Tagerting larger fish

[spinner.man]

On the small river i have been fishing i only tend to catch fish up to 1/2 lb and want to catch bigger. My main method is float fishing deep close to the bottom using medium size worms and sweetcorn.

Is it better ledgering big baits a better method for larger fish?

I also do not always feed the swim as i fish , could this be a problem with me not keeping the fish interested ?

 

Any help would be appreciated.

[Phone]

spinner,

 

I believe big bait equals big fish. As you can see, I'm in the US. While is not a custom in the UK I use much larger end tackle also. Not unusual to use 2/0 hooks. Not sure how you would use a "gob" of sweetcorn. I thread 7 - 8 kernels to the hook. Even then the dinks will pick them off one at a time. Three full sized lob worms is not uncommon. Not many have the patience to 'specimen fish'. Far fewer fish will be caught for sure.

 

Phone

[Anderoo]

http://www.anglersnet.co.uk/forums/Catchin...h-t3534178.html

 

[davedave]

Spinner, I too am having a similar problem. Although bigger baits can mean bigger fish I don't think 8 pieces of sweetcorn or three lobworms on a size 2 hook would yield very good results. I am currently trying whole (single) lobworms on a basic free running leger (http://www.anglersnet.co.uk/rig-section/leger-rigs/running_leger_rig.html) although admittedly haven't had much success.

 

Basic watercraft is key, without sounding patronising- remember to stay quiet and low to the ground if possible, try not to sillhouette the water and underarm cast your leger so it makes a slight plop instead of an almighty crash. I have found these rules to be true more so than on stillwaters.

 

Popular baits you may want to try could be bread, worms, slugs, meat, paste (cheese) and pellet.

 

You may want to feed the swim a little, although don't go mad, a handful of maggot or caster or a ball of bread mash is a good start. You may want to bait a swim and come back to it an hour or so later.

 

Probably the biggest thing you need to do though is find where the fish may be holed up. Any obvious features such as bends, overhanging trees and bushes, reeds, lilies, weed rafts, creases and slack water are all basic places to start.

 

Depth is important, and although legering on the bottom can result in better fish I have had more luck so far on the float. However as the waters get colder you may find legering to be more succesful, but maybe not

 

Don't ignore feeder fishing too, I have had a lot of luck on a small kamasan black cap maggot feeder with two or three maggots on a size 16. I saw a rig once where an elastic band was put around the maggot feeder and the hooklength put inside the elastic band against the feeder, working as a bolt rig but safe in that the fish can pull the line free from the elastic band- this is something I plan on trying next time on the rivers.

 

To be honest spinner I have temporarily given up on the rivers, the ones near me are so clear and shallow mostly it is a waste of time unless you know any particularly deeper spots. I don't know about your river situation but I intend to wait about 6 weeks for (hopefully) a bit of colour and depth and less weed. Ironically though this also the time I will be piking again and the club start to have matches on the rivers so I may not get out as much as I like.

 

 

Best of luck, Dave

[Phone]

spinner,

 

As davedave eludes. It takes enormous confidence and even more patience. One other thing, sometimes I've simply quit when fishing is real good. Sometimes you simply can't get to the specimen fish for the dinks. Almost always, you better be ready to blank with enjoyment in a land of honey. I don't know why he thinks it won't work? Probably never tried it. Worked for me in England. I admit, I did have to "suffer" from the "you don't know how to fish" indignant critics. By the same token England was the first place I caught anything on a "hair rig" with a size 12 hook. (What's that chit all about??)

 

Whatever you do you will have to develop confidence in your decision. Ohh, and since the percentages are "bigger fish" equal a small part of the total number the "best" way to catch big fish is to fish fish fish. Sometimes I'd rather be lucky than good.

 

Phone

 

WARNING! larger hooks (you decide for yourself what "larger" means) do more initial damage.

 

Edit: I don't want davedave to think I'm picking on him. His head is a bit out of place. He just landed a new PB perch this month and would like to offer my congratulations!!!

Edited September 20, 2012 by Phone

[Steve Burke]

I too go along with the previous answers.

 

I've written about this before but new members may be interested in the problems with a chub I named Oswald. Why Oswald? Well it was the name Dick Walker gave to a trout he wrote about in "Drop Me a Line". Both his trout and my chub were in very difficult positions.

 

In my case, despite approaching Oswald as carefully as I could, I always spooked him. After several weeks of this I finally worked out a solution (yes, I know I'm slow on the uptake!)

 

Having spooked him for the umpteenth time, I measured out the length of the cast from a position well back from the bank and totally out of sight. The following day I returned, aimed at a marker on the far bank and cast into the water totally blind.

 

Thirty seconds later Oswald was on the bank. All two pounds fourteen ounces of him!

