range feeder fishing

With the unfortunate demise of the close season, looking forward to June 16th, to warm misty dawns and tench bubbles fizzing up to the surface may not be quite the same as it was, as some anglers won’t have had a break from fishing. Of those who have, I suppose many will be carp fishing on that day. It’s possibly true to say that the majority of anglers who have fished for carp have taken their personal best tench on their carp rods. This was the case with me for a while, and though my best tench at that time wasn’t massive by today’s standards, at just over 6 pounds it was a very big fish for the water. It did leave me a little dissatisfied though – I hadn’t caught it intentionally, and hadn’t had the best of it on a 2.25lb test curve rod and 12lb line. It was only weighed out of curiosity, many other fish of 5 pounds plus being slipped back without ever getting near the scales. I’d thought about this on and off for a couple of seasons, remembering clearly the days when I did purposefully target tench, usually on small atmospheric lakes where I would fish a small peacock quill float next to the lily pads. That, to my mind, is the epitome of tench fishing. Tench can provide superb sport on the float, and if you’ve never tried it I can only urge you to get hold of a match type rod or light Avon, and if possible a centrepin reel and try to catch them that way. Much as I supported the close season (still do) one has to be honest and say that it could make the dawn of 16th June a rather busy time. On the lakes I tend to fish it also meant that you could be hard pushed to get a swim anywhere near the carp if there were full-time anglers on the water. Often they would be camped out on the lake from the beginning of June. Taking this into account I decided for a change to spend the first month of the season tench fishing. There were various waters I had in mind, and not all of them were the much-loved lily-infested tench lakes. In fact my first effort would be on a very large gravel pit, not known for bags of fish of any description. It did produce the odd big tench, to around 7 pounds in those days. To get a fish like that on a float would be very satisfying. I also intended fishing another small gravel pit, a pit hardly fished but from which I’d heard rumours of tench to over 8 pounds. The other 2 waters were smallish natural lakes. Both of these latter waters were long established, both very silty with plenty of Canadian pond-weed, silk weed or potamogeton. Both contained lily pads and would therefore satisfy my sense of aesthetics Let’s start with the approach to the big pit. I had fished this for carp, and caught quite a few tench on boiled baits and carp rigs. But I didn’t want to fish for them in that way. I feel that the attraction of fishing for different fish is the different techniques you can learn and use. Other anglers did catch tench from the pit, but not in great numbers. The standard approach it seemed was long-range feeder fishing – scaled down carp tactics more or less. One or two tench per trip was the norm, and mostly they were caught at night. I really didn’t see why you shouldn’t be able to find them in the deep margins and catch them on float tackle, the bottom of a marginal shelf always seeming a good place for tench. Whilst the effects of pre-baiting can be a little uncertain for some species, I’ve found that tench respond to this tactic very well. What you use to pre-bait may depend on the presence of other fish, the weed growth, and the nature of the bottom. To give an example of the latter, although I’m sure tench will happily root out blood-worm from within the silt, I’m not so sure a maple pea will be sought out in the same way, and it might be that a lighter bait will be preferable in that situation. The big gravel pit was around 60 acres. Finding swims to float-fish for tench could be a bit daunting here. The inconsistent catches by other anglers weren’t going to help much either. But if you are going to float-fish using a lightish rod and centrepin you will in most instances be restricted to marginal swims. The margins on the pit were around 6 – 8 feet deep, and the water heavily coloured throughout the summer. There was hardly any weed-growth. Previous experience led me to believe that tench liked reed-fringed margins; also that, unlike bream, they were not great wanderers. A reedy bay, sheltered from the colder north-easterly winds seemed a good area to start. I’m of the opinion that tench, like most fish, don’t like changes in water temperature too much. This sheltered bay would, I hoped, help maintain a constant temperature. Plumbing revealed a depth of 7 feet a rod length out. The bottom felt to consist of gravel covered with an inch or so of silt. A bed of reed-mace extended a few feet out on a shallower marginal shelf before the drop off into the deeper water. The bay covered no more than a quarter of an acre – I was sure it would contain tench. In those days you could buy a crushed-hemp based groundbait called Catch. I found when using this that you could always tell when fish were in the swim, rooting about on the bottom. After throwing in a few balls the oils in the bait would break on the surface and the surface would fizz for a couple of minutes then stop. If the oils appeared on the surface again later on you could bet that fish were down there. I dropped some of this ground-bait into various swims on consecutive warm evenings and spent several hours patrolling the margins looking for signs of fish. Luckily for me, it seemed the swim I fancied fishing most had the most activity. Just beyond the deeper margin area a long gravel bar running parallel to the bank rose to within 3 feet of the