Shropshire Canal fishing!

[William Burns]

Never fished a canal before & planning to fish the Shropshire Union Canal near whitchurch.
"Has anyone fished there,What techniques & bait works best,& would I need to tackle up to 5lb breaking strain in the event of me hooking into a tench,bream or even carp as well as the smaller species."

[Dave Smith]

William I've never fished the streatch of canal you're planning on fishing but I very rarely go above 3lb breaking strain main line on canals.

Dave
http://www.predatorangling.co.uk/

[William Burns]

Thanks Dave,I was going mostly for roach as my partners younger sister has always wanted to go fishing so I thought a canal would be an ideal start.
What 3lb mono line would you recommend as I'm float/waggler fishing for the roach and would it be best if I pre-bait the spot I'm fishing the night before?
I'm also going to flavour the maggots a little with corriander,tumeric(to get the bronze colour),vanilla,horlicks and almond powders but unsure what sweatner to use.

Many thanks and tight lines

William

[Dave Smith]

line wise I use Maxima

It wouldn't hurt to pre-bait though it might not be necessary.

don't go overboard with the flavours, just keep things simple, a little turmuric in would be fine the roach in my local go mad for it.

Dave
www.PredatorAngling.co.uk

[Dave Smith]

becareful if you do use horlicks.... it will make them stick together, Horlicks was used in the days before stickymag!

[Peter Bishop]

Try above the locks at Grindley Brook. Fish as light as you can, small baits, and against any old boats and you find fish. Oh and the tea and the bird in the cafe makes it worth while too.

[William Burns]

Your a star Dave,cheers.

All the flavours I was going to use are powders but I never would of guessed horlicks would stick the maggots with it all being dry as I know the first two flavours can be a de-greasing agent with the process of cleaning them.

Is Maxima a floating line as it is better for waggler fishing apparently?

William

[William Burns]

Grindley Brook is around the area I was thinking of and with having a young one with me then the bird and the cuppa will have to wait I'm afraid.......GUTTED lol

William

I can confirm Peter Bishop's recommendation of Grindley Brook Locks, in particular the pool between the two single locks, we were passing through that flight last year and had a chat with the locals who were fishing there.
They were catching plenty of roach and bream there with the chance of a decent size lump always there, unfortunately they did take a lot of abuse from my "fellow" boaters and as the water is fairly deep and there is a strong flow of water between the locks is probably not suitable for children.
We moored up for the night just above Whitchurch and I fished downstream of a hireboat base, (Viking I think), there was a bit of a reedy bay there unfortunately not catching much of note however that whole stretch around Whitchurch looked "fishy".
The baits I used were bread and sweetcorn as we were on a boat I was banned from using maggots though using slugs and worms gleaned from the towpath helped.
It is worth bearing in mind that the Llangollen branch of the Shroppie carries a flow being used to carry water to the reservoir to supply Chester!
Hope that helps.

[Dave Smith]

"Is Maxima a floating line as it is better for waggler fishing apparently?"

no it sinks, can't for the life of me work out why a floating line would be better on a still water for wagler fishing you want to sink the line to lessen the impact of the flow.