River Roach at night

[Rod & Annette]

I've never tried really tried fishing for Roach after dark. Most of my sessions have been early morning but a change in work means that that's not really a possibility any more.

Does anybody have any positive experience of fishing for River Roach in the dark? The stretch of river I'm planning to go I've caught 2s in the past trotting in the daytime. There's a dull glow from some foottpath lighting.

 

[mikench]

The dark has many virtues imo, including restful sleep, amorous intentions and peace and quiet. That list is not exhaustive but fishing for roach is not on it.

The River Roach holds few living things unless it's improved.

 

[chrissh]

I found an hour or so after dark roach slow down and stop feeding, the only time I caught roach in the dark was on a marina which had lights all around it. it was still a hard going and slower then the day light hours

 

[Mark Wintle]

Back in the early 80s I did a fair bit of mid winter after dark roach fishing on the Dorset Frome at Wareham QWuay. More failures than successes and we soon found that maggots brought amazing numbers of tiny flounders (47 one evening) and elvers - both species long gone, even dace as well, using a float. In time I had more success using breadflake and some nights had big roach when anglers had blanked in the same swim all day. Many years later a handful of anglers fished the same swim night after night but success was an exception, and some claimed that the roach would reappear long after midnight not that I wanted to be on the river that time of night. Even on the nights when the roach fed the action ceased by 9pm though given that I would be staring at a computer screen the following day for 7 hours programming in the days of green on black screens overdoing it watching a betalight wasn't recommended. The very biggest roach rarely showed after dark when I fished though I had one or two very good ones and strangely roach just under 2lbs which rarely showed in the day sometimes turned up, maybe it was another shoal that visited at night? I did some legering but the rods were poor in the early days and only much later when armed with a top class carbon quivertip rod did it become easier to hit bites.

If the place is safe to fish then I'd try flake on a 10 with a little cage feeder with liquidised bread and see what turns up. Keep sessions short, 2 or 3 hours.

 

[peterjg]

My results are similar to Mark Wintles - it's hard fishing! In winter I fish after dark quite a lot, I have found that after dusk is better than before dawn on the rivers. I leger flavoured bread flake on big hooks, bites are usually very positive but expect a lot of blank sessions. I have only caught one 2lb+ roach from a river at night and that was from the Kennet.

Light or/and water clarity (in my humble opinion) really effect when and how roach feed. Yes, they can be caught in bright clear water but very dull or almost dark is best - not necessarily the full darkness of nighttime.

 

[Philip]

I have done quite a bit of fishing after dark for Roach and as others have suggested the bites I have found generally stop after full darkness and I have never really understood why. That last hour before full darkness is my favorite time by a long way. I have had them in full darkness but its not been very consistent.

One exception that a couple of people have alluded to is when I have have fished in the vicinity of street lights. I can think of two or three areas were I can continue to catch roach way into full darkness when there there has been street lighting on the water. One swim in particular I could trot by the street lights and used to catch a Roach a trot (small ones) on breadflake. I also noticed when I switched to maggot I got allot less bites. I dont know why..perhaps the bread was just more visible.

Obviously I am talking about river Roach here. I think there are lots of examples of big stillwater Roach feeding after dark going way back...the Startops Roach at Tring for example and on some well known Carp waters the anglers catch some whoppers on the Carp baits after dark.

Let us know how you get on !

 

[john step]

I'll echo the fact that dusk is the prime time. Last hour of daylight. Its the time you can spot where the roach are situated as they show themselves at dusk. Rivers and lakes. I had my best roaching on the Lea at this time.

 

[Philip]

One other observation I think its worth mentioning that I noticed very recently. In the last couple of months in fact. It was during the warmer weather and again on stretch of river that was lit by streetlights. Well after dark I noticed a very large shoal of small fish just under the surface. Literally hundreds of fish possibly thousands closely grouped and resting stationary in the very slow flow inches under the surface in 15 feet of water. I am almost certain they were Roach. This was well into night, 1 or 2 o’clock in the morning.

It made me think that perhaps that is where the Roach go when it gets dark. Perhaps they are packing together in dense shoals in places we would not expect them to be, in this case right in the surface layers. Why they did / do it I don’t know…perhaps to try and avoid predation like shoal fish in the sea or maybe something else.