Big bream

[Anderoo]

A really sharp hook is the one thing I'm obsessive about, yes. The straight points blunt easily on gravel. If it's not really sharp I either sharpen it or replace it.

 

The point about the braids was just that braids designed for mainline are likely to be tougher than hooklength material (coated braids aside), and also a higher BS and diameter so more abrasion resistant for that reason.

 

I also stick to mono when using maggots or worms as bait, not only for protection against eels but also to try to avoid tangles (with worms especially!).

 

I might be brave next time and try maggots on one or two rods...

[tincatinca]

I might be brave next time and try maggots on one or two rods...

 

Would that be the wriggling variety or the Anne Summers version . Just to let you know that I now a couple of packets of the soft bouyant red rubber ones sitting in front of me in an attempt to get rid of my mind block but you can't argue with the results that you had

[Anderoo]

Would that be the wriggling variety or the Anne Summers version . Just to let you know that I now a couple of packets of the soft bouyant red rubber ones sitting in front of me in an attempt to get rid of my mind block but you can't argue with the results that you had

 

Aha, the first tentative step towards an eel-free life!

 

And bream-free probably

 

I keep thinking, what if I'd kept the fake maggots on for that second night and caught the bream anyway - that would have been fantastic!

 

But for the tench, they certainly work. I think I'll continue to fish them in the day and switch to 'real' baits at night for the bream.

 

I feel pretty liberated now about hookbaits - I'm going to play around with a few options before my next trip and see if I can find a way to include a maggot ot two without it being too 'eely'.

[tincatinca]

I found the comments made about fishing through the eels for the Bream interesting but unfortunately when I have tried to do that on my local mere it was either eels all night or none at all with it being predominantly the former. I must confess that the eel population at the time when I fished the mere regularly was dense and when the water suffered a major fish kill due to lack of oxygen caused by the dense tree growth around the mere and no wind getting on the water, I have never seen so many eels in my life with fish ranging from small to about 6lb in size floundering on the surface all round the mere. Fortunately prompt action with pumps saved the vast majority of the fish. Getting back to the main theme though, a group of us fished it regularly for many years and found after going through all the popular combinations that the bait most likely to succeed for the Bream was maggot with the odd fish coming to corn, worm and caster or combination of same. Whilst there were no ultra large fish, there were a small number of low doubles one of which I eventually managed to connect with and lost halfway over the net. The other big difference to many waters was the depth of the soft bottom which prevented the use of any form of bolt rig and also promoted the use of long tails. In terms of baiting up, the most productive was a combination of boiled rice, scalded maggot and chopped corn which we would generally introduce over a period of several days prior to fishing.

[Guest tigger]

A really sharp hook is the one thing I'm obsessive about, yes. The straight points blunt easily on gravel. If it's not really sharp I either sharpen it or replace it.

 

 

I've found that to stop your hook from getting blunt it's better to reel in fast keeping your hook from dragging bottom and blunting it.

[Anderoo]

Here a picture of the 11lber:

 

 

The flash picked out a couple of reddish areas on it, but in real life it looked mint. You can see how pale and 'fresh' it looks compared to the bigger 15lb+ bream.

 

Compare to the deep bronze of the older, bigger fish:

 

Hopefully we'll meet again in a few years' time!

Edited June 3, 2009 by Anderoo

[lutra]

Nice one Anderoo.

 

I don't want to throw a spanner in the works But my experience on other waters is that different age groups don't hang round together.

[Anderoo]

Nice one Anderoo.

 

I don't want to throw a spanner in the works But my experience on other waters is that different age groups don't hang round together.

 

Not a spanner in the works at all - very interesting!

 

So they group by age, not size?

[lutra]

Not a spanner in the works at all - very interesting!

 

So they group by age, not size?

Maybe size, certainly just a couple of pounds seems to make a difference as to which shoal they belong to even in low double figures.

[Kappa]

I don't want to throw a spanner in the works But my experience on other waters is that different age groups don't hang round together.

 

It would be very interesting if the 'little' ones tended to use different parts of the lake! Maybe the REAL monsters are in a completely different area that no-one fishes!

 

Rich