Weed problems...

[108831]

Right I'm going to inquire into the joint minds of FM to hopefully solve my problem. On the deep lake I slider fish over the last three years a dark green/black weed,similar to silkweed is coating the bottom of the lake,only in water over ten feet(most of the lake),it's still there in winter too,though not as bad,I'm finding that if a fish has a nibble,but doesn't take it,the bait is covered and ignored,in warmer weather softish baits are mullered by small roach,so pellets are a good bait,but are prone,as is meat,corn,also any bait fished off bottom is ignored by anything other than roach,any ideas guys...

 

[john step]

Pop ups? Any way I am trying to figure out what a Scottish bait is. Haggis dipped in krill?:wh

 

[108831]

Tablet correcting incorrectly,softish...

 

[peterjg]

Whitty, you have a difficult problem there to overcome!! What are you fishing for and roughly how deep is the weed? If there are lots of carp in the water the carp will clear an area by feeding heavily with hemp or/and you could try raking. Pop ups have already been mentioned which is probably your easiest solution.

 

[steve2]

I have the same problem on one of my lakes it's covers the bottom all across the lake at all depths and like yours it now never seems to die back. The only way I have found round it is popup artificial baits and popup dead baits for pike or Paternoster rigs set at what ever depth is needed.
Before I stopped fishing the lake 4 months ago I was catching the odd tench in the weed on normal baits but got fed having clear the weed off the bait after ever cast.

 

[108831]

Whitty, you have a difficult problem there to overcome!! What are you fishing for and roughly how deep is the weed? If there are lots of carp in the water the carp will clear an area by feeding heavily with hemp or/and you could try raking. Pop ups have already been mentioned which is probably your easiest solution.

I'm fishing for what comes along,mainly quality roach,but I don't want to rule out tench,bream,carp and catfish. I really can't say how deep the weed is,but it is deep enough to cover the bait if the fish don't take it instantly,if they suck and blow you've had it,dragging is out of the question,as I would be lucky to get a drag far enough,also there are bits of machinery,sticking up in places on the shelf,you rarely have a problem fishing,but the weight of a drag with weed on it is dodgy...

 

[daniel121]

My usual approach is to drag weed out and create a small area you can groundbaot and fish conventional, it's the time tested tradition tech fishing method sorry hardly ground breaking.

However while on holiday a few years back i fished a heavily weeded lake for tench. It's not an easy thing to do however I tried fishing with a modified slow sinking polyball to sit on top of the weed with air injected lobworms on a hair. It was a clown around but it worked, I managed to land a few of the large golden tench in that lake at the time.

 

[peterjg]

Whitty, the only other ideas that come to mind do not totally resolve your problem but you could possibly try:
Use a long rod or pole to lay on with dead maggots as hopefully they will tend to rest on top of the weed
Or
Same as above but with several bits of punched bread on a long shanked hook - compressed punched bread (as I am sure you already know) is a bit tougher than flake.
Good luck, not an easy problem to solve.

 

[108831]

I keep meaning to try bread as it's fairly light and visible on the weed,small roach are an issue,which will slowly lessen as the weather cools,the fish I could hook are of large proportions and I don't think I'd have a hope of landing one at 14m,with no more pole to ship out,I like the idea of feeding plenty of hemp to attract carp,but there are many days the carp don't come into your swim,no matter what you feed,on Saturday I had one carp but had no signs of another(I fed around three pints of 6&8mm pellets),but carp were showing around 30m or so,it's around 25ft deep there,apparently the club de-silted the lake 14years ago and it seems it needs doing again,as this weed was a problem then....

 

[no-one in particular]

Like problem, you may have read my last two HDYGO posts. The river seems to have a fine silkweed at the bottom of it as well, when I reel in there is a small bit on the hook. The previous but last post I mentioned a home made dead weight. A piece of cork made at home with a line through it and weighted with shot just each side of the cork till it just sinks, a loop one end to attach to main line and about a 10 inch hook length. I had two good takes in in an anotherwise fairly fruitless day. I found I had to attach a tiny bit of float to the main line as I cannot watch the line these days, eyes getting bad but it should be fished freelined and watch the tip but you cannot tighten up to it very well so I found it was a line watch thing which helps with a tiny float on the line if you see what I mean. But, could be an answer to your problem but I was fishing in more shallow water than you, about 6ft. A piece of flake or crust will pop up from it, maybe a shorter hook length than 10 inches. The thing it it gives the weight to be cast a fair distance but slides down through the water nicely and then settles on the bottom. Might be a roach only method from what your saying but I am sure it could be improvised with other baits like pop ups maybe.
Something for you to consider maybe
I might go tomorrow and try this again, I don't think I gave it enough of a trial last time.

 

[mikench]

Can't you float fish at a depth above the weed or weed depth?

 

[108831]

It's not really even enough Mike,the weed that is. It's heartbreaking,because I think I'd get more big fish if it was cleaner,I'd like to put twenty inches of line on the bottom.

 

[Philip]

A very buoyant bait popped up a fair distance over the weed that will continue to pop up when pulled down so never gets into the weed regardless of how many tugs it gets sounds like the easiest solution if you want to fish a lead. Fishing the lead as well on a paternoster link with something buoyant glued to the paternoster swivel will also keep that clear of the weed & allow a free passage of line to the indicator.

Another option if its Roach the target - fishing on the drop with a float and regular feed to try to bring them up in the water.

Third option if its rare single bites from big fish…neutral balanced baits and rigs weighted to sink so slowly that it stops an rests on top of the weed tops. Great for summer cruisers over thick weed but any drift will knacker it.

All that said in truth I personally would spend allot of time trying to find any areas that are clear of the weed and fish those...assuming they exist. As a few other have said as well baiting a spot regularly you can get the fish to clear an area for you. Hemp is good as its so small they will root around for ages digging up the bottom to get at it and uprooting the weed but you need patience for this, it wont happen over night

 

[108831]

I've fished wafters,floating plastic baits,I've caught,well at times,the bottom has areas better than others,but these areas aren't good fish holding areas,for whatever reason the productive parts of the lake have always held fish,when there was weed or not... Though I fish for roach,there are plenty of gooduns over two,they sometimes,like on Saturday won't come up in the water,as I say,I also don't want to rule out the bigger fish that makes you wonder what the next bite will produce.