Can you give me some advice on how to rake weed out of a swim before fishing?

Drew Withers, email

For fishing the float, create a narrow channel in the weed about 4ft or 5ft wide and have it running as far out into the lake as you can manage. For fishing the feeder at any range it becomes trickier, but there are small casting rakes which you can use with a spod rod and braid. These weigh about 60g and cast really well, allowing you to drag a fair bit of weed out at a reasonable distance. Again, don’t make the cleared area too wide though. Darryn

Stolworthy

AF YOU want a simple answer to this question, then I’d say that a big pot is for ‘dump potting’, as in putting in a decent hit of bait and then sitting and waiting, whereas a small pot, or ‘kinder pot’, is more suited to a littleand-often feeding approach.

Both definitely have their day, often relative to the time of year and amount of bait you want to put in, but that’s not to say that either way of feeding won’t work, even on days when it seems unlikely! All I can do is tell you how I like to use both.

There are two situations where I will use a big pole cup and the first, as already mentioned, is for ‘dump potting’. This involves using large amounts of bait to keep the fish on the deck and is better suited to the summer months than it is right now.

When dump potting, I feed baits like corn, or dead maggots and groundbait in the margins, where I know I need to be positive to pull fish into the peg.

The second way I use a big pot is to try and slow everything down or fish for one bite at a time. This will normally involve feeding six grains of corn and a few pellets and then nailing my rig on top and waiting for a bite. You aren’t trying to attract loads of fish into the swim, just one that you will hopefully catch.

Another advantage of this is that I get fewer line bites and foul-hooked fish as a result, which is the main reason why I prefer this approach, as false indications and fish hooked anywhere but the mouth is a disaster in early spring, when every bite needs to count.

I tend to use a small pot on the pole tip when I’m trying to pull fish into the peg. Using one fitted with a sprinkle lid means you can drip bait over your float in small amounts, which is a great way of attracting a bite or