Steve reveals how to catch skimmers faster on the feeder

“On the feeder bites are easy to judge and foul-hooking is rare”

Doug Cartwright, email

ALTHOUGH the pole might initially look like the better method, I believe that the feeder can be much quicker and result in more fish being hooked properly – provided you get everything right to begin with!

Bites on the pole can come at any depth and if the fish are swimming about a lot feeding, liners and foul-hooking are common. You’ll also suffer spells when you’ll miss bite after bite with no amount of tweaking the rig helping. The feeder is different. Bites are easy to judge and foul-hooking rare, and you can land the fish much faster than on the pole.

Get them close in!

The first thing to consider is the distance to fish. It goes without saying that the shorter you fish, the quicker you’ll be once the skimmers arrive. Unless the stamp of fish is bigger further out it’s a false economy to fish long when you can catch the same fish short. I’d be looking to fish anywhere from 6m to 12m out. If in doubt, I’d start at 12m and try and bring the fish closer in as the day progresses. If you start catching well, come closer by a metre at a time and see if the fish follow.

Short rods make it much easier to fish close in. A 10ft soft-actioned rod is perfect. Mainline is 6lb Guru Pulse Pro mono – you can use braid, but it’s really not needed when fishing at such short range. Mono also gives you a better chance of landing any rogue carp that crop up.

Fish a running rig

My set-up for small skimmers close in is simple – it’s a running paternoster using a 2ins Guru Feeder Link with a 4ins boom below that. The hooklength is 0.14mm Pure Fluorocarbon to a size 12 Kaizen hook.

This may seem on the big side but small skimmers feed very aggressively in numbers, so you need a positive approach to catch fast. I use a running paternoster for bite detection, because bites develop better on a running rig than a fixed one.

Length of hooklength will vary, but as a guide 30cm is a good starting point. That said, if I start getting lots of indications and not many bites, I will shorten it further. Little skimmers, in particular, tend to come very close to the feeder, which is why I use a shorter hooklength than normal. It can be as little as 4ins long!

My feeders and bait

For feeder choice, I’ll kick off with a 20g two-hole Guru Slimline Cage and see how things pan out. If I feel that the skimmers want more bait, I’ll switch to a three-hole feeder in the same weight.

If I start to get lot of indications and no bites, and shortening the hooklength doesn’t have the desired effect then I’ll switch to an extra small Guru Window Feeder, again in 20g. The beauty of a little window is that it doesn’t release much bait, so if the skimmers want to eat, the first thing they will see is my hookbait. The window feeder only really releases the bait when the fish is hooked, or you wind in. This helps minimise the indications as there isn’t bait being blown about all over the swim.

On the bait front it’s a pellet-based groundbait on commercials, a 50/50 mix of Ringers Dark and Original Bag Up mixes. To this I’ll add wetted -down 2mm micros and dead maggots. You really don’t

need anything else at this time of the year for skimmers.

Opening shots

How I kick the swim off depends on whether I’m going to start on it or drop on to it later in the day. If I’m going to start short, I’ll put one six-hole Guru Bait Up feeder in with sloppy groundbait and micros and then start fishing straight over the top. If I’m going to kick off for a carp I’ll put four or five Bait Ups in to try and hold a few skimmers while I fish elsewhere.

Skimmer fishing at short range is all about speed, so regular casting is key. If the skimmers are mainly small (3oz to 6oz), I’d look to be casting every 60 seconds. Only if the skimmers were larger, say 1lb-plus, would I consider leaving the feeder in for longer. That’s because you won’t need so many big skimmers to catch a weight.

Another little tip regarding speed is to try an empty feeder. Once you have a lot of skimmers in the swim it’s well worth having a cast with an empty feeder. Not only can this help to prevent you overfeeding, it’s also quicker.

Quite often I’ll get into a rhythm of two casts with bait, one cast without. It’s definitely something that’s worth experimenting with.

What’s a bite?

Last but not least is the issue of hitting bites. You can’t afford to miss loads of bites if you want to catch well. Therefore, when you pick up, you need to know that the fish is on. The best way I’ve found to do this is to fish a very slack tip and wait for a solid, continuous movement before picking up.

When there are a lot of skimmers in your peg, striking at knocks and taps is a recipe for disaster.

Patience is key – waiting that extra second will help to make sure that the fish is on.