How many "hair-rig" variations? Your preferences for river fish.

[Steve Arnold]

Had a few hours feeling bored this winters afternoon! As usual I started thinking about fishing, this time it was about hooks and rigs.

My mind is becoming increasingly confused, partly age related probably, but not helped after I tried to work out why the carp anglers use so many strangely named developments of what was a simple hair rig.

For barbel I have found the basic hair rig works well, but many bites did not develop and I often thought "chub". Probably my first attempt at a different rig involved the "D" rig arrangement and I did seem to hook a few more chub after that, but maybe I was just trying harder for that species.

Since trying various fancy rigs I have now a few that I am confident in, I certainly seem to hook carp with little problem, but who knows if these changes really made the difference?

This photo is of a drawing I made earlier whilst trying to remember what has worked for me.........

Sorry for the "iffy" drawing but it's years since I had any use for that skill!

So, what rigs do you favour for river species, if you can explain your reasoning as to why it works that might help me in my deliberations.

 

[@Clive]

Youv'e got too much time on your hands

a) the bait has to remain attached to the hook
b) it should be bream & chub resistant

That's my hair rig requirements.

 

[Keith M]

Youv'e got too much time on your hands

a) the bait has to remain attached to the hook
b) it should be bream & chub resistant

That's my hair rig requirements.

I’m in agreement with the above.

If I’m after Barbel and I want to deter chub from being hooked I use a very ’simple‘ hair rig setup like the one on the very bottom right of your diagram; only I use a fairly short shanked and wide gaped offset hook; which the chub on the streams that I fish (especially the small to medium sized shoal chub) often move off with the bait still held between their lips; with the hook still on the outside; which often results in the bait being pulled back out of their lips.

If the Chub are not being a problem; or I‘m targeting them specifically then I prefer to use a hook mounted bait instead of a hair rig; or an extremely short hair with the bait often hanging alongside the hook shank.

Keith

 

[Steve Arnold]

Youv'e got too much time on your hands

a) the bait has to remain attached to the hook
b) it should be bream & chub resistant

That's my hair rig requirements.

Yes, to your first observation!

a) I like screws and bait spikes as I experiment with different boilies through the session. Rarely do I want to be sure the bait will stay on for hours, that's why I will never be a dedicated carp angler! But their ways with rigs is interesting, especially when it's too miserable to go fishing!

b) I am happy to catch anything that can get a decent bait in their mouths! I have been surprised there are not bigger shoals of bream in my section of the Lot, I can understand carp and barbel anglers being frustrated if their baits are wrecked by too many "nuisance" species.

 

[Steve Arnold]

I’m in agreement with the above.

If I’m after Barbel and I want to deter chub from being hooked I use a very ’simple‘ hair rig setup like the one on the very bottom of your diagram; only I use a fairly short shanked and wide gaped offset hook; which the chub on the streams that I fish (especially the small to medium sized shoal chub) often move off with the bait still held between their lips; with the hook still on the outside; which often results in the bait being pulled back out of their lips.

If the Chub are not being a problem; or I‘m targeting them specifically then I prefer to use a hook mounted bait instead of a hair rig; or an extremely short hair with the bait often hanging alongside the hook shank.

Keith

If I was restricted to just one choice of hook on the Lot it would be the Nash Pinpoint Flota Claw hook. But I would like two sizes, the 7 for chub and barbel and the 5 for carp, though the chub and barbel seem to cope with the size 5 easily enough as well!

Unfortunately these sizes have been discontinued so I use a size 6 Claw now. Still catching these species!

But the curved shanks hooks will work, the longshank useful as well.

Have I caught more by experimenting? Who can tell?

But for me it's all fascinating! that's some of my feelings when faced with these choices! Keeps me going

 

[@Clive]

Yes, to your first observation!

a) I like screws and bait spikes as I experiment with different boilies through the session. Rarely do I want to be sure the bait will stay on for hours, that's why I will never be a dedicated carp angler! But their ways with rigs is interesting, especially when it's too miserable to go fishing!

b) I am happy to catch anything that can get a decent bait in their mouths! I have been surprised there are not bigger shoals of bream in my section of the Lot, I can understand carp and barbel anglers being frustrated if their baits are wrecked by too many "nuisance" species.

