Like most people, my time on the bank is severely restricted by work and other hobbies. I’ve found that by prebaiting a swim and then maximizing my time by fishing early morning or late evening I can boost my catch rate considerably.

Identifying your aim in prebaiting plays a major role in deciding how to go about your campaign. Other variables to be considered include the type of water, the stocking density, the different species present, the angling pressure on the water and, of course, the species of fish you’re targeting.

The main aim of prebaiting is to get the fish feeding confidently enough to take your hookbait. There are many ways to do this e.g. by feeding your chosen bait on a regular basis or by feeding a certain swim with bait in order to encourage the fish to return to the same spot time and time again.
I try to develop a combination of feeding a small number of spots using both the bait I intend to use as a hookbait and some other background feed.

The main reason for using a background feed is to help keep the cost of prebaiting down. Background feeds include groundbait, trout pellets, hemp, groats, carp/hemp/CSL pellets etc.

My prebaiting campaigns can be split into two categories, short-term and long-term. Most of my short-term prebaiting has been for the more general coarse fish such as tench and bream. My longer-term prebaiting has been for carp. In the season when I kept up a steady supply of bait, it proved an absolute success from my very first session.

Another factor that needs considering is that the prebaiting that I detail in this article was concerned with fishing close in on spots that were easy to bait by hand or catapult, even with light particle baits. I’m sure that the principles can be applied to longer range fishing especially where you are prebaiting with boilies or have the use of a boat, good spod rod or bait boat.

There are some pitfalls that need to be considered before you decide to undertake a course of prebaiting. Most anglers don’t take too kindly to others throwing in large amounts of bait when they’re not fishing. It pays to be discreet as this normally keeps the locals happy and prevents them from taking advantage of your hard work! A good trick is to bait up heavily over the spot you’re fishing just before you pack up. Another problem is that it is often difficult to get to prebait the spot you want as i s being fished. Often, you need to be the first or last person on a water so that you can introduce bait into your desired spots.

SHORT-TERM PREBAITING

I would class my short-term prebaiting as anything from two weeks before I commence fishing to just a few hours before I fish. If I’m starting to fish with a new boilie, or starting on a new water or one I haven’t fished for a while, then I like to introduce a few samples of my intended hookbait in likely looking spots just to give the fish a taster. This is a tactic I adopt frequently when using particles. I like to introduce a pound of particles three times in the week prior to fishing. I feel that the fish will then be familiar with the situation when they then come across my bed of particles and will therefore feed more confidently.

I have had particular success using this method with black-eyed beans for both carp and tench.

When I was younger, I used to bait up two swims in a morning on my local water after I had finished my paper round. After two weeks, I fished one of the swims capturing eight tench in a morning session - a comparative success in contrast to my usual results.

If I intend to fish a few sessions in winter, then I always like to introduce a small amount of boilies over a couple of weeks just to get the carp looking for food.

Most of my prebaiting has been done for carp, but when I’ve applied the short-term prebaiting principle to other coarse fish I’ve also had some success. When fishing on the Lancaster Canal I raked a weedy swim and baited it with a 1kg bag of groundbait and a pint of squatts. When I fished it the following morning, within 10 minutes of fishing I landed an old looking bream of 4lb-plus from a stretch that rarely produced bream.

The groundbaiting had obviously drawn the fish in, and they’d cleared the bait but had stayed in the area looking for more food. The same thing applies to fishing for tench. Raking the swim and baiting it the day before fishing draws fish in and you will often find that the fish have mopped up all the bait but stay in the area looking for more.

The number one bait to use has got to be hemp. If you prebait the swim with hemp, then the fish will keep coming back to the spot time and time again until every single grain of the tiny seed has been eaten. Hemp effectively draws in most types of coarse fish. When I’ve baited heavily with hemp I’ve noticed that the true impact only occurs two or three days later.

