off. When fishing drop

Most pike waters have only limited spawninghabitat for the pike and if you are not in one ofthese places your chances of catching are severelyreduced. So my aim this week is to try and point youin the right direction. With a little bit of effortthe Spring haunt of the pike can be quite easy to findand can bring superb results.Pike will begin to think about spawning several weeksbefore actually committing themselves. The eggs takequite a while to develop, and as the hormones begin tokick in the fish will start to move. Pike need shallowweedy areas in which to spawn. Depths of less thanthree metres tend to be favoured, and if present,dense beds of soft weeds, such as Canadian pond weedare favoured. If this type of weed isn’t present, thenthey will use just about any plant material. Look outfor exposed tree roots, reed beds and sunken trees.All may be used if there is nothing else available.Pike are generally quite difficult to spot whileactually spawning. Try looking for gentle swirls inthe margins first thing in the morning, or last thingat night through the month of March. This will giveyou some idea of where to fish the following year.While actually spawning pike tend not to feed. Whatyou are actually looking for are the areas that thefish will hold up in while they wait for conditions tobecome just right. Once again, the areas we arelooking for are normally the same on a wide variety ofwaters. Pike will seek out deeper water where theywill feel safer, and which will also give them a pointto ambush passing prey. These drop-offs can be foundwith a plummet on smaller waters, but on some of thebig lakes in Scotland and the Lake District I preferto get afloat with an echo sounder to accuratelypinpoint their location. Anchoring up in the shallowswill allow baits to be fished at varying distancesover the drop-off. When fishing drop-offs at any timeof year my favourite spot of all is where there is adepression in the drop-off giving slightly deeperwater. These channels are often cut where a streamruns into the lake and the action of the water causeserosion of the bank. If you imagine how this wouldlook underwater it is not too difficult to imagine thepike moving up and down these channels, safe in theknowledge that they cannot be attacked from the sides.Certainly, a bait fished in the channel will producethe bulk of the runs. Fishing in the shallows can pick you up the odd bonusfish, but these tend to be the smaller males, whospend much longer on the spawning grounds than thefemales. For the biggest fish stick to the deeperwater and you will not go far wrong. As in all things,timing is everything. Fishing the drop-off channelswill mean you intercept more fish as they wait tospawn, but the fish will still only be present for afew short weeks. Make sure you fish these areasregularly and don’t be put off by a few blanks orsmall fish. If you wait the big girls will eventually

come.