OUR MAN ON THE BANK
Hopefully, I can catch chub before we are denied rivers at their best
I HOPE and pray that this incessant rain will stop so I can get on a half-decent river for the last few days and fish for chub.
I don’t like fishing rivers in high flood, but that’s the state they’ve been for most of this winter. But, looking at the levels and the forecast, I can possibly get on a couple of my favourite little rivers before the season’s end – fingers crossed!
Chub can be very easy to catch at this time of year, and it always grieves me to see bluebells, daffodils and snowdrops coming into bloom, water levels dropping and the fish at their biggest and best, only for the season to end. It’s a silly rule, in my opinion, but that’s a topic for another day.
For my last-chuck chubbing I favour simple leger tactics with breadflake or crust and, of course, cheesepaste.
I will walk away from the car about six pegs and bait up with a couple of handfuls of mashed bread and a couple of bait-sized pieces of cheesepaste.
Then I’ll start fishing the pegs back to the car, but each time I move I’ll bait a couple of those pegs for the second, third and fourth time before I put a baited hook in there.
There is always a favourite peg for me – usually it’s the one that stands the chance of me landing the biggest chub of the day, so I’ll give that the most bait and leave that one till last before I head back to the car.
If allowed, I always like to fish a few hours into dark, in fact if I’m away from home I’ll happily fish on till midnight.
What I do is have a bite to eat in a local pub, then go back to the swim and fish well into dark. Very often, around dusk can be a bit of a le
