BIG ROACH a book by Mark Wintle

[Mark Wintle]

Must admit to enjoying some roach fishing success this week with elderberries on the Stour. No big ones but plenty of netters. I've fished a pole float (on rod and reel) with no. 8s to avoid shot bites and fed hemp. Last week I tried tares, corn and bread but caught too many small dace although some roach.

 

[watatoad]

Mark Wintle,

Sorry but this may sound like teaching your grandmother to suck egg. However you are groundbaiting in the wrong place. Throw the groundbait in so your groundbait is 3 to 5 yards upstream of on your rod tip, then loosefeed between the groundbait and your rod in a widely spread pattern between 2 rodlengths out and the bank, or if you can loosefeed pretty accurately so the loosefeed gets within a foot wide heading downstream. Do this fairly constantly for a few minutes then cast out and draw your line/hookbait into the loosefeed area and trot downstream if you are using elderberries add just a little silkweed or a slug on your hookbait. expect a Roach take around the rod tip or slightly downstream of your rod, try 15" between hook and first weight shortening the distance if you miss sny takes/bites.

 

[Mr Cholmondeley-Corker (PaSC)]

Mark

Do you have any experience/records of catching big roach on banana?

 

[Mark Wintle]

Mark Wintle,

Sorry but this may sound like teaching your grandmother to suck egg. However you are groundbaiting in the wrong place. Throw the groundbait in so your groundbait is 3 to 5 yards upstream of on your rod tip, then loosefeed between the groundbait and your rod in a widely spread pattern between 2 rodlengths out and the bank, or if you can loosefeed pretty accurately so the loosefeed gets within a foot wide heading downstream. Do this fairly constantly for a few minutes then cast out and draw your line/hookbait into the loosefeed area and trot downstream if you are using elderberries add just a little silkweed or a slug on your hookbait. expect a Roach take around the rod tip or slightly downstream of your rod, try 15" between hook and first weight shortening the distance if you miss sny takes/bites.

Sounds very complicated! The swim contours are such that the hotspot is easily found just beyond the rod tip; inside that are snags and beyond the current is no good. It's an easy swim to fish compared to many that I fish. Since trying a different tippier rod yesterday instead of the one I used on Monday I've missed very few bites. I changed the 3 no. 4 bunch for no. 8s as well but suspect that a bit of practice is helping. I'd say my feeding is OK as 3-5 yards upstream would put the groundbait on the topside of the WEIRSILL! No slugs about but as the elderbush is only 10 yards away the bait is easily sorted unless the birds finish off the rest of the berries.

Haven't tried bananas as bait as I think roach have a problem getting them into their mouths...

 

[Mr Cholmondeley-Corker (PaSC)]

It was a serious question Mark. Sliced up then each slice quartered would fit. I assume you haven't heard of it's use?

 

[Mark Wintle]

It was a serious question Mark. Sliced up then each slice quartered would fit. I assume you haven't heard of it's use?

I have heard of it for mullet but never tried it for roach. Perhaps I'll have to give it a go? I'm amazed at how well the roach recognise elderberries as food. There are places where bushes overhang the water but none where I'm fishing so the roach obviously know it's food. A lot of the fish are excreting green gunk which indicates they are feeding heavily on silkweed. There are lots of unusual baits that will catch roach but the vast majority of big ones are caught on bread or maggots.

 

[watatoad]

It was a serious question Mark. Sliced up then each slice quartered would fit. I assume you haven't heard of it's use?

I use it mashed with bread and elderberries in a paste trotted with about a foot between hook and first weight or just tripping along the riverbed. Roach and in particular the large Roach seem to have a very strong desire for sweet baits from around the end of August until the end of October, sometimes longer. I have found that although banana on its own will work reasonably well once mashed with bread and used as a paste so long as a hook is disguised so it cannot be seen at all the larger Roach seem to prefer this. Another important point is to use the minimum amount of weight and watch for the float pausing or moving sideways in its trot rather than expecting it to vanish into the depths with every bite.

 

[Tee-Cee]

I used the 'berry' today on a pit which almost everyone (if not everyone) fishes for the carp and I know the fish would probably never seen an elderberry!
I used light groundbaiting with berries squashed and mixed in (a proven mix!) and fished a 12' deep swim with berry on a 16 to 2,5 lb bottom.

Result was three roach-not big by any means- but promising for the future. The fish came almost at once, one after the other then nothing for three hours......(why??)

So I agree, Mark, that they do seem ro recognise the bait veey quickly but heavens knows why!!

ps I shall have another go for a few days next week!!

pps Another bait that seems to have instant recognition (on my pit!) is soft bread paste mixed with a LITTLE custard powder in the mix.....very sift though......

 

[Philip]

Roach and in particular the large Roach seem to have a very strong desire for sweet baits from around the end of August until the end of October, sometimes longer.

