Improve Your Coarse Fishing (UK)
Bank on bread – Dan White
Widely pigeon-holed as a winter-only bait bread has yearround potential if you tweak the way it’s fed, says Dan Jones who shows how to bag canal silvers on a sliced white
IF BREAD comes into the equation on canals then thoughts of crystal clear water, chilly conditions and a tough few hours ahead come to mind. It is seen as the last resort – the bait that will buy a bite when all else fails – and is pushed to one side when the hike in temperatures begins. But in my eyes, it’s not just a bait that needs to be fished in a negative fashion and it has more than a bit-part to play when the fish really turn on to the feed. At this time of year the biggest change is the amount you feed. In cold conditions a nugget of bread here and there is all you can risk introducing but in spring this can be increased. Put simply, you can easily pile in several loaves of liquidised bread during a session and catch double figures of silverfish. How you use your loaf once it warms up does change a little and the rigs, feeding and overall strategy requires a rethink.
Feeding zone
The most important thing to get right with bread fishing is the liquidised feed. The night before a session I put three or four loaves of Warburtons thick sliced bread through a blender, leaving the crusts on. What comes next is a crucial part of the process – it all goes through a flour sieve. If it didn’t go through a sieve, it would be too food-rich with large particles and could easily overfeed the fish. For the hook, I use Warburtons Toastie Medium as there simply isn’t any better bread out there for the job. It’s soft, yet tacky enough to stay on and doesn’t come off when you strike. Accurate feeding is key in almost every type of pole fishing but when bread fishing on canals you want to do exactly the opposite – spread it everywhere! Aim to feed over a metre square to get the fish moving around the swim to take the loosefeed.
This will ensure the bites are more positive because the fish are moving when they intercept the bait rather than just sitting stationary with it in their mouths. It is important not to squeeze the balls too hard or they won’t break up and create the column of feed you need. The plop from the bread hitting the water is also like a dinner bell, attracting new fish into the swim.
Lines of attack
Bread is often used solely close in, with most anglers aiming to present a rig and bait at the bottom of the nearside boat shelf which is usually around 5m out. But my good friend Tommy Boyce, who has taught me an awful lot about this style of fishing, showed me it is best to fish bread in numerous areas of your swim. “It pays to have lines at the bottom of the near shelf and the bottom of the far shelf. Careful plumbing will help you locate these spots,” explained Tommy. “While I feed nuggets of bread every couple of minutes on the short line, I will cup in every 10 minutes on the long line as it is out of reach by hand,” he added. One area where Tommy and I differ is that I prefer to hedge my bets in favour of skimmers on the long line and add some stunned pinkies and maggots to the feed. You can stun these livebaits by placing them between your hands and rubbing them together, effectively killing them.
Rig presentation
Although I target only two areas of the swim, I always have four rigs set-up. Each one offers a different presentation and rotating between the quartet is often the best way to keep the bites coming throughout the session. The first rig for my 5m line is a 4x14 Richard Lattimer Punch float with a bulk of shot and three small dropper shot below. This is tied to 0.10mm Matrix Pro Micron line with a 0.07mm hooklength and a size 20 Kamasan B511 hook. I also set up a more positive 0.6g float with an olivette and one dropper if the fishing is really good and I want to get the hookbait to the deck quickly. This has a 0.09mm hooklength and slightly bigger size 18 Kamasan B511 hook to help deal with the rigours of fishing at pace. When it comes to the long line the float is lighter as the water is often a little shallower here on my favourite venues. I go with a 4x12 Lattimer Punch float on 0.10mm mainline to an 0.07mm hooklength and a size 20 B511. The final part of the jigsaw on the long line is a rig for laying a bit of line on the bottom for skimmers. It features a 0.3g float with a thicker hollow tip and I fish this 4in-6in overdepth because it helps keep the hookbait still, even if there is a tow or wind. This is important if you want to tempt skimmers into feeding.
Grand time on the canal
I spend a lot of time fishing bread on the Grand Union Canal and the stretch running through the centre of Leighton Buzzard is one of my favourites. It is home to stacks of roach and skimmers which makes it perfect for this style. When the IYCF cameras came to see how we both fished, Tommy and I cupped in a ball of feed long before we both started on the short line and were into small roach and skimmers from the off. Keeping the feed going in was definitely important as whenever we got roped into posing for pictures the swim died briefly. Getting back into the routine soon reinvigorated things and brought the fish back. The short line will have lulls even when you keep the bait going in. This could be down to predators coming in, bankside pressure or even that you’ve caught everything that is there! When this happens, it is time to place a 6mm punch on the hook and ship out to the long line. The float settled and within less than a minute it had buried and a 1lb skimmer was in the bag. This was the start of a busy period for us both and in only three hours each of us had double figures of silvers, Tommy a mix of roach and skimmers whereas I had mainly skimmers. I firmly believe that adding the particles to my feed on the long line has drawn these skimmers in, giving me victory in our side bet for a shiny £1 coin! If either of us had just cupped in tiny nuggets of pure bread on each line then I am convinced we wouldn’t have caught a fraction of what we did. Keep the bread going in at a fast and furious rate and you’ll soon see it is much more than a winter bait.