I live on the Kennet at Newbury, so really I'm a spoiled so and so, but though I've had good fishing for most species, the one that largely eludes me is the roach. There still are good roach on the Kennet, but I'm told not like there were, and I don't think I'm very good at fishing for them!

Am I deluded, or used there to be places where you could go down to the river and have comparatively easy sport with roach in the half pound to a pound bracket, with bigger ones if you were lucky, without having to fish all night with a ledgered piece of breadflake? And do such places still exist?

One person assures me that one such place is the Hants Avon (I think he said a park at Fordingbridge with free fishing, and a feeder stream at Ringwood with d/ticket, or it might have been the other way round). I've provisionally arranged a trip there in the new year, but this friend hasn't been there for 15 years, and I'm a bit worried things may have changed!

Any comments would be welcome.

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I remember seeing some huge roach at Barton Court last year.

They'd help themselves to free offerings, but shied away from hookbait.

Some roach to 3lb plus have come out at Timsbury Fishing, on the Test, recently.

Tight Lines - leon

test and Avon were always throwing up some exceptional fish in the winter when I was down portsmouth around 10 years ago!! But not a lot since have I heard!?

The trouble with exceptional fish is that they're hard to catch, hence my comment about legering through the night. I was wondering if anyone gets easy fishing for middle size roach. I'm interested in the south of England, but others might like to know about other parts.

Finding waters that hold a head of reasonably large fish is relatively easy.

Finding where a shoal is feeding, not so easy.

There's some places I fish in Kent, where, once I've located a good shoal, I've had excellent sport for most of the session.

But the majority of days, I've blanked, or only found the smaller fish

That's what makes roach fishing so challenging!

(I suspect that I'd soon get bored if I could just turn up somewhere and catch some decent roach almost avery time).

So, sorry I can't help to put you onto a reasonable chance of catching fish without subjecting you to too many sessions where that won't happen.

Tight Lines - leon

I guess I've probably been gullible. I still meet people who say 'Roach - you want to go to the canal at X - can't fail, bite a chuck. Don't even need to take bait, mate, get some elderberries off the trees, you'll get them up to a pound and a half easily' etc etc. But when I go and watch someone fishing it's usually 'Only small ones today, mate, but I got a 2 pounder yesterday!'

OK, taking Leon's point seriously about needing to find the shoal, what's the best approach? Ideally you'd bait up in advance, but that's not practicable for many of us. What I normally do when I get to a gravel pit, say, is to choose a suitable looking swim (in winter where I know it's reasonably deep at the edge, and facing into the prevailing wind), put in a little groundbait, start loose-feeding, and start fishing. But if the shoal's not there, how likely is it to arrive in the 3 hours I've got?

I've heard of an approach where you cast a maggot feeder in lines across the lake, and wind it in leaving trails of maggots leading to your swim. But won't the maggots soon crawl away?

Would an alternative be to tackle up, and move round the lake, moving say 2 swims at a time and giving 5 minutes or so at each, in the hope of bumping into a shoal? I've never heard of anyone doing it. My instinct is you'd be most likely just to contact small ones that way, but maybe a swim where you got a small one within 5 minutes in winter would be a reasonable place to start?

Otherwise, my impression is that, even if you found the shoal one week, roach move around and you're not much better off for the next?

Are there any clues I'm missing?

I fish a very small lake near me. During summer the smaller Roach and Rudd are a pain, but once the water gets colder the bigger Roach and Rudd (1lb+)start to show and you can spend a very pleasant day indeed.

fish ANY carp water with maggots

I have caught some nice roach while fishing for carp even took one on a 10mm boilie in york once

Joel

Mashed bread in a cage feeder and flake on the hook is hard to beat for roachies. The old Colthrop stretch of the Kennett (where it meets the canal) used to be good but not sure who runs it now???

River Wear, Durham City A.C. Prebends stretch. A 22lb match catch included 4 roach for just over 10lb.
The river regularly produces 2lb+ roach, but keep it a secret.
Problem is unless anyone lives locally its a bit of a journey up the A1.