levigsp
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Posts posted by levigsp
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Hi
The hook should be pushed out following the entry route as close as possible.
Barbed hooks tend to go in then not move and if pushed the opposite way cause less damage then trying to twist them etc as this only enlarges the entry and internal hole.
The best way to achieve this is to either use a discorger pushed down the line to the bend of the hook and then keep pushing the opposite way to the entry.
Or a pair of forceps on the bend of the hook and again push the opposite to entry.
All but the most stubborn hooks will come out neatly like this.
Big barbs sometimes stop the hook moving if embedded in cartilage and will take a bit more moving, hold the hook tight and give the back of the holding hand a sharp tap with your other hand
If the point and barb go right through to the outside cut the hook in half with a pair of cutters
Whilst I am at it I will try to explain the correct way to remove a barbed hook from ones own person.
Imagine the hook is embedded deep in the end of you left index finger,
Get a length of fishing line 60cm long; tie the two ends together so you have a continuos loop.
Put the loop over the hook and slide it down until it sits on the bend of the hook, now trap the shank of the hook with you left hand thumb tightly against your index finger,
With your right hand get hold of the loop of line and give it a quick sudden jerk or better still get someone else to do it.
I was shown this way to remove hooks by the late Fred J and was again shown in hospital when I got a size 4 single embedded in my face.
It works a treat and I have successfully removed barbed hooks as big as 8-00, painful but no long lasting problems.
Frank
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So how do you know when to use a certain rig then?
It's all very well saying you use a certain rig in certain situations, but expand on that a little please.
Fishing the waters I do, you do not get the opportunity to watch fish feed, so how the hell are you going to know what rig is going to produce the goods?
Say next time out I change to a D-rig and catch the biggest fish in the lake....and the following session I try out a withy pool and catch a couple of whackers....am I all of a sudden an elite angler, or have i just been lucky?
Whats to say it's the rigs that are helping to catch the fish? Would they have been snagged on that simple knotless knot anyway just becasue they were havin it at the time?
To be quite brutal, I think alot of anglers will claim that they use a certain rig in certain situations to make themsleves appear to be the next terry Hearn, and catch regardless of the rigs they use, not because of them.
You might be right in some cases but far from all.
Before I even try to fish a lake I try to get a detailed underwater substrate report,
I then do a lot of leading with a 4oz-pear lead and 60 lb braid.
By tying the two together I get a good idea of how the bigger carp will feed.
That then tells me what type of rig I should be using.
What a lot of people cannot get into their heads is a lot of different rig work in exactly the same way mechanically.
What you are trying to do is find the method of feeding, then you choose one of the rigs that will present the bait in a fashion that will work mechanically on that feeding fish.
The reason so many rigs have been invented is that people will always try and make a rig that will hook better/quicker than any other in the same situation.
The person who sticks to one rig alone is the person denying themselves of valuable fish.
Earlier this year I fished an estate lake.
I fished running leads and the hook was knotless knotted with an aggressive hair on normal nylon line with bottom baits.
I was catching fish like there was no tomorrow and there was no reason to change.
But these were nave fish in turbid water.
The following week I was on quite different water, an old very large gravel pit with a very low stock.
If I had fished the same as the previous week I think I would have caught in the end by luck, but I do not think I would have caught what I did.
I fished running leads again but the rig consisted of the much-maligned 360o rig attached to flouro and critically balanced snowmen.
If you saw how the fish were hooked you would not have any doubts; to say the hooks were in is an understatement.
There is another side to this.
The selfish person inside of me says the less people think about these things and stick to their guns and use simple rigs, the better it is for the like of me.
Frank
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Quite simply really
If you tie direct to the loop on your hair it’s easy the first cast, then when the loop is wet the floss bites into said loop and make life difficult.
Tying to a ring eliminates this problem and also makes cutting the floss away easy.
Frank
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I know that damaging the mouth of the carp with the scorpion rig has been mentioned already in this thread, but I am concerned that foul hooking in general would be high with this rig? Even fishing semi fixed rigs with short hooklengths I have experienced too many foul hookings (chest, eye, fins...) simply from the fish brushing across the rig or possibly even while thrashing about after feeling the hook.
