Beginning Pike Fishing - Baits and Tactics
Beginners guide to pike fishing - Part 2. Tony Stone discusses his recommendations for baits, rigs and tactics and more pike fishing advice
Beginners guide to Pike Fishing, Part 2 - Baits, Rigs and Tactics
By Tony Stone
Baits
Knowing what baits to use when targeting pike can be difficult, a bait that works one day may not work the next.
I always carry a selection of baits with me, most can be purchased from your local tackle shop, there are online companies such as www.baitsdirect.com or you could try your local fishmongers, here you can buy bulk bags of herrings, sardines, larger mackerel baits for cheaper than tackle shop or mail order prices.
Below is a small list of baits that are always in my bait bag, I use other baits too, but this small list will get you started as they are proven fish catchers
- Roach - A great natural bait that pike are used to eating. This makes a really good live of dead bait.
- Mackerel - This is an all time classic bait. Silvery/blue in colour. Great oily smell that leaks into the water. Cast out a mackerel and watch the water, the flat spot appear on the surface. Its tough skin makes this a very good casting bait.
- Smelt - Beige in colour, the smelt has a cucumber smell that pike find hard to resist. A great bait for wobbling or fished on the bottom.
- Sardines - Cheap and very easily available, you can buy a bag of them for around £3 from a fish mongers containing around 20 baits. This bait is best fished at close range once defrosted as the skin is very soft and will not withstand a long cast without being tied to the trace. If you want to fish these at any distance, they are better used frozen.
- Herrings - Another soft skinned bait, but more durable than sardine. Has a silvery/beige colour to it. This bait accounted for my first 20lb pike.
- Rudd - Similar to roach, natural food for the pike, make good wobbling baits and great ledgered live baits as they are a surface feeder, so they will continually swim upwards from the bottom.
- Perch - I have not used perch a lot. Mick Brown rates them very highly. Don't worry about the spiky dorsal fin, the pike isn't worried. Definitely a bait I should use more often
- Trout - excellent bait used live or dead. They make hardy live baits and they will tow a float around all day if hooked correctly. Another good bait for wobbling, but must be used freshly killed as they go stiff quickly, pike will still take them like this though. Some waters provide trout live baits for sale during the winter, and although these can be expensive at around £1 each, they make very good baits.
- Lamprey - An Eel like bait, can be cut into 3 of 4 sections depending on the overall length of the bait. Best fished in 6-8 inch pieces. This bait will leak blood for hours, a great bait for rivers as the blood creates a scent trail through the water.
Allow more blood to escape by putting slices on the side of the bait. Has accounted for fish over 40lb - Eel - Similar to Lamprey. although not as bloody. These baits can be a god send if you are getting plagued by Eels on other dead baits, as Eels wont eat there own. So one to bare in mind if you fish the lakes or places where Eels are active at night.
These are the main baits I would recommend, with this small list it should provide you with enough of a variety to get you started.
How to rig baits
How should I hook my baits? This is a question I am often asked, and also one I see people on the bank getting wrong. Whichever bait you are using, be it a live or dead one, the pike will nearly always grab the bait across the flank, then turn it to swallow it head first. When it turns the bait depends how hungry the pike is, sometimes it will turn and swallow the bait straight away, other times it will grab the bait and run with it, before stopping and turning the bait. This is why it is imperative that your bite indication detects any movement of the bait, and why you must strike straight away.
All my baits are hooked in such a way that as soon as I receive any indication on the float or drop off indicator, I can strike straight away and hook all the pike I get takes from.
For dead or live baits fished on a ledger rig, or live baits fished on a paternoster set up I hook them as below.
Live baits are hooked this way so that they are continually trying to swim away from the rig, or up from the bottom if being used on the ledger rig.
For dead or live baits fished under a float I hook them like below
If I am using small live baits then I will use a single size 6 or 4 treble, and hook the bait through the top or bottom lip, not both though obviously, as it wont be able to breath!!
You can purchase small red plastic tags, known as bait flags, these can be added to the point of your treble to add attraction, or better still to keep baits on the hooks when casting out.
For wobbled dead baits, I hook my baits like this,
One hook through both lips the other down the flank, the reason for this being that the pike will grab the bait side on across the flank and I can strike straight away. For wobbled baits you will sometimes need to add a swan shot of 2 to help the bait sink a little quicker. I actually use the Fox quick-change weights, as these do not damage the wire.
Popping up baits
For popping up baits, I use 2 methods.
