HOW TO HAIR-RIG A LOBWORM FOR BREAM

Tie a Drennan Pushstop to 3ft of 12lb fluorocarbon and use a knotless knot to tie on the hook, leaving a hair of 2ins. Use a Pushstop needle to thread the stop from end to end through a 2ins length of lobworm hookbait. Grip the Pushstop and carefully remove the needle, leaving the stop in place. Turn it so it holds the bait in place.

go for without worrying about success or failure, since so few readers of Angling Times will have any interest in catching them.

Occasionally I’ll try to convince you that nothing beats casting to truly wild game fish, and that it’s not just a sport for the well-to-do, but for now I will let that hobbyhorse rest.

I need instead to talk about a real working class species – bream.

BREAM

With so much on offer in spring I have tended to neglect these slab-sided beauties, so with a free day at my disposal I set about redressing the balance.

Amazingly, my early morning start was blessed with enough blue in the sky to patch a Dutchman’s trousers, and no wind across either of my two chosen pools. Located as they are in a valley, there was a fair chance the weather would stay perfect all day. Now, I could easily have set up a battery of rods but this was a lovely opportunity to do something different and set up a quivertip rod.

First, though, I needed to grab the shoal’s attention.

I added betaine and Aqua Amino to a fishmeal groundbait at the dampening stage, and once I was happy with the consistency of the mix I left it for 15 minutes, after which I needed to add a little more water. Only then did a sprinkling of Sticky Bloodworm pellets go in to provide a food source.

Half this mix I made into tangerine-size balls and fired them into deep water at 50 yards where the bottom was clean and firm.

Thanks to my use of a marker float every cast would be guaranteed to land in the exact same place as the line came up against the spool clip.

My chosen Acolyte Distance Feeder rod is perfect for bream, and equally good at targeting river chub at distance. I’ve even used it for mullet!

Today I would be punching out a 30g Gripmesh feeder attached to 12lb Syncro XT mono. My simple twisted boom paternoster rig ended in 3ft of 12lb E-S-P Soft Ghost fluorocarbon.

Why go so heavy? When carp are present I refuse to fish in a way that virtually guarantees me being smashed up.

The hook was a size 10, knotless-knotted to create a hair terminating in a Drennan Pushstop. This would carry a section of lobworm, and I added a few pieces of this potent bait to the feeder just before casting.

A quivertip holds my attention far better than a set of buzzers, and when the first line bite came an hour into the session I was ready for it. Dustbin lid-shaped fish with their heads covered in spawning tubercles were bound to catch the line, and the tip twanged several times in response.

It was time to sit on my hands until the right moment to strike, which came 15 minutes later as the reel handle churned and the first big bream of the day made a break for it.

Great fun… the only problem being, how do I find the time to do it again this spring when the diary is already full to bursting point?