I have to ask this. Mr Toad by your own definition a large Roach is 3.5 to 4 pound. You were really quite categorical on that point earlier in this thread.

So in order to know that these “large” Roach do indeed have a strong desire for sweet baits from August to October implies you must have seen or caught many such sized Roach in order for such a statement to be made. Otherwise how would you know ?

So that does beg the question how many 3.5 – 4 pound Roach have you actually seen on the bank ?

 

[Tee-Cee]

Regarding the storage of elderberies:

I collected a load yesterday and after cutting off the big stalks I laid the on a tray and put them in the freezer overnight. This morning (I was fishing!) my wife pinged most of them off the remaining stalks (which she said was easier than removing them from the stalks BEFORE freezing) and popped them into small freezer bags for future use-probably next spring!
Anyway I'm sure they will be okay once defrosted BUT this will have to be done on kitchen towel to soak up the moisture which could make the individual berry too soft.....

The berries are coming to an end soon so freeze a few whilst they are very big and plump-just right for 'medium' roach of 2lbs or so!!

 

[watatoad]

I have to ask this. Mr Toad by your own definition a large Roach is 3.5 to 4 pound. You were really quite categorical on that point earlier in this thread.

So in order to know that these “large” Roach do indeed have a strong desire for sweet baits from August to October implies you must have seen or caught many such sized Roach in order for such a statement to be made. Otherwise how would you know ?

So that does beg the question how many 3.5 – 4 pound Roach have you actually seen on the bank ?

Please lets forget the 'Mr'. Toad, Toady or Rod is great.

I have seen more than a couple on the bank although I was and am trying to use everyone elses size guide as that is easier for you all. Sure Mark and I differ in choice of description. However it is a pity some people want to try to get a flame going in a thread. Hopefully by using the more common and generally acceptable definition, this will not be such a problem. So to reitterate in future I will be using what appears to be the general size definition for fish, does that make everyone happy.

To make it totally clear I have even seen a few Roach in excess of 4lb on the bank. But I make no reference to who may have caught them. Believe it or not as suits yourselves. I will not however be drawn into a flame session regardless, as I don't care what anyone believes or does not believe. Nor will I say what any of my personal bests are, that is between me and the fish.

---------- Post added at 16:42 ---------- Previous post was at 16:34 ----------

You want Roach from 1.5lb upwards, in my upinion a good bet would be at this time of the year is to use silkweed and elderberries on rivers. I trust that will help. But still fish light.

 

[Graham Marsden]

I'm surprised that some anglers seem surprised that fish recognise elderberries as food considering there may not be any elderberry bushes in the vicinity.

And yet those same anglers accept that fish recognise as food (even where that food hasn't been used very often), bread, hempseed, luncheon meat, tares, pellets, boilies, sweetcorn, etc, etc, without batting an eyelid.

Fish will have a go at anything, and elderberries are more like food to fish than many of the baits we take for granted.

 

[Peter Jacobs]

At this time of the year there can be no finer bait on my local Hampshire Avon.

For some reason though this year the berries are not too advanced on the trees, ie not ripe.

 

[watatoad]

I'm surprised that some anglers seem surprised that fish recognise elderberries as food considering there may not be any elderberry bushes in the vicinity.

And yet those same anglers accept that fish recognise as food (even where that food hasn't been used very often), bread, hempseed, luncheon meat, tares, pellets, boilies, sweetcorn, etc, etc, without batting an eyelid.

Fish will have a go at anything, and elderberries are more like food to fish than many of the baits we take for granted.

Spot on, and to add remember elderberries look more like the small black water snails so belovedby Roach which is a far more natural bait than bread can be and yet everyone accepts that Roach love bread.

 

[dezza]

There is a big elderberry bush very close to one of my favourite roach swims on the tidal Trent. During a very recent Aegir, it is likely that some of the berries were washed into the river so that but now the grandad roach know them as bait.

But they are good and ripe for next week's fishing.

Bread is taken by many Cyprinid species throughout the world, not just in England. The main reason for this I think is due to the fact that wheat is grown in most countries and significant amounts of wheat get into rivers in one way or another.

Personally I don't think that fish take hemp because it looks like a small water snail. They take hemp because it is good food for them and they like it. Man has been introducing hemp into English lakes and rivers for hundreds of years, so that most cyprinids will readily accept it as food, as accepting it as such has been programmed into their genes.

Can you remember when hemp was banned because people thought it drugged fish? What a load of old bollax that notion became.

In years past, roach especially, readily accepted stewed (creed) wheat as bait. Today it does take time to get roach to feed on it as very very few anglers use it nowadays, yet it is one of the cheapest baits around. It was always good around harvest time, which is about now I guess.

