The tactic of fishing is to constantly move along the river bank and check the places you like with a baited float rod. Finding a suitable submerged shrub, I make a cast to the border of branches and water. Posting from 15 to 20 m, depending on how the angler is located. In the spring, when the water is clear, camouflage is very important. Where the coast is heavily overgrown, sometimes you have to make a short wiring - 3-6 meters. Nozzle movement in the early period of cold water should be as slow and uniform as possible, at the very bottom.

If the weather is sunny for a long time, shallow waters begin to warm up. The fish are getting more active. Then already in April you can carry out wiring with nozzle stops, during which it will smoothly rise from the ground, and as the wiring continues, it will fall. Roach, bream, perch and some other fish peck well at raising and lowering the nozzle.

It happens that roach, podust, dace, chub and even scavenger love when nozzle rolls along the bottom. Therefore, the float must be weighed so that on the lowerings of the bottom the nozzle goes above the ground itself, and on the tubercles it slightly touches the ground. More catchy is the zone when Nozzle moves in low to medium speed jet next to fast jet. In general, when fishing in spring, you often need to focus on twisting the current and swooshes, especially if the jet touches snags or algae, from which various larvae can be washed out.

Equipment for fishing in the spring

Concerning snap, then for fast enough water, I often use only one main sinker and the lightest shed, mounted on a leash, taking into account the necessary movements of the nozzle. Sometimes, to create smoother vertical movements of the nozzle on the fishing line, a distributed load should be made. For example, starting from the end of the main line, the lead elements are fixed at intervals of 15 cm, so that their mass gradually increases. Shepherd boy sometimes put on a leash, and sometimes not - it all depends on its length, current and method of wiring. For example, if it is necessary that the nozzle quickly rushes down after rising above the ground, you can use a shed weighing 0.1-0.2 g or a little less.

About the same tooling showed itself well when fishing in a calm current. In this case, at the end of the main line 15-25 cm from the beginning of the leash, I put one element of the load weighing 0.1 g. Then, at a distance of 10 to 25 cm from each other, 5-6 pellets go. The distance between the pellets, as well as their mass, increases exponentially.

During spring fishing, when large fish periodically come across, fishing line you need to use a strong, with a diameter of 0.16-0.2 mm, a leash of 0.14-0.18 mm. Hook size depending on the nozzle No. 13-18. Float with a drop-shaped body, a long wire keel and a short thick antenna. The correct loading of the float is when only the tip of the antenna sticks out of the water. If fishing does not take place at great depths and not too far from the shore, be sure to fix the float at two points. Above it, so that the line does not blow out in strong winds, I put a pellet - then the cutting is more confident.

With sliding equipment float ring should be small. This is necessary so that the stop knot does not pass through it. You can use a wider ring - in this case, a sliding ball such as a large bead should be placed between the float and the stopper, preventing slippage.

Tips and baits for fishing in early spring

Before floods, they are caught exclusively on baits of animal origin. Works well at this time bloodworm, worm, dragonfly larva, caddisfly. The warmer the water, the larger the nozzle should be. Immediately after the ice melts, I usually catch one bloodworm, one medium-sized worm or a caddisfly larva. Just before the flood and after it, you need to experiment more often with large nozzles. The method of baiting can be different, depending on the activity of the fish.

Feeding fish in small rivers in most cases does not make sense, the main thing is to find places of its greatest concentration, and such "aquariums" during the spring run of fish are not uncommon. Sometimes roach, ide chub, white bream, white bream they hold so tightly that bites follow as soon as the float touches the water.

On larger tributaries, where the concentration of fish is more difficult to detect, it is sometimes easier to collect them with bait. However, in early spring, even good bait does not always collect fish, if all the nuances of the location of promising places where fish can stay downstream (from there it will have to be pulled to the place of fishing) are not sufficiently taken into account.

Bait for catching fish in the spring

Often well activates nibble a mixture of chopped worms and loam taken from the shore. Small balls (4 cm in diameter) are molded from it. They are thrown to the border of water jets of different speeds, closer to faster ones, so that the balls are better blurred. The frequency of tossing bait depends on the intensity of the bite. It is also necessary not to forget about the anticipation of the cast, so that the balls are blown away by the current to the calculated point of catching. If the fish pulled itself up to you, then in order not to scare it away with bursts, feeding can be stopped.

The size of the balls increases if you are fishing in a fast current. Similarly, you can prepare feed balls using as a filler larvae of aquatic insects: barnacles, caddis flies, mayflies, bloodworms. I noticed that it pulls up well roach, scavenger, ide and white bream to the place of fishing dry food intended for aquarium fish.