If it weren't for the fact that I have pretty much eliminated the chance for the carp swallowing the hook I would switch back to a running rig. Can anyone share any more experiences with the Scorpion Rig although honestly I have been trying to make my rig less complicated(working on getting rid of the swivel at the moment).
Hi approx 40 years of fishing the lead and I have NEVER foul hook a carp, no matter what the rig.
I MUST be doing something wrong
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I think carp like that aren't clued up so to speak. its not like pressured carp where you need to perfect your rig to get a bite. did you say they ate your boilies? i think it comes down to them not being fished for so much. it may sound weird, but i think pressured lakes are easier to catch out of than one you are on now, where the carp havent came into contact with many hooks. mainly because man made baits have become a dietry need for pressured carp and eventually will take one. on the lake you are fishing they are thriving so well they dont really need to eat your bait. i reckon a natural is the way to go on a nice long hooklink laying across the choddy weed. i would actually love to fish somewhere like that though.
I think it is exactly the opposite.
There is a HUGE difference to highly pressured water and highly stocked water.
These fish are educated because they have been under pressure at some time, so they realize hooks are dangerous.
That is why they cleaned up all the bait and not his hook bait.
One heavily stocked waters you can get the fish competing for food, as they need the feed as you rightly point out, so even if educated they are more likely to make a mistake.
On EVERY unfished lake I have had fortune to fish, once feeding the fish would pickup literally any hook bait, no matter how crude.
Please do not confuse pressure and stock.
Frank
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Hi, the did is tied using very stiff nylon/bristle, the braid is then tied to the hook with a polomar knot.
Do you have any pics of that? i don't quite understand how you can tie the d seperate? as its the knotless know that holds in place isn't it?
Im a bit slow on these things though
Dale
Hi I have no photo ready but it is easy to understand with out.
Get a length of stiff bristle and a hook.
Forget the eye of the hook and treat it as a spade end, tie on the stiff bristle.
Now the tag end[closest the bend] is threaded through a ring or micro swivel, then the eye of the hook, so forming the D.
It is then blobed with a lighter to stop it coming back through the eye.
The other end exiting the knot closest the eye is neatly cut of.
Now you have a hook with a D rig ready to attach as you please.
Or you can simply whip the bristle onto the shank of the hook with fine thread, either works.
Or attach the bristle to the shank with aquasure
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Frank you say you use braid for a d rig, but how do you stop it slipping out of the eye? as with mono and fluoro you can blob the end. i am probably missing the obvious again though. another thing im curios about that some of you guys might be able to shed some light on, is when you use a longer hair how do you know that its not going to fall in the same place? by this i mean the hook and bait landing next to each other. which then would lead it to the same situation as using a short hair wouldnt it? if this happens then the carp will still suck the hook and bait in at the same so was a long hair then needed? i hope it kinda makes sense, im not really good at explaining what i mean lol.
Hi, the did is tied using very stiff nylon/bristle, the braid is then tied to the hook with a polomar knot.
Your second question is very valid in my eyes.
In theory the carp sucks the bait up and the hook follows regardless of how it lands.
In practice I do not believe it and I think the same as you that the carp sucks both in.
If it is a fish that picks the bait up then it will feel that something is not right before the hook is anywhere near its mouth.
If you saw how quickly carp could separate feed and stones you would have no doubt.
Some would say I am the same as a lot of others and just frightened to use long hairs.
When I first used hair rigs they were often 3-4 inches long, and fished on free running setups or freelined.
Frank
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Ive seen this diagram in a book fella, im now racking my brains to think of which one
Frank,
As regards to the 360. Ive heard nothing but bad points on this due to the hook, double hooking fish. I think its something to do with cos the angle that the swivel creates on the hook eye.
Have you had any experience of this yourself?
Now i do admit i dont know the ins and outs of this rig at all cos im not sure of what situation it would be needed in my fishing. Can you shed any light on this at all?
Tony I this was discussed a couple of years ago and Ill say now what I think I said then.
Dispite catching countless fish on the rig I have yeat to dammage the mouth on any fish.