 

[Mark Wintle]

There is certainly something in many baits that fish instinctively recognise as food ie amino acids and certain degrees of sweetness. I just dropped a hard pellet of brown bread in my aquarium and the little crucians fought over it. They've never seen wheat or bread but they are conditioned to feed on anything that falls in; they'll bite your fingers if you dip the tip of a finger in! Fish certainly sample objects constantly including picking up gravel etc. and filtering out the food. There are few things that they'll reject, mainly fish poo.

All the elderberries I've seen are ripe and I'm going to get some for later. I might also try some expanded pellets with blackcurrant jelly if I can find some. I've used strawberry jelly before with pellets and caught big roach on them. I'm trying to avoid the numerous dace on the Stour at the moment mainly because they're not that big - 1-3oz with odd 5oz ones - whereas the roach run to 2lbs, and berries seem better than tares at the moment in this respect.

 

[Tee-Cee]

All I was trying to say is that I found it unusual to get instant bites on a bait which, based on my considerable knowledge of the water is very rarely, if ever used. I know for a fact that elderberry bushes do not exist anywhere near the water and to get three bites and three fish after the 2nd or third cast is,for me anyway, as rare as hens teeth!!

I don't doubt it can happen with any bait but in my experience instant recognition of a new bait doesn't happen too often and the introduction of same usually, but NOT always, means prebaiting over a period of time.

If instant recognition was a regular feature with my fishing I would be offering even more different baits for instant success!!

I hope that explains what I was trying to say a little clearer........................

 

[dezza]

whereas the roach run to 2lbs, and berries seem better than tares at the moment in this respect.
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In my River Trent, the roach at the moment are averaging about 7 oz with the odd one, and I mean odd, going just over the pound.

I am fascinated why certain baits produce good sized roach and with others like maggots and casters produce bleak after bleak after bleak!

The other problem of course if you use maggots, a darned nuisance of a whiskers comes along and smashes up your delicate roach gear. It happened 3 times this last week.

We have lots of small dace too in certain swims on the Trent. On others, there is the chance of bigger dace. I caught 2 dace of 10 oz each last week. They are lovely fish that make you think you have caught a chublet with a little gob!

 

[fishface1]

Toady,

Have all these "big" roach come from your local Suffolk waters?
The only reason I ask is that being a freshwater biologists and having electrofished (which you might admit is probably as efficient a method as using elderberry and banana paste) many, many miles of a large number of rivers (mostly the Thames and it's tribs and Hampshire/Dorset rivers) I have never seen a 4lb roach. I've seen a good number of hybrids in the upper 3's bracket and I do agree with you on your point that there are 2s in more rivers than people think, but they are often loners, or a small group of survivors of a successfull breeding year and old fish (many have been 12years plus). I have only ever seen a handfull of true 3lb river roach (and you need BIG hands to hold a 3lb roach!) and never one over 3.8.
The best roach I've ever seen came from an irrigation pond on a tomato farm in the Wirral. This water was a green soup due to the enrichment from run-off, but it was full of stunning young (8year old) 2.8- 3lb roach, and the odd considerably larger one!
I'm sure you are being genuine, but it would appear that for some reason you have a particular breed of super large roach that have established themselves in your local rivers, and I'd love to see a pic!

 

[dezza]

Toady,

Have all these "big" roach come from your local Suffolk waters?
The only reason I ask is that being a freshwater biologists and having electrofished (which you might admit is probably as efficient a method as using elderberry and banana paste) many, many miles of a large number of rivers (mostly the Thames and it's tribs and Hampshire/Dorset rivers) I have never seen a 4lb roach. I've seen a good number of hybrids in the upper 3's bracket and I do agree with you on your point that there are 2s in more rivers than people think, but they are often loners, or a small group of survivors of a successfull breeding year and old fish (many have been 12years plus). I have only ever seen a handfull of true 3lb river roach (and you need BIG hands to hold a 3lb roach!) and never one over 3.8.
The best roach I've ever seen came from an irrigation pond on a tomato farm in the Wirral. This water was a green soup due to the enrichment from run-off, but it was full of stunning young (8year old) 2.8- 3lb roach, and the odd considerably larger one!
I'm sure you are being genuine, but it would appear that for some reason you have a particular breed of super large roach that have established themselves in your local rivers, and I'd love to see a pic!

Thank goodness for the voice of reason.

I have fished a great deal over the past 15 years for big roach, and although I have caught my share of 2 pounders, my biggest remains at 2lbs 7oz, from the River Severn.

I did once catch a 3 pound "roach" from a gravel pit. This was at night, so I put it into my keepnet until morning.

Next morning I examined the fish carefully. It was a rudd/roach hybrid, the tell tale dorsal fin being too far back and presence of an abdominal keel giving the game away.