Reading the bubbles

[Guest Rabbit]

Just to clarify John Tench bubbles are like the Alka Seltzer fizz you gulp to kill that hang over. if the area they covered were the size of a dinner plate I think you can assume they were not roach or gudgeon

[poledark]

So many variations...on some waters (usually silty bottom ones) you can gat a large area seething with bubbles..usually caused by a congreation of small fish disturbing the trapped air in the silt. Bream will send up bubbles as they browse along...if you get a pair of them, then they are usually bigguns

 

A sudden "violent" burst is usually a pike strike (also disturbing the trapped air)

 

Big carp browsing often send up a couple of bubbles (often a couple of different sizes)...they reappear a foot or so further on....and then another couple. Very exciting, especialy when you end up with a "Forty" on the bank

 

Roach will do the same...one here, one there.

 

Has anyone actually seen these bubbles emerging from the gills of a fish? I have watched loads of fish "bubbling" but almost all the bubbles simply appear as the fish noses in to the silt.

 

Den

[Newt]

Be glad you don't have to add turtles into the mix. They are absolute champions at sending up bubbles and with them, it is small amounts of air expelled through the nose.

 

I never even knew that fish might do the bubble thing until I joined this forum. I always put it down to trapped gas in the muck either releasing on its own or due to some help from a bottom feeding fish or five.

[Guest Rabbit]

So many variations...on some waters (usually silty bottom ones) you can gat a large area seething with bubbles..usually caused by a congreation of small fish disturbing the trapped air in the silt. Bream will send up bubbles as they browse along...if you get a pair of them, then they are usually bigguns

 

A sudden "violent" burst is usually a pike strike (also disturbing the trapped air)

 

Big carp browsing often send up a couple of bubbles (often a couple of different sizes)...they reappear a foot or so further on....and then another couple. Very exciting, especialy when you end up with a "Forty" on the bank

 

Roach will do the same...one here, one there.

 

Has anyone actually seen these bubbles emerging from the gills of a fish? I have watched loads of fish "bubbling" but almost all the bubbles simply appear as the fish noses in to the silt.

 

Den

 

Den the bubbles emulates not from the fish but from the silt......honest.

[bluerinse]

Bubbles can be really tricky to read, some weeds get covered in bubbles as they Photosynthesis under water. If a fish brushes the weed it sends up a cloud of tiny pin prick bubbles, this can be mistaken for fish feeding, I have seen this in very clear water lakes, if the water had been coulored I would have sworn fish were feeding in my swim.

[poledark]

Rabbit, that's what I always thought..and from what I have seen.

 

But I have seen pictures (drawings? ) showing the bubbles coming from the gills. I have no doubt that if the fish is nosing IN the silt, then some of the trapped air will go in to its mouth, and then out thro the gills.

 

Den

[Guest Rabbit]

Rabbit, that's what I always thought..and from what I have seen.

 

But I have seen pictures (drawings? ) showing the bubbles coming from the gills. I have no doubt that if the fish is nosing IN the silt, then some of the trapped air will go in to its mouth, and then out thro the gills.

 

Den

 

Agreed, and what I fail to understand is why then the different sized bubbles? Tench bubbles are smaller than say the carp perhaps the gill rakers on the tench are smaller than the carp? Could be when they filter feed in the mouth air is injected to aid the breaking down of foodstuffs such as ground bait.

All a bit of a mystery really,