Roach are a common culprit, as are the subject of this weeks column, chub

This can happen with all fish, but it’s more likely with some fish than others. Roach are a common culprit, as are the subject of this weeks column, chub. While chub will feed in almost all conditions, hooking them can be a real nightmare. The stimulus for this article came from a recent session on the River Ivel. Our first visit to the river, but with a good head of chub present we were fairly confident of some action. My buddy and I certainly got some action. A total of seven bites during the morning, ranging from almost imperceivable mouthing of the bait to decent pulls. Now, I haven’t fished a river for a little while and the lack of practice was showing as we managed to miss every bite. What should have been a nice morning on the river was turned into a disappointment. If only we had followed our own advice! The trouble with chub is that even when feeding confidently they will pick a bait up in the extremities of their mouth and then move off with it before taking it back to the pharyngeal teeth. When the rod is left in the rest this gives rise to a good pull followed by a strike into thin air. The trouble is that either the chub ejects the bait when it feels the tension of the line tethering it, or the strike pulls the bait from the fishes mouth. There are several ways of increasing your chances of hooking chub. The first is to upstream ledger. By balancing the lead, so that there is just enough weight to hold bottom, when the chub picks up the bait it can move off with very little resistance and the tension in the line decreases as the fish moves downstream. Alternatively, the same effect can be achieved when fishing across the river using the bow method. By having the rod tip pointing downstream, a bow of line forms between rod tip and lead. When the chub moves off it is again fed slack line.

When fishing downstream things become a little more difficult, but still there are answers. For longer session I dispense with watching the rod tip and instead use a bobbin which only just balances the flow. By fishing with a two foot drop, the essential slack is once again given to the chub. For shorter sessions I prefer to hold the rod and touch ledger. When using this method, I tend to hold the rod so that the tip is pointing up at about 45 degrees. On first feeling a bite develop I drop the tip so that it is pointing directly at the bait, once again giving a small amount of slack. With all these methods I allow the fish a couple of seconds before striking. This is generally enough to allow the chub to take the bait further back in its mouth, but it is worth trying to experiment with the amount of slack and time you wait as the moods of the fish change.