Roach Reflections

[ItchenRoach]

thanks for the latest videos mark looking forward to the next big roach film.

[Troydog]

Thank you Mark, always a few golden nuggets in each of your videos. Ive had a few breaks on my 3lb Maxima attached to 10ml Reflo and I expect it is because I do keep my rods made up, but I don’t regularly cut off three metres of line. I will do from now on....

[Catfish.017]

I posted my comment above Alistair, before reading your post. But yes it is all fascinating stuff for those like us and, for example, Captain Parker with his underwater telescope!! As we sit here, waiting for the Atlantic low to push the anticyclone out of the way, I wonder what water conditions we will have to deal with in the next month or so?
I’ve recently been engrossed in fishing some high water swims for roach. I use my 11 foot wand with a 10 gram feeder to start the session, usually more or less on the inside, and if I catch a roach or two, its straight onto the sliding float. It can be ten to fifteen feet deep, but if they are feeding on the feeder, they MUST be catchable on the float.
And that is where the intrigue begins, because sometimes I simply can’t catch them!! I’m focussing on swims where I have caught big roach before; I’m adjusting shotting, bulk weight, depth, even float size to try and get it right. Sometimes, even after holding back hard and watching the float like a hawk, I swear that it hasn’t moved, but I reel in two squashed maggots or two shelled casters. Ha! I laugh at myself, shall I change down to an 18 and a single red maggot?
Now Alistair I will give your post above some more thought before replying, but right now I’m off walking downriver with a bag (for litter) and some tools for gardening a few swims ready for the last few weeks.....

When my pal Alan and I targeted the Wye Dace at Glasbury back in the Seventie's, we invariably started on the straight lead. We always felt it was the quickest way to discover if the fish were present in our chosen swim. Our favoured spot was a smooth pacy glide around five foot deep and we usually loose fed maggots. If the lead produced plenty of bites we would switch to the Stickfloat.
More recently our club lake would hold large shoals of Dace in Winter. The lake, around 13 acres, shallow no more than six foot at normal level, is prone to strong undertows when the wind is S/W and this used to throw up some interesting conundrums working out which way the Dace (and Roach in smaller numbers) wanted the bait presented. When I say strong undertows sometimes it is like fishing a river! I could never really work out what influenced the fishes preferences. The pole was the best tool if one could find the fish within that kind of range, enabling the bait to be presented anywhere from dead still through to full tow speed. Waggler fishing involved spaced out shot on the hook link to drag bottom fished over depth. Legering for the Dace only worked with very short tails and lead links and these were proper Dace averaging about seven ounces with plenty of eight to ten ounces. Another trick that used to work on quieter days was to fish at half depth? I wonder if that would work on the Wye?

[Troydog]

Great stuff Catfish.017. Lots to think about on your post. Well I tried the six gram and two gram (tell tale!) approach today and it worked. On the Wye around a radius of five miles from the city centre there are probably two dozens swims that either I or others have caught verified two pound roach. Obviously there are other swims that have yielded these fish that I don’t know about. However, some of these swims crop up in reports /match results year after year. Down a couple of miles below the city I tried the method described after first catching two or three roach on the wand /feeder. After ten minutes I had a 1:10, and then twenty minutes later I had a 1:8.
I know it proves nothing but I will carry on exploring 2, 3 , 4 gram (?) tell tale weights in these big roach swims and see what happens. Lots of water on its way!!
- the 1:10
- the 1:8

[DaceAce]

Not part of my Roach Reflections series but my latest video and roach-related:

[Troydog]

I think that half depth does work on the Wye, Catfish.017, but more especially for me in the late summer and Autumn. I prefer to be near or on the bottom at this time of year, but some local roach men often take good fish in midwater, even now. Others also use the pole very successfully, and there are certain roach swims where the pole and a flat float out scores my 15 foot trotting rod. I haven’t ever used a pole and it’s probably too late too start......

[Catfish.017]

I think that half depth does work on the Wye, Catfish.017, but more especially for me in the late summer and Autumn. I prefer to be near or on the bottom at this time of year, but some local roach men often take good fish in midwater, even now. Others also use the pole very successfully, and there are certain roach swims where the pole and a flat float out scores my 15 foot trotting rod. I haven’t ever used a pole and it’s probably too late too start......

It makes me smile when I read the old books that say the biggest Roach ALWAYS! Feed on the bottom. I've lost count of the good Roach I've caught well off the bottom, particularly on hemp. Tim it's never too late to try something new and I'm sure if you try the pole you will become addicted to it. I certainly did in my match fishing days and for plumbing around mapping a swim it's the absolute guv'nor.

[Troydog]

I hear what you say about the pole Catfish.017 and I watch some of the local roach experts, and the top match men; they undoubtedly perform at a level much higher than I can achieve with a 15 foot float rod and an 11 foot wand, both made incidentally, by a Mr Drennan.
However, I am 71 tomorrow, and it does not feel like the right time to be investing in a whole lot of new kit.
Shazza wouldnt mind one bit if I asked for a grand or so to indulge my hobby, but I wouldn't be able to live with it. I bought a pole fishing book by Bob Nudd and I can see all the advantages. Mark Everard even votes for poles in his major work on roach. I cannot recall DaceAces views on the subject, but I may have just missed it.
Four and a half metres on tonight and its still rising.....

[DaceAce]

I did write a book on pole fishing....

[Troydog]

Thank you Mark, I will research it.....