Winter Pond Fishing Advice Please

[rarepleasures]

Taking advantage of the break in the weather I journeyed to New Barnet this afternoon to check out Jacks Lake.

 

The water was the colour of cafe au lait.

 

Most people there were fishing maggot on a float.

 

Is this the best / only way to fish when the water is so churned up.

 

Tony

Edited January 14, 2007 by rarepleasures

[RUDD]

Taking advantage of the break in the weather I journeyed to New Barnet this afternoon to check out Jacks Lake.

 

The water was the colour of cafe au lait.

 

Most people there were fishing maggot on a float.

 

Is this the best / only way to fish when the water is so churned up.

 

Tony

 

Its certainly an effective method.

With the waggler you can search out fish in most of your peg.

When you find then you can then put in a little (and I mean little as in two of three maggots/pinkies/casters) feed and see what response this brings.

Maggot is certainly a top winter bait as every species will take it and they wriggle - therefore creating attraction and some times annoyance. I am sure Perch that are not feeding are annoyed by a wriggling bait and just snap at it.

 

You can also search out various layers of water by fishing on the drop and alter your rigs depth accordinly.

[BREAMAGAIN]

Ask yourself why the water was the colour it was ? Rain run off ? or avid feeding Carp ? Feeding fish can be caught !

[rarepleasures]

Ask yourself why the water was the colour it was ? Rain run off ?

 

Rain run off ? , the overflow stream was pouring water off and the whole lake was that light brown colour.

 

I assumed the whole depth of water must be that colour so I wondered how a fish can see anything at all.

 

Tony

[Steve Burke]

Coloured water on lakes and ponds isn't always a bad thing. Indeed, some species such as roach and perch may well feed harder than in clear water.

 

If you look into a bucket of such coloured water you'd be surprised how much visibility there is!

 

Edit note: Many fish (perch are an exception) feed at night when of course they use senses other than sight to find their food.

Edited January 16, 2007 by Steve Burke

[John Weddup]

there are 2 small ponds that I fish sometimes in winter that when they are really coloured due to a stream beside them flooding in fish really well.

 

The colour is so bad you would not beleive any fish would feed. On those ocasions the skimmers feed when its less coloured you cannot catch them until later in the spring.

 

There are lots of small pike in them and I guess the silvers get attacked so much when clearer they avoid feed and sticking together.

 

john

[Alan Roe]

If you want some sort of a result try a little liquidised white bread flavoured with anything sweet and fish punched bread over it at the same time if there are any decent roach in the pit feed on another line 3 or 4 casters on a regular basis and for the last hour of you session fish caster over them.

The combination of the two should give you a result even in very hard coditions

[rarepleasures]

Coloured water on lakes and ponds isn't always a bad thing. Indeed, some species such as roach and perch may well feed harder than in clear water.

 

There was a couple of guys regularly catching roach on the maggot. I was perplexed by the choice of 'visual' bait over a 'olfactory' one and how the fish were locating the bait , given you couldn't see even beyond the surface of the at water.

 

Tony

[Steve Burke]

There was a couple of guys regularly catching roach on the maggot. I was perplexed by the choice of 'visual' bait over a 'olfactory' one and how the fish were locating the bait , given you couldn't see even beyond the surface of the at water.

 

Tony

 

Ah, I see. Maggots of course smell to the fish and wriggle to boot sending out vibrations, although I appreciate other baits will leave more of a scent trail.

 

BTW, I always flavour my maggots. In fact I can't remember the last time I used an unflavoured maggot! In winter I tend to use various spicy flavours from Archie Braddock. His web site is at http://www.braddocksbaits.co.uk/

[rarepleasures]

BTW, I always flavour my maggots. In fact I can't remember the last time I used an unflavoured maggot! In winter I tend to use various spicy flavours from Archie Braddock.

 

Are there any home made / supermarket methods of flavouring them in the mean time

 

 

Tony