Chub - hair rig or straight on the hook?

[dazdidge]

My local river has some huge chub that I wouldn't mind trying to catch. can anyone advise me on whether to use a hair rig or just to hook the bait straight onto the hook.

I heard from somewhere that if I hair rigged a bait then i would not catch any chub.

 

[Paul H]

You'll catch fewer chub using a hair rig because they don't feed in the same was as carp, barbel, tench and bream. The others suck their food in whereas chub actually pick things up with their lips.

Straight on the hook is the way to go for chub, quiver tips or floats and strike at bites rather than waiting for a run.

 

[Sean Meeghan]

Paul's right, Chub and hair rigs don't mix! If you want to use pellets band them on to the hook, but be prepared to have a few pinched!

 

[Mr Cholmondeley-Corker (PaSC)]

Sean

The better chub I've had on the Ribble all came to bait on a hair rig. All were either boily or pellet wrapped in stiff paste on a SHORT hair. I often super glue two pellets onto the hair.

All produced a good positive bite on my rod tip (solid top not quiver).

But maybe all those little knocks that I didn't strike at beacuse they were 'chublets nibbling the paste' where perhaps bigger more whary chub that may have produce a more positive bite if I'd used a bare hook.

 

[Sean Meeghan]

You're right Matt. Like you I've had a number of chub on the hair when barbel fishing, particularly when I'm using a lumpy paste wrap, which they can't seem to cope with. In general however I wouldn't fish for chub with a hair as you do seem to get a lot of abortive takes when using one. Most of my chub fishing is done in winter and I almost exclusively use flake or a paste.

If John Conway is lurking he might have some interesting comments as he's Mr Statistics on chub!

 

[Poshpaul (Angling Trust and PaSC)]

Straight on hook or banded pellets....have taken chub on hair, as above, but take advice from sound chaps like Sean and Dara....winter on the Dane it's flake for me!

 

[Stick_Float]

Mr CC, those little 'chublet' knocks I'd be willing to bet are actually decent chub a lot of the time. During my barbel fishing this season I've been driven crazy by what I thought were chublets going at my bait until I finally caved in and struck at a knock resulting in a nice 3lbish chub.

This got me thinking, I don't use a quiver tip when barbelling so were these knocks actually decent chub reversing with the bait between their lips and when they tightened up with the stiff rod top were ejecting the bait or it simply pulling the bait out of their lips. I'm led to believe chub can't suck like barbel, bream etc so I reckon it's feasible, I may of course be barking up the wrong tree. And now It makes sitting through those knocks even more painful when it could be a decent chub on the other end!

 

[Mr Cholmondeley-Corker (PaSC)]

I'm sure you're right Mr. Float.

One session I changed the hook to one without a hair. I pushed a bit of foam on the shank and wrapped some paste round it. Within 5 minutes I had a good chub on, but unfortunately it shook its head and the knot gave way.

I haven't tied a hook with a half blood since!

---------- Post added at 22:11 ---------- Previous post was at 22:10 ----------

But it proved my theory that the 'knocks' and paste stripping were good chub.

 

[Stick_Float]

I've been tempted to quickly put together a lighter quiver tip set up on occasion but you just know what happens next as a 14lb barbel turns up! I can't help wondering if I've had monstrous chub pecking at my bait and I've been sat there cursing little chublets waiting for a barbel that never comes!

 

[Neneman Nick]

The chub in the areas i fish on the Nene are bold as brass....hair rig or straight on the hook,both work equally well.
If they want it,they`ll take it regardless.
My biggest Nene chub was taken on a torn piece of garlic flavoured luncheon meat,fished on the hair.

 

[Jeff Woodhouse]

Although my PB chub came to a pellet on a hair, I think it's rare.

Now a certain Mr Guttf**ld fishes with a little bread crust on the hook and paste moulded above that. It counterbalances the weight of the paste and he fishes with the least amount of lead necessary, sometimes just 1 SSG on a link leger.

Don't ask what paste, I know it smells cheesy sometimes, but if he told me, he'd also have to shoot me.

 

[Dave Slater]

Chub can be caught using a hair but, if fishing for them delibarately, straight on the hook is always best. As others have mentioned on this thread this is because of how they feed. The tend to back off with a bait. Personally I prefer a soft bait whenever possible. I also agree that some of the small bites that people assume are from chublets can be from big fish. I caught one of 6lb 12oz this evening on a couple of taps similar to those given by chublets.

 

[Stick_Float]

Another huge Chub Dave, congrats!

 

[supgen]

anybody had success with scaled down bolt rigs for chub?

 

[Dave Slater]

I have seen Pete Reading using scaled down bolt rigs for chub with great success. Personally I prefer more conventional tactics with light leads and tips. I think it is all down to how you fish. When I have seen Pete fish he uses large quantities of particles, casters the last time I saw him fish. I think the fish get into feeding heavily and hook themselves. This way of fishing is too expensive for me and I tend to use large baits without a lot of feed. Fishing this way means that I have often have to hit small bites and I would miss most of them if I used a bolt rig. I do sometimes use large quantities of bait, but only at times when more conventional methods are not working very well and I have enough spare cash.
On the original track of the thread I think a short hair can be very effective when fishing the particle/bolt rig approach but I would NEVER use it when fishing conventially. The chub tend to suck my usual cheese or bread baits in gently on most occasions and back off with it.

 

[Graham Whatmore]

Thinking back I havn't caught many chub with a hair rig either, not even accidental ones so I agree with the general consensus.

As an ex river match angler I soon found out that though chub are greedy feeders and respond to heavy feeding the bites aren't always massive takes even on the float. Quite often a strike at a very slight indication can result in a chub even when fishing maggot or caster let alone bigger baits.

 

[dazdidge]

Thanks to everyone for the advice. Once more question - what size hook is recommended, bearing mind that I stil want to hook the barbel if they're also around.

 

[Graham Whatmore]

The general rule is that the hook matches the bait, the bigger the bait the bigger the hook and in the case of breadflake or cheesepaste this can be as big as a size 6 or even a size 4.

With autumn well established and the winter not far away you will not go far wrong in using breadflake or better still cheesepaste in your search for the wily chub they probably account for more more big chub than any other bait and the best bit is it is cheap to use, try it you might be pleasantly surprised.

 

[Peter Jacobs]

The general rule is that the hook matches the bait, the bigger the bait the bigger the hook and in the case of breadflake or cheesepaste this can be as big as a size 6 or even a size 4.

With autumn well established and the winter not far away you will not go far wrong in using breadflake or better still cheesepaste in your search for the wily chub they probably account for more more big chub than any other bait and the best bit is it is cheap to use, try it you might be pleasantly surprised.

Last Friday both Dave and I were using size 4's with either bread or cheese, or lobworms (2 at a time) straight onto the hook - I've never caught a Chub on a hair rig.

As Dave said; take a look at a decent sized Chub's mouth, then imagine a size 14's or smaller? Of course, there are times when you have to scale down according to the size of the target fish and the river conditions, but a basic rule of thumb is; use the largest hook size that you can get away with.

 

[Gav Barbus]

My pb chub came on a hair fished bait and so did the next two down all on the hair ,so maybe it is not that rare after all?? saying as alot of the lads have had the same experience.Maybe thats down to us fishing with baits more on the hair than on the hook?