I was fishing one particular spot on a gravel bar close to some rushes. I was only fishing for 24hrs, but I introduced half a bucket of hemp. I had two dropped runs during the night and several line bites. Despite my lack of success, the owner, who had been present when I introduced the hemp, reported that the spot produced some fantastic captures of all species in the following week. So if you prebait with hemp, it’s worth considering fishing the spot a few days later (or for a few days if you can sit and wait). If you’re fishing sooner you must be careful about the amount of hemp you introduce to prevent total preoccupation. It often pays to lace your bucket of hemp liberally with your intended hookbait. Hemp is also quite cheap, especially if you buy it in bulk, an important consideration for lengthy baiting campaigns.

A tactic that can be applied equally well to rivers and lakes is to bait up several swims on your arrival at the water. This is a good method where you don’t have the time or money to properly prebait. What I normally do is fill a bait bucket with two-thirds trout pellets and one-third hemp. I then add a small amount of pre-soaked black-eyed beans. They’re a very visual bait, especially against the dark pellets and hemp, and they also rest on top of any silt deposits. I then walk around the lake and put four or five large handfuls of bait in likely looking spots.

When you come to fish the swim a few hours later the fish often betray themselves by sending up bubbles as they feed on the bait.

In fact, I like to use this method to fish spots that I’ve always fancied trying but have never bothered with. Often you look at small spots under bushes or you fancy small corners that are never fished, but you never get round to fishing them as you always plump for the ‘banker’ swims.

I started on one lake by introducing bait into four small areas around the lake and then fished each one in rotation. By fishing each swim for a couple of hours, by the time I’d reached the third swim, a small corner which had never been fished, there appeared to be no signs of fish. However, within the next half hour I landed three carp all around 8lb in weight. The fish had obviously had time to feed on the bait without being disturbed or have line hanging over their heads. That day I float fished close in using hair-rigged luncheon meat, a bait that seems to be picked up confidently over my prebaited area as long as it not been ‘hammered’. (Where ‘old favourites’ like meat, sweetcorn and bread are being overlooked it often pays to use these highly effective baits).

This method of introducing bait into a swim and then fishing it a few hours later led to my catching my biggest fish from the lake in question. This method can be applied successfully to rivers where you can walk several miles baiting fishy looking areas and then work you way back home, giving each spot a go until you return to your starting place with hopefully a few fish under your belt.

One of the simplest ways of prebaiting is to purchase a large bag of groundbait and simply introduce this into a swim for several weeks. It can be improved by the addition of a small amount of your intended hookbait. If you can discretely introduce groundbait into a swim that won’t be fished or only lightly

Fished, then the fish will become accustomed to visiting the area for the regular supply of ‘safe’ food.

LONG-TERM PREBAITING

If you’re about to embark on a long-term baiting campaign, then you need to be committed to your task. To ensure that my baiting goes to plan and I don’t waiver too much from the task in hand, I have a wall planner on which I write down when I’ve baited up so I can see if I’ve started slacking!

I’m lucky in that the water I often prebait is just five minutes from home. If you’re to make the prebaiting work, you need to have good access to the water. To make things easier, it would be better to bait a water close to your home or one on a route that you take regularly, e.g. a water that you pass on the way to work. Or failing that, just fish the water all the time; at least then you’ll be there to introduce bait regularly! Once you’ve got into a baiting routine the quick trip to the water becomes part of your day/week, and it also gives you the chance to keep in touch with what’s going on or do some fish spotting.

Getting up just 15 minutes earlier could give you enough time to bait up and dramatically improve your catch rate.

All my long-term prebaiting has been in pursuit of carp. I like to start in January when the water is only lightly fished. I make it my New Year’s resolution to keep up with my prebaiting and then catch the lake’s biggest fish. I generally succeed with the first part of the resolution, but fail miserably with the second!

I bait up the known fish holding areas. Despite the weather being cold and the fish feeding less, I always feel confident that my bait will be eaten. I always start with a smaller amount of bait and then build up. As there is less bait going into the water during winter, I feel that my bait has a good chance of being eaten. You can start prebaiting at anytime of the year, but I feel that the longer it is before you start fishing the spot the better your results will be.

This is another reason for starting prebaiting in winter. Not only will I not fish the swim (it’s too cold to venture out!), but others probably won’t fish it either.