Crushed gamarinus and daphnia crustaceans emit a strong odor in the water which attracts fish from a distance. However, with the right choice of fishing spot, it is enough to throw on the current small maggot. In early spring, when the water is still cold, this bait has to be sent into the water literally in pinches, using a special slingshot. More food can scare the fish away.

Spring fishing - where to fish in March

The most catchy places on the rivers will be calm areas below the constrictions, the calm of the current behind the snag, blockages, flooded logs, large stones, in a word, where the fish rests and at the same time collects the food brought by the breaking stream. Very often in the spring any white fish stands under various kinds of coastal shelters, nestling close to the shore. It can be a bush hanging over the water, dense extended areas of algae, coastal niches, and tree roots outcrops. But not all coastal shelters work. Usually there are certain conditions at the exit points of large spring roach, ide, scavenger, white bream. For example, under the shelter there is a zone of calm water, and a strong jet passes nearby, which hits the shore and washes out the larvae. In other places where the conditions for fish are unsuitable, it will be empty - I checked this on many rivers near Moscow when I was engaged in spearfishing.

In the spring, fish also enter channels, canals and even small flowing ditches.. The most fishy of them are those that connect nearby lakes and reservoirs. There are many channels and ditches promising for spring fishing in the floodplain of the Oka. In the early spring open water, I had to successfully catch a variety of fish in Karelia, on the Valdai Upland, in the Meshchera Territory.

Features of fishing in spring

• Catching an ide in March - where to catch an ide, what to catch an ide for, how to catch an ide

Highlighting the features of catching individual fish, we can say that the parking of ides can often be found near trees and bushes hanging over the water, located in the sun. Insects and larvae that hibernated in their bark come to life faster here after winter, begin to get to the surface and, with gusts of wind, fall into the water. On warm sunny days, ide can be successfully caught on the larva of the bark beetle and on the forest ant even in the flood itself. To do this, it is necessary to look for special zones in the floodplain, where the water remains transparent even when the level rises. If the village orchards come close to the water, then near them you can successfully catch on the resurrecting apple caterpillars. The peculiarity of the biting of the spring ide also lies in the fact that it has an early spawning, and after it it begins to eat intensively.

• Catching roach in March - where to catch roach, what to catch roach, how to catch roach

Roach concentrations are often found near grassy lagoons located near currents and in grassy channels. Here they catch roach, both with wiring near the bottom, and half-water. The nozzle should be carried along the edge of the algae. No less productive at this time is fishing on riffles with small and medium depths. Often, roach chooses a zone with rocky ridges, while areas of slightly silty soil should be located in the neighborhood. The nozzle - a bloodworm or a small red worm - is led 5-15 cm from the bottom. When catching a caddisfly, a roach usually reveals itself with greedy bites. Then the float instantly goes to the bottom, and it is important to have time to make a short cut in time. When fishing for maggot, the bite is more careful.

• Catching bream and bream - where to catch in March, what to catch bream, how to catch bream

Catching in March for white bream and white bream in open water in the tributaries of spring rivers has its own characteristics. The bream and white bream that have entered the tributary often gather in dense flocks near the mouth, not far from a large river, lake or reservoir.
The bream and white bream in early spring like to feed on deep rifts, the bottom of which is marked by various irregularities, whether they are pits or mounds. It is desirable to have judges.
Quite often the white bream and white bream keep close to the washed away steep banks, on the channel edges, in the depressions behind the rifts. Blue bream can also be found here.

• Chub fishing in March - where to catch a chub, what to catch a chub on, how to catch a chub

The chub is more picky than other fish in choosing shelters. If a semi-submerged shrub grows along the coast, and an island of quicksand is blocked by some obstacle next to the channel, the chub in most cases will prefer the latter, since there will always be food in the form of dragonfly larvae or other food organisms. An important condition is the presence of a fast current in the neighborhood. Large chub often prefer more remote from the coast and therefore safer areas. If there are islets or spits on the river, he often keeps to them, waiting for food carried by the current. Chub is caught from the bottom, half-water and near the surface. For wiring near the surface, due to the caution of the chub, you need to use a float in the form of a transparent ball, which is half filled with water for loading. The bite of this fish is sharp, so this shape of the float is quite suitable for wiring. Alexey Georgiev

