Some things to sort out from parts off tool not quite going together as expected, and fit and finish issues here and there but considering I had to redesign a load of parts that were already off tool, and also design some new one due to some 'late packaging changes', the outcome thus far has been better than expected.
Family stuff as always occupied much of my weekend, but then why wouldn't it, however some down time is nice. Cooking is my thing especially with a glass of red in hand where one of the highlights was the Turkish Lahmacuns with homemade flatbreads, very nice they were too, with the distinctive flavours of lamb, parsley, aleppo pepper and copious amounts of lemon.
Anyway I WONDERED when you would want to know how to go about catching bream. These fish can be as aggravating as the carp in its most tantalizing mood. When fishing for bream you can expect first class sport or absolute disappointment. They either feed all out or go on a hunger strike.
There are two kinds of bream silver and bronze. You will catch silver bream but I should say you would be angling for bronze. There are no big silver bream! To what weight does the bream grow? The biggest ever recorded in the UK is one weighing 22 lb. 11 oz. If you catch a four pounder you can be pleased with yourself, though six pounders aren't all that rare. Of course there are the occasional eight or ten pounders, and if you take one of them it will be an opportunity for the glass case and gold lettering. I'm still waiting!
A canal fish, well 4lb and 3 ounces is the best I can muster up thus far.4lb and 3 ounces is the best I can muster up thus far.
Very doleful they look! The picture is Tomorrow will be Friday and we've caught no fish today.
Carp and bream were the monks' fish on Friday which was, as you know, a meatless day. I used to think to myself that they must have had a few hungry Fridays. And so they would, if they'd had to depend upon a good catch of bream or carp every Thursday! But the monks were as artful as the fish. They were always fishing and kept the fish alive in special small ponds stew ponds from which they could net them when needed. And they stuffed them with herbs, baked them in butter and wine. I wonder if they had bilious attacks?
I'll begin telling you about bream with a piece of sound advice.
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| Really ? literally where the public footpath turns 90 degrees, I despair |
If there is any wind from the east in the air, angle for some other fish. I have never caught any bream when there has been an east wind in evidence.
Further, I have found that winter fishing for bream is useless. Bream don't like the cold, and I can't say I blame them. Summer is the time for bream, but I will qualify that by telling you that they dislike hot sun. Before the sun gets too high in the sky and when it begins to drop in the west - those are your times. Mark you, when on a summer day there is a soft south or west wind ruffling the water, and a little cloud in the sky that is very different!
Oh yes, you want to know about tackle. Line? Breaking-strain 3 lb minimum., use a small waggler Hook? A number 12 should suit. If you find a school of really big bream change over to a number 8. I'm all against VERY heavy tackle. After all, we aren't angling for sharks! Bait? Paste, worm, maggot. Ground bait? Bran and bread or cloud
There, now we know what we need.
Yet we must know a little more about the bream before we set off after him. He can be a very contrary chap when he likes which is far too often for any but a keen angler. We have agreed that he is a summer fish, so we know the time of year when we are most likely to catch him. But where? In rivers and in the still waters of lakes, ponds and canals. But bream rivers are generally slow running, with muddy bottoms, and away from the main flow there must be deep 'holes', the deeper the better, for in those holes the big ones will be found. Both in rivers and ponds there must be weed if we are to find good bream.
Then, for no apparent reason though some anglers believe it is preparatory to feeding the water will become alive with bream rolling about all over the surface. Maybe they are just playing for I can't believe that they are preparing to feed. I've tried all the tricks I know to tempt them with various baits at varying depths, with the odd scrap of success.
Bream travel about in schools. If you can 'get into' those schools you are in for really fast and furious sport. To do so depends on the way you use your ground bait. We will return to that matter in a few minutes. Keep an eye open for the school travelling on the bottom.
We can spot this school by the bubble trails it makes. As the school travels, the fish are poking about in the bottom mud with their noses, which makes the bubbles rise to the surface. You may have sport with this kind of school. Cast your bait in front of it. As the fish are sucking up insect life, offer them a worm. I suggest the tail of a lob. So far so good.
I now suggest that unless you know the water you are to fish, you get to know an expert angler who does, and who will point out the best places to you (not good asking me). It is essential that you should know the holes both in the rivers and still water. You must know where to do your ground baiting.