The best times to introduce bait are at dusk and dawn, especially where wildfowl are a problem. If you bait up in the half-light you can often avoid the birds diving and devouring all the boilies before the fish discover them. Getting to a water early can mean you avoid the first anglers of the day and can prepare your spots in secret. However, I was unaware that whilst on one of my prebaiting trips I was spied on by some guy in camo gear! When I started fishing the water seriously a few months later the guy came round and introduced himself and told me he had spotted what I was up to.

Introducing bait into several spots will mean the fish will become accustomed to finding bait all over the water. I like to bait a combination of known fish holding areas, so fish will definitely be finding the bait, and areas that are quiet and unfished. Prebaiting an unfished area takes some confidence. These areas are often ignored because they don’t produce fish! To bait an area that is believed by others to be devoid of fish takes willpower but can provide good rewards.

The advantages of baiting quiet unfished areas (if they exist on your water) are that the fish can learn to feed confidently on the bait without disturbance or fearing capture, and you can often bait these areas more discretely or without upsetting other anglers. And the more confident the fish are feeding, the more likely you are to catch them. It also means that you can nearly always get onto your chosen prebaited swim when you want to. You know when you’ve finally cracked it when people start fishing your chosen swim because your results have become too much for them to ignore any longer. Unfortunately, it then means you have to start all over again and develop a new area.

If you stick at baiting an area that normally doesn’t produce, you may find that you’ll end up producing an artificial hotspot. On my local water, I chose an unfancied swim and baited it once a week with around 50 boilies from January until March. When I started fishing, I continued to introduce bait. The fish had obviously discovered the food source, and I found that they’d started to visit the area looking for their free meal. I caught consistently from the unfancied swim. I no longer introduce bait into that area, so has the artificial hot spot died?How much bait should be introduced? If you’re part of a baiting team, sponsored, or cost is not a problem then introduce as much as possible. However, please make sure that all your bait is being eaten and not causing detriment to the water. I only fish for a small number of carp in a relatively small water, so I don’t need as much bait as would be required on a large water or one with a number of large carp. Also, don’t forget that other species will be eating your bait. If the water has a big head of tench or bream, they could be eating the majority of your bait. However, I feel that a regular supply, no matter how small, has its benefits. If you’re restricted to only a small amount of bait, then concentrate on a small part of your water so that the fish get used to feeding on a regular supply of your chosen bait and keep visiting your specific area.

In Julian Cundiff’s book ‘Practical Carp Fishing’ he recommends as a general guide:

For 50 carp in a lake 4lb of bait three time a week, for 100 carp 6lb of bait and 10lb of bait for 200 carp.

That is a very expensive outlay, but cost and effort equal results. However, I’m still prepared to say that even a small amount of bait will help improve your results. If you use the levels recommended above, then as long as you’re using a good bait, your results should reflect your efforts. If nobody else is introducing large amounts of bait, you should be able to take the water apart.If you are undertaking a long-term baiting campaign, then you must use a good quality bait. Don’t start using a bait you’re unsure about. Use the well-proven mixes such as Nash S-Mix, Nutrabaits Big Fish Mix or one of the highly successful Mainline baits. You’ll find that the long-term success of a bait can be improved by using low-level flavours. The bait should become a food source for the fish and so initial attraction via high flavour levels are unnecessary.

The Hinge Rig

Snake Bite Rig

Critically Balanced Rig

The Snowman Rig

Nail
Rig

PopupRigOnMud

‘Hinged, Pop-up, Stiff rig’

Pop-Up Rig

Helikopter-Rig

Amnesia D-rig

Scorpio-rig

The Lay-on Rig

Gravel Rigs

Roughorshallow Rig

Shocker Rig

Silt-rig

Wonderlijn

Bait Bag

When Steve Slater of Innovate Baits agreed for us to undertake a review of their boilie range, I was over the moon as I could wait to get my hands on their “365″ range of steamed HNV boilies.

As part of the package we received, we were sent the following products to test and review:

• “Apocalypse” (fishmeal)
• “The Fix” (spicy fishmeal)
• “Squid2T”
• Apocalypse Glug

Upon opening the boilies, you could immediately see the difference between the steamies and ordinary boilies. The steamed boilies were a lot softer and appeared to carry more texture and aroma.