Immediately after the ice melts, spinningists who yearn for open water begin to try to catch with their favorite tackle. But the off-season is the off-season - most often the first spinning steps turn out to be fruitless.
Perch, actively pecking on the last ice, seems to disappear, phantom pike perch is also extremely difficult to find. The notorious spring course of the "fanged" is observed not in all water bodies of the country. Asp and ide are caught in the spring only on large full-flowing rivers, and the peak of the most active biting falls on them somewhat later. This is only on the Lower Volga, and in Krasnodar in early spring there is an abundance of fish, while in other parts of the country, fishermen have to rest. Or trying to catch pike. Moreover, many venerable authors in their writings predict even a real "spring zhor" in a predator.
In practice, of course, no zhor does not happen. A pronounced post-spawning pike bite occurs later - at the end of May - June. And all April you have to literally torture the spotted predator. The behavior of pike in different water bodies can vary greatly. Parking places, activity, preferences in bait - everywhere the predator shows different behavior patterns. Most likely, temperature affects the fish - the main natural factor for cold-blooded creatures. Water temperatures in different types of water bodies can vary greatly. Because of this, for example, in ponds and small lakes we have to catch already spawned pike, while in the Volga until mid-May we come across eggs. Therefore, the approach to the fish will need a purely individual.
Small rivers
Small rivers are freed from ice in the very first place. Snow floods flow very quickly in them and the water clears up the fastest. At the same time, they are very critical to precipitation. Even after short rains, the water in them becomes very cloudy and the level rises noticeably. Therefore, you need to go fishing after stable dry weather, otherwise the chance of overflight is too great.
Small rivers can be roughly divided into two types: those that flow into larger rivers or lakes, or those that end in small ponds or merge with slightly larger "small" rivers. For spinning fishing, rivers of the first type are much more interesting, since a lot of pike rush into them from high water in the spring. It does not rise high upstream, usually concentrating on 3-5 km pre-estuarial sections, sometimes having a decent width of up to twenty meters or more compared to the main course. Parking fish chooses the most banal, adhering to the channel depth. Dumps, transverse edges, spits and local pits - all these bottom anomalies in April are simply clogged with migrating caviar pike. It is the alien fish that is easiest to catch. In its quantity in the spring, it greatly exceeds the local "aboriginal" race, and its activity will be higher.
You need to catch such a predator on a jig. It still does not rise to the upper layers of the water, it does not come close to the shores, so bottom fishing with front-loaded baits will become optimal. Super-heavy jig heads are not required - on small rivers, even real "crocodiles" come across for fairly light weights - up to 10 grams. Of the baits, everything is suitable, starting with foam rubber and ending with overseas "edible rubber" - it doesn't matter. But the size is worth paying attention to. Too small rubber will remain unnoticed by fish, and for a large "autumn-summer" silicone, the pike will not have enough activity. No matter how scared at all. The most suitable size for the bait will be 6-8 centimeters. Color, who believes in it, take a brighter - yellow, bright green, red can be. In spring, in such places, the main thing is to find a parking lot for fish, and catching it will become a matter of technology. Well, you may have to wait for the "exit", ie. a short burst of activity, which usually occurs in the afternoon, when the water temperature reaches its maximum daily value.
If your small river is completely "small" and has no access to big water, then problems may arise with pikes. Firstly, there will be relatively few of them, and secondly, their activity cannot be compared with migrating predators, whose energy expenditure is very significant. In the rivers, making their way through dense thickets, pikes in the spring keep pools and other deep areas. Often stand under branches hanging over the opposite bank. There will not be much choice in baits. Turntables do not work well seasonally, wobblers have nowhere to go deep to the working depth due to the short casting distance, and classic jig fishing will not be entirely ideal, a good working alternative is light oscillating lures. If the river is very narrow (and such reservoirs are usually relatively deep), wiring can be omitted altogether. It is enough to throw the bait in the place you like and let it fall freely to the bottom on a stretched fishing line. Accordingly, spinners need to be selected with a good own game in the fall. You should definitely try silicone baits on an offset hook on such reservoirs without additional loading. Most of all, voluminous American "rubber" is suitable for such purposes, which also has a decent own weight. It's time to put the newfangled wacky, flipping and pitching styles into practice. If these "terrible" words mean nothing to you, urgently study the fishing press and the Internet! When a pike, located to peck, stands within a radius of 3-5 meters from the place where the bait fell, then most often a quick attack occurs. If the fish does not intend to peck, then you will not wait for a bite either on the thirtieth or on the hundredth cast. Such fishing involves frequent changes of places and long-distance crossings along the river.
big rivers
Large full-flowing rivers, usually regulated by dams, are released from ice captivity unevenly. Sections below hydroelectric power plants, channels and volozhkas are "cleared" very quickly, and sluggish reservoirs due to ice jams can remain shackled even until the end of April. Spinners, of course, should be primarily interested in sections with a current. It is later that the fish will go to the heated shallows of bays and backwaters. If there is no confluence of the main tributary river nearby, then a sufficient number of "local" pike will most likely remain on the site. It will approach the shores at a distance accessible to a spinning "shot" and, perhaps, will even peck. The predator will rise along the lower slopes of the coastal brows, choosing places "stronger" - no one has canceled the innate craving for snags and shelters.
Fishing will be a classic jig with a bias towards extremely heavy. Although there is no very strong current in early spring, the extra weight of the jig head will not hurt. The pike is now passive, it needs something to bring it to life, stir it up. For this, you will need a noisy, furrowing, with clubs of turbidity, immodest heavy jig. The size of the baits will fit exactly the same as in the mouths of small rivers, except that the use of non-catching foam rubber fish and all kinds of offset rigs is more justified. In general, you will need more powerful tackle - a fast "stick" up to 55-60 grams in dough, a reliable braided cord with a breaking load of up to 10 kg and strong string leashes. Increased reliability is needed because of the non-zero probability of biting a really very large pike and the very likely capture of a giant spring asp, which, despite the cold water, can pretty much fray even the most experienced spinner's nerves. Trophy zander are regularly caught, and sleepy catfish may be accidentally bugged. In general, be ready, angler!
Ponds without a current
On ponds and lakes, ice is the last to melt. But what is interesting is that due to the initially higher water temperature (no mixing of layers), spawning in pike occurs at an earlier time than in rivers. Therefore, the period of pre-spawning biting here is very short and you need to have a real hunting instinct in order to get to it. You need to visit such reservoirs immediately, as large gullies and open areas form. It happens that one half of the pond has already melted, on the other there is a porous dirty ice, and the pikes are simply rampant. And by the time the mirror of water opens completely, the biting may stop until the summer. In such fishing, the main thing is to get to the right place on time.
The approach to fish in water bodies without a current differs from the methods of fishing in rivers, and quite significantly. Of course, you can also fish in the pond with a light jig, but the rotten thickets of last year's vegetation will stick around your twisters and vibrotails in mighty bunches, wind on hooks and clog carabiners. It is better not to lower the bait to the bottom at all. For such purposes, floating wobblers come in handy. Long wobblers of the "minnow" type, carried out by weak twitching, accompanied by 3-4 second pauses, will not leave pikes indifferent. Higher-bodied shad fish will also work, working on slow, even wiring with small stops. Preference should be given to the smallest floating models of wobblers. They will be out of competition in the spring. In reality, fish can also be caught on a "spinner", as the water warms up, rotating baubles begin to work. Again, voluminous silicone lures (especially the so-called "edible") behave with dignity on a bare offset hook. In general, many believe that the latter option, being mastered in more detail, will be able to compete even with wobblers. Such baits are the future. And the price-performance ratio pleases.
You don't have to expect outstanding results from fishing in the "swamps". They are only for enjoyment. Be sure to take a spinning of a light class, it is also better to try the thinnest "braid" - here catfish and asps do not threaten us - we would like to catch a bee!
Based on materials from the "Russian Hunting Newspaper" Author K. Kudinov www.mk.ru/blogs/

