Big roach

[tiddlertamer]

No reason at all why it wouldn't work. A pole would eliminate the 'problems' with using FS reels for trotting in the same way that a centrepin does, just more limited for range and perhaps a bit cumbersome if you get too ambitious.

 

On the subject of retrieving I always try to retrieve along a different line to that which I'm trotting. It's not always possible from the bank but if you're wading it can be done just by swinging the rod to the other side.

 

In a piece he did for the media, angler Martin Bowler goes after a record dace but puts forward the argument that trotting and the continual retreival of the tackle over the swim would put fish down. He then proceeds to ledger for them on a small carrier on the Kennet.

 

I should shout 'poppycock and balderdash' but perhaps he is right.

 

But trotting is a tad more fun and, in my experience no barrier to catching large hauls of dace.

 

It's just that elusive extremely large roach, and dace too, that escapes me...

 

Perhaps I should focus less on enjoying myself and more on actually catching the monsters out there, that maybe, just maybe would fall to my new tactics.

Edited October 15, 2009 by tiddlertamer

[Vagabond]

.winter on a lake after what turned out to be hybrids, .....got a brace of 3lb 6oz fish ..... again hybrids.......others were adamant they were true roach.

Yep, I've had 3lb plus hybrids also

One of the surest ways to make an enemy is to identify his "roach" as a hybrid.

[Chris Plumb]

In a piece he did for the media, angler Martin Bowler goes after a record dace but puts forward the argument that trotting and the continual retreival of the tackle over the swim would put fish down. He then proceeds to ledger for them on a small carrier on the Kennet.

 

I should shout 'poppycock and balderdash' but perhaps he is right.

 

But trotting is a tad more fun and, in my experience no barrier to catching large hauls of dace.

 

It's just that elusive extremely large roach, and dace too, that escapes me...

 

Perhaps I should focus less on enjoying myself and more on actually catching the monsters out there, that maybe, just maybe would fall to my new tactics.

 

 

I've fished the very same swim as MB (I recognised it on Catching the Impossible) - and always trot it. Have had most of my big dace from that carrier (Including multiple catches of big dace on the same session) plus my PB Roach. Alas it's a very fickle stream - and only fishes when the Kennet is high - so will probably be barren of fish this winter unles we get a lot of rain SOON!

 

 

C.

[tincatinca]

Not posted for a while as I have been working away a lot but the Roach threads are very interesting as I do like my Roach fishing, particularly from a river. Where I have been living for the last 25 years or so there are some good Roach and in the past I am lead to believe that my local river has produced a 3 but that was a long time ago. I do llike the middle reaches where there are lots of bends, undercuts and glides and although I have come very close to a 2 from my local river I have still to manage one from it unlike where I used to live in my younger days fishing the Rivers Sow and Meece in Staffordshire which often produced Roach over 2lb and Dace just over the 1lb. It is interesting that where I fished then was not subjected to very much angling pressure as there was quite a bit of walking involved to get to the swims involved particularly gor the Roach. There used to be a superb Dace swim on the Meece which was within the confines of what used to be the Royal Ordinance factory at a place called Swynerton where the method used to be trotting red worm under a specially designed home made self cocking floatwhich had a triangular balsa body with a long fine bristle tip and an alloy stem. (Must make some of those again) These used to be made up within the English Electric factory as it was known then and were really excellent for this type of fishing being good and accurate casters and were locally known at the time as the Stafford float. As for Roach, most of my bigger fish came from one of two methods and always using breadlake on the hook. The first method and generally utilised in the first couple of hours of darkness was to find a cattle drink with deeper water adjoining it and trot from upstream and hold back on the edge of the cattle drink in the slower water using a torch shining accross the water just enough to illuminate the float tip. This was a very successful method and caught me a lot of very good fish. The second method and again preferably into the dusk was to fish bends where there was a good depth of water and a gravel bottom wher you could lay on tight to the bank in the slacker water. Using this method I have caught fish virtually under the rod tip but obviously a very stealthy approach was required. Normal trotting did produce some good fish but nothing like the previous methods although I once hooked into and lost a fish up against the old gasworks wall in Stafford where there used to be a warm water outlet which still haunts me to this day. Unfortunately those waters were decimated when the M6 was built and changes to made to the river bed in some areas virtually destroyed the fishing. The Sow was also capable of producing Chub to over 6lb and Perch 3lb plus which were big fish at the time. Another river which also could produce was the Blythe which runs into Blythfield Reservoir and there are some huge Roach in there.I can also recall an old boy whose name I think was Tom Hawkins who used to go everywhere on his push bike catching a 27lb Pike from the upper stretches of the Sow which won him the News of the world prize which I think was a Mitchell reel. I personally still think there are still big Roach to be caught especially from the smaller rivers but very few people actually fish for them and those that do say nothing. It is surprising what you could get if you are prepared to go looking for it and not rely on the instant success approach. With regard to line, I still rely on the old faithfull 4lb Maxima.

