The biggest of a cracking morning – 14lb 2oz

With the start of the ‘traditional’ coarse fishing season almost upon us I thought I would mention something I picked up whilst fishing a big pit some years ago.

The venue I was fishing was the best part of 200 acres and had a very low fish population (both bream and carp). Because of the low stocking levels the bream were all large fish (nearly all over 10lb) and the fishing was obviously difficult. But this sort of venue suits me down to the ground, as they get very little angling pressure with most anglers giving up quite quickly, which leads to some very quiet unspoilt fishing.

For the first couple of months I took the traditional route (for bream) of baiting up fairly consistently/heavily with ground bait / corn/ maggots etc. I did catch a couple of big bream this way (including what was then a lake record of 12lb 2oz), but I wasn’t really happy with my results.

Because of the relatively low stocking levels the bream didn’t go around in big shoals (has they do when there are lots of smaller bream in a lake), so I had a feeling that by feeding the ‘stodgy’ type cereal / crumb ground baits, I could be filling the fish up too quickly and therefore not getting the best results whilst fishing.

Over the next couple of seasons I used a much different baiting approach for the few sessions I managed, and the results were much better. I stopped using the ground bait altogether. This was replaced by a mixture of small trout pellets / CSL pellets and a small amount of sweet corn and maize. The pellets would have different dissolve rates (similar to the Quest mixed pellet range) and would leave a nice scent trail in the silt, along with little bits and pieces, which would keep the bream grubbing about in the swim, but would hopefully not overfeed them. This could then be lightly topped up after every fish. I then fished a piece of real maize (soaked and cooked in CSL liquid) combined with a piece of plastic corn This change in method brought me some success, with one particular stand out morning which produced bream of 10lb 2oz, 11lb 15oz, 12lb 14oz and 14lb 2oz.

So if you fancy a go for some big bream at the start of the season be prepared to try something a little different to the norm.

Cheers, Pat Gillett

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