To the reservoir. After the coastal zones of the reservoir are refreshed with melt water and the fish begin to actively move along the coast in search of food, fishing becomes much more effective. During this period, fish often stay in shallow water, where tributaries or melt water carry food. On dammed rivers, where the speed of the water flow is very weak, but the depths are large, roach, blue bream, bream, having taken a sufficient sip of oxygen-enriched water, can return to feed on deep edges, where there are colonies of mussel mussels. Such places are typical for the lower reaches of fairly large tributaries, such as the Ild, Sutka, Sit, Poshekhon, etc.

"Sea" roach, blue bream, bream, perch, ide are very fond of visiting medium-sized bays. True, there are often such bays in which numerous small perches and the same roach do not allow a decent fish to bite. In such conditions, in order to be more likely to catch large roach, you need to choose the deepest places in the middle part of the bay and at the exit from it, for example, 3-4-meter holes near the steep bank. Sometimes, however, moving into the upper reaches of the bay along the channel of the inflowing tributary, one manages to come across a flock of large fish there too. At the same time, roach and perch prefer to stay in a snag, standing apart in a large clean area. It happens that in some places the zone of the snag chosen by fish is quite extensive. However, it has been observed that roach and perch avoid thick snags, and it is better if individual snags are widely scattered on riverbed irrigations. A large roach prefers to stay as far away from the perch as possible - it irritates her. But this does not mean that if perches come across, roach will not bite. It's just that the bite will not be as stable as where the roach is kept apart. Sometimes, once in a catchy area, you can drag up to thirty roaches from one hole, some of which are very impressive in size. If the snags on the riverside table are scattered widely, then the area for catching roach is often quite extensive. Then it is recommended to drill several holes at once over the entire area of ​​the snag with an interval of 5-10 m and methodically catch them, do not forget to let them “rest” when the bite is weakened. This is due to the fact that with the constant drilling of holes, large fish often leave their chosen place, besides, it is alarmed by the movements of the fish being fished out.