surface. It was a perfect feature in which to channel any fish moving around the bay. This then would be the main swim. Hemp almost always figures in my pre-baiting sessions. I baited the swim and 2 or 3 adjacent ones every other night for the 3 weeks prior to June 16th. The ground-bait was a mixture of hemp, cooked maize, sweet-corn, casters and breadcrumb to which I added unflavoured Minamino. No doubt there are other things you could add, but Minamino & casters apart (and I didn’t put in too many casters) this is a fairly cheap ground-bait. I’d put in around half a bucket per swim each time I visited the lake. I did intend using maggot as one of the main baits but thought pre-baiting regularly with them might encourage too many of the water’s small perch into the swim. As the days went on I gradually cut down the bait in the other areas (though didn’t stopped completely) and concentrated on the main swim. June 15th. I arrived at the pit around 6pm, feeling extremely anxious. Would the swim be free? I had no need to worry – the carp anglers were ignoring this bay for the more open water, and no-one else was keen enough to be on the water for the mid-night start. I hauled everything round to the swim, set up the bivvy, then the rod. For once I wasn’t intending to make my first cast at midnight. I would sleep as best I could then start at dawn on the 16th. I’ve read elsewhere that it is not recommended you throw in large balls of ground-bait as you are likely to scare tench out of the swim. This has always puzzled me because the same authors will then often recommend raking a swim, throwing in huge lumps of iron-mongery, and tell you the tench will soon return. Yes indeed they do, so why I wonder should large balls of ground-bait scare them away for long? I appreciate you wouldn’t be raking while the fish are feeding, but then I wouldn’t expect to be wanting to throw in big balls of ground-bait at that time either. Around midnight, and erring on the side of caution, I threw a few dozen marble sized balls of the Catch ground-bait into the swim and followed this with a little sweet-corn., maggots and casters. Then, as best I could. I went to sleep. Long before dawn I was awake, and making test casts with the float to see if there was sufficient light for me to see it. You don’t really need a complicated set up to catch tench on the float. The float chosen was a 6-inch length of peacock quill with a fine cane insert at the tip. I’d attached it bottom end only, weighted it down so just the fine tip showed above the surface, and set it over-depth by almost a third so the line wouldn’t come straight up from the bottom shot, which was just a few inches from the hook. This way you can fish the lift method, but minimise false bites caused by fish bumping against too vertical a line. In fact I’m fairly sure that this was how the lift method was intended to be fished and that the diagrams you see where the line rises straight up from a large shot positioned just a couple of inches from the hook are inaccurate. Main line was 3lb Maxima, connected to 3lb Drennan double-strength hook-link. There being an almost total lack of weed it wasn’t necessary to fish any heavier. The hook was an eyed size 14 – I forget the make. I was using an old 11-foot through action rod with a test curve of around 12ozs and an ancient Allcocks Aerial popular reel. At 3.30 a.m. I threw a handful of tiny balls of ground-bait out, followed by two pouches of maggot, caster and sweet-corn and at 3.45a.m. the baited hook followed. Bites were almost immediate, though curiously, hardly any of them were lift bites. Mostly the float just bobbed slightly, then slid under. The tench fought extremely hard on the lighter tackle. This has surely got to be the most enjoyable way of fishing for them. By 11a.m when it went quiet I’d taken 8 tench, the biggest a new personal best at 6lbs 12oz. I’d also had a few “nuisance” carp, small stock fish up to 8 pounds, and been broken a couple of times by bigger carp. I’d had some good bream, and a 1lb 2oz roach. Although I’d switched baits regularly, often essential to keep bites coming when tench fishing, most of the fish had taken maggot. When it was obvious that fish were in the swim I continued to regularly loose feed small quantities of maggot, caster and sweet-corn. It can be very important that you continue loose feeding small quantities of your hook-baits while you are getting bites. When things went quiet for a while I introduced more small balls of the Catch ground-bait, and this would often announce the arrival of fish by beginning to fizz again some time after I’d thrown it in. At this point I continued the loose feeding. I kept the swim baited for a few more weeks, catching more good tench, and having incredible sport, sometimes catching tench right through the day. Now it was time to move on to one of the other lakes… The above shows the benefit of pre-baiting a swim. There are times when you can’t, or don’t wish to pre-bait. On the other lakes I am going to describe, for varying reasons I did no pre-baiting at all. The second water was also a gravel pit, but at only 6 acres, far smaller than the previous one. It was extremely weedy, with Canadian pond-weed reaching the surface (which, by the way, I don’t believe tench are that fond of) in 12 feet of water. In the area where there were gaps in the pond-weed was a layer of silk-weed. I think this is far more attractive to the fish – it certainly holds more food than the pond-weed. I was only intending to fish early morning sessions, often prior to going to work. For this reason I looked for a swim with a deep margin as I feel tench will retire to the deeper water as the temperature drops, and often not