What is a skimmer & how did the name originate?

[Vagabond]

However very important as you won't get a bite afterwards if you do not wipe it off!! not sure what it is but it spooks them off feeding?!?!

 

 

If only.....

 

Ivan Marks reckoned bream are put off by chucking groundbait on their heads (whereas tench are not)

 

Tried that one too......

 

Our southern skimmers are not put off by ANYTHING once their snouts are into the groundbait. If you are after tench, the only thing is to move swim and start again!

[Steve Walker]

I've just been having a look at Ivan's comments on bream in my "Collins Encyclopedia of Fishing in Britain and Ireland", which my grandparents gave to me in December 1984, when I was 11. His was the chapter on match fishing, and along with Dick Walker he was one of my childhood fishing heroes. I found the bream section, and then read on - it's fascinating now to look at the advice in there and realise how much of my fishing was based on that book. Old Ivan has caught me a lot of fish since then!

 

Anyway, interesting. His take on bream, bigger ones rather than skimmers, in the Welland and Witham and Ouse, was that he would wait until the men either side of him had put in their opening barrage. Then he would feel around his swim with a bomb, and find some clear river bed on a different line to his competitors. He would put two or three balls of groundbait in at this point, and then no more until an hour or so later or until he had four or five fish. Then two more smaller balls every 20 mins. His concern wasn't so much not to groundbait on top of feeding fish, but not to do so until they had settled. His take on skimmers was to catch them close in on float tackle, on the drop but towards the bed of the river, and to feed casters in sloppy groundbait. The groundbait to distract the bleak, hopefully allowing the casters to sink to the bream below!

 

No tips on how not to catch bream, though!

[Anderoo]

No tips on how not to catch bream, though!

 

Here are two - from a very successful and experienced angler who fishes at Wingham.

 

1. Hemp, and lots of it. Lots and lots and lots of it!

 

2. Salt or ingredients that are very salty like anchovies.