You could almost sense that these boilies were going to be something a bit special !

These baits were tested at Culcreuch Castle Loch. The weather was brightening up as the last of the torrential rain passed leaving us optimistic that the carp would come up in the water.

First on the hook was “The Apocalypse” which smelt fantastic. As well as the hookbait, we added a couple to a bag and added some bait dip for extra attraction hoping that the smell of the matched glug would send the carp into a feeding frenzy.

On the second rod, we used a single “The Fix” boilie on a hair rig. These boilies look superb.

They are spicy in flavour and you can see the niger seed within the mix which overtime would breakdown and act as particle feed enhancing the attraction to any passing carp.

This rod was cast to a margin which had seen some surfacing carp.

Over an hour went past and we had received no activity and with a huge cloud overhanging the lake looking ready to burst, we decided to call it a day.

However in order to give the bait (and ourselves !) more time , we will conclude this review in Part 2 (Scheduled for one week’s time) so please check back shortly.

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Their presence within the Carping fraternity is well-known and the bait range they offer caters for all types of carp fishing.

SBS Baits have over 30 years of experience in the bait industry and their reputation has been earned by providing quality products to anglers all over the world. From their office in Kidderminster, Worcestershire, they produce a huge range of products such as boilies, base mixes, attractants, glugs, dips and pellets.

For the record, we have not been paid to write this review and it is our honest opinion based on the service received, quality of bait on arrival and the results achieved on the bank. As you will see below, we have put each product through its paces and here are our findings.

Our bait arrived within two days of ordering and was well packaged.

The service received from Des Taylor of SBS was simply excellent.

In order to get a good all-round feel for their products, we ordered the following:

• Monument M1 6mm Pellet 1kg
• Monument M1 Long Life Boilies 1kg Bag
• Monument M1 Bait Dip 250ml
• Monument M1 Paste

The chosen venue for the review was Culcreuch Castle Loch (A.K.A Fintry) which is a water set in the grounds of a sixteenth century castle which now run as a hotel and is based in Fintry, Stirlingshire.

The chosen swim was the lochside car park swim which allows easy casting to margins and lillies.

The first item put to the test was the Monument M1 boilies and Monument M1 Bait Dip.

Upon opening the glug, the aroma reminded me of a mixture of Bacon and Tomato Ketchup ! The texture of this stuff is seriously thick and will stick to anything…simply excellent !

For maximum impact, we added a PVA bag of Monument M1 pellet which was again soaked in the bait dip…

The initial cast was placed straight in front just off the lillies to the right hand side.

The second rod was prepared making good use of the paste. The paste was used as a boilie wrap and was presented on a single boilie hair rig.

The paste supplied is the same paste used to produce Monument M1 boilies…the only difference is it hasn’t been boiled !

This makes it an excellent addition to the boilies as it breaks down quicker in the water.

The overall outcome of the few hours we had produced little apart from a few line bites and a single run. The quality of the bait we received was excellent and with more testing time, I am positive that the Monument M1 range will produce large catches again and again.

The smell and substance of the glug and paste gives you the confidence to try different methods of bait presentation.

We are going to continue testing this bait over the course of the next few months and will post details of any catches here.

Our conclusion on the Monument M1 bait range is that it is simply excellent.

Des Taylor and the team over at SBS Baits have tried to cater for all methods of carp fishing and I would say that they have achieved this…

Keep up the good work lads, I am definitely a future customer

Anyone who is a keen carp angler would know that Wellington Country park is the UK mecca for catching very large carp.

The opportunities to fish at Welli are as rare as winning the National Lottery! So when Trevor (Affectionately known as TT) offered me a 36 hour session with him I jumped at the chance.
For those of you who do not know about the venue it’s about 20 acres in size situated in lovely quiet countryside about 4 miles outside Reading. The average depth is around 4.5 feet with the water being very clear which promotes prolific weed growth. This water is home to many very large carp to 47Lb. Many top name anglers fish Wellington and its not uncommon to meet then when you are there.

A nice pair of Welli whackers! Welli was featured in one of the most recent Korda DVD’s and is always in magazines without being directly named. Most days you can spot an angling celebrity fishing there.