The more actively the fish moves under the spring ice, the more difficult it is to keep it in place with bait. During this period, in order to succeed in fishing, you have to combine feeding methods. So in quiet waters, you can first lower one or two feeders with a feed bloodworm or a mixture of feed bloodworms with mixed feed to the bottom, and then attract the attention of the flock with a bloodworm spreading in the water column, throwing it directly into the hole in pinches.

in the channels. There are a number of artificial channels in the water system of the Rybinsk Reservoir, where fish like to enter from mid-March.

The most convenient access to the canal is near the village of Borki. Reeds grow along the banks of this canal; All this is attractive to spring fish.

At the same time, ending in a dead end in the area of ​​the village, the canal is, as it were, a trap for fish - it enters the canal, but does not immediately find a way out.

The most important thing when fishing in a canal is to guess the time when fish enter it, and different flocks come here: blue bream, large sea roach, large perch, bleak, bream, bream, ide; sometimes there is a chub. The listed species of fish prefer to stay at depths from 1 to 3 m. We have found good places more than once at the edge at a depth of 1–1.5 m, which is located behind a narrow coastal shallow starting from reeds. Often, fish trails intersect where the canals branch off from the canal. (Fig. 9). Sometimes large roach goes to shallow water with separate snags.

Since the accessible places of the Rybinsk Reservoir are too crowded, shallow areas should be chosen for fishing, away from groups of anglers, otherwise the fish will quickly leave, frightened by the noise. Gear for fishing in canals and the reservoir use the same gear as for fishing in rivers: a fishing rod with a nod and a mormyshka. The same range of nozzles and mormyshek. In periods when there are a lot of fish under the ice, but it does not take, a baitless mormyshka helps out. Each angler chooses the technique of the game himself. Sometimes fast wiring “works”, and sometimes slow with fluctuations of such a frequency, which is typical for catching a particular type of fish.

Rice. 9. Crossing point of fish trails when fishing on the canal

II. AFTER THE ICE IS GOING OFF

Behind the spring ash

Spring ide fishing can be very exciting and rewarding, provided you know the behavior of this fish, know where to look for it and how to catch it.

The ide spawns after fattening in the same tributaries at a water temperature of 4 °C and above. It lays eggs on floods and rifts at a depth of up to 0.7 m. Obviously, with the fall of water, a lot of eggs die, but some of it remains in the shallow waters of bochags and rifts. After the water subsides, the ide returns to the main river, lake or reservoir. During the spring run, the ide can also enter floodplain quarries, lakes, channels and oxbow lakes, where it also sometimes spawns.

After the water subsides and becomes clear, the ides come out to feed on coastal shallows with a hard or sandy bottom.

It is very important to get to the exit of the ide, decide on the place and method of catching it. The tactics of fishing during this period is to search for places of concentration of fish or waiting for it in passing places.

Wiring. Having entered the dammed river from the reservoir, where the current is not so strong, a flock of ide usually makes a move to the upper reaches along the border of the upper edge. Also, the ides like to move along the rocky ridges, a series of hollows - in a word, the ide prefers to walk along the relief. Therefore, the wiring must be done taking into account this fact. Upstream, where the flow of water becomes fast, the ides begin to huddle to the shore calms. The path of the flock often lies along the coastal grass or submerged shrubs.

In the fast tributaries of lakes and rivers, the ide, starting from the very mouth, enters, moving along the coast. The course of the ide from large rivers to tributaries is also explained by the fact that in a large river, turbidity, carried by a strong stream, clogs the gills of the ide. Therefore, the ide chooses areas of the cleanest water both in the river and where the flow resistance is the least. It is in such areas that you need to look for yaz paths. But biting sometimes have to wait a long time. Feeding doesn't help. But if you wait for the approach of the sore flock, bites can follow one after another.

FISHING IN SPRING

With the advent of spring comes one of the most interesting fishing seasons. Already on the last ice, with the flow of melt water under the ice, white fish begins to actively move around the reservoir in search of food, approaches the mouths of tributaries, enters rivers from closed reservoirs, and in lakes and reservoirs, dense schools of roach, silver bream, bream, blue bream often walk in thicker than water and greedily rush to a suitable bait.

Do not lag behind forage fish and predators. Pike occupies snags and edges near the mouths of tributaries, in large reservoirs and lakes flocks of pike perch and large perch accompany accumulations of roach, bream, blue bream, silver bream, hunting for small things feeding nearby. In some lakes and reservoirs, these predators, in order to profit, approach places where bleak and smelt accumulate.

In spring, both peaceful fish and predators are often caught throughout the day, so the angler does not have to be bored.

