weirwulf

Being even more pedantic, one bloke I know has a good idea what he is going to catch and that is usually nothing

Best method mix I can think of is plain old Vitalin dog mix

Method feeders by their nature work best when there are plenty of fish competing for food. You will not miss the bite when it comes but do expect lots of plucks and twitches as the fish attack the offerings before one finds the hook! If you go for a method feeder you will get best results with around a 3 inch hooklength. Good luck

I met that guy on my one and only visit to Wasing on the Kennet where he told me I should use much bigger bits of luncheon meat. ( I was using about an inch cube) Shortly after that I adopted the idea on my local river and banked a mid double Boris. If you read this Martin, thanks!

A nice fit looking chub Anderoo and the river looks a lot nicer than mine!

Thanks for that input Budgie. I certainly would never have thought to use braid but presumably line pick up time is reduced considerably and very few worries about the line not floating. I think the bit about keeping the bait down is sound and again perhaps the only way to manage that is with a float that can carry loads of weight. I am much more used to a slower pace and often get away with a 5 No 4 stick. With that neatly shotted a minnow can take it under without stress! Looks like I may have to ressurect my 17ft rod

Although I am too late for the fish in I do hope to visit fairly soon so I am seeking some tips about tackling the fishery. I have visited it once a few years ago when I had problems with eye sight and just chanced trotting a chubber float so at least I could see it! The river was carrying extra water and the going was tough for most but I did still manage some good fish alternating between maggots and sweetcorn trotted at almost full depth. I felt this approach was far from ideal but it attracted grayling trout and a good chub. Most of the gang I fished with were also newcomers to the fishery so not much to learn from them either. Wanting to travel light means for me getting the right line, float weight/type, and hook size/type before I start walking so I am looking for these 3 things for an average day at the fishery. Despite the quick pace I still prefer the lightweight, fast action match float rod and corresponding line etc approach though some have commented that they were successful even with quite unrefined set ups and one commented he felt he would have struggled on finer tackle to land some of the fish. Help!

It is possible for chub to be finicky and the golden rule seems to be you find them and not them find you. There is howver in my humble opinion one exception and that is the trotted caster or single pinkie approach. Chub will seldom use energy to dart out for things unless they will gain loads of energy in return for example from a big ol' bait. However I caught some of my better winter specimens last season on nothing more than one caster on an 18 and even then the bite was often finicky. That said I don't know it all and still havn't found a way to catch the 7-8lb specimens that occasionally show up locally so if anyone has advice on what would most likely be a good approach for sorting out the big lumps from the average fish I would love to know.

Sensor in both coloured or clear is great value and reliable but if you can afford it the Fox Illusion is the heaviest toughest barbel line I have ever used. It is a flourocarbon line which requires you to tie palomar knots and supposedly has the same refractive index as water (in laymans terms the fish can't see it) However I believe it gives me an edge purely because it holds to the river bed better than any other line so far and often when I have battled a good fish the line comes back roughened but still superbly strong. It would never make a distance casting line though!

Well done Anderoo you really have it covered! Thanks for taking the time to write and present the piece.

Can't advise too much on the rod not having used a pellet waggler but as I have a lot of experience with both the exage and the mach 3 I can make proper comment. The exage reel is presumably the one with the fighting drag lever which is an excellent idea that has saved a lot of fights with barbel in tight snaggy areas like the ones I often fish. If you want maximum response then that is the reel to have. The mach 3 has features that excel way beyond it's price such as the well finished shallow spools and excellent line lay. It also has a single or double handle option and for float fishing I find the double handle can get in the way. The mach 3 has a very reliable and smooth drag. I wonder whether you would get away with using a 1.5 test barbel rod for your pellet waggler fishing as you seem to be hooking carp a lot. Most barbel rods have that great combination of power and forgiveness which give you the edge when the fish changes direction suddenly whereas most carp rods have distance casting in mind.

I use ready rolled pastry for the basis of my cheese paste and always make sure there is plenty of smelly cheese in the mix like danish blue though any cheese will do really and a 50/50 mix of pastry to cheese should work well. You can elaborate as much or as little as you like but simple seems to be good on most days. I have a personal preference though for soft almost runny paste made from one of the green groundbait mixes with a bit of ground hemp and chinese five spice for good measure. Simply mould a good lump round a hook with a piece of corn or some other hookable tough bait to keep the paste in place and wait for the line to straighten!

I think you might have put that topic to bed now tincatinca!

