Preoccupied tench

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keora

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The last couple of times I've been tenching there's been lots of tench bubbles rising to the surface, but not many bites. This is typical of tench at this time of year - the explanation often given is that the tench are preoccupied with natural food so ignore groundbait and loose feed.

I wonder if this is true ? There were no bubbles in the swim until I started groundbaiting, then the bubbles appeared about half an hour later. Perhaps a simple explanation is that tench are eating the loose feed etc and are avoiding the baited hook. Has anybody seen tench feeding on the bottom in these conditions, eating everything but the baited hook?

What do you think puts them off taking the bait ? Is it seeing the hook, or the hooklink, or is it that the bait doesn't behave naturally when the eddy currents from the tench stir up the baits on the bottom ?

What's the best way of getting bites ?
 
W

William Spencer

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are the tench avoiding the baited hook?or the WEIGHTED hook?
1 try fishing a piece of fake corn hair rigged on an esp size 10 hook.this should counter balance the weight of the hook.
2 try tying a knotless knot to a size 10,take some red boilie foam and cut it roughly the size and shape of a red maggot,thread the piece of red boilie foam onto the hair and trap it in place with a hair stop,put three or four maggots on the hook and again the rig should be critically balanced.
 
W

William Spencer

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hope it helps keith.try tying your rigs with a nice soft and supple braid,kryston's supernova,fox's megasilk,carp r us smooth are pretty usefull
 
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keora

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William, what breaking strain hook length do you use ? I normally use about 5lb or 4.4lbs mono, so I wonder whether its worth using the brands you recommend, as I believe they are generally stronger than 5lb.
 
W

William Spencer

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keith don't be afraid to use a 6-8lb mainline to bully the tench out.coupled up with a 8lb hooklink.megasilk is available in 8lb,as is fox barbel braid.what you have to remember is that mono will stretch where as braid doesn't.5lb mono should stretch and break at around six and a half pounds if the pressure is carefully applied.8lb braid will snap at 8lb.(this is one reason carpers use 12lb mainline to a 15lb braid hooklink).
drennan also do a specialist braid in small spools in strains from 4lb upwards.i have bought a few spools of 6 and 8lb but won't get chance to use them until this weekend.
best bet is to carefully up the bs of both mainline and hooklink until you find a compromise.for the record i use daiwa sensor in 6 and 8.it's only ?6.99 a spool,will fill three spools with a little left over for hooklinks if need be.drennan's specialist line is worth a look.maxima used to be top notch but there have been some bad reports about it lately.
hope this helps.
 
W

William Spencer

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keith can you actually observe the tench in your swim?
if so regarding the use of rubber/plastic corn,try an experiment.get a bit of real corn,try scooping out a little of the inside and inserting a little bit of polystyrene or cork so that the corn very slowly sinks,throw this in the swim and watch the tench feed.this should cofirm the use of a bouyant hookbait
 
Morespiders

Morespiders

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Keith can you use a float if so use maggots on a 14s drennan spade to 3-4lb line failing that use a single grain of corn just nicked on the hook size 14 dont use a hair usually solves the problem for me with wary tench
 
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blankety blank

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I've improved my catch rate in these circumstances by putting a very small bit of rig foam on my hook (a drennan superspade size 14) before hooking double caster. You need a smaller bit of foam than you think to achieve neutral buoyancy. This was a tip that I picked up from John Bailey's book "The Fishing Detective", where he described the phenomenon of not being able to get a bite when the tench were obviously feeding heavily and mopping up his loose feed.
 
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Bully

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Keith - you haven't actually said how you were fishing for them?
 
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keora

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I was float fishing with a 13 ft Drennan waggler carp rod, 5.25 lb Pro Gold monofil(clained breaking strength is higher than this, but I tested the BS and it breaks at 5.25). One of the waters where I fish is a fertile 2.5 acre marl (clay) pit. Usually, the water has a visibility of about 3ft, which means there's plenty of weed growth. The swims I fish are between 6 and 8ft deep, so I can't see the fish feeding - it would be interesting if I could.

The tench I catch are usually between 3.5lbs and just over 4lbs, a couple of times I've had fish of exactly 5lbs. I know this is small by national standards, but in Yorkshire it's not a bad fish. 20 years ago tench in the water averaged 2.5lb, and I never caught one bigger than 4lb, so it indicates how tench sizes have increased.

I don't think I need to increase the BS of the line because the tench in the waters I fish are not that big.

I've got Bailey's Fishing Detective, so I'll have a look at it. I have previously tried balancing baits with slivers of foam, without being convinced they improved things.
 
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keora

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Blankety Blank, I've read the section about Tench in John Bailey's "Fishing Detective". His description of seeing tench feeding is interessting, and it shows that I should persist in counterbalancing hooks and baits with bits of foam.
 
W

William Spencer

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bait and wait m8.set the feeder/avon rods on a pod with alarms.bait heavy the fish will come.
 
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john hooper

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when i've struggled for bites with fish obviously in the swim i find free lining can bring a result, for some reason with tench it results in screaming runs.
 
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