For 90% of my Chubbing, I use Drennan Super specialists - went stalking on friday for 2 hours and landed all 6 fish, some from very substantial swims......
If you want to select the bigger fish from a shoal -you have to be brave and use a big bait.......... Its how you present it that dictates wether they will accept it...... You can use small hooks by all means - but if you observe a small shoal of fish, the smaller individuals get their heads down very quickly and 'tail up'. The bigger fish will take a sample and move away. they never more than lightly browse. If you go small, you will in all probability catch a small one - and then that's game over.
A point worth remembering is that often the very biggest Chub live solitary lives and may be caught from swims not typically assossiated with this species -rarely seen - its just instinct and experience that will lead to their capture.
Drennan Speciment plus hooks in larger sizes are good for large meat and paste baits - anything bigger than that (well thats classified lol)!!!!
I will just add that my experiences are on small rivers - I could not vouch for these observations on the Wye or trent.
Ill post a picture of my full inventory of my entire chub fishing gear....... you don't need much!
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Form the types of river I fish, this is what i use for 90% of my chub fishing. Simples....