Regardless of how good a rig is, I would not use it if it hurt fish.
I will add again that I only use it when I think it is what is needed, and that is normaly to target a certain fish.
However I have caught small fish on it without double hooking.
Frank
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A fair number of valid points in this thread, and for example I know that Tony Nad Frank have said some very good and certain points that have definitely been missed.
Firstly I'm of the view that some fish "Suck and blow" and some fish "pick" thier food. Those that suck and blow, in my view will need a longer hair than those that Pick their food up, where as above then the bait may need to be tight to the shank.
How a rig behaves may also contribute to how quickly it gets ejected as well. If you have a nice rig made from Fluorocarbon or Mono that is nice and straight (as it cannot move any further), then it may often be ejected very quickly, whereas a rig that is on a braided hooklink may be taken in further.
The lead attachment may then also add to this. A Semi-Fixed lead may then allow the fish to feel the lead and cause it to "know" that something is wrong. Yet with a Running Lead the fish has no stopping of movement as the line is not tight and the fish CAN NOT feel the lead.
I have sat and watched fish in clear water in an area that I knew that I could get them feeding and seen them differentiate and "feel" for the lead (Complicated rigs thread
)My starting point with anything is a basic Knotless knot rig and then play around with the Hair and rig length, but work on getting them to feed comfortably in the first place can mean that my rig which is very basic is very efficient
Some decent thought there Nick but I answered the question asked.
Nick I did say I knew not all fish were suckers, meaning they do not suck and blow and that I had seen fish actually pick single baits up.
When they feed like this, like Chub they are most definitely caught easier by baits as close to the hook as possible, but dependent on the bottom this cannot always be achieved with the same rig.
That is the reason why Ill stick to a D Rig with soft braid for a bottom bait or a popup on a 360 or chod type setup.
If I am fishing where carp feed by sucking and blowing then normal knotless knotted rigs will serve me as well as anyone.
I know without shadow of doubt that on one of my target waters the bigger fish were constantly getting away with it.
I tried various hair lengths, various length of hooklink bottom baits, balanced and popups etc. etc. and nothing not one single bleep.
But all the boilies were gone after a very short time.
A change to a 360, not only did I catch some fish but one was caught twice in three days, this taught me a lesson.
Now the same could be true in reverse and you could on certain waters fish a 360 till the cows come home with out a tap.
To me knowing what the substrate of a lake is made up off helps me know how the bigger residents are LIKELY to feed, this helps me decide how to fish.
I have said this before and I will repeat it, the bigger the fish the more it eats and the more often it should be caught.
If it is not being caught it is not being angled for correctly.
Normally the bigger fish have been caught because they really have made a BIG mistake not because the angler has not.
The angler should force the fish into making a mistake.
Be cause of my circumstances I do not have the luxury of going for a quick day session or overnighter, I travel thousands of miles a year to target my chosen fish, if I wished to just fish to pass the time of day I would stay up here and go Salmon Fishing when I felt like it.
I go angling to catch my target fish, I cannot help it is how I am.
If I am not catching my target fish relatively quickly after I have it feeding, I know I am angling poorly and I will change things so I am angling well.
Believe me, all of you, If I thought tying sixty four swivels two condoms and a packet of rice up in one rig was going to catch my target I would do it.
Fortunately normally I do not need to go to those lengths.
Yes there are places and days when a simple hair rigged bait, fastened to a heavy leader and even heavier lead will catch fish and catch thousands of fish to boot, but! I do not want to catch thousands of fish.
I want to catch certain fish and these by their very nature are often the fish that pick a bait up and drop it almost straight away.
One final thought for you all.
Picture a table you’re sat at blind folded.
On that table are ten apples and you are told to pick them up in turn.
You would do so tentatively getting braver by the apple, but if there was a hook the size of the apple 8mm thick attached to one, you would without knowing why drop that apple.
If on the other hand there were a ratrap placed under one you would not get the chance to drop the apple.
We are setting that same table with mini apples for the carp their lips are our hands, out tentative approach from the blindfold is the same as theirs from being hooked in the past etc.