TT and I arranged to meet at 7.00am on Saturday morning at the main gates, for me 7.00am could not come quickly enough after a sleepless night. After what seemed like an eternity TT eventually arrived and after the usual meet and greet we unlocked the gates and drove to the angler’s car park.

With just four cars in the car park we knew that the best swims would possibly be taken. Both of us loaded up the barrows and headed off to the lake with much anticipation but sure enough the better swims on the lake were already taken. TT made the decision to set up on the grassy bank area so we turned our barrows around and set about the long walk to the grass bank area of the lake.

The spot we chose gave us good coverage of the water. With three rods out each we could ambush the carp as they swam from one end of the lake to the other

The tactics Due to the abundance of weed it was 12.30pm before I got my last rod into the water. Confident in the spots I had chosen I set about baiting up.

The left hand rod was positioned at about 60 meters out and 20 meters of the bank to my left hand side. This made baiting a simple matter of walking around the lake and catapulting boilies onto the spot.

1Kg of Dynamite boilies were catapulted onto the spot My second rod was placed at 90 meters straight out in front, too far to reach with the catapult so out came the trusty Grey’s spod rod. 20 or more casts later I had deposited another kilo of Dynamite tiger nut boilies over my hook bait.

The third rod was a roving rod and used the same rigs and bait but was set up with PVA ground bait sticks and was cast to showing fish.

Special G ground bait and crushed tiger nuts mixed with tiger nut oil made up my stick mix ingredients

Rigs were very simple - Korda side-clip systems were used to eject the leads quickly due to the weed problems. Safe zone leaders helped the side clip systems work well and pinned everything down on the lake bed.

Size 6 Kamasan Maxx Barbel hooks were tied to Suffix Camo Skin 15lb braided hook lengths. The rigs were made up deliberately very long 13” to help bait presentation allowing the bait to settle as naturally as possible on the weedy lake bed. A long hair was used with a small Korda micro ring giving a claw rig set up.

A long length of heat shrink tube was used to give a simple kicker at the eye of the Maxx Carp hooks The going bait on Welli is Dynamite Monster tiger nut boilies in 10mm, 15mm, 18mm and 20mm sizes both shelf life and freezer baits. To complement this I had some Dynamite 15mm pop ups and tiger nut liquid. The fishing For the first 24 hours the rods and bobbins sat in perfect symmetry only moving when either a weed bed drifted into the line or a coot thought it was a carp and picked up my bait. Don’t you just love coots?!

No carp yet no runs yet but we were looking good

TT was getting bored so he decided to do some swim clearance. The floating weed was a real nightmare. TT managed to create a weed mountain nearly 3 foot high and six foot long.

We were surrounded by the most beautiful country side and with the carp on a go slow we were able to fully enjoy these exquisite surroundings. The lake had been very quiet for the preceding weeks and our session followed that slow trend. However a few carp gave us a demonstration of jumping and crashing out of the water more akin to dolphins than carp.

All too soon it was our last morning our rods had remained upon there rests and no carp had bothered us. As we lazily sat in the warming autumn sun, without warning TT left hand rod burst into life as the clutch on his Shimano Technums went into overdrive as a fit carp tried to escape.

TT jumped into action grabbing the rod as he lifted into a powerful carp, his Free Spirit rod took on a full and healthy curve Our expectations were very high could this be a 30 or maybe one of the lakes many 40’s. The fish was skillfully played into the margins.

Due to the very shallow margins TT decided to net the fish himself

The carp was soon being looked after on TT’s very old but strangely hardly used unhooking mat TT manged to hold the lovely common up for the cameras before letting him back to his watery home.

TT assures me that this is his happy look!

This superb miniature common will grow to one of Wellington country parks much larger residents in years to come With just a couple of hours left to go before we had to start packing up our tackle it was my turn to get a screaming take from the left hand rod. I lifted the rod from the Delkim and felt a heavy fish but immediately the line went slack; I had managed to drop the fish. When I eventually reeled in the rig, the pop up bait had managed to get impaled upon the hook point, preventing the hook from catching the carp properly. Oh well maybe next time.