return to shallower areas until the water begins to warm up. The swim I found was a superb looking tench swim – a gap in the reeds, the reeds extending some 10 feet into the lake. The bottom shelved gently down from the margins and levelled out at 10 feet depth just at the point where the reeds ended. It then very gradually deepened to around 12 feet. In fact it was such an obvious swim I felt that other anglers were certain to fish it. For this reason I didn’t do any pre-baiting at all, relying on loose -feeding, minimal ground-baiting and raking the bottom when I was fishing to attract the fish, and also to clear some of the weed to help bait presentation. The rake was made simply by binding 2 small rake heads together, back to back, and attaching them to about 30 feet of nylon cord. Tackle was much the same as I’d used on the big pit except that I was using a longer rod, a 15 foot Harrison match rod. This would enable me to keep control should a fish run along the reed-beds to the left or right of me – as you will remember these reeds extended around 10 feet into the lake. Again I used a centrepin, and in deference to reports of huge tench, and the amount of weed present stepped up the line to 5lbs Silstar Match straight through. The float was a 3 AAA balsa bodied waggler. I’d chosen this float as the swim could be affected by winds coming along the edge of the reed-bed, and the bodied waggler fished bottom end only gives more stability in that situation. This was fished as a sliding float, using a small stop-knot. Initially I used power gum for the stop knot, but when using a match rod this often gets stuck in the tip ring. I found pole elastic to be a good alternative. The bulk shot were grouped about 4 feet above the hook. Although I’d be dragging the swim, I was aware that weed does continue to drift about and settle in the swim after it has been raked. For this reason I set the bottom shot about 6 inches from the bottom of the lake, leaving a foot of line below it so the bait and 6 inches of line would settle gently on the lake bed, or on top of any weed. One warm June dawn I ventured out to fish the lake. There was no-one there when I arrived, though it did look as if the swim had been fished. I immediately set to work with the rake. It seems almost blasphemous to be repeatedly throwing a pound or two of iron into the place you wish to fish, especially on a perfect tench dawn. But the rake can be worth its weight in gold, not only for clearing the area where you want to fish, but also for stirring up food items from the bottom. It doesn’t seem to worry the tench over much either. After about a dozen throws with the rake I threw in a small ball of loose ground-bait and a couple of handfuls of sweet-corn. Don’t tench love sweet-corn? Well normally they do. For 3 hours the swim fizzed and bubbled and not a fish did I catch. I tried a paste-bait, then bread but still no fish. I had to leave at 8 a.m., and I have to confess I was puzzled by the failure of the bait. Perhaps they wanted something more natural. It brought home to me what I already knew – that going tench fishing with only one or two bait options could be a chancy business. Two mornings later I returned armed with 2 pots of brandlings, half a pint of maggots, a packet of casters and a small quantity of cockles (not the ones that come soaked in vinegar). After 10 minutes raking I cast the tackle, baited with 2 small brandlings. Ten minutes later bubbles started coming up in the swim, and then the float started dithering before slowly disappearing. “Whack!” – Tench! The fish put up a terrific fight on the float tackle even though it weighed only 4.8lbs. In the next hour I had a couple more before it went quiet. I ‘m never scared to give the swim another raking even in the middle of a short session. Out went the rake another half-a-dozen times, and shortly after I began getting bites again. I landed 2 more tench, both between 4 and 5 lbs, and they both fought tremendously. Through the early summer I continued to fish these short early morning sessions, doing no pre-baiting, but always raking & loose feeding regularly. I never found the rumoured monsters though did hook a fish that ran some 50-60 yards before breaking the line just above the hook. From that day hence I stepped up to 7lb line straight through and still the tench kept coming. Mostly they were between 4lbs and 5.8lbs, the best touching 6lbs. But on float tackle you couldn’t ask for better sport. I didn’t try corn again, using either worm, maggot, caster or cockles, and the fish definitely switched their preferences from one to the other, though I could establish no reason as to why they did this. They may well have taken other baits, but I was getting sufficient bites on those mentioned above not to need to change. It did show the importance of having different baits available on the day though. Not only did they switch their preferences from day to day, but sometimes from hour to hour. One thing they definitely didn’t like was a cold wind. Despite the depth of the swim, any cold wind would switch them off completely. I found that when the air temperatures were between 55F & 70F, and the air was fairly still to be the best times of all. The third lake was a slightly different proposition. It was an estate type lake, very old, very shallow with a thick layer of bottom silt. It was quite weedy though not choked, and the water fairly clear. At the time I was only able to fish during the middle part of the day. For a while I struggled to come to terms with it and had put the tench down as typical estate lake fish, early morning or evening feeders. I discovered how to catch them by accident. One day, bored with watching the