And finally their rattrap is the 360 on the end of my line.
Frank
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Frank, if you think i spoke out of turn then please (and everyone else for that matter) accept my apologies. It wasnt meant has you obviously read it. I was merely trying to add to an extremely interesting subject with my points of view
I apologise if I read you wrong.
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If I thought (or knew) the fish was 'picking' or 'mouthing' the bait then my first thoughts would be the opposite to yours Ant.
I would want the bait as close to the hook as possible with the hookpoint just clear of the lakebed or even upside down
My theory being that as soon as the carp touches the bait with its lip, it has a chance of being hooked - mega sharp hooks required I think.
Admitidly your not going to have many runs like this but it may get you that fish that you are targeting - if thats the way it feeds
I agree with your thoughts.
Frank
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You guys make me laugh
Lets be honest, the whole thread is based on a hypothetical question cos no one will know with 100% certainty that the fish you are targetting in your particular venue pick up and drop your bait immediately. The only way to know this is to don scuba gear and watch the fish at length for a considerable time to gauge your findings.
So what is the answer?
Pulling out stock photos of rigs with rings here, loops there, swivels on that bit is not the way to go, you are merely confusing the issue and making things way more complicated than it actually is.
I will tell you my to answer the question of the thread and i will gladly hear your views if you think im talking rubbish..... Get the fish on a good bait that they have confidence in eating and a simple knotless knot will out catch anything that you have suggested here.
But hey, thats just my opinion
Tony you are right in what you say but!
The question was about fish that pickup and drop strait away and that is all.
And you should allow the person asking to do so without jumping down their throat and you should also allow other forum users to answer the question again without ridicule.
After all most of the questions on here are hypothetical
I have watched fish do this as said.
I have tried various things to catch said fish and given my verdict, a truthful one.
If I had fished for ten years for may target fish with a simple knotless knot I probably would have not caught it.
If the question was what rig will catch the most fish, I would have said as simple a hair rig as possible., but that was not the question.
Just my opinion.
Frank
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What carp doesn't hoover it up and blow it back out?
In every underwater video I've seen, carp suck up a handful of sludge, silt, debris, blow it back out, then pick the one piece they wanted out of the pile, and suck it back in.
If they are not retaking the bait, I'd look very carefully at anything that could be causing them to drop it and move on.
Pardon me if I'm wrong, but I thought the whole point of the hair rig was to catch them as they blew the bait back out? If your not, it seems something is not right.
I have only ever watched one short video but I know your statement is incorrect.
I have watched countless carp feed in clear water to realize that not all carp are suckers.
I have seen carp, especially big carp swim into an area, home in on the food trail, and pick up a single boilie as soft as you like.
I have also watched a big carp pick over a kilo of boilies up and bully every other fish out of the way, yet when it picked up the only one with a hook it dropped it instantly.
There is no denying that most carp are suckers but not all, and for those that are not you definitely need a rig that instantly hooks.
The most effecient rig i've found for a pop up is the 360. I think a bottom bait rig would vary more depending on the lake bed.An absolutely brilliant rig that has caught so many big carp it's almost unbelievable.
Having said that depending on the bottom the Chod or the short hooklink on a hinged stiff rig [given they are both the same] is an absolute belter.
For bottom baits its got to be anything with a lot of movement in the hooklink but the bait on a D.
One of the best I know of is a simple D rig, with a very soft braided hooklink, either direct to swivel or normally to a stiffish boom [combi].
Frank
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Hardwick Hall is not far from Matlock ,slightly northwest without looking at a map.
It contains some very old traditional looking carp.
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Hi, First time on forum so hi to all
I am off to Darbyshire near Matlock at Easter will be able to get a day or two fishing with my lads.
Looking for a day water not to hard but with desent size fish. seen a couple of lakes on go fish web site but was hoping that someone will be able to help.
Quite like the look of Allestree Park water, does anyone know or fish it, is it a bollie water better sweetcaorn maze type of thing. Fish with Cell as singles 18mm and small cell dumbell over a spod at the moment.
Thanks
Wattie
Allestree is a public park, and come easter will have every tom dick and harry there.
