Big bream

[Dick Dastardly]

Now that does make sense! It was the comming and going that I couldnt get my head around with Alex's initial theory.But staying over the feed but eating the preffered items first would certainly explain it.

[mark barrett]

Lutra - a good observation. Thinking about it, that does make sense.

 

Has anyone seen giant bream sunbathing, like smaller shoal bream do? I guess they may feel too exposed, not having the safety of a big shoal with them, therefore they never did it when they were smaller, and so don't do it when they're big?

 

 

 

Yes! Hooray, someone agrees with me I re-read Derek Quirk's book again last night, and he describes exactly this (as does Alex). It is also what I believe. Once the small items in the groundbait have all been eaten, all that's left are the big items, and by then they want to pick that spot clean, so the bigger items then get eaten. That's why I think having a bigger item on the hook is the way to get a multiple catch. The others are far less likely to spook if they're feeding hard on a spot they've been polishing clean all night.

 

I do believe that they prefer to eat the small items (which is the reason they get eaten first - I'm now less convinced of Alex's theory that they stir up the bottom on purpose and then pick the small items out of mid-water), but once they're gone, the bream will take what they can get.

 

(Derek Quirk was using lobworms as bait and suffered hours and hours of liners as the bream picked out all the corn and casters in his groundbait, but then he caught 5 in a row! He came to a different conclusion - that he should therefore use small baits so he would start catching straight away and catch all night long. I reckon if he'd had one straight away, he'd have only had one. He knew they'd been eating the corn and casters because he sacked the fish overnight, and by morning the sacks were full of them.)

 

 

yes I have seen big bream sun bathing for want of a better phrase on more than a couple of gravel pits around my way.

[Dick Dastardly]

Allthough SB often give the impression of being solitary fish I think there must still be some deep rooted "shoaling" urge in them and going around/feeding in small groups is the only way I can explain the multiple captures that do occur amongst the many more blanks or single cptures!

 

It could seem that this thread has been a bit repeatative and disjointed but this is a great example of how analyzing something from many different peoples views has helped us (well I think I can speak for the others in the Wingham SG?) clarify our ideas.

Edited February 5, 2009 by BUDGIE

[Dick Dastardly]

I never saw SB's "sunbathing"/basking at either TC or Queenford but did see them a few times during the spawning period. I had hoped to spend more time just waching at Wingham last spring but hospital prevented that!

 

Other non SB waters it seems a common occurance.In clear water you can often see huge shoals just below the surface.If their is glare or a heavy ripple on the water they can still be there but you are unaware of it untill you spook them.

[Anderoo]

It could seem that this thread has been a bit repeatative and disjointed but this is a great example of how analyzing something from many different peoples views has helped us (well I think I can speak for the others in the Wingham SG?) clarify our ideas.

 

I was nodding like mad when I read this! Good god yes, it's been such a huge help to me. The first rule of fishing is to think like a fish, and I had no idea how to think like these freakish, weird, unpredictable, elusive, annoying things! I now understand things enough to feel confident when actually fishing for them, and can now start to formulate my own ideas (which may or may not work). Importantly (for me) I now have a pretty clear idea of how and when I'm going to fish for them this year.

 

The big question is - where!

 

I now - thanks to this thread and everyone who's contributed - feel I can tick off: rig; bait; groundbaiting; good times of year; decent weather/conditions; behaviour. What's left is swim choice, and if we can work that one out, we'll have got further than anyone else.

 

I know many people think we're over-thinking this whole business - and maybe they're right! - but I genuinely don't think we are. There's virtually nothing useful written about big bream fishing and hardly any first-hand experience. In the future it may be obvious looking back at our clumsy efforts and knowing where we went wrong, but until then there's an awful lot of elimination and learning to do, and the way to do that is to test theories.

 

I also think that we're on the path to collaboratively writing the modern definitive big bream fishing book (not that there's much of a market! And assuming someone doesn't read all this and rip us off).

 

So, keep it coming!

[Fenman]

The only thing left to consider is the moon.

 

 

And I don't want to go there

[gozzer]

I may be sticking my neck out here, but it's a theory I've had for a long time. No scientific basis, just observation and my own 'logic'.

 

On this thread and when talking about fish in general, I hear "the bream at XXXwater acted like YYY", or "the fish would only take xxx bait in xxxwater".

 

Well, I believe that individual fish act in a different way to others. I believe that not only different species, but individual members of the same shoal and year class are different.

As with any animal, some will have better developed eyesight, some a better sense of 'smell'/taste, some more cautious, and even different metabolic rates, (hence fish from the same shoal/year class weighing different, regardless of sex). Some will be more sensitive to pressure/vibration, and will act as warning to the group.

I believe that this can account for single catches from a shoal. The one that gets caught is the one with a below average eyesight, or sense of 'smell'/taste, or even the less cautious of the group, (the 'thicko' if you like ).

 

This would be especially noticed in small shoals of 6/8 fish like Wingham. In a shoal of dozens of fish there will be many such fish and multiple catches common, but with so few fish there might just be one or two, or even none.

 

My theory goes much deeper than this, but that's just the 'gist' of it.

 

I put myself in your hands, feel free to pull it through to pieces if you like.

 

John.

[Anderoo]

I definitely agree with you there John! I was talking to Richard and Alex last time I was at Wingham and said the same thing. There could well be one or two real super-huge-giant bream that will only pick up a maggot...

[Steve Burke]

Dose Wingham have any deep or deeper holes?

 

I ask this as none SB's have a disliking for the sun and on bright days they head for deeper water. You might think this pointless as you are night fishing, but if you have an idea where they are on a bright day it might give you an idea of where they will start out from that night.

 

Yes, there's quite a bit of 15ft deep water plus a few deep holes, two of which go down to 20ft and 23ft.

 

On featureless waters I can well imagine the bream going deeper. They may do at Wingham of course, but there they also have other options including in the shadow of cliff-like bars, into thick weed and under overhanging trees. I've several times seen the tench in the trees on bright sunny days at Wingham, and I've often caught perch in bright sunlight in the shade of the "cliffs".

 

I've also read of bream feeding on the surface during the day. I seem to recall this was on snails, and of course snails are often hanging upside down on the surface film in hot weather. Wingham is stuffed with small snails; in fact it's the only water I know where your feeder can come back not just covered with snails, but snails' eggs!

 

I find it interesting that big bream rarely feed in weed but tench do. There are several possibilities I can think of and I suspect others can add to them.

 

1) It may be that the food that bream prefer is more common away from the weed.

2) Bream may be able to feed more efficiently away from the weed.

3) Being largely nocturnal big bream may avoid weed at night as it gives off carbon dioxide.

 

Some of this may help with location, that I'm convinced is the key factor. You may be fishing anything up to half a mile away from any bream at Wingham. So if you're swim choice is wrong it doesn't matter how good your bait, groundbait or rig is - you simply have no chance of catching.

[gozzer]

I definitely agree with you there John! I was talking to Richard and Alex last time I was at Wingham and said the same thing. There could well be one or two real super-huge-giant bream that will only pick up a maggot...

 

Cheers Andrew, at least I'm not alone.

 

Part of this thinking is from something I mentioned in an earlier post.

I've watch fish, (chub mainly, but other species as well), and one has approach the bait and repeatedly taken and rejected it, only to have another shoal member to approach it (just as cautiously) and then take the same piece without any hesitation.

I have watched this behaviour on too many occassions to dismiss it as unusual.

I assume that one of the fish found something it didn't like about the bait, (smell/taste), where as the other didn't find anything wrong with it for what ever reason.

 

John.