The weed issue!

Hi all....with a few days off from rolling bait and at last five minutes time to myself, I thought I'd piece together a little article about some of my tactics I've been employing on one of my new waters. The pool in particular is extremely weedy and has numerous issues that have to be dealt with before one is able to catch from it's tricky depths. I'll go into my main approach tactics and also discuss a few other matters arising which I have come across in the past too.

Ranunculus weed growth

So, how to approach a weed infested pool such as this? Well, it all depends firstly on the kind of weed present. How thick the weed is? The depth of water? Fish present etc etc. My chosen water has Ranunculus growing through out and also the dreaded Elodea as well. Both flourish in the rich water around the small beds of beautiful lily pads that inhabit the water. In all honesty the Ranunculus is fairly easy to cope with as it breaks away from the stem with relative ease. The Elodea is more problematic and can be a real pain in the arse at times.

I watch anglers spending hours upon hours smashing the water to a froth with their heavy leads and markers in a vain attempt to find a small clear spot amongst the weed. This is great when time is on your side or when doing preparatory work at the chosen venue in advance. But if like me your limited to time and investment in a water, then my approach may well be more beneficial to you. My obvious first tip would be to find some fish before you even start....observational skills are something we all have. There is no special requirements, other than that you pay attention to whats happening on, in and around your water. Leave the DVD/TV/Radio at home and get your binoculars and Polaroid glasses out. Location is key to short time success.

Elodea or Canadian Pond Weed

Spend time watching the water before you start. It's absolutely useless getting to your venue with a preconception as to which swim your going to fish before you arrive. The fish may well be half a mile from where you thought they were going to be. Fishing a swim just because it's near the car park is the worst excuse for fishing the crap swims. Get off your backside and make the effort. You made the effort to load the car, buy expensive bait and tackle and travel to your lake, so why then be too lazy to walk to the better swims? Makes sense when you think about it. 5 minutes in the right spot is better than a week in a crap one!

Creep around and take your time about things. The bivvy should be the last thing on the agenda for setting up and getting the rods into the water is surely the more important job. So, we've located a pod of fish. They're in weed, not too thick but thick enough to cause issues with a cast of a straight lead rig and boilie. My approach here is all about concealment and stealth. The fish are in the weed for a couple of reasons. First off it offers them concealment from us and other predators. Secondly, the weed is full of food and thirdly, it also offers high levels of oxygen through photosynthesis during daylight hours. All reasons why you tend to find the fish present in these locations during bright, warm and sunny days. 

I just love weed fishing!

Looking at our tackle, we need to insure that it's man enough to cope with the rigors of pulling a good fish through the weed beds. I suggest using a 3lb+ TC rod and at least 18lb main line to cope with the demands of the fishing. I personally use a braided mainline for my weed work. This is 25lb breaking strain and has a thickness of 10lb mono! It also floats, which I find an aid when fishing in weedy situations. My terminal tackle comprises of a section of  1.5M of weed effect coated leadcore of 35lb b.s from Katrans Mimicker Range. I then put on a safety lead clip to insure I'm able to drop the lead if it becomes entangled in the weeds. Often a fish will come back through weed far easier if there is no lead attached to the rig. It's also important if a break should occur that the fish is able to also jettison the lead.

This is all tallied up to a size 8 swivel and then a short section of around 6-8 inches of Katrans Mimicker Hooklink in 25lb b.s. This I use in a blow back style with a small ring mounted free running on the shank of one of our CBS Saber size 4 hooks. The kit all needs to be strong as it's likely to be put under immense pressure should you hook a carp in said weedy conditions! I've recently become a huge fan of our new Center balance weights too....these insure that as soon as the fish makes contact with the rig and attempts to swim away, its in contact with the whole center weight of the lead almost immediately.

My choice for the occasion!

For the cast I slide a PVA Mesh bag down the hooklink and right over the point of the hook. I do this for two reasons. The first is that during many sessions on a clear water pool some years back, I had the use of a rowing boat to put out my baits in the gin clear water. I chose to do some many hours of investigative work on rig and tackle placement after the cast. This was a real eye opener in many ways. Prior to my doing this I would always just clip on my mesh bags for the cast by nicking the hook point into the mesh bag. All looked great on the cast and I would sit back confident of the small PVA package sat next to my delicately cast boilie and hook.....This couldn't have been further from the truth. What I was able to see after the cast was that on 10 out of 10 casts, the PVA would break away from the hook on impact with the water. Thus leaving the small parcel some considerable distance from my hook bait! The only way to achieve 100% confidence that the rig and PVA bag would end up in the same spot was to pull it down the rig in a stick style.

Bury the hook in the PVA bag or wrap it safely in PVA tape!

The above first method is fine for marginal close in work but when a cast is required then my technique is pretty much full proof. I like to use around 6-8 crumbled boilies in my bags and slide down onto the hook point. As the hook point enters he mesh bag I like to give the hook a few gentle wiggles to insure no pieces of bait have masked the point. I then tie a few turns of PVA tape around the lead system to make sure it doesn't come free on the cast. You can now chuck this pretty much where ever you like with the confidence that it will settle in the weed with a clear hook poin and untangled away from the lead. I then like to scatter a good handful of loose boilies around the area. Not too tightly either. I want to get the fish moving freely through the weed beds looking for their next meal.

Proof it all works! Excellent!

Bear in mind that we are effectively fishing in snags and that you need to be fishing right next to your rods at all times. Takes can be fast, immediate and very powerful. I always fish a tightly set clutch and set myself up so that my rods are at just on arms length where at all possible. When the take occurs it's best to keep the pressure on as much as humanly possible. I've found that 99% of my weed hooked fish have come back fairly easily when in contact with continuous strong pressure in weed.

Well, that's a little about my weed approach. There are many other methods you can employ in weed but I feel this is the most effective I've come across. I'm not an avid fan of chod rigs and I think they are employed far too often just because they do the job, even when there are so many better rig options available to us!

Tight lines all
K x