In March, having rested after spawning, the burbot begins to scour its hunting trails. They catch it at night on vents and hooks, and some experts also use special fishing rods, tapping the bottom with a heavy mormyshka with a ruff tail baited on a hook.

On small and medium-sized rivers it is interesting to fish during high water. You just need to move more along the coast and find areas of clear water away from the muddy stream. Usually the bite depends on the level of the flood: the higher the water, the weaker the bite.

An increase in the feeding activity of fish is observed 2–3 weeks before spawning. Knowing at what water temperature a fish of one species or another spawns, you can easily calculate the time when this fish needs to be caught. During spawning and over the next one and a half to two weeks, there is a lull in biting, but then suddenly a real zhor begins in fish of many species. For an angler, the main thing is to catch this period, and then, as they say, it’s a matter of technology ... And, of course, you always need to look for catchy points, only then you are guaranteed success.

I. ON THE LAST ICE

For pearl fish

Bleak is a small, beautiful and very tasty fish when skillfully cooked. If you take it in your hands, pearl scales remain on your hands. The bleak stays in flocks, which become denser by the end of freeze-up and often reach enormous sizes.

This fish is not shy, and even when a large number of anglers accumulate on the ice, it often stays at the lower edge of the ice. She is not afraid of bright light and also feeds from the bottom and in the water column in spring.

Each time, by the end of winter, bleak, previously dispersed throughout the reservoir, suddenly, all at once, begins to approach the mouths of rivers and streams, where its concentration can be very high. The bleak enters bays, backwaters, and estuarine sections of rivers. At such times, the catches are rich. By carefully clearing the hole of ice chips, you can make it easier for yourself to play the fish and reduce the number of gatherings.

It happens that a large flock of bleak approaches the place of fishing, and at first it seems that it will “spin” around you for a long time. In fact, this is not the case, and in order to keep the fish in the area of ​​​​the hole, you need to use bait. The bait is lowered into the hole in a dry form. Crumbs and lumps of the bait mixture, swelling, will be near the lower edge of the ice and only after they become heavier will they slowly sink to the bottom. The procedure is repeated after about 20 minutes. As bait, you need to use cloudy mixtures containing oatmeal, flour, starch, milk powder. It is best to toss the bait mixture in small portions directly into the hole, then slowly sinking particles will separate from the cloudy suspension formed in the water. Here, factors such as movement and smell are important: the fish, having smelled the bait, comes up and immediately reacts to what eludes it. Another option is to feed the bleak with a dry mixture of the Unikorm type, soaking it with water taken from the hole and mixing small, unwashed bloodworms into it. (If the bloodworm is crushed, then its smell will awaken the appetite of any fish.) Often, a positive result is the addition of small maggots, which are attracted to bleak by smell and mobility. However, the big disadvantage of maggot as a bait is that it sinks very quickly. If you have a lot of patience, then at home you can in advance use a syringe to pump the maggots with air - then they will sink very slowly, and the bleak will feed on them near the surface.

If you lower a large lump of bait into the hole, then, swelling, it will go to the depth, dragging the bleak with it. Some anglers use this method to switch to bottom fishing. Sometimes sinking food attracts larger fish such as bream and roach.

Fans of bleak fishing are divided into floaters and mormyshechniks. There are also anglers who fish with combined tackle, which will be discussed below. All advanced cleavers are distinguished by one feature - they use very delicate gear with soft, elastic fishing line with a diameter of no more than 0.08 mm. Many anglers find that the float is preferable to the nod. They proceed from the fact that the bleak usually takes the bait in the water column and does it briskly and decisively; but, feeling the resistance of the nod, she often throws the nozzle, and hooking her in this case is quite difficult. However, if the nod is made according to all the rules under the lightest mormyshka, then it reacts to the thinnest touch of the bleak to the nozzle, allowing you to make a cut in time. Although, perhaps, the one who catches the bleak with tackle with a nod should have a faster reaction.

A sensitive nod is made of a lavsan plate in the shape of a cone. To pass the fishing line, two holes are made in it - at the end and in the middle. Under the weight of the mormyshka lowered into the water, it should deviate by about 30 degrees relative to the horizontal plane.

Mormyshka for catching bleak is better to take lead or tin, capable of naturally planning. Any tungsten mormyshka sinks too quickly, unnaturally. We recommend using such models of mormyshkas as "shotgun", "ant", "wing", "droplet", "oatmeal", and others with a hook no larger than No. 18. The nozzle, a piece of elastic fat, is attached so that the sting remains open , otherwise it will be very difficult to break through the hook. In the same way, bloodworms, burdock moth larvae and maggots are most often baited.