The first one I have been experimenting with is how to pop up baits effectively without causing tangles. Until now, attaching poly balls to your trace to pop up a bait consisted of using a small length of fuse wire or mono, but I have come up with a way that uses wire so that the pike cannot bite through and swallow the balls.
It features a hair rig, both hooks are attached the same way, and a small loop is formed using a crimp.
Next I have made up some small links of wire, with a small swivel one end and a crimped loop the other end
The poly balls are pushed onto these short lengths of wire, how many balls depends on how heavy the bait is that you wish to pop up. The top ball is pushed over the swivel to hide it away.
This is then connected to the hair rig on the hook trace via a snap link
And there you have it, an easy way to pop up your baits. If you need less buoyancy then you can simply undo the snap link and put a smaller ball on. The links are long enough for 3 large fox poly balls, which should be enough to pop up even the biggest baits.
The other method I use for popping up baits is to use a balsa stick. This is made using exactly the same hook trace above, but instead of having a visible poly ball, the stick is inserted into the bait, provided a natural looking bait, which can be set to waft around on the bottom. I like to put a couple of swan shot on the trace next to the bottom hook, so the bait just lifts off bottom, like a carp anglers pop up boilie. You don't obviously have to add shot to the trace, and you cant fish the bait popped up straight from the lead, the pike don't care and I have caught them on both methods. If the water you fish contains Cray fish or crabs (like the Thames) then you are better off popping up straight from the lead.
Never tie poly balls or balsa sticks to your trace with mono as it can damage the pike if swallowed, due to the pike not being able to digest the foam or wood causing an intestinal obstruction. This could ultimately cause the death of the fish.
Rigs
Below are the rigs and tackle that I use, they are very simple, but also very effective, these are not all the rigs I use as there are variations plus a couple of others that I use now and again, but for a beginner this is what I would recommend.
Live bait float rig
This is very simple to use and to set up, you don't need any extra bite indication, as you will be watching your float.
The float in question is an egg shaped dumpy float, this aids the live bait as it tows the float around and stops the bait pulling the float under causing false bites.
As I said its very simple to set up, all you need do is thread a float stop or tie on a stop knot at your chosen depth followed by a bead onto your mainline followed by your float followed by another bead and then your weight to cock the float.
It is important that the weight used to cock the float is fixed to the swivel with either a rubber sleeve or a float stop above the weight, if it is not fixed then this can cause a problem is a pike takes the bait but swims up towards the surface, the weight would slide back up the line and the float would remain still, if the weight is fixed and the pike swims up then the weight comes with it and the float lies flat on the surface, and you know you have a fish on. All that is left to do is tie a stop knot on your mainline (I use power gum) at the depth you want to fish, tie a wire trace on and attach your bait.
Don't over tighten the power gum stop knot as this can kink you mainline which in turn weakens it. Make sure you moisten all knots before you tighten them up.
Dead bait float rig
This is exactly the same as above but the float shape is different, this
is because you do not need the added buoyancy to hold the bait up, as
your bait will be dead.
What is important to mention for all float rigs, (aside from a float ledgered dead bait, as the float isn't supporting the bait) is to match the size of float to the size of bait you are using.
For instance if you are using a whole mackerel you wouldn't want to use a small float as the weight of the bait would sink the float. So as a general rule, the bigger the bait, the bigger the float. Small baits such as smelt, roach, perch, and sprats can be used under a small to medium sized float, whereas bigger baits such as herring, mackerel, larger roach need large to xxl floats. You may also find that if you try live baiting that more lively baits such as trout will probably need a larger float than would be necessary if it was dead, this is due to the trout being a very lively bait and using a smaller float would have it pulling the float under the surface every few seconds.
Float ledger rig
This is a rig I use when I'm roving around as I don't need bite alarms or rod rests, I just cast out and rest the rod on my rucksack. Again the rig is very simple to set up and use, thread a bead onto you main line, followed by your float (this will be a bottom end only, waggler type, float), next thread a run ring and shock bead and the attach your wire trace. Above the top bead you should tie a stop knot using power gum approx. 2 - 3 ft deeper than the water depth, next attach a 2 oz lead to the run ring,
The idea of this rig being over depth is so that you can tighten down to the lead leaving the tip of the float showing above the surface. Then when Mrs. pike comes along and picks up your bait, if she swims away then
the float will slide under the surface, or if she swims towards you and dislodges the lead then the float will lay flat on the surface, either way you will know the pike has picked up the bait, watch out for signs of the float moving but not going under, this could mean the pike is just mouthing the bait, if this is the case, slowly pull the line tight
until you just dislodge the lead, moving the bait slightly in the process, this could tease the pike into taking the bait, as it thinks the meal is getting away. This method is very similar to the popular lift method rig used for tench.