While bream travel around in schools, they invariably return to the hole or swim. You must find two or three holes, ground bait them and stick to them. There isn't much point in wandering all over the water. You'll probably miss the schools. Use groundbait wisely and bring the bream to you. We are getting along nicely, but just one word more about your needs. For a day's fishing I don't think 10 lb. of ground bait would be too much. You will have two or three holes or swims to feed. And one more thing: don't have your shot closer than 18 in. from your hook. Now we are all set.
You have chosen the water and you have taken the depth. Remember that the bream is a bottom feeder. I believe that it is better to fish just off the bottom a mere inch or two. It is rather a tricky job to adjust the float correctly, but I feel it is worth it. The bream is a 'deep' fish, so while his belly is on the bottom, his nose is a few inches above.
But you should try both fishing right on the bottom and an inch or two above, and learn by trial and error. If you are fishing the river holes, I suggest you try first with bread or maggot, but if there has been rain and the river has risen, then the tail of a lob is the bait. (You may well pick up a good chub or perch with the lob tail, too.)
You begin to fish, and you are lucky. You have tempted a fish. But, oh dear, what a miserable little twitch the float gave! And that is the way of the bream. He is far more hesitant than the carp.
He will mess about, and then just when you are fed up away the float will go. Then you strike. Now and again you will find that, as with the carp, your float will be 'lifted' or flattened.
Of course, there will be no preliminary twitches and such like dithering. Your float will dive as if a whacking great perch had taken your bait. Keep your eyes open and keep your hand ready to strike.
I think you have all that I can tell you about bream and if you have just that bit of luck to help you to find a shoal on the feed, you will have sport, but don't be too disappointed if the day is blank.
I'm sorry to tell you this, but it is no good pretending that the bream is anything like a fighter unless you happen to hook a good one in a river hole and he gets out into the current; then you may think you've hooked a submarine!
Anyway looking back over coarse angling over the years, and thinking about bream, I can see a great deal of difference in the attitude to coarse fishing. Nowadays we take fish and we put them back for another day. But in the days before the war when there were so many people without work, fish were not so often returned. This is not a fisherman's story, but I was told by my Dad as many as twenty bream, weighing over 70 lb. altogether, being taken by one fisherman he knew and not one of those fish was returned! They were all for the pot. And that angler wasn't the only one.
However, what I want you to understand is not only the different attitude of the angler of today, but the sport which bream can give when on the feed. Twenty fish weighing more than 70lb. altogether was not a particularly out-of-the way catch then, nor is it today. You will have blank days. What angler does not ? Yet there will be those days when the bream will give sport you will remember as long as you live.
Just look a this memorable session from Nic from Avon Angling up at bream bay prior to an invite to a marina to fish where this was a taster for what was to come. Bream soup !! Bites are good, bream are good, what's not to like. Well maybe the smell of the garage afterwards from the keepnet or landing net.
Anyway to the fishing, I was back to the area I caught my PB from because I've had others that were not far off that weight too over the years. I decided to fish the method I've been trying of late which is fish a small buoyant waggler that can be fished overdepth with a SSG anchoring the shot on the bottom, and a large piece of bread on the hook. It's more sensitive than the Generation Z'ers, and boy (insert one of the other 71 genders (apparently) they are sensitive, there is no denying that !!
The reason why I like it is because it just seems to work rather well for the roach and the roach bream hybrids as well as the bream, any interest whatsoever is registered on the float and you don't need the reactions of a fighter jet pilot to strike at a light bite. Obviously I'd have a Zander bait out as well, because there are a few knocking about here.
I arrived just as a boat was headed up the track but luckily the lock paddles were already open meaning that the disturbance would be minimal once the boat had churned up the water. It soon settled down thankfully so I could get the baits out.
The bites were slow to come by to honest and the bigger bream didn't show this evening. But one schoolie Zander on the roach deadbait and also some nice roach bream hybrids succumbed to the overdepth pellet waggler set-up.
The key is to fish as many swims as you can because after dropping the bread in, feed some bread slop it's surprising just how quickly you get a bite if a fish is there. Bread seems a very selective bait as well and it's my preference over maggots if I'm to bag a large roach that may slip up using this technique.
Still a few fish caught but overall very quiet indeed. The heavy rain ended the session but an enjoyable few hours I must admit. Now I need to give a recently dredged (5-6 mths or so) area a go sometime because I'm sure the extra depth might hold some nice fish. It's also where I bagged a 9lb Zander many moons ago so it would be nice to see if there are any hanging around. The problem is it's a popular mooring stretch and I'd be fishing the winding hole, so being early or late is a necessity.
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