Rig of the month

The German rig

THE German rig has proved hugely effective across Europe but has become increasingly popular in this country over the last few years.

It is designed for fishing bottom baits or wafters over clean lakebeds and can be used on either safety clips or helicopter set- ups.

With swivels and beads attached to the hook, the rig may look complicated but it’s actually incredibly simple to tie as there is no need for shrink tubing or peeling back of any coating as required by the majority of modern rigs.

The first thing you’ll notice is that the hookbait is attached to a small hook swivel as opposed to being threaded on to a hair. The swivel enables the bait to slide effortlessly up the shank of the hook which makes it hard for the carp to eject the hook.

If you hold the hookbait and move it around, you’ll notice that the hook hangs below no matter where the hookbait goes, perfect for nailing carp in the bottom lip! It also means that there is no need to worry about your hair tangling around the hook on the cast.

It works best with a curved shank pattern of hook in a larger size from 6 upwards. These style of hooks are excellent at flipping over and grabbing hold when the rig is picked up, and, due to their claw- like shape, they tend to stay in place during the fight.

In terms of the hooklink material, the rig can be tied with any semi- stiff coated braid, monofilament or even soft fluorocarbon. Because there is no supple area directly behind the hook, the hooklink never folds back on itself and stays in the carp’s mouth until the hook grabs hold.

It doesn’t just have to be fished over a bed of boilies because, if you mount a 10mm pop- up on the swivel and use a size 4 hook to weigh the bait down, you have great presentation for fishing over particles or a PVA bag of pellets.

“Because there is no supple area behind the hook, it stays in the carp’s mouth until it grabs hold”

Attach the hookbait by threading it on to a doubled up piece of fluorocarbon and blobbing with a lighter Don’t remove any of the braid’s outer coating, which keeps the stiffness directly behind the hook The swivel is held in place on the hook with a small rubber rig stop positioned opposite the barb