Ledger rig
Probably the easiest of all the rigs to set up, Quite simply thread a run ring and rubber bead onto the line, followed by your trace, add the required weight, 2 - 3 oz. (I use 2 oz for most of my ledger rigs, although I will use 3 or even 4
oz if I need to hold bottom on a fast or flooded river)
What is very important with this rig is the bite indication. You must have adequate indication, as you need to see when the pike has picked up the bait. Indication is simple really, carp front swingers have no place here, you want a drop off indicator, either electronic or just a plain and simple clip on one. This is explained more in the bite indication part below.
Sunken/surface float paternoster rig
This is a slightly more advanced rig and a little harder to set up.
Firstly thread a stop knot, bead and float onto the mainline, next tie on the swivel of an up trace, this is a length of wire roughly 10 inches longer than you main bait trace, this prevents the pike from picking up the bait and swimming upwards and biting through the mainline, on the up trace you will have a run ring and shock bead, to the run ring you
need to attach a weak link (also known as a rotten bottom) I use 8lb mono with a couple of knots tied into it, you want about 2-3 ft of this so that your bait is just off bottom, next to the other end of your up trace clip on your trace.
This rig can be fished with a float on the surface so you can watch for a run, or with the float under the surface used with a bite alarm set up as with the above ledger rig.
Weed ledger rig
This is only slightly different to the standard ledger, the main difference being a plastic boom of around 12 inches long, one end has a run ring and poly ball the other has a clip for your lead weight.
The idea behind this rig is to keep you mainline and bait away from any bottom snags, weed or debris, fished along with a popped up Dead bait you can keep your rig out of weed and in sight of the pike.
I use this rig for fishing the margins of the River Thames once all the cabbage weed has died back, there is still some on the bottom, this set up keeps my rig above this.
That covers my basic rigs, and these cover 99% of my fishing. There are some more advanced variations of some, but the above will cover all your needs.
Unhooking
Once you have netted your pike, you will then need to start the job, which every beginner dreads, unhooking your prize.
Although the pike is ferocious in the water, when it is out of it, its another matter completely. It is a good idea, where ground conditions allow, to peg your mat down, as you can guarantee that when you come to use it, it would have blown away!!!
Before you lift the net from the water, your unhooking area should already be laid out.
Here is my unhooking mat set out ready for action, forceps, net, weigh sling and scales are all at the ready, having it set out like this will minimise the length of time the pike is out of the water.
When you are sure everything is close to hand, lift the net from the water as below
With the fish on the unhooking mat, lift the pike clear of the net and move the net to one side.
Once the pike is on the unhooking mat, lay it on its back, exposing the gill covers
When you insert your fingers into the gill cover of a pike be careful of the red gill rakers, these can be easily damaged.
Once your fingers are in the gill cover, pull the jaw upwards; the jaw is hinged so the mouth will open when you pull upwards. This will expose the hooks. Carefully slide the forceps into the mouth and turn the trebles out.
Something that is important to mention here is that if the pike starts to tense (like a muscle flexing) then its about to thrash about, you can either hold the fish close to you
Or you can put the fish back onto the mat, and hold it gentle down, until you can pick it up again.
Look at all those teeth, could you imagine fishing for them without the proper equipment such as wire and forceps!!!
If your fish is such that you wish to weigh it, simply slide the pike into an already wetted weigh sling
Zero your scales, and hook them under the sling, and lift the sling off the floor.
Next all that is required is to pose with your capture, keeping it low to the unhooking mat in case it flips
I wouldn't normally take pictures of fish this small, but it was taken for demonstration purposes only.
If i'm fishing on my own, I will only photograph fish I weigh, so probably anything over 10lb. When i'm fishing with others, I normally have a quick snap whilst i'm unhooking a fish as someone else can take it quickly
Please don't feel that because I have written or photographed something within this article that you must use it, there are many different methods in pike fishing, and the ones listed above are the ones I use. It should be used as a guide to keep you on track without over complicating things.
I hope this goes some way to helping beginners understand what they need to enjoy their pike fishing safely.
All the best
Tony Stone
Beginning Pike Fishing - Tackle and Bite Indication
External Links
PredatorAngling.co.uk - an up and coming site dedicated to predator fishing.