motionless float on my tench rod I decided to set up a lighter rod and try to catch some of the small and very abundant rudd. I set up a self-cocking quill float on 1.5lbs line, and fished an 18 hook with single maggot. first cast the bait was knobbled before it had sunk a foot. I lifted the rod and swung in a small rudd. I re-cast, the float dipped, and again I struck, but this time into something heavier. It was of course a tench, and during that hot afternoon I had 6 more and lost a mysterious creature which took my float to the other side of the lake before leaving the hook in a weed-bed. I was fishing the lighter tackle side by side right with the other float, which was being fished with 3lb line and maggots on a size 12. That float never moved! I continued to catch tench in this way for quite a few weeks. I did try other methods and baits, and stronger line too, but in the middle of the day I could only get them to take a single maggot, on fine tackle. They weren’t big tench, a 5 pounder being a real specimen for that lake. Mine were all between 3 and 4 pounds, but on light tackle they certainly gave me a few hair-raising moments. In similar daytime conditions on yet another lake, one that was full of potamogeton that you weren’t allowed to drag, I modified this tactic by using slow sinking flake on a self cocking rig. I cast into small gaps in the weeds using loosely mixed crumb as a cloud ground-bait. Though calling for stronger tackle (I used 5lb Maxima straight through) due to the proximity of the weed, this tactic was very successful on that water, the tench feeding confidently in the shelter of the potamogeton and picking the flake off the weed whilst bottom baits were ignored. Bags of up to a dozen tench in an evening were quite common. Then there is the unexplained – when you fish a bait side by side with another angler and he catches all the fish. In the most noticeable instance of this happening to me, the other angler was a she, my ex-wife in fact (no, that wasn’t the reason for the divorce!). We were fishing from a punt at Blenheim Palace, in Oxfordshire. I set up both rods, and baited both hooks with lob-tails (my wife wouldn’t touch the worms). Our tackle and set-ups were identical, and the floats sat side-by-side. I never had a bite all day, while my wife hooked around half-a-dozen beautiful tench. Even changing the float positions made no difference. To add insult to injury on most occasions when her float slid under I had to tell her to strike as she was day-dreaming, staring into space. As I said at the start, I’ve tried to make this a little more interesting than the normal how-to-do-it articles. The baits on which tench can be caught are numerous – in fact I doubt there’s much they won’t eat. Boilies of all sizes and flavours are taken readily, and all kinds of particles such as hemp, tares, maize, sweet-corn and maples to mention but a few. I’ve caught them on freshwater mussel, bread and on all kinds of worms. I know anglers who, at certain times of the year have caught them on tadpoles, and tiny frogs. I would expect to catch the majority of my tench with the bait on the bottom. However, as you have seen, there are occasions when a bait fished off the bottom can succeed, and a bottom bait fail. If weed is present I would prefer to fish near to it, raking a small hole rather than a huge one in which the fish might be reluctant to feed, then fishing near the edge of that hole. On some days you will find the float dipping and moving about the swim. Often the fish are not actually touching your bait, but brushing the line as they up-end and feed on the ground-bait. If your line rises too vertically from the bottom then it’s possible that no matter how hard the tench try, they cannot actually get your bait as in brushing the line with their body, they will cause the bait to move away from them. Some days the original lift method, with one large shot fixed just a few inches from the bait will work very well, bites being signified by the float lifting and toppling over. On other days all you will get are line-bites and it is best to set the float over-depth by about 30 per-cent, and move the shot to 9 inches or so from the hook. The rod should always be placed in 2 rests, and the line then tightened to the float. Minor adjustments to shotting patterns and depth settings can also make a difference, though at times I have to confess to being puzzled as to why. But so often has it happened that a movement of a shot 6 inches up or down the line has brought more bites that it can’t be coincidence. Float fishing for tench is really a simple exercise once you have found the fish and got them feeding. Synonymous with tench feeding are bubbles, what has been referred to as needle bubbles, which describes the tiny streams of pinhead bubbles perfectly. Once you see them you won’t forget them. When fishing the float it really is tremendously exciting to see these streams of tiny bubbles breaking surface and gradually approaching the bait. When this happens, if you have everything else right then mostly a bite is guaranteed.

Dawn is the traditional time for tench, and mostly I wouldn’t argue with that. Tench in the larger gravel pits do seem less conservative about their feeding times and if you tackle them with small baits and hooks you can often catch them through the day. But even on estate lakes where the tench are often rigid in their dawn and dusk feeding routines you can have some sport if you modify your tactics and go to the fish. Tench are terrific fighters. It’s a pity that so many anglers only experience these sleek green fish on carp rods. I urge you to get out your match rod and try to catch them on the float. You won’t regret it.