Weed rakes?

Never used one before, but my new club has a shallow, weedy lake stuffed full of tench

So, it seems a weed rake is in order.

I assume that trawling the boot fairs for a couple of old rakes and cable tying the heads back to back is the cheapest option?
I know it's a slightly silly question, and I could just drill a piece of old metal and put bolts through it. Except I don't have any old metal, or bolts. Or decent metal drill bits for that matter!
Am I missing anything obvious? what do you use?

2 large rake heads lashed to a brick...

When I used one it was made of 2 rake heads lashed to a square iron bar with chains at each end coming together where the rope was tied to the last links of the chain.

I've not used one for quite a few years as my clubs/syndicates do not allow their use any longer - thanks to a few idiots . . . . .

Won't all that noisy splashing about with the Rake, make plumbing up impossible :wh

Great video BTW very simplistic too.

http://desmond.imageshack.us/Himg191/scaled.php?server=191&filename=dsc04216hw.jpg&res=landing
Most folk go way over the top when raking. They use too heavy a rake, involving bricks, whole scrap cars tied to a rake, multiple rake heads with scythes and a dead donkey and so on.
You only need to tickle the bottom, not cluster bomb it or nuke it and just let the rake trip lightly over the bottom, not rip it up. The water plants are then harvested not eradicated completely, else where does the lake's productivity come from?
The one shown above is just a lightweight rake with wooden handle, cut off so that the rake head will just hit the bottom and the handle will float upright. The cord is just a length of polyprop cable/pipe puller. The technique, you'll notice is double handed and as the kit weighs next to nothing there's hardly a splash when it hits the water. The range is a lot further than you can manage with a brick/kitchen sink set up. The rake is drawn back slowly and picks up more weed than I've seen any other device take. The retrieved weed is left hanging down the bank and into the water so all the wee beasties can get back in again.
I usually fan out across my estimated swim from left to right because I usually get the rake to land right way up like that, but don't go too wide and don't be too thorough otherwise you'll leave a small patch of desert that fish may not enter whatever you're offering. Whilst it's still cloudy, I lob in lots of loose feed, usually red maggots and worms and a couple of maggot/caster-loaded fistfuls of hemp laced crumb.
Then I set up the rod and plumb it with a small plumb and set to fish for tench with my rig lead-heavy at the bottom about 3-4" from the hook to indicate on the lift.
Call me old fashioned, but it's the most exciting form of bite known to man.
My best daytime session last year was 9 tench and 2 lost runs.

Just a note of caution; make sure you have nothing immovable on the lake in front of you, like a dragline cable. All kinds of mining debris can snag the rake, then you will be anchored to it!

The earlier tip about joining the rake on with two lengths of chain will actually reduce the efficiency of the rake because the chains will push the weed to one side before the rake head reaches it.

I just used to lash two rake heads back to back and bolt a short wooden pole in one to attach the line to. As has been said, they can and do get immovably stuck so don't spend too much money and time on one. If the lake is shallow it might be easier to wade and use a conventional rake.

Once at Nostell Priory I wound in the float to the end of my rod while I was having a sandwich. I had just been paddling about mixing groundbait and clearing a tangle from the line. While I was having lunch the float went and I ended up catching several tench averaging about 5lb each from just under the rod end. This was after a couple of fishless hours fishing further out in deeper and groundbaited water. From then on my tactics were to paddle around the rod end and fish close in. It worked surprisingly well.

MarkTheSpark said:

The earlier tip about joining the rake on with two lengths of chain will actually reduce the efficiency of the rake because the chains will push the weed to one side before the rake head reaches it.

Click to expand...

That all depends on the type of weed really Mark.

Personally I found the design to work very well indeed.

steph mckenzie said:

Won't all that noisy splashing about with the Rake, make plumbing up impossible :wh

Great video BTW very simplistic too.

Click to expand...

Steph, the fish will turn up very shortly afterwards, after all you're creating a new/different feeding area to investigate - I've caught within 15 minutes, or less. If you rake first then you're ready to fish as soon as you've got set up.
Jerry

Many thanks for the replies all, it certainly looks worth a go
As I say, it's something new to me so I'm looking forward to giving it a try.

I on a occasion use my rake which must be getting on for nearly fifty years old now as it originally belonged to my father.It works well enough but i choose the waters to heave it out in with care.Some of the more popular lakes on my clubs permit would see a serious sense of humour bypass by the bivvy bound occupants, i will say no more

Has anyone tried the small over the counter contraptions that are designed to be cast out with a rod?

They do seem to be extremely small.

I am surprised that one of the engineering type companies, Prestige Carp Porters for example, has not built a proper good quality weed rake for sale.

Well, I finally got around to it!
My membership came through for the lake I was intending to try this on, so I nipped down there for a couple of Hours after work. As expected, the weed growth was very thick so I had real problems with presenting the bait, forcing my hand into knocking this up last night



Had to buy a brand new rake, and sabotage our own garden one as I was too impatient to wait for the bootfair on Sunday...
Very much looking forward to giving it a try though, this new lake is, by all accounts, heaving with good Tench and very few Carp

---------- Post added at 08:10 ---------- Previous post was at 08:07 ----------

terry m said:

Has anyone tried the small over the counter contraptions that are designed to be cast out with a rod?

They do seem to be extremely small.

I am surprised that one of the engineering type companies, Prestige Carp Porters for example, has not built a proper good quality weed rake for sale.

Click to expand...

I did see these for sale, I honestly don't see the point in them? surely it would take Hours to clear a spot and I don't understand why you'd want to cast the thing to clear weed at long range.
Mind you, I'm not a Carpie, and don't understand what they get up to so it's not really surprising!

It looks sturdy enough and it also looks all shiny and new, you sure you're going to want to dirty it

Peter wrote,

I've not used one for quite a few years as my clubs/syndicates do not allow their use any longer - thanks to a few idiots . . . . .

Do not understand this @ all...

1. how on earth can they ban the use of such an important tool?
2. what have the idiots done ?

confused of Alnwick

tight lines,
Mike

nocatch said:

Peter wrote,

I've not used one for quite a few years as my clubs/syndicates do not allow their use any longer - thanks to a few idiots . . . . .

Do not understand this @ all...

1. how on earth can they ban the use of such an important tool?
2. what have the idiots done ?

confused of Alnwick

tight lines,
Mike

Click to expand...

1. Easily;
2. Among others:using the rakes and splashing all over the place 10 yards from other anglers;clearing big patches of weeds/lilly pads etc. and thus destroying the fishes cover/habitat;leaving heaps of stinking,decomposing weeds on the bank side etc.....

Well it worked a treat! felt very strange though, creeping into the swim then spending 20 minutes heaving out what sounded like a shopping trolley crashing into the swim! although, to be fair, I blanked...

Years since i done it as most places i fish these days have too little rather than too much weed, but i think the trick is to be minimalist - clear a small patch only that preferably connects to an open area or channel beyond it.

I must admit I didn't put too much thought into it. There is the odd clear patch but generally it's weedy throughout. It's a shallow estate lake (maximum depth 3') so does get heavily weeded.
The club who run the lake have a forum so I've asked there for advice. The lake holds a good number of large Tench so I'm keen to crack it!