As for the float rod, it is equipped with the lightest float loaded with a series of small pellets, each subsequent of which should be lighter than the previous one; usually use no more than three pellets. The leash is left no more than 5 cm long. You should choose the weight of the sinker so that the float is maximally submerged. The float is selected flat-surface or with a small antenna. After loading the float, check the operation of all gear with a nozzle on the hook. Some anglers use two hooks at once. Then the weight of the sinkers is somewhat reduced. There are craftsmen who, with a greedy bite, use three hooks and even more. But such equipment is too inconvenient: when lively fish take the line to the side, free hooks cling to the edges of the hole. At the end of the fishing rod, a shock-absorbing polyvinyl chloride tube is placed through which the fishing line passes. When biting, the bleak most often raises the float, so the weight must be adjusted to the milligram. For catching bleak on bloodworms, it is better to use a long-barreled hook No. 18–22 of red color; when fishing for maggot, a piece of fat, a larva of a burdock moth - the same hook, but white.

The choice of a fishing rod for a float rod depends on the preferences of the angler. Some choose a “filly” with a reel, others choose a branded Finnish fishing rod with a “TENO” type reel. When fishing with nodding tackle, using the game of mormyshka, it is very convenient to use a balalaika-type fishing rod. This rod is used by most jiggers. The whip of both the float and nodding rods must be hard in order to make the right cut.

A very important element of the fishing rod is the reel. It should work flawlessly (make sure that snow does not freeze on it and that it does not have a backlash, in which the fishing line often “chews”). When fishing for bleak with a reel, you have to work often, making a vacation of fishing line for fishing in different layers of water. For the same reason, the nod holes should pass the line well. It is good if the rod has legs on which it can be easily installed, since the bleak takes periods only on a fixed bait.

There are many ways to play the mormyshka, but the main condition is the smoothness of the wiring. Whether you lower the bait or raise it, or stop it for a fraction of a second, the key is to correctly mimic the natural movement of the food organism. The panning moment remains a priority, as in roach fishing, when no other tricks help. Along with a smooth lowering, you can practice stops with the jig jiggling in place. The method of lowering the mormyshka with leisurely zigzag movements is also suitable here. But in some cases, only a fast retrieve with a high frequency of nod oscillations, both in the direction of the bottom and in the direction of the surface, gives success.

Let's say a few words about the combined gear. With a good biting of the bleak, it is possible to use a mormyshka on the float gear instead of a sinker and a hook. In some cases this pays off as the contact with the fish gets better. You can, on the contrary, put a sinker instead of a mormyshka on a nodding tackle and a hook below it on a fishing line. In equipment with the thinnest fishing lines, the leash, as a rule, is not used. Some anglers on nodding tackle above the mormyshka put an additional leash with a small hook. With a bad bite, this can improve the catchability of the tackle. A leash 2-3 cm long in this case is tied so that it rushes up, then it will not bend too much to the fishing line under the weight of the hook and nozzle. It is possible to install a hook on a leash below the mormyshka. However, combined rigs suffer from the disadvantage mentioned above - this is the frequent hooking of a free hook on the ice when playing a fish. Combination tooling options are shown in rice. one.

Rice. 1. Combined rigs for a nodding rod

Now let's talk about biting and hooking. The bleak takes the nozzle greedily only at the beginning of its pre-spring run, later it only raises it a little and immediately releases the nozzle. It is important to feel the moment of contact between the fish and the bait, which sometimes lasts a fraction of a second. At the slightest straightening of the nod or with a slight ascent of the float, it is necessary to make a biting short sweep.

Particular attention should be paid to the size of the nozzle. With a good bite, the bleak can greedily grab a couple of maggots or large bloodworms, but with a sluggish bite, it is best to use a feed bloodworm, planting two or three larvae of a fiber mosquito through the middle so as not to leave long ends. Often, only one feed bloodworm is taken as a nozzle. As for the maggot, you need to take small larvae - those that have retained their mobility, then the bleak will react better to them. The burdock moth larva should be hooked to the edge of the skin - then it will not leak out and will move attractively. The “sandwich” of a bloodworm with maggot helps out when the bite worsens. At the same time, only the freshest bloodworm is suitable; piercing it with a hook in the middle of the body or under the head, make sure that its contents do not leak out. Also, the bleak takes well on a tiny cube of fat 2x2 mm in size, put on the very tip of the hook, or on two such "grains" put on in a row.

We should also say a little about accessories for blee fishing. Catching bleak from the ice is quite an active occupation: you have to move around, and in order to make a timely sweep, it is convenient to catch from your knee. Therefore, clothing should be warm and at the same time not restrict movement. For fishing from the knee, knee pads should be made from a piece of polyurethane mat, to which a rubber band is tied. It is better to wear gloves with cut off compartments for fingers on your hands. It is even more convenient to fish with gloves without "palms".

