Big bream

[Steve Burke]

I'm going to be experiment more this season with popped up baits. It's interesting that several of the Queenford lads found that off-bottom baits frequently outfished bottom baits even on 2-hook paternoster rigs.

 

I originally thought this might be because the bream wouldn't have to tip up to suck the baits in. If so it would be logical to suggest that sides of bars would be particularly good spots.

 

However an additional reason may be that off-bottom baits are less covered with detritus. Bream have a habit of sucking in and blowing out food to separate the edible bits. I assume they do this by touch and/or the different sinking rates.

 

Have any of you tried any such comparisons at Wingham or elsewhere?

[Anderoo]

Hi everyone,

 

Firstly, what a fantastic thread! I've really enjoyed reading it. Unfortunately, I don't have the same experience as many of you when it comes to fishing for specimen Bream, but I did spend last Autumn targeting Bream in one of the more historic 'SB' venues referred to throughout this thread.

 

Although I'm still learning (largely thanks to this thread!), there is one point that has been touched on that I can offer some observations on. I can't remember who, but someone earlier on in the thread mentioned that they didn't put much weight behind the idea of Bream disturbing the lake/pit bottom and subsequently eating the food items left 'wafting' mid-water. Similarly, Lutra mentions this in the previous post.

 

Well, on one particular trip last year when I was fishing off a large point on the venue in question with a friend, we were both fishing over a large (relatively widely dispersed) bed a bait. We were fishing the same area with the same bait and the same rigs (or so we thought), but only he caught. We both found this rather puzzling, so decided to more closely examine our rigs in the margin. It turns out that the artificial corn he was using was actually more boyant than he had anticipated, and not having checked his rig in the margin ( ) he had essentially been fishing a short zig-rig. On the other hand, my bottom bait had stayed on the bottom but had not been picked up.

 

Unfortunately, these were not SB, but an interesting none the less.

 

Keep up the great debating lads - I will be reading with interest!

 

Stuart

 

Steve, this is the best info I've heard re a direct comparison between bottom vs popped up hookbait (from p. 38).

[Dick Dastardly]

I was considering using my normal big bream two hook rig (without the bottom hook) at Wingham. I never really got my head around why the top hook would often be the taking one at Queensford or the other waters Ive used them but without a doubt they do produce.

 

I initially thought that it might not actually be that they were giving an off botton presentation.I say this as over the bottoms we were using them and at the distance I very much doubt that most of the first 20' of line (no matter how tightly fished) wasnt laying on the bottom. I thought that maybe the top hook just gave a bettere hooking/self pricking situation and that we were getting just as many pick ups on the bottom hook as the top but not realising due to them not registering. Once sunk floats were incorporated in to the rig there was then no doubt that the top hook was off bottom....or was there? I say that as it would very much depend on the feature(s) fished to or inbetween rod and lead.Maybe no coincidence that fish were caught on top of bars here (unusual on most bream let alone SB waters) and not just because they were weed free?

 

No I dont know why it worked out so but as it did for most who used double hook rigs I followed suit.

 

One thing that seems to have been missed by many about Queenford was that despite the 1 3/4lb rods and buzzers etc the aproach was far more along the lines of a match anglers ie small baits,small hooks,delicate presentation etc than the bolt rig, big hook,big bait "specimen" type aproach we are all in general using at Wingham. The big tench have a hand in this though I suppose as does the "scaled down carp" aproach we tend to use for them..

[Anderoo]

I was talking to Steve yesterday, and a couple of things occurred to me during the conversation. The first is that I think I'm going to up the amount of feed I put in. I'm always there for at least 2 or 3 nights, so even if they turn up and don't get caught on the first night, hopefully they'll come back the next night, assuming the conditions don't change. More bait = more pulling power. At the moment I'm relying on them coming right over my feed.

 

When I say 'more', I don't mean 'lots'. At the moment, I'm using hardly anything worth eating. I'm not sure it's enough.

 

The other thing is to be brave and pick either one or two 'spots' (not necessarily a spot, could be a line between two features) to fish, and put all my eggs in those baskets, and fish different baits on different rods on the same spot. I think fishing one or two spots well is better than fishing 4 spots poorly.

 

This topic is so long now, I'm not sure what to do with it. Finding older posts is very difficult, and there's a fair bit of repetition. What do others think we should do? Keep it? Summarise it and start a new one? Let it fizzle out?

[Kappa]

When I say 'more', I don't mean 'lots'. At the moment, I'm using hardly anything worth eating. I'm not sure it's enough.

 

I think you have to be clear about how little/much you use, it seems there is a very big difference in what some anglers think a lot and a little is! I think I know how much you use (which is usally more than me), but just to be sure what would your average mix on one spot contain?

 

The other thing is to be brave and pick either one or two 'spots' (not necessarily a spot, could be a line between two features) to fish, and put all my eggs in those baskets, and fish different baits on different rods on the same spot. I think fishing one or two spots well is better than fishing 4 spots poorly.

fizzle out?

 

I totally agree here, given there are so so few captures each season, you absolutely have to make sure you have the right bait/presentation in the right place at the right time. If you fish two rods into the same baited spot you can hedge your bets a little and fish two different approaches.

 

This topic is so long now, I'm not sure what to do with it. Finding older posts is very difficult, and there's a fair bit of repetition. What do others think we should do? Keep it? Summarise it and start a new one? Let it fizzle out?

 

You could start a new thread, however if you wanted to find an old post you'd then have to search through two threads to find it! Let it die naturally as and when we stop being interested in catching bream?

