Wintle’s World of Angling – Up in the Water

Mark Wintle, an angler for thirty-five years, is on a quest to discover and bring to you the magic of fishing. Previously heavily involved with match fishing he now fishes for the sheer fun of it. With an open and enquiring mind, each week Mark will bring to you articles on fishing different rivers, different methods and what makes rivers, and occasionally stillwaters, tick. Add to this a mixed bag of articles on catching big fish, tackle design, angling politics and a few surprises.

Are you stuck in a rut fishing the same swim every week? Do you dare to try something different and see a whole new world of angling open up? Yes? Then read Mark Wintle’s regular weekly column.

Deep lake (click for bigger picture)

UP IN THE WATER

During the summer and early autumn months, with water temperatures high, many species of fish are willing to feed high in the water, especially on still waters. Though you can catch river fish near the surface, especially dace and chub, I’m going to concentrate on stillwaters in this article, with an emphasis on roach, small carp and bream.

I had an early introduction to catching fish near the surface because my first attempt at catching stillwater fish was way back in 1970 on a very deep lake using a seven-foot rod. The lake teemed with small roach, and fishing 4ft deep, I caught just as many, if not more, as trying to fish on the bottom. More importantly, it was much easier to accomplish (ever tried casting a float set to fourteen feet deep with a seven foot rod when you’re only five foot tall?). So, right from the start I had overcome any notion that this method might be irrational or illogical. I set the float, cast in, fed a few maggots and caught fish. Simple.

As the years passed by, I fished for different species in different waters. I learnt to catch fish on the drop, in both lakes and rivers, and eventually figured out catching fish when they are set at a level that is neither surface nor the bottom. For a keen match angler, this is one hell of a method. Yet, many anglers are reluctant to try this, reckoning that their bait must be presented on or near the bottom. Even when confronted with the evidence of my own and other’s catches caught this way they would seek to explain it by saying that our feeding had somehow brought the fish up in the water.

They could not be further from the truth.
During the warmer months, and even occasionally in the colder ones, those fish are at a level, often just two or three feet below the surface but sometimes six or seven feet down. Find them and coax them into feeding, and you could be on a winner, and I don’t just mean winning matches either. To keep things simple I’m going to concentrate on roach, small carp and bream. Rudd behave differently, and are worthy of an article in their own right another time. What I have found is that the fish are present in a swim at a certain level. At first, you must rely partly on experience, partly on guesswork to find them. Initially, the fish are not especially interested in feeding but as you build up the swim, it will come alive. Once a few bites are forthcoming, the experimentation begins to find the best depth, and even this may change over the course of the session. What’s more, the fish may also move away slightly from the disturbance. The other factor to consider is how to pick out the better fish from the smaller ones. Expect to catch the smaller fish first. Get the feeding right and the activity of the smaller fish will encourage the better ones to compete for the bait and eventually push out the tiddlers.

Make sure you’re comfortable

Now I’ve told you that this can be successful it’s time to sort out bait, tackle, rigs and tactics.

Bait
The two simplest baits for this method are maggots and casters. Both bream and roach like them. For the better fish, caster has the edge though it may take longer than maggot to get the fish interested. The important thing to remember about these two baits is that they sink relatively slowly through the water, taking, on average, about eight seconds per foot to sink. As the killing zone that you hope to set up is not going to be measured in inches but more like two or three feet in depth, this means that you can have bait in mid water for close on half a minute. Therefore, if you can get in a rhythm of feeding twice a minute, you will always have some feed for the fish to compete for. The great thing about this method is that it is all about little and very often. But because it doesn’t take huge amounts of bait to keep them interested, just two or three pints of casters can easily be enough even for a five hour session.

If you are trying this method for the first time then two pints of casters should be ample. There are about 3000 casters in a pint so 2 pints = 6000 casters. Feed 20 twice a minute over five hours, and expect to run out at packing-up time.

With the continuing popularity of pellets, I can hardly ignore their effectiveness. If the water you fish gets loads of pellets fed into it every day then by all means try them. You need some slow sinking pellets as feed, around 3-4mm plus some hookable or banded ones for the hook.

Tackle
The beauty of this method is its simplicity. This means that you can use anything from a straightforward match rod and reel set-up to 16 metre long pole tactics. For enjoyment, I prefer trying to catch fish in this way close in to the bank. This means that you need to identify a suitable swim for the method where you can get them within as little as twenty feet of the bank. On a couple of lakes that I fish there is not only a good depth (up to 14ft) within this range but also there are overhanging branches on both sides of the swim to provide cover.

Mark’s pole floats

My own preference these days is to fish with a match rod, a small fixed spool reel (one situation where using a centrepin could be used successfully) and a small pole float. You never know what you are going to hit, and I like to be able to give line rather than rely on pole elastic. I’ve had bream over five pounds fishing this way on a whip (it’s exciting stuff trying to hang on as they charge off!), and the tendency is for the bigger fish to belt off when hooked. I’ve also fished with a short pole to hand (4 metres) with around number 5 elastic set slack. With both of these methods, I try to avoid the rod or pole tip being over the fishes’ heads. I am at variance with many of today’s pole experts on this one as they often advocate a very short line between the pole tip and float. But we’re talking about a bit of fun fishing for the average angler who doesn’t want to fish a pole at maximum length for five hours, and will appreciate a simpler, more relaxed approach.

The other tackle requirements are some small pole floats taking around 2 – 4 no. 10 shot, some micro shot in sizes 10 – 12, and barbless hooks of 20 – 16. When shotting up the float, there are two easy patterns; shirt button style or bunched. Both work; so be prepared to experiment whilst fishing. If using the bunched set-up then ensure that the bunch of shot is more than halfway down from the float, as this reduces tangles. Such lightweight floats demand settled weather, though the advantage gained over heavier models or even small wagglers is near resistance-free bite registration. Get this part of it right and the bites are incredible with the float zooming off into the depths.

Tactics
If you’ve never tried this method then it’s important to remember that, as ever in fishing, location is vital. Ask around the local match anglers as they may know good pegs for the method, as well as recommend the best baits. Because you are aiming to catch fish close in, try to fish sitting down on a box, and get organised so that you don’t have to keep standing up every time you need to cast or land a fish.

The feeding rate is important; this method truly calls for little and often. Start by feeding ten casters every cast and make each cast lasts just thirty seconds, laying the rig on the water gently as you feed. If you find that lots of small fish are pestering you then step up the feed rate. In time, not only will the big fish push the smaller ones out but also the small fish will get full up and stop feeding. Be prepared to hit some decent sized fish; I’ve had decent bream, big roach, rudd, perch, carp and brown goldfish (even a tench or two!) on this method. Keep altering the depth as the session progresses; sometimes a little, just four or five inches, sometimes much more – two or three feet. Just because you’re only catching little roach two feet deep doesn’t mean that there aren’t a load of big bream at a depth of five feet.

Summary
I’ve only given a taste of what is a successful way of fishing; I’ve been using it for over thirty years and never found all the answers. It’s a method that rewards the thinking angler prepared to experiment and persevere, and even if you are much less experienced you can have lots of fun learning.

Next week: ‘Watercraft or Technique?’