Your Best Bag Of Roach

[GlennB]

..... but I'd have thought the weather in denmark and Holland is similar to here? .....

 

This rings a bell with an old thread here. Can't remember the conclusions, but Holland and certainly Denmark have somewhat longer and colder winters than us.

[hermes]

I used to fish Denmark for few years, the best Roach bag I had was some 180lb from a river about 30 feet across feeding a lake, we used to fish the river every year and every year it was just a good.

[The Flying Tench]

I used to fish Denmark for few years, the best Roach bag I had was some 180lb from a river about 30 feet across feeding a lake, we used to fish the river every year and every year it was just a good.

Hermes, how big were the roach? Sounds fantastic!

[Guest rabbit]

Globe had 3 4lb roach from a lake in Denmark. Am I right that no-one's ever caught a 4lb roach from a lake in UK? The dutch record perch is over 8lb. Is there some simple reason why continental fish seem to grow bigger than over here? I can understand Spanish barbel, but I'd have thought the weather in denmark and Holland is similar to here? Did I get a message that some of the big Dutch fish are from brackish water? Or is it that UK waters are more heavily fished?

With the recent picture galleriies sent from Holland I to was impressed with the bigger Perch and dare I say Pike I cannot think the seasons vary a lot from here to there. Of course Holland is blessed with a great deal of inland waters, or perhaps there is more natural food available. It could be however that the lakes and rivers are bigger than here?

Good point John, hope some of the better informed on this site can throw some light on the subject

[poledark]

Interesting the question about brackish water, Roach can definitely thrive in slightly polluted water, and also in at least one stream I know where they get the direct run off from a busy main road, this contains a load of salt from surface treatment several times every winter.

 

This stream is also full of zebra mussels, and I know a couple of lakes (wink, wink) where the Roach grow very big and they also hold lots of zebras.

 

Best bag???? I suppose the most memorable was my first (and only) Two pounder, caught by design, and hugely satisfying.

 

The bags from the Len were outstanding with up to 50 or more a session all well over a pound and several to within an ounce of the magic barrier.

 

Short pole trotting the R Cray for a bag of 9 fish over a pound, certainly never been caught before...swim only about 8 feet long and 2 feet deep and three feet wide and rush lined each side. Sat well back, flicked about 6 maggots in and lowered my hook bait in with them.

 

Never had a bite, but waited a couple of seconds after dropping the bait in and then lifted..bingo. Yeah, I remember that day, I really did crack it.

 

But what about those winter days a Wilstone back in the late 1950's? Saturday after Saturday thro' the winter for two years without a single bite, and it was train and bus across London, must have been mad!!

 

Any session where I caught Roach was a good one..

 

Den

Edited December 17, 2005 by poledark

[hermes]

Hermes, how big were the roach? Sounds fantastic!

 

 

Sorry for the slow reply, most of the Roach I got were between twelve to fourteen ounces, nothing smaller but sometime bigger, it's a rather sureal river to fish being so narrow, only half as wide as an average canal.

[Dick Dastardly]

Just a couple of observations on the subject of roach being bigger in Europe.

 

As previously mentioned up untill the mid 80's the Roach fishing on Germanys River Waser was superb.as said treble figures would be needed just to frame in the section of a match.However from the mid 80,s the roach fishing (and only the roach) went in to a marked decline. This was always blamed on salt polution from East Germany.

 

The Waser is a big river the roach fishing on several other of the smaller (more like Bristiol Avon size) rivers like the Lienne and Lippe was very good numbers wise but the average size no where near as high.

 

In France I have found similar ie the bigger rivers producing higher average sized fish.None holds a light to the Waser in its heyday though.

 

River Po in Italy (even though it has a species of roach unique to it) has never proved to be that special for me or people who have fished with me.A big river especially in its lower tidal reachs.

 

River Dyje in Czhechoslovakia has some great roach fishing with the average shoal fish weighing between 10 and 14ozs.lots of but Ive never caught a bigger one. Other than in the Vranov Damn area not that big about Avon size again.

 

The Guden in Denmark was the home of the famous Embassy sponsered matchs of the 70's big bags but not sure of the average sizes as Ive only fished it twice in the late 80's where the fish I caught were around 8-10ozs a piece.

 

In general the bigger waters seem to produce the bigger fish so I must conclude it is in most cases as simple as that! the bigger water being the reason. In general there is so much more water per angler in Europe so that is bound to be a factor.Even here in the UK the quality of roach fishing on all venues seems to vary through time....just like most species but in what seems like shorter cycles.

 

Ive not mentioned Ireland as my only interest in Roach whilst there has been in the ones one my trebles!

[The Flying Tench]

Very interesting, Budgie, you're a mine of info!

[The Flying Tench]

In general the bigger waters seem to produce the bigger fish so I must conclude it is in most cases as simple as that! the bigger water being the reason.

 

I'm really interested in your info on Europe, Budgie, and I've got no knowledge of this at all. On reflection, though, I'm not totally convinced about the size of water being the key factor for determining the size of specimen roach - though I take your point about big shoals of decent sized fish. I suppose my argument is that, from what I know of UK, the biggest fish come from all sizes of river. For example, the Dorset Stour isn't that enormous. (Though you might have more conclusive evidence on this for Europe than I realise.)

 

Specific items of food supply is an interesting theory. Someone mentioned a type of mussel. If we think of perch and chub in UK, a lot of people are saying they're getting big through eating small crayfish.

 

Generally in England being a chalk stream seems more important than the size of river per se. Does anyone know if the productive rivers on the continent are chalk streams? The Scottish rivers are another interesting point. In a thread a few months ago I seem to remember someone saying they'd weighed a dead roach from the Tweed and it was 5lbs. Does anyone know whether the Tweed is chalk?

 

I may be rabbiting on about this too long, but if anyone shares my interest I'd be interested to hear.

[Steve Burke]

I may be rabbiting on about this too long, but if anyone shares my interest I'd be interested to hear.

 

This is a subject I too find fascinating.

 

I haven't got any answers, and I suspect that there are a variety of factors involved. One of them could be lack of fishing pressure.

 

25 years ago probably the best roach river in the country was the Beult, a narrow tributary of the Medway (not a chalk stream BTW). This produced roach to 3-14, this fish falling to my then fishing partner, Nigel Witham. In fact we didn't catch a single roach under a pound that year!

 

This though was a freak situation as there were few roach left, but they were a very high average size. The small population meant a lot of food for each fish. Not surprisingly, the fishing was thus very difficult and so the venue was very little fished. In fact so little that it took us a long time to get the roach to take bread, with most of the roach falling to worm!