 

Rich

[Anderoo]

Yes, you're right Rich, Alex tells me off for that too

 

Currently, over 4 spots, I use 2 bags of brown crumb, one bag of off the shelf groundbait (bag in both cases = the usual size bag of groundbait in the shops), approx 1 pint of maggots, approx 1 pint of micro pellet, 1 large tin of sweetcorn. The water I mix it with has a good squirt of brasem liquid.

 

That ends up as a lot of mix, once it's all fluffed up - probably 50 spod fulls. So, on each spot there is a fairly large coverage of fine crumb and flavour but only about 1/4 pint of maggots, 1/4 pint of micro pellet, and 1/4 tin of corn.

 

Doesn't sound very much does it!

[Dick Dastardly]

Good points by Rich there. "a lot" and "a little" are very subjective!

 

I dont know whether this thread has helped or hindered my hunt for SB's! It has made me think a lot but also possibly seduced me away from the tactics Im confident in!

 

Back to Wingham next week and Im fairly sure that a return (other than hook bait) to my "normal" SB tactics is on the cards! I say this as Im now of the opinion that due to the very small head of bream in the water I possibly (in fact definately) didnt really give them a chance.My last big bream water was so prolific that I had got used to pretty much instant sucsess with these tactics.After a few failed trips to Wingham and not catching I straight away "decided" that these tactics wouldnt work there.

 

When I first started fishing for specimen bream I put my sucsess (compared to others targeting them) down to my feeding. I based my feeding (mainly amounts and the "not actually much to eat" principle) on my match fishing days in Germany where often huge shoals of 4lb bream would be the target. I never thought that the other bream anglers on the waters were putting any where near enough groundbait in compared to what I was used to.Or in fact in the same way.

 

As said Im going to return to my favoured tactics but slightly modify them (amount of feed wise really) due to the very low head of bream in the water.Its going to be hard to get the amount right as you can never be to sure how much is getting eaten by tench and other small fish.I will start measuring out the exact amount of bait Im putting in so I can keep a note/report back.

 

Also I will only be targetting "pinch points" and other "known" areas rather than putting out a large bed of bait just "anywhere" at a comfortable distance.

 

I think the repetition in this thread can be helpfull as it kind of underlines valid points especially when repeated by different people.

 

Keep it running and hopefully by the time we get into the 30's we might have some definates and a few pics to post!

[Steve Burke]

I'm going to be experiment more this season with popped up baits. It's interesting that several of the Queenford lads found that off-bottom baits frequently outfished bottom baits even on 2-hook paternoster rigs.

 

I originally thought this might be because the bream wouldn't have to tip up to suck the baits in. If so it would be logical to suggest that sides of bars would be particularly good spots.

 

However an additional reason may be that off-bottom baits are less covered with detritus. Bream have a habit of sucking in and blowing out food to separate the edible bits. I assume they do this by touch and/or the different sinking rates.

 

Have any of you tried any such comparisons at Wingham or elsewhere?

 

As Andrew mentioned we were chatting on the phone yesterday about this and other things. One of the points I brought up was the different way bream feed compared with other species.

 

This was brought home to me on a trip to an aquarium with my grand-daughter. As she was only a toddler I couldn't stay long, but did see that the bream righted themselves after taking a mouthful, having sucked and blown at it to separate the edible matter from the non-edible.

 

Thinking of that the other day was one of the reasons why I posted that I was going to try pop-ups more.

 

It may also have a bearing on bait size as well as buoyancy. Presumably with the bream sucking and blowing a lot, a big bait would be in the mouth longer.

 

Or would it?

[Dick Dastardly]

This buisness of "off bottom baits" being (well seemingly so) more attractive is why Ive been trying so hard to get a really light presentation with a semi bouyant bait and light hook and hook link.Not so sure this is going to be possible unless Im prepared to leave hooks in the occaisional tench and Im not.

 

Instead of the aproach Ive tried Im seriously thinking of using a popped up/criticaly balanced bait on a very short hook link to get the off bottom attraction and the self hooking as the bream rights it self.This way I can use heavier end tackle.That and a two hook paternoster (but without the bottom hook) as I used at Queenford. See if there is any difference allthough Im still inclined to think that the rig aint that important just where it is placed and amongst what!

 

Cant do any harm though.

 

Ive enjoyed this years early Tenching but cant wait till next weeks session to get down to the real buisness.

[Anderoo]

As Andrew mentioned we were chatting on the phone yesterday about this and other things. One of the points I brought up was the different way bream feed compared with other species.

 

This was brought home to me on a trip to an aquarium with my grand-daughter. As she was only a toddler I couldn't stay long, but did see that the bream righted themselves after taking a mouthful, having sucked and blown at it to separate the edible matter from the non-edible.

 

Thinking of that the other day was one of the reasons why I posted that I was going to try pop-ups more.

 

It may also have a bearing on bait size as well as buoyancy. Presumably with the bream sucking and blowing a lot, a big bait would be in the mouth longer.

 

Or would it?

 

I'm glad Steve posted this. It's the first proper evidence I've heard of how bream feed, which has a huge bearing on bait and rig choice. They'd be a damn sight easier to catch if they were hooverers like tench and carp, but it sounds like they do indeed 'pick' at individual items, and sound very fussy about which bits they pick up.

 

Perhaps this is why fishing on gravel as opposed to silt is more productive - the bait needs less (if any) washing, so they simply prefer to eat there. Or perhaps when fishing in silt, the washing process alerts them to the fact the bait is tethered.

 

Perhaps also the washing could account for some 'line bites' on running rigs.

 

In any case, it's certainly a good case for using the short hooklength, bolt rigs. And as Steve says, bouyant baits too...

 

However, it does mean choice of hookbait is really important. They're not going to hoover up any old thing, they have to really want to eat it.