Tench Fishing – Its Not Just For Summer Dawns

Many anglers think of summer days and misty dawns as the time to seek the tench, not really true. Yes, come June 16 th my thoughts often do often turn to tench, where they are often easy to catch. Its during this first month of the season when these lovely olive green fish with bright red eyes, are usually caught in large numbers on crust, flake, paste or worms.

From late July, it’s a different story, when the fish are often difficult to catch. In late July I have had to change my whole approach. Gone are the big baits, heavy lines and large hooks. Its now small baits gentles, corn, hempseed, red worm and caster, this of course means light lines and smaller hooks to get the right presentation and some bites. A caster doesn’t look right on a size 10 hook.



August can be a real tough month, not only for tench, but for all our coarse and game fish species. But then come September, its all change. Its like the start of a new season where I have had some wonderful sport from dawn through to dusk, in fact many times I have continued to catch tench well past midnight. October can be a good month, though I have found on many occasions the fish do not feed for such long periods of time as they will in September. You get a feeding spell for a couple of hours then suddenly its switch off time. I then move into another raked and baited swim. Often catching straight away, before that feeding spell suddenly ends. Then sometimes its back to the first swim to be rewarded with one or two fish. Even during an early autumn frosts the tench will be willing to take our baits.



Back in the 1950’s it was so different. Mr Crabtree along with virtually every other angler thought tench, barbel, carp and bream were summer fish. As we know today its not true. When I look back to the 1950’s both tench and bream were caught from rivers swollen with extra water. In those days London anglers fishing the flooded or semi flooded River Beult, Thames or Medway would often catch tench and bream. I well remember fishing the River Beult on Christmas day in the early 1950’s catching two tench one of 3-12-0 and the other of 4-4-0 on float legered lobworm.



This season with all my rivers in a horrid condition of low water, low oxygen and high water temperatures. I have spent most of my time fishing for bass and mullet in the ocean or bream and tench on the Wasing Syndicate’s Shalford and Bottle lakes in Berkshire, Prince Albert AS Marbury Mere Cheshire or Badger lake near Worcester. All three waters are picturesque with lots of birds and varied wildlife.



What I have noticed this season, has been the large number of grass snakes and owls. On two occasions at Shalford Lake I had a kingfisher use my rod as its resting place and fishing platform. For the first time in some sixty plus years of fishing I witnessed a kingfisher dive and catch a small perch, then returning to its resting place. Hitting the fish on the rod, it was killed then swallowed. I didn’t realise kingfishers ate perch. I suppose they eat any small fish.



When ever possible I choose a sloping bank with five foot of water a rod length out. Fish feed in the margins with confidence, if there is weed in the margins so much the better. I don’t mind fishing over clean gravel or a soft silty bottom, there are times when the latter can be a better swim.



Recently I was fishing over clean gravel, where having baited my chosen swim I expected to catch. Twelve hours later without a bite I called it a day. My mate Phil then went out in his boat where he discovered lots of crayfish in my swim, but a few feet further out where the bottom comprised silt, leaf mould and weed Phil could see several tench feeding.



Its not a difficult choice in choosing tackle for tench, I like to use an 11 -12 foot soft Avon action rod for lines of 5-8lbs. If you prefer to use a powerful fast action rod, that’s OK. If your looking for a rod for float and legering then I suggest a Masterline John Wilson Avon / Quiver . Not only will this rod be ideal for tench fishing, you can use it for most of our coarse fish species both in Stillwater's and rivers and you want break the bank. Any small or medium size fixed spool reel will be suitable, though given the chance I like to use a centre pin. You should get a good fixed spool reel for less than £30-00. I am using an American line Gamma of 6lbs breaking strain, but some waters

I will step up to 10lbs. A selection of eyed hooks from 6’s to 12’s should be suitable, If I use a green lipped mussel its a size 4 hook. You will need a selection of floats, split shots and leger weights, I use the Stonze. They are good for the environment I don’t own a keep net, preferring to release my fish as I catch them.



One of the most important bits of fishing kit I have is a rake, It’s double sided which any good blacksmith can make one. The Age of Iron Telephone 01200-440020 sell them for about £40-00. I have caught tench within minutes of raking the swim. I don’t feed with cereal ground bait, just sprinkling some corn, gentles, casters, hemp or some chopped worms.



This year I am using green lipped mussels, nothing new. During the 1950’s Richard Walker in his column Walkers Pitch discussed swan mussels as bait. Walker was the great Guru of the time, me and my mates would follow Walkers example. We used mussels for carp and tench. We didn’t set the world alight, but we did catch. Then swan mussels were put on the protected list. I moved on. My education about green lipped mussels started June 16th this year. I had gone to Pallatrax Lake in Dorset the home of the Stonze system at the invitation of Simon Pomfroy. To fish the river Frome for brown trout and his lakes for tench and carp. The fishing was good and I enjoyed the whole experience especially the wildlife, including many water voles.

Simon supplied the baits, apart from gentles and boilies he gave me a box of mussels. Sadly I didn’t realise how good a bait the shellfish could be and concentrated on boilies, corn and gentles. As I was catching I was more than happy.



Next afternoon Simon joined me, and float fishing midwater with a chunk of mussel he quickly hooked a succession of nice tench. I was amazed and impressed. I quickly changed over to this magic bait, and started to catch. Not only tench but some lovely roach and rudd. On Simons advice I added chopped up mussel to my groundbait. In fact, so good was this bait I used a kilo box. Then like the character in the book Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens “I asked for more” Using this bait on other waters it proved attractive for tench and carp. I tried cooked mussel and caught nothing. For carp I suggest you use a whole mussel on a size 4 hook, for tench you get two baits from a mussel which are available from the supermarket, or fishmonger.



Another good bait are boilies I use the Tock special from Phil Chun Bait Creations telephone 01285-861896 or e-mail [email protected] For spodding Phil does a bucket of Wet and Dry method mix also he does buckets of cooked hemp. One bait I always like to have when tench fishing is sweetcorn I buy bags of frozen corn which I soak in Phil Chuns pure sweetcorn oil. I have found adding salmon oil to my spodding mix has helped. As the fish root around they dislodged globules of oil which rises to the surface leaving a calm spot. You immediately know there are fish in the swim.