Barbel fishing and Boilies

[Surrey Martin]

Guys
Why is it that so many are using Boilies for Barbel on traditional rivers like Hants Avon . Spoiled the traditional bait approach I reckon or am I just a bad fisherman !!! ( could be that I am not good ) Just that all fish caught seem to be on Boilie or am I wrong and just paranoid or is it that I don't know one end of a boilie from another and no idea what to buy even if I wanted to.

Thanks

Martin

[Plot36]

If it's trendy then the blame lies fair and square with Izaak Walton who observed that carp were rather partial to boilies (balls of paste and wax dried before a fire). Like you, I assumed boilies were a modern invention until Shaun put me right. I would also dispute that it's an expensive bait - I've been known to make a bag of boilies last over two years . . . casters on the other hand, now there's an expensive bait

[Bumble]

It was over 40 years ago when I believe Fred Wilton, someone will correct me I'm sure, first experimented using boiles as we know them today
So if it is trendy the trend has last sometime, personally I don't use them preferring to use a lump of paste, a boile not boiled,
as I find the leakage better.
I have read many articles of Barbel anglers frying their cubes of luncheon meat to ensure a harder outer skin to the meat making it easing to stay on the hook not that different to a boile really.
To me the issue with them is the quality of the ingredients used if you stay with a recognised company like Shaun's Quest baits
you are guaranteed the best quality.
Bumble

[Shaun Harrison]

Boiling paste baits to toughen them up go back much further than any of the tackle any of us use. Boiled Ragi paste has been catching Mahseer (giant barbel) seemingly forever so it was only a natural thing for carp anglers to eventually start to boil their paste baits in the early 70's to toughen them up a little. The word boilie is only around 40 years old so quite a new thing I guess but these baits have been made and simply referred to as boiled paste (for that is what they are) for much, much longer.

[Olly]

Boilies are easy to get - to put on the hook - to take home those not used - therefore quite cheap in comparison to casters, maggots as they turn, even bread as it goes stale or meat that can go off! OK they have a shelf life - sometimes some length of time!

Some are made from rubbish but many are excellent with high quality ingredients - those work best and for longer (Shaun will confirm that I hope!).

For many it is the simplest way of fishing for carp, barbel, catfish, tench, even roach, rudd & bream! Possibly the cleanest as my hands do stain & pong after a days trotting. Buy a bag of boilies & off you go!

If all are using boilies follow Bumble, use paste, unless you are only going to cast once or twice a day.

[Shaun Harrison]

Some are made from rubbish but many are excellent with high quality ingredients - those work best and for longer (Shaun will confirm that I hope!).

You are very right there Olly but a difficult one for me to comment too much upon without it sounding like I am doing a selling job of my own and slagging that of others. you can eventually read through the lines though when anglers with no connection to companies are seen to be continually catching better than average fish on some. It is those one off captures that don't really prove anything.

I have only made 5 trips for barbel this season and have been fortunate to land 13 barbel up to 14 lb 11 oz including 8 over 10 lb from 4 different stretches. all have been on boilies, mostly with a paste wrap.

Had I fished different baits I would probably have caught more fish and more species but I very much doubt I would have had such a high average size of fish and as I was purposely trying to catch the larger barbel then the boilies which put off the smaller fish are the obvious choice.

Take our fun pin and cane day out of the equation on Bob Brookes's stretch last week where I used just paste and no boilie it would have been 5 trips, 10 barbel with 8 over 10lb.

I guess that also highlights the selectivity of boiled paste. The only small fish I have caught this season have been when I have not used a boilie.

I make no apology for trying to catch the largest fish in the swim when I dangle a line as they are rarely any more difficult than the smallest in the swim. Just a simple case of trying to be selective.

[Dave Burr]

No offence intended Martin but there is an inverted snobbery about boilies and pellets with some saying that they make fishing 'easy' and that you are 'just buying your fish'. It is nonsense.

I've barbel fished a lot over the last twenty years and have used pellets and boilies since the start and way before they were popular. I've also caught barbel on every other bait imaginable - its just another bait. During that period I have seen barbel refuse sweetcorn because its too easily distinguishable and they learn quickly to avoid it, likewise they have grown suspicious of luncheon meat and meatballs due mainly to the size and obvious nature of the bait. I've chopped and changed size, colour and flavour of these baits with some success but with boilies all of this is done for you. I can buy any size, flavour, colour and, to a degree, shape of bait I want which keeps the fish guessing. Bt using small baits (10mm boilies or chopped boilies), I can fish them like a particle bait but without all of the preparation needed with seeds and pulses, and avoid nuisance fish at the same time.

Bait does not make the angler. Shaun and Bob are on the Trent which is fished by many hundreds of anglers, they choose to use a good bait in areas where their watercraft has led them to believe good fish will inhabit and then they catch those big fish. Luck, cheap fish, buying results and poor ethics have absolutely nothing to do with those results.

[Nigel Rainton]

I've never used boilies and I never will. They are banned on my local waters. Can't see the point. I might try Shaun's questrami paste, that sounds yummy :-)

[Shaun Harrison]

I've never used boilies and I never will. They are banned on my local waters. Can't see the point. I might try Shaun's questrami paste, that sounds yummy :-)

One of my local clubs 'The Pride of Derby' has banned maggot's on their Pride Lake. It's a truly mixed world.

[Mark]

I've never used boilies and I never will.

I have never even touched a boilie let alone fished with one and never plan to but that is my choice. I don't consider todays boilie's anything like what Izaak was using back then, but his slugs, worms, gentles, grasshoppers, all insects in general, possibly bread and cheese paste have not changed that much in all those 400 or so years.

Saying that I use so called modern baits like sweetcorn and luncheon meat, at the end of the day it is each to their own and if boilies catch you lots of fish then jolly good luck to you I say.