The session went very well. Only one fish caught but the setting, atmosphere and the company had made this for me an excellent weekend session that will remain in my thoughts for many years to come. TT learnt a whole raft of new rigs ideas and concepts and I am sure if he keeps practising he will become a very confident angler. Thanks TT for a great weekend.

Tight lines! Ian Gemson is a PAA Qualified Professional Angling Coach offering training courses and one-to-one sessions for new and Experienced anglers alike. For more information regarding his services, please visit his website at SmartCarping.com

Why bother? Well it’s a good long range, anti-tangle set up. Again I’m not going to debate the merits and variations ( as usual there are slightly different ways to skin this cat ), rather illustrate how it’s tied and leave the debate for another time.

This rig can be bought in ready to assemble kits and I would recommend these as they’re usualy safer. However I don’t think its so bizarre and specialised that it can’t be made without the custom made components either.

The kit I’m using here is by Korda. Here are the components.

1. Rig tubing
2. Lead weight
3. Buffer bead
4. Rubber bead
5. Swivel bead ( a wide bore swivel will do the job as well )
6. Tail rubber
7. Leader ( stiff leaders work best - I’ve used coated braid here ) Apologies - the leader shouldn’t have a swivel on it

Step 1

Thread your mainline through the tubing and push a tight fitting rubber bead over the tubing.

Step 2

Thread the tail rubber onto your leader and tie the leader to the swivel bead.

Step 3

Push the tail rubber onto the swivel bead and slide the swivel bead onto the tubing. Then thread your buffer bead onto the tubing.

Step 4

Tie the lead weight to the mainline and slide everything nice and tightly together. Job done

I’m using the korda ( before anyone asks no I don’t work for them ) method feeder, since it has the right size clip socket for my swivels.

So, thread it together as per an inline lead

And clip the swivel into the socket at the bottom end of the feeder to create the semi-fixed bolt rig setup.

Job done

COMPONENTS
I’ve checked their site and while Wacker Bait don’t have Korda feeders, the Fox and Anchor method feeder are available and work in exactly the same way.

All other components I’ve used are available there as well ( no I don’t work for them either! ) incuding safety bolt rig kits, tubing and inline leads.

Its well worth checking with them about getting the correct size swivels for individual method feeders. Size 8 swivels are usualy the right size for inline leads in my experience.

The principle is simple ( see below. )

In Step 1, the fish picks up your hookbait on a slack leader, taking with it the hook..

In Step 2, as the carp moves away the leader tightens and the weight of the lead comes into play.

The carp ‘bolts’ ( hence the name ) and the weight of the lead helps pull the hook home.

Right, here’s how to construct a simple in-line bolt rig.

First you need your components.

OK this is what I’m using here ( ps this just my own personal preferences - obviously there are other makes and types etc. ) My rig here consists of 8″ Kryston Snakebite leader with a size 8 Fox Uni-swivel to a size 8 CarpRus Longshank hook tied with a hair rig. 3oz Fox inline lead, tail rubber and 12″ sink tubing ( your tubing must always be longer than your leader, about 1.5 times the length is ideal. )

Step 1: Thread your mainline through the tubing and then thread on the tail rubber, which must slip over the end of the tubing.

Step 2: Thread on your weight, attaching it to the tail rubber.

Step 3: Take your leader swivel and push it into the rubber or plastic housing. This is an essential move, since this housing creates the ’semi - fixed rig’ set-up essential to a bolt rig. IT MUST NOT be jammed in too tightly so that if the line breaks or the lead gets snagged up the swivel can be pulled free of the lead. At the same time if the swivel can come free too easily when the carp picks up the hookbait the bolt rig effect is lost as the weight of the lead will not come into play.

Step 4: Push the housing into the lead weight and there you have it.

Just want to re-iterate the ’semi - fixed rig’ thing. The important thing here is that the weight is fixed to the leader so the weight helps drive the hook home. But it is important that the swivel can come free under pressure. If, for example, a mainline break occurs it is important that the leader can come free of the weight so that it is not going to have to drag around a length of line attached to a lead weight.

This will often eventualy kill the fish, why such fixed rigs ( for example, tying the lead weight to a mainline ) are known as ‘death