Steve Ringer
Plot your way to your greatest-ever year with Steve’s month-by-month guide to his favourite tricks…
reveals is 12 best tactical tips for the year ahead - they’ll make you a winner in 2018!
JANUARY COME CLOSER TO THE BANK AND CATCH FASTER
THE closer you fish, the faster you catch. I call this my ‘5m’ line but I often find myself fishing at around 6m-7m, and will plumb up to find a spot just over the nearside slope and on to the flat, deeper water where F1s feed with confidence in clear water. The beauty of this line is that you feed it all day but don’t tend to fish it until the last 90 minutes of the match… when you can double your catch!
The secret to making this line work, though, is the frequency of feeding. F1s are attracted into the swim by bait falling through the water, so kick off by feeding 4-6 maggots – you can up this to as many as 70-80 maggots later if there are loads of silverfish present! I feed by hand, which makes it a lot easier to keep the swim topped up when I’m fishing other lines.
MAY GO HEAVY ON THE HYBRID
ONCE a Hybrid feeder hits the bottom it needs to be heavy enough not to move, otherwise the hookbait gets pulled away from the loose offerings. Feeder size determines the amount of bait you’re putting in and I use either Mini, Small or Large in various weights. When fishing in open water on small lakes, or when I only want to feed a small amount, a Mini in 24g is perfect.
The Small version is a more general-sized feeder for year-round use and comes in 24g and 36g weights. I pick the heavier version for longer casts. A ‘Big Bertha’ Large version, in 28g and 45g weights, allows you to get a lot more feed out and it’s the 45g size that I love for venues such as Boddington, where 90m-plus casts can be required.
FEBRUARY FEED MICROS FOR WINTER SKIMMERS
FEEDING loose micro pellets into deep water can be the kiss of death when you’re fishing for F1s and carp, leading to lots of line bites and foulhooked fish – but for skimmers it can be brilliant! This is a method I picked up while fishing a silver fish match at Hayfield Lakes.
I’d been told that potting 2mm micro pellets worked well for the skimmers, but feeding loose micros into 10ft of water seemed like madness to me. Not catching much on my groundbait and pinkie approach, I decided to give it a go, and two feeds later I had a bite, then another and another. Within 20 minutes I was getting a bite every put-in. I can only think that the micros falling through the water were pulling fish into the swim. Since then this has been an approach I’ve used a lot.
JUNE MUG CARP ON THE MUDLINE WITH MEAT
ONE of the most exciting tactics you can fish at this time of year is what I call ‘mud line’ fishing, where you fish across on snake lakes in literally inches of water, tight to the far-bank mud.
While it might not sound glamorous, it’s actually a very prolific approach and, if you get it right, quite often you can actually see the fish swirling in the shallow water as they take your bait.
It’s vital to find the right depth of water, and ideally you need 8ins-12ins tight against the bare bank in between areas of cover.
Baitwise there’s no better combo than 6mm meat cubes and wetteddown micros – the pellets give off loads of attraction, while the meat gives the fish a decent meal.
MARCH EARLY BREAM – IT’S ALL ABOUT WORMS!
IN COLD, coloured water there is no better bait for pulling bream into a swim than worms!
For a five-hour session I want to be using at least half-a-kilo of small dendrobaenas, and I will kick off by casting out six big cage feeders of my favourite 50/50 mix of Ringers Original Bag Up mix and Ringers Dark.
This is packed with as many very finely-chopped worms as possible, plus a sprinkling of micro pellets, casters and a few dead maggots.
This combination helps me introduce as much scent and attraction into the water as possible, in order to draw the fish to my hookbait.
This is usually two big pieces of hair-rigged worm – the perfect spring feed for bream!
JULY LIGHTER ELASTICS ARE BEST FOR SHALLOW FISHING
WHEN trying to catch big summer weights while fishing shallow, one of the best tricks is to go against the grain and use lighter elastics. This allows you to feed when playing fish and line up the next carp to be caught.
I use White Hydro, which is very soft and extremely forgiving, and when fished on a puller kit I can pretty much land anything on it, everything from a 1lb skimmer to a 10lb carp.
Being initially soft, it has the benefit of allowing me to lift into a fish and then, while the elastic is doing the work, I can feed the swim until the fish slows down and I can start to ship back.
The softness of White Hydro means the fish don’t splash all over the surface, something that can cause other fish in the swim to spook.
APRIL FISH DEEP ON THE WAGGLER
IN THE warmer weather fish start to move around looking for food. This is where searching the layers of the water can pay off. My favourite way of doing this is to fish a deep pellet waggler or, even better, a sinking float.
These ‘floats’ have a removable stopper. Add small shots to fine tune them so they sink slowly through the water column. On the waggler I start with a 5ft hooklength but will come shallower if I get indications.
The slow sinking float/bomb has a shorter 2ft 6inz hooklength. In an ideal world I will catch a few fish early on the waggler and then, if bites slow up, I will make the switch to the slow sinking bomb.
Bites are signified by watching the line where it enters the water or, when the carp are really on the feed, watching the rod-tip.
AUGUST CLEAN UP WITH A WINDOW FEEDER
WINDOW feeders take some beating when you need to get a lot of particles into the swim. They are a vital part of my bream fishing at this time of year, especially when fishing at distance.
The weight on a window feeder is situated at the base so they cast like bullets and can still be fished accurately even at long range.
I tend to use the bigger sizes – they allow me to really attack the swim as they carry a lot of loose offerings.
There are lots of baits you can use in a window feeder, including casters, maggots and micros, but where I gain an edge in my bream fishing is to fill the feeder with chopped worms and give them a covering of groundbait to seal them in.