Lovely looking place and I fished it shortly after hatching
Waters a lot closer to Matlock as well, why not try in RWs footsteps and fish Hardwick?
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Hi all a few bits of information for you.
The pool is nothing like 200 ft deep and to the best of my knowledge its deepest point is a little over twenty feet.
The original fish were very long and lean fish and by 1978 they resembled wildies.
The lake was stocked with King carp in the early 70s and by the mid 80s they were getting to reasonable sizes.
There is a really strange stone monument there and often there would be druids in its vicinity.
The lake used to be under private syndicate control and probably still is.
I used to know a certain Charles Pool, who treated the place as his second home, however I have had no contact with him for over 20 years.
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Is that Beechmere Pool?
Yes, thats why I posted it
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Hi does this wet your appitite
It was fished by someone on here in the late 70s and again in 86.
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frank, i think that is his idea mate (to do your head in) and everyone else as well, just wind up as many people as pos
I have come to the same conclusion and have decided to give him this last opportunity to answer with a sensible response, before I start to ignore his jabber.
Are we sure this is Jim?
After all with his glory seeking you would think he would be proud to display his rig etc.
Frank
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you dont have to use a leadcore leader,x line and floats stop,balance the the chod pop up though as you havent got the weight of the leadcore to sink it .
uncle jim
KIR
Jim I am very confused:?
YOU are the one who has been saying you need to use leadcore, others on here have said its not necessary.
If you are referring to the so called chod rig, then again you are the one who says you need lead-core etc., I am the one who says no need, simply use line straight through and balance the popup by adding weight to the swivel on the hooklink.
Please explain as you are now starting to do my head in.
Frank
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Mistakes are part and parcel of fishing and to be honest what is a mistake at one moment in time is the correct solution at a later date , although tangles are not part of it, and I don't accept them, even though I use Braid all the time. I spent a long time making sure that my rigs wouldn't tangle or those that would working out solutions to them.
Quite right if you use your brain you will not get tangles.
Casting correctly also helps a great deal.
I will also say that on experiments I did two or so years ago every baited rig I cast to the far side of a pool [50metres] was not tangled on the bottom.
However on retrieval 4 out of 11 were tangled.
So do not assume you are getting tangled on the cast.
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Hi Everyone.
I must say that although I agree with a lot that has been said I must add the following.
Not everyone will wish to use a running rig, lets face it there are a lot of different bolt style rigs used.
But the regardless of rigs the rules can be the same.
Most rigs used for carp fishing can be used without leaders or tubing.
When and if a leader is needed think very carefully about what you use and stay well clear of lead-core.
Frank
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my worry is with a runnind led unless a rig tube is used will the swivel on the lead not wear away running up and down the line ?
Most definitely not.
There are thousands of fish every day caught on rigs with the lead eye or swivel running on the line without problem.
The reason for using a large run-ring is to stop weed and detritus from jamming up the running arrangement.
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Do you feel that this would still be a problem with florocarbon leaders, or do you think the thickness would be enough to stop this?
I genuinely think the thicker the line the less likelihood there is of this happening and the fact a lot of anglers fish with heavy line nowadays helps.
In which case Frank, it could easily be the hook link that has lifted the scales and not the main line. If you think of the angles of the line with a fish taking off hard from under your feet the lead is likely to have been above it but with the hook link against its flank.Keith I will be honest and say I never really gave that a thought but I doubt it.
If it were the hooklink it would surely effect the smaller carp, as there would be more likelihood of a long hooklink reaching their sides.
You have caught enough big carp to realize that a short/standard hooklink
will not reach the flank.
My theory is that the scales are larger on the bigger fish and there is more likelihood of the line slipping under them.
You will no doubt recall that I stated I use leaders in the margins for free lining, since doing this I have not had a problem.
This could be coincidence though because as I said it was not a common occurrence.
However you will be pleased to know due to our discussions on leaders I have re-thought my rigs for this season, and I will no longer use leaders for this.
I will try heavy fluro mainline instead.
Frank
Looking for a new water for 2010
in UK Venues and Where to Fish
Posted
Could I have the keys to your house please