 

He's far from being the heaviest chub I've caught. In fact, he wasn't even the heaviest that day.

 

But he is my most memorable fish!

[Steve Burke]

If I'm not catching it may be that the fish aren't feeding. It's more likely though that I've got something wrong. So instead of waiting for the fish to come on the feed, I change something.

 

To help work out what I might have wrong I use the principles laid out in the introduction to the late Richard Walker's "Still-water Angling" (that Anderoo referred to in his link in post no 3 above). These principles apply just as much to river fishing as well. To paraphrase the great man:

 

1) Fish in the right place

2) At the right time

3) With the right bait (I'd add groundbait as well because correct feeding makes a huge difference)

4) With the right tackle

5) Avoid scaring the fish

 

If you read just one book on specimen hunting make sure it's this one. As Anderoo pointed out it's not expensive, and the Introduction alone is worth the modest price of the whole book.

 

Before Still-water Angling it was widely considered that specimen fish were literally "fish of a lifetime". With this book Walker taught us that specimen fish could be caught deliberately, and often.

 

Walker wasn't just theory though. The Daily Mirror ran a club competition where points were awarded for the best few fish caught of each major species in a season. Christchurch Club, who had fishing on the Hampshire Avon and other good waters, were widely expected to win. They didn't. Instead it was won by Dick Walker's club, Hitchen, with more than double the points of their nearest rival, almost all contributed by Walker and his friends fishing deliberately for specimen fish!

 

Walker's catches speak for themselves. He smashed the then carp record by a massive margin - and held it for almost 40 years! He also held the rainbow trout record and was a fine fly fisherman, inventing many fly patterns into the bargain. He also caught a record dace on the fly, but as it was in the closed season it didn't count.

 

Walker was also a competent match angler. The press challenged him to a series of 3 matches on different waters against Tom Sails, the captain of the team that won the National that year. Each could choose a venue, then the final match was to be on a water chosen by the press. Sails won the first match, then Walker cheekily opted for Sails's own local water - and beat him! The deciding match was on a venue that neither had ever seen. Walker won it with a catch that included a double figure barbel!

 

Another great angler, Bernard Venables of Mr Crabtree fame, wrote that there are several approaches to success as an angler. You can achieve success by being a great technician. Some of the top match anglers are a good example here. That's way beyond my ham-fisted ability. But like a match angler I also often change something even when I am catching. Even if I don't up the catch rate I'll have learnt something.

 

Instead of becoming a technician I major on learning the habits of the fish to work out when they feed, how they feed, and what they feed on. Bernard Venables devoted much of his book "Freshwater Fishing" to this. Start with your quarry he said. Then from that comes the baits and methods to use. In turn, from that comes tackle.

 

Becoming successful as a specimen hunter isn't difficult (it's a lot, lot easier than becoming a successful match angler). Everyone reading this can achieve success if they put their mind to it.

 

I just wish I hadn't wasted the first 20 years of my angling career being pretty unsuccessful!

Edited September 21, 2012 by Steve Burke

[Steve Burke]

Davedave - excellent advice. I wish I was as good as you at your age. You have the makings of a fine angler!

 

Spinner.man - excellent topic, the best I feel for a while.

[wotnobivvy]

Just to add a caveat. Are you sure there are bigger fish there. Have you seen them, or do you have reliable information. I have often tried for bigger fish, only to find I am already catchin the biggest

[gozzer]

Just to add a caveat. Are you sure there are bigger fish there. Have you seen them, or do you have reliable information. I have often tried for bigger fish, only to find I am already catchin the biggest

 

You beat me to it watno'.

 

Spinner, you don't say what fish you are catching, or what you class as a 'small' river.

 

I have fished 'small' rivers/streams where the fish, (usually chub) seemed to max out at about 1lb. Only after going down with just bait and polaroids, have I seen the odd bigger fish. Once found, only then I was able to target them.

There were a few ways I located them. First taking cover, in a likely looking spot, and slowly introducing loose feed. With clear water you can easily see what you've attracted, usually small fish which in turn, seems to stir the curiosity of the bigger fish.

Another is to introduce a floating bait, crust or floating casters. If you follow these down stream, you will see what comes up for them, and where, and consentrate on those spots.

As for baits, it again depends what species you are after. If it's chub, then there is not much you can put on a hook that a half pound chub won't tackle. I preferred using a lump of cheese on a size 8 or 6, with a few similar sized pieces used as loose feed. I often also fed maggots, to keep the smaller fish occupied. I took some sizable roach using that method. Lobs, bread, luncheon meat, all brought results at times, as did casters fished shallow with the loose fed floaters.

 

To sum up, location is the main thing, then you will know what size fish to expect. Sometimes it can surprise you how big, (or how small), the maximum size fish the water holds.

 

John.