IF YOU TRY ONE THING

Mark Pollard gets to grips with bream on a rising and coloured Great Ouse

Get on a window feeder! Mark Pollard’s tips for river bream

RAIN is always welcome to the angler in pursuit of river bream. The extra colour and flow it brings to the water spurs the fish into feeding – but it can also throw up a few problems when trying to catch them on standard cage or open-end feeder tactics. The increase in pace can force the contents of the feeder out of the frame well before it has hit bottom, especially in very deep swims of 10ft-plus.

This, in turn, fails to concentrate the fish in the one area where you want them which, after all, is the whole point of the feeder!

Thankfully, one of the more recent innovations in tackle has supplied the solution – the window feeder.

Originally designed to let you get lots of particles such as maggots and casters into deep swims when groundbait wasn’t needed, anglers have begun to use it to solve different problems, and deep rivers with a good flow are one of those.

To illustrate the effectiveness of the window feeder, I’ve come to the River Great Ouse running through Bedford town centre, a deep venue with a bit more flow than usual from recent rain.

Beginning on a cage feeder, it just wasn’t right. Bites were on and off, and I got the impression the bream and skimmers weren’t feeding close enough to the feeder. Changing to a 30g window feeder made a world of difference. Immediately, I knew the contents would get straight to the bottom before emptying, even in 15ft of water.

Another beauty of the window feeder is that you can regulate how many freebies are going in the peg. On some casts, this can be more or less all chopped worm and caster with just a smear of groundbait, on others mostly groundbait and just a few goodies.

To kick off with I’m not a fan of making quick casts to get a bed of bait down. If I know bream live in the area, I’ll begin with a hooklength and bait on the rig and cast every couple of minutes. This way, I can keep an eye out for early bites or indications that’ll tell me if the fish have arrived.

After half-an-hour of quickish casts, I’ll then settle into a more measured routine of waiting five minutes maximum before winding in, giving the bream more time to find the bait.

MAIN FLOW You don’t have to hit the far bank when you’re after bream – it’s much better to cast into the main flow down the middle. On the River Great Ouse this about 15ft deep. SLACKER WATER Although I’ll normally go for the main flow, I’ll sometimes target slower, slacker spots when the river’s running really high.

A window feeder is great for bream in fast, deep swims.

Two groundbaits form the basic mix.