I use bait screws simply because no matter what size boilie or pellet that you use, the nearest part is always the same distance from the hook so you don't need different length hairs. As Keith mentions; having a gap (around 8 to 10 mm for me) helps prevent catching too many chub or bream, although bream are persistant bu99ers. On the Dearne it was important not to have to play, land and then re-cast every time a chub took the barbel baits as the barbel were very wary. The hair gap was important to avoid hooking the chub. But when Boris takes the bait it doesn't matter to me what shape or brand the hook is. As long as it is sharp and strong I don't care.

With non-hair rigged baits like luncheon meat I like to have a split shot, a BB usually, a couple of inches from the hook or tungsten putty if I was using coated braid.

 

[Steve Arnold]

I use bait screws simply because no matter what size boilie or pellet that you use, the nearest part is always the same distance from the hook so you don't need different length hairs. As Keith mentions; having a gap (around 8 to 10 mm for me) helps prevent catching too many chub or bream, although bream are persistant bu99ers. On the Dearne it was important not to have to play, land and then re-cast every time a chub took the barbel baits as the barbel were very wary. The hair gap was important to avoid hooking the chub. But when Boris takes the bait it doesn't matter to me what shape or brand the hook is. As long as it is sharp and strong I don't care.

With non-hair rigged baits like luncheon meat I like to have a split shot, a BB usually, a couple of inches from the hook or tungsten putty if I was using coated braid.

Thanks Clive, useful observations. Funny how my often poor memory will certainly remember these details!

The barbel here are often the least cautious species, maybe it's just that there are more of them than chub and carp.

I enjoy the chub as they are such handsome fish. There are many really small chub but a big gap before the 4lb-6lb specimens, I do not get bored catching those better sized chub, just not enough of them!

 

[@Clive]

The Dearne is similar to the Cèlè in size, but had a short stretch containing some very large barbel that topped out at over 16lb before they declined. There were also chub to around 6lb. In order to catch one of the specimen barbel you had to leave your bait in a likely spot often all ssssion and avoid catching any chub. Typically I would use around 1oz of lead spread over several LG shot on a link contained in a pva bag with some small pellets to deaden the impact as the depth averaged only around 3 feet and those few barbel were very wary.

Hence the importance of the gap in the hair rig. It was to avoid hooking chub. If you did go for the chub instead there was some good sport on lighter tackle.

 

[Steve Arnold]

The Dearne is similar to the Cèlè in size, but had a short stretch containing some very large barbel that topped out at over 16lb before they declined. There were also chub to around 6lb. In order to catch one of the specimen barbel you had to leave your bait in a likely spot often all ssssion and avoid catching any chub. Typically I would use around 1oz of lead spread over several LG shot on a link contained in a pva bag with some small pellets to deaden the impact as the depth averaged only around 3 feet and those few barbel were very wary.

Hence the importance of the gap in the hair rig. It was to avoid hooking chub. If you did go for the chub instead there was some good sport on lighter tackle.

In the Cajarc "pond" I take a more carp angling approach to barbel. I am usually camping there and can leave my baits out many hours, there are usually only a few barbel bites over a couple of days, but the barbel are often as big as any I have caught from this river.

On the town side of the pond I have caught plenty of smaller barbel using feeder techniques. The bigger barbel I am sure are wary of this disturbance, a pva bag of bits and a boilie left for several hours seems to find the better barbel.

Maybe if I spent longer hours at other parts of the river this approach would find big barbel, but I get tired now and need my home comforts. Even my carp are caught on short sessions when I can be pretty sure where the river conditions will have pushed them for their comfort. I actually catch carp when the river is very low (weirs) and very high (canal sections). There are also a couple of places I know they take shelter amongst sunken trees along the far bank, I have to wait for the river flow to almost stall before I can get a bait in front of them!

This is probably what keeps me thinking about rigs, so many different species and conditions can be caught with the same basic approach. But, it needs tweaked to get the best out of it!

PS..... I feel the need to get a big fish to finish off this year. Too many social events to give me a few hours, but my mind is festering over this so I guess I will just have to get up early soon!

 

[@Clive]

My thoughts are that location is far more important than rigs where the larger barbel are concerned. Especially in this region of France where their numbers are so low. In your river this creates extra difficulties in that you don't have much near bank fishing and the more line you have out means more chance of drifting weed or leaves fouling the line. Also you have more competition from large carp and bream. I don't think that the rig is important. But every now and then I would experiment by finding a chute or narrowing of the flow where the current is stronger than anywhere else and fish a heavy lead and whole maize grains to avoid the catfish. Two of the three 9lb fish that I have had over here came from such locations.