Barbel and chub love coloured water and locally anglers have caught both with the river carrying an extra 8 feet of water. On the same river I have found grayling totally disinterested until the water clears whereas the dace and roach will be tempted whilst it is still fining down. The perch just seem to feed at irregular times and much harder to define

Depends really whether you want to continue using it as a float rod or would you want to make a quiver rod from it . Either way the tip of the rod is not the muscle part. In the case of the match float rod it becomes a responsive tool for quickly setting the hook and absorbing the jerking movements of smaller fish to prevent hook ejection and the quiver tip is mostly for bite indication although a fine quiver does help to self hook fish when it gets pulled under tension. Fine float rods used to have spliced in tips to create that hook setting ability but most now have hollow carbon all the way down the blank. To revert to float rod use you could adapt a carbon quiver tip of say 4oz rating and splice it in permanently or to convert the rod for quiver use cut the tip back to the right point for a push in tip and then whip where the join will be.

Depends quite a bit on conditions but as a rough guide in water that is not too ripply on a bright day I like flourescent orange and as the light fades I swap for a flourescent green/yellow. In just about all dull conditions the greeny yellow is good but when a river produces bright reflections I favour black even with sunnies on. I guess that floats weigh very little and I tend to walk with a selection of colours all with a similar pattern and weight loading so that if I move from a clear section to an overhang it is simple to swap.

In my limited experience of cats I found the fish pretty much dictated how the rod was held. Most of the time it was as much as I could do to just hold on comfortably but in terms of actually controlling it seemed that the old trick of keeping the rod low to calm the fish was a good plot and each of the fish I played responded to my call to relax a little. You do however at some point have to apply pressure because the fish has got all day and you want to ruin it for them and I found that using the pumping action that sea anglers use gradually brought the fish to the net. This meant making an arc between water level and around 70 degrees. I gather the lake was around 30 feet deep so a shallower water may produce longer runs where you would doubtless be left just holding on with the clutch slipping a bit at whatever angle felt comfy

A very sad situation indeed. Perhaps the author of the article made the claim after he fell off his Perch! Somewhere in my failing memory I seem to recall a previous nationally affected sudden death of Perch that perhaps some of you can throw some light on

I haven't yet discovered how to post a link but I have been using a ruck stool with a proper back rest for 3 years now made by WSB tackle. If you google WSB and then click on the chairs icon you can view it. The bag does have it's faults such as I had to oversew some of the stitches which is a shame because otherwise it is the perfect roving bag. It cost very little too. I don't think I have had any problems with the water getting in but in fairness I haven't used it in the kind of weather we had today

Chris Plumb I salute you on a fine mornings work! Was that a signal crayfish that got spat out?

No hard and fast rules about the length of line between the weight and hook and in some cases such as when a feeder is in use it could be an advantage to keep it short. However I have established after loads of experimenting that at least on my local the long hooklength seems to create the right presentation. The fast sinking mainline just puts the icing on. Works for me!

For once I am stuck for an answer but it would involve a small river, drennan ultralight float rod, 4lb flavour berkeley xl line a stick float and a size 14 mustad hook to 3lb 14oz nylon. Some flouro pinkies on the hook or small red worms for just about anything that swims(hopefully not signal crayfish)

Interesting concept Alan. Not knowing about flies in general I am always intrigued by alternative methods but surely all flies are only effective when they match what is happening naturally. OK a bit of corn is not a natural happening but it does have scent and it does stick out as something bright trundling along. Is there a preffered time to choose the method you mention?

As others have mentioned it may just be you need to change something slightly. My first season I landed only 4 barbel but once I got my head around things that increased dramatically. One angler on my local river had tried for 2 seasons without a boris and I asked him to reel in. He was using a hooklength around 9 inches long so I suggested increasing that length to 2 feet. Big head I know but he caught within one hour! Bear in mind that at this time of year old Boris may prefer some quite small baits and may initially give very tentative bites before slamming the rod over. If you are fishing with large baits or a heavy rod top try going lighter(try one of the quivers supplied with that greys rod) but do not reduce the line capacity. use a fast sinking line and fish it with as little weight as you can get away with. Barbel will spook if the line can be felt so keep it pinned down and offer as little resistance by keeping everything free running. Good luck!

First afternoon out for a while and conditions looked very good on my local river. Not generally known as an easy barbel water I managed to land 3 with the best a respectable 10lb 9oz. Still puzzled as to where the chub were but hey I'm not complaining