Accurately feeding a river swim..

[guest61]

I was watching an angler fishing Bolo style on my local River Dee, he was into fish yet was fishing 14ft deep through the centre of the river (20yds off the bank), his rig was standard Bolo 6grm float with an olivette approx 2ft from the hook and a couple of shot on his hook length.

When he cast out he sprayed some maggots and some hemp a couple of yards downstream of where his rig settled. There was a reasonable flow and he trotted approx 10yds downstream before either striking at a bite or reeling in and recasting.

Given the flow, swim depth and float loading I couldn’t understand how his loose fed maggots benefitted his hook bait, then I realised that it didn’t.

Whilst I’ve been analysing and perhaps critical of this anglers’ technique I realised that if that had been me fishing; I’d have probably been doing something very similar – firing loose feed upstream and probably hoping that by some miracle that I was feeding my swim.

I'd always believed that loose feeding ‘little and often’ was the way to do this, but for the first time I’ve sat back and thought – wait a minute... I can’t use a bait dropper every cast; ground bait? What mix? How much?

Here’s my question – What is the ‘best way’ / ‘most effective way’ of feeding such a swim?

Many Thanks

Mark

 

[geoffmaynard]

Welcome to FM Mark

Heavy weighted stiff groundbait balls? (Just guessing)

 

[guest61]

Thanks for the welcome Geoff.

I'd thought about 'balling in' a heavy groundbait mix c/w loose feed and topping this up periodically. But then thought that there might be something else that I'm missing. Hence the post.

 

[Philip]

I have watched French anglers fishing some deep fast swims with heavy float gear and their tactics have been to do one really heavy feed with dense ground bait balls filled with particles (mags, casters etc) at the start and then feed nothing else for the next few hours... and they were getting a fish a chuck.

It also made me sit back and wonder about feeding patterns. For me the French way seemed an awful lot easier than constantly trying to spray maggots in every cast...

 

[peter crabtree]

Hi Mark, if the angler was "into fish" why do you question his feeding?

 

[mol]

I have watched French anglers fishing some deep fast swims with heavy float gear and their tactics have been to do one really heavy feed with dense ground bait balls filled with particles (mags, casters etc) at the start and then feed nothing else for the next few hours... and they were getting a fish a chuck.

It also made me sit back and wonder about feeding patterns. For me the French way seemed an awful lot easier than constantly trying to spray maggots in every cast...

Most of my French friends fish the same way, but just not in the rivers in lakes too. The French don't really seem to loose feed all their bait seems to be sent out in groundbait.

 

[Harvey]

..........

 

[andreagrispi]

Be honest - the only way to guarentee the feed being within 4-8 foot of a chosen area at 10 foot depth with fast flowing water would be to either bait drop or fish feeder.

 

[guest61]

Hi Mark, if the angler was "into fish" why do you question his feeding?

Hi Peter

In watching this guy (not fishing myself) I had the opportunity to 'think about the situation' I'm wasn't questioning his feeding per se - its what I would have done. However, when you are into your fishing you tend to get into a rhythym, cast, feed (strike) retrieve etc. sometimes without thinking it through.

The fish that he 'was into' were small Roach and Dace, when I spoke with him, his hope was that that bigger fish would come on to his loose feed. From my vantage point (up the bank) it was clear that his loose feed would reach the river bed about 40yds down stream and not where his hookbait was fishing.

You're right though, if you are catching why worry? But I feel that its a fair question, to ask 'What would be a more effective approach?'

Mark

---------- Post added at 16:22 ---------- Previous post was at 16:19 ----------

Most of my French friends fish the same way, but just not in the rivers in lakes too. The French don't really seem to loose feed all their bait seems to be sent out in groundbait.

I can see me attempting something similar this Autumn / Winter.

Thanks for your replies.

Mark

---------- Post added at 16:36 ---------- Previous post was at 16:22 ----------

I have watched French anglers fishing some deep fast swims with heavy float gear and their tactics have been to do one really heavy feed with dense ground bait balls filled with particles (mags, casters etc) at the start and then feed nothing else for the next few hours... and they were getting a fish a chuck.

It also made me sit back and wonder about feeding patterns. For me the French way seemed an awful lot easier than constantly trying to spray maggots in every cast...

Hi Philip

Thanks for this reply, I think that I'll be trying something like this.

I fished with my pole in the local canal though a good portion of the summer and had some good catches which I think were due in part to accurate feeding - this got be thinking about achieving accuracy on the river, and hence the question.

 

[jcp01]

The water at half depth is probably moving at half the speed of the water up top in a deep swim, and the water at full depth a fraction of it. If the fish are sitting two feet off bottom in a swim eight feet deep then the bite zone will be quite some way downstream but not nearly as far as you might imagine.

The water does not all move at the same pace throughout the water column because friction just would not allow it to.

 

[guest61]

Hi Rufus - and thanks for your reply

That's a good point. Something that I hadn't fully considered in this post, but if anything it complicates matters. I'd (wrongly) assumed 'laminar flow', clearly the water column is more complex and I fully accept that something falling through the water column will not exhibit linear behaviour.

However, loose feeding a bait like maggots with a catapult, in a deep river swim is still 'a guess', and you can't compensate for something that you just don't know.

There are countless articles which detail accurate feediing as being the key to success at a venue, alas these are generally variations on the theme of - 'still waters that contain lots of Carp, within the range of your pole'.

I thought that I'd ask here for advice.

Mark

 

[Ray Daywalker Clarke]

In the 80's we used to fish the Trent at Burton Joyce.

We had a beach caster rod, reel with 20lb line and an old fairy liquid bottle with both the ends cut off it, today you would call it a spod.

We used to plug one end with brown crumb, fill with maggots, then plug the other end with more brown crumb, and cast out. We would do this 6 times then fish.

Every other cast we would throw a ball of grounbait with maggots in, topping up the swim, if the bites started to slow down, we would cast out the bottle again another 5 or 6 times, it worked.

We always feed a little up stream, but there isn't a hard and fast rule to feeding, you have to work it out. Balling it all in will work sometimes, other times the fish want it little and often, and sometimes no feed at all, just the hook bait is enough.

 

[guest61]

Hi Ray and thanks for replying.

I can remember back in the 70's reading in the AT about swim feeders and I remember seeing a photograph of what you describe.

Out of interest did your (Beta) spod sink?

Still, the idea of getting lots of bait in early in the session is a common thread in the answers here.

I'm certainly getting lots to go at / think about.

Mark

 

[Ray Daywalker Clarke]

Hi Mark,

Yes the fairy bottle did sink from the weight of the feed.

It wasn't an idea of mine but of a friends. We used to fish a large pit not far from us, for the Tench and Bream. The Tench we could catch within a rod length of the bank, but the Bream stayed further out.

We used to ball in by hand, then my mate came up with the fairy bottle idea, we could get more in the swims quicker, and further out. I don't know if he had seen it somewhere before or if it was his own idea.

 

[chav professor]

couple of thoughts really - Bait dropper? I often kick start a swim with the dropper if using maggots, caster/hemp. As you lift it a decent amount of bait lifts into the flow on the retrieve, thus drawing fish towards the bait concentrated on the deck.

Trotting with bread, I have this ritual that I start at the most upstream part of the river. After a little constant feeding, sea gulls are feeding on the floating bits of mash some 100yards downstream. As I'm roving in a down stream direction, I guess i have been prebaiting these swims to some extent as the hovis makes its merry way.