to big 10mm ‘donkey chokers’ and colours from bright yellow to black. You’ll get bites on them all, but some will be much better than others – if you know which ones!

I tend to use just a couple of sizes – micros and 6mms – for much of my summer pellet fishing, and I stick to plain-coloured baits. Most carp and F1s are reared on plain pellets, so they see them as part of their diet.

Having an edge, though, is important and that’s where colours come into play.

On some venues, I’ve struggled to catch on a brown pellet but emptied the lake by changing to a red one. Swapping sizes can also have a big effect. Experimentation is key, but getting the basics sorted is the first thing to get right.

Micro pellets

At this time of year micros won’t get to the bottom due to small fish. I will only use them in shallow water and on a Hybrid feeder.

Big pellets

The best all-rounders are 6mm pellets. Big enough to be loosefed on a waggler or feeder line, they make plenty of attracting noise.

The plop of a 6mm pellet is hard for a carp to resist

Expanders

Expanders are a great, light hookbait for carp and bream. The only time I’d feed them would be on shallow and very silty lakes.

Colour them

On venues where the water is heavily coloured, a red expander pellet will stand out that bit better because it creates more of a silhouette.

Colouring your pellets can be a real edge

Commercial Fishing Tips | Top five tips for expander pellets with Bob Nudd

December 11, 2019 Guest User

On the bank, keep them damp but not overwetted. Make sure they don’t dry out, otherwise they’ll float.
Use a decent-sized hook – a size 16 or 14 – and hook the pellet through the round outer rim.
If the pellets have dried out a bit, have another small tub of water by your side and give a hooked one a little squeeze to push the air out.
Try colouring them by adding a little liquid or powdered colouring to the water in the pump. Red and yellow work.
If you don’t get a bite on one size of pellet, try another. You’ll be surprised what a difference this small change can make.

Steve Ringer's guide to fishing for skimmer bream

February 10, 2017 Bauer Xcel

Feeding loose micros into deep water can be the kiss of death when you’re fishing for F1s and carp, as it leads to lots of line bites and foul-hooked fish.

But for skimmers it’s a very different story. This is a method that I first came across a few years ago after making a trip up to Hayfield Lakes for a silverfish match.

My plan was to target skimmers over groundbait and dead maggots and pinkies. In theory it was a good plan, but despite trying lots of different ways of feeding the swim, after two-and-a-half hours I’d managed just one small skimmer.

With time running out I knew I had to try something different to pull fish into the swim. I’d been told that Kinder potting 2mm micro pellets worked well for the skimmers on there, but I had dismissed it – frankly, feeding loose micros into 10ft of water seemed like madness to me.

But with nothing to lose I decided to give it a go so I quickly attached a Kinder pot and filled it with micros. Two feeds later I had a bite, then another and another, and within 20 minutes I was getting a bite every put-in from small skimmers. The difference was quite simply amazing. I can only think that the micros falling through the water were pulling fish into the swim.

Since that day it’s an approach I’ve used a lot and it’s rarely let me down. Right now, on waters with a silverfish bias, it’s definitely worth trying. I have to admit, it still doesn’t seem right, but it certainly works!

Wetted-down 2mm coarse pellets and expanders for the hookbait

How many pellets?

When it comes to bait it really doesn’t get any simpler - all you need is a pint or so of wetted-down 2mm coarse pellets and a few expanders for the hook.

I always like to prepare my micros the night before, slightly overwetting them so they soak up as much water as possible and expand to their maximum size. In fact, if you have the right micro pellet it’s even possible to use them on the hook!

Coarse pellets are best for this type of fishing as they are light in colour and skimmers can spot them easily as they fall through the water. As I’ve said many times before, I’m convinced that when the water is clear fish feed by sight rather than by smell, so these falling pellets offer a high degree of attraction.

Feeding

Steve starts by sprinkling half a pot of pellets

To kick the swim off I like to feed a quarter of a small 100ml Drennan pot of loose micros.

After the initial feed I like to let the swim settle for at least 30 minutes – I’m not a fan of going straight in when fishing for skimmers as I feel they need time to feel confident enough to feed. When I do decide to have a look, though, I will first load up a small Guru pole pot full of wetted-down micro pellets.

I’ll sprinkle half out straight away and wait for a bite. If I don’t get one within two minutes I’ll sprinkle in the other half of the pellets. I’m totally convinced the reason this method works is bait falling through the water, hence even if I’m not getting bites I like to keep a bit of bait going in.

From this point on I’ll feed to bites, and once I start getting a few fish I will feed again. This is a busier than usual way of feeding for skimmers, but it works, believe me!

Start on an expander

When it comes to what to fish on the hook I will always start with a 4.5mm Ringers Coolwater Expander. Skimmers love a soft pellet, and an expander stands out well over a bed of micro pellets, giving the skimmers something they can easily home in on.

I also carry a variety of sizes and colours of expander, just so I can mix it up throughout a session. You’ll often find, for example, that you’ll catch well on a standard 4mm expander to begin with and then bites will go a little bit funny, even though there are still fish in your swim.

I think what happens is that the fish get used to feeding on the micros and start to ignore the bigger baits. When this happens I switch to a 3.5mm F1 Light expander pellet to match the feed and keep catching.

My Rig (click to open in full)

Follow my advice for a catch like this..