Mark Wintle
Well-known member
A number of 'old' big roach threads have been resurrected lately to promote this:'I am involved with a? website called surefirefishing.com.?Big roach are featured on the?information page and this might interest you.'
As an angler who works five days a week, and finds Saturdays the only practical day for my winter fishing, I have to rely on knowledge, experience, Metcheck, and a sneaky look at the river on Friday evening to attempt to gauge my best prospects for the weekend.
That means back to the basics of locating the fish which must be 90% of angling followed by ensuring I have the right bait and gear for whatever takes my fancy that day.
On the bank it's then a case of understanding how to feed and fish the chosen swim, and taking it from there according to what happens.
These are Walker's angling principles. Or the 4 'F's - Find em, Feed em, Fish em, Foto em.??
What I dare not do is attempt to analyse too deeply what my chances are; there are too many variables, even on the same river and same day.
My local river has several water temperatures, several water colours, even several levels, all on the same day. The effect of the wind can be mitigated or exaggerated by local geography, and to add to the fun, there are the seasonal barely understood migrations of the fish, especially at the back end of the season.
Sometimes I blank, sometimes I do OK, and once in a while have a red-letter day, but if I stopped enjoying it I'd stop going.
So telling me I should fish for roach because roach score 32% as opposed to chub 21% on a given day seems nonsense? Hell, without unpredictability angling soon loses its charm and sense of mystery.
What does anyone else think?
[Admin Edited for clarity]
As an angler who works five days a week, and finds Saturdays the only practical day for my winter fishing, I have to rely on knowledge, experience, Metcheck, and a sneaky look at the river on Friday evening to attempt to gauge my best prospects for the weekend.
That means back to the basics of locating the fish which must be 90% of angling followed by ensuring I have the right bait and gear for whatever takes my fancy that day.
On the bank it's then a case of understanding how to feed and fish the chosen swim, and taking it from there according to what happens.
These are Walker's angling principles. Or the 4 'F's - Find em, Feed em, Fish em, Foto em.??
What I dare not do is attempt to analyse too deeply what my chances are; there are too many variables, even on the same river and same day.
My local river has several water temperatures, several water colours, even several levels, all on the same day. The effect of the wind can be mitigated or exaggerated by local geography, and to add to the fun, there are the seasonal barely understood migrations of the fish, especially at the back end of the season.
Sometimes I blank, sometimes I do OK, and once in a while have a red-letter day, but if I stopped enjoying it I'd stop going.
So telling me I should fish for roach because roach score 32% as opposed to chub 21% on a given day seems nonsense? Hell, without unpredictability angling soon loses its charm and sense of mystery.
What does anyone else think?
[Admin Edited for clarity]