 

For anyone interested a rough sketch of the old Stafford float is included below. These were made so that they self cocked and were used with no shot down the line. The little plastic attachments at the bottom which were fixed to the small split ring ensured that there was no slippage of the float on the line

 

 

Edited October 16, 2009 by tincatinca

[Leon Roskilly]

One angler that might be worth asking for advice.

 

http://www.fishingmagic.com/features/catchreports/13222.html

 

 

 

 

Back in the late '50s I'd go with my dad and a neighbour to fish the river at Sawbridgeworth (herts).

 

We had some big roach from there, many over 1.5 pounds, and the odd 2lb+ fish.

 

(A few ended on my dinner plate )

 

Then it was deep there, and the fish were taken amongst lily-pads.

 

Bites (on hemp) were lightning fast, with the bigger fish hardly giving any indication at all.

 

A very short length of peacock quill, attached at the bottom with a piece of bicycle valve rubber (were these the first wagglers?) and dotted right down was our secret weapon, and lightning fast reflexes developed for quick-striking (I'd practise for hours perfecting that lightning response!)

 

We'd set off on dark mornings, driving though mist in an old 1939 Morris 8, passing herds of deer sitting by the roadside in Epping forest, to arrive as dawn was breaking and as crows flew cawing overhead. Brew-ups of tea made with river-water, accompanied bacon and sausages cooked on a paraffin primus-stove the smell of bacon and paraffin mixing together with the morning air and the magical smell of a fishy river.

 

It was a huge disappointment when I returned from Australia in the very late 60's to find the river there silted up, and hordes of very small roach had replaced those giants.

 

 

 

Interesting too that roach seem to have a boom period on particular waters, and it all fades away.

 

(Johnson's Lake in Kent was once more commonly known as 'the roach lake').

 

If you do find a place that produces big roach, make the most of it, before it inevitably becomes a nostalgic memory.

[Sharkbyte]

I'm heading south in a few hours time for a weekend away targeting big roach, with the chance of a few other species of interest.

 

More of a recce really, but you never know.

[tiddlertamer]

I've fished the very same swim as MB (I recognised it on Catching the Impossible) - and always trot it. Have had most of my big dace from that carrier (Including multiple catches of big dace on the same session) plus my PB Roach. Alas it's a very fickle stream - and only fishes when the Kennet is high - so will probably be barren of fish this winter unles we get a lot of rain SOON!

 

 

C.

 

Can anyone remember rivers being so low in mid October? I've been struggling. I can see big fish. I can even get them to feed when I'm putting in loose feed. But the water is so low and gin clear in the rivers I'm fishing, the canny chub and retiring roach are refusing to take my long trotted hook bait!

I can imagine rivers being so low is a common phenomenon in summer but so late in the year - is that normal? Anyone else struggling with their autumn river fishing this year?

Edited October 19, 2009 by tiddlertamer

[Steve Walker]

Anyone else struggling with their autumn river fishing this year?

 

From comments on here, my own experience, and tackle shop gossip, I think the answer is "everyone".

 

Everyone is waiting for rain, it would seem.

[Leon Roskilly]

I can imagine rivers being so low is a common phenomenon in summer but so late in the year - is that normal? Anyone else struggling with their autumn river fishing this year?

 

 

Yep, fished the Kentish Stour on Monday, surprised how low it was even after the deluges of the week before.

 

Fished it again on Thursday and it had gone down considerably more, so that the bed was beginning to show in places beneath the bottom of the banks.

 

And those chub!

 

Happy with me moving around on the bank near them, but as soon as I lifted a rod into view, they melted away.

 

Some quite big ones too

 

 

(And don't get me started on how dry the soil in the garden is, very few lobs amongst the too-small potatoes )

Edited October 18, 2009 by Leon Roskilly

[poledark]

Watching them plough the field behind my house today, very surprised to see dust blowing off the freshly ploughed soil from 12/15inches deep.

 

Den