Finding swarms of bleak involves drilling a large number of holes. Therefore, the most important accessory for such fishing is an auger-type ice drill with a cutting part of a small diameter. For bleak fishing, we recommend Mora and Konsaku oy ice drills, which allow drilling holes with a diameter of 90-110 mm.

Bloodworms, maggots or larvae of burdock moths for planting are poured in pinches into a special small box, which is equipped with a strap. It is convenient to hold the box fastened to the leg or to the arm. To prevent the nozzle from freezing, the main part of it is kept in a larger container in the inner pocket.

Catching tandem

A tandem of lures designed for fishing with a rod equipped with a nod has a number of advantages over a single lure, especially in spring ice fishing, when fish, animated by melt water, appear in the most unexpected places of the reservoir. An additional bait, located at a sufficient distance from the main one, allows you to control higher layers of water, where fish are often kept in early spring. The second bait, under certain conditions, can "work" as the main bait, while the first will play mainly a regulatory role. In addition, the tandem lure has many other positive features.

Tandem mormyshki. Many believe that when melt water begins to flow under the ice, the fish comes to life so much that it is easy to seduce it with any mormyshka. However, it is not. Although the fish begins to move around the reservoir, its bite is often capricious, and it is often tempted only by small baits. This applies to fish such as bream, roach, perch, dace, ide, blue bream, silver bream, and some others. But the game of small mormyshka is good only when the thinnest line corresponds to it. However, for catching, say, large bream, weighty humpback, kilogram fish roach, there is not enough fishing line with a diameter of 0.08-0.1 mm. Sometimes it becomes necessary to use a monofilament with a diameter of 0.12-0.15 mm. Only a large or very large mormyshka can pull such a fishing line. But if two medium-sized mormyshkas are tied at intervals one after the other, then their total weight may be sufficient for the correct balance of the gear. There are various combinations of tandems:

When there is a large (or medium) mormyshka below, and a very small one above it;

When two small mormyshkas are tied one after another;

When large (or medium) mormyshkas are tied one after another;

When there is a large (medium) mormyshka at the top, and a small one at the bottom.

The tandem of mormyshkas is also good because when it is pulled, any fish gets the impression that one crustacean (larva) is chasing another, and it instinctively seeks to grab the “escaping” bait. That is why bites on tandem baits are more confident than when one bait is used. In addition, two mormyshkas in the water are better visible than one. Wave vibrations from the tandem are also more noticeable.

With a tandem of mormyshkas the size of a match head, it is good to fish in shallow areas of reservoirs with a slight current. As the depth of fishing increases, an increase in the weight of one of the mormyshkas will also be required (usually the lower mormyshka is set larger).

In the spring, the fish often stays on a fairly strong channel current. However, she often chooses the middle or upper layers, where the flow is weaker than at the bottom. However, fish here can wait for food carried up by a stronger stream, especially in places where water barriers are located, say, bottom rocky ridges. Then, when using a tandem consisting of large and small mormyshkas, the first mormyshka basically keeps the tackle on the stream (although bites happen on it), and the second one acts as the main “working” bait when retrieving from the bottom. We add to this that the presence of fish much above the ground can also be due to the turbidity of the bottom stream.

The distance between the baits is determined by the conditions of fishing. If the fish is mostly at the bottom, then a distance of 15-20 cm between baits will be optimal. If the fish is kept higher, this distance can be increased to 50, 100 or more centimeters.

The nozzle for the tandem jig is selected taking into account the characteristics of the reservoir. With a bad biting, it is preferable to catch roach, perch and bream on the burdock moth larva, which is put on the hooks of both mormyshkas. But there are reservoirs where you can successfully fish only with a “local” bait. For example, mormysh can be collected from algae growing near the shore, and for this, anglers cut through small lanes. Both mormyshkas are usually baited with a mormysh and they slowly rise from the bottom, practically without hesitation or with very rare short twitches.

Tandem with a sliding mormyshka. Many anglers do not like to fish with tandem lures, as the additional mormyshka often clings to the ice when playing. However, this happens for the most part when both mormyshkas are tied with “deaf” knots. If the upper mormyshka elastically slides along the line, the hooks will not be a disaster. Why does the lower mormyshka cling if the fish is caught on the upper bait? This is because when fighting, the end of the line dangles along with the free mormyshka. But if a tandem with a sliding mormyshka is used, then under the weight of the fish, the upper mormyshka slides down, so that the lower mormyshka will not swing. In what cases does the upper mormyshka cling to the underwater ice edge? This happens most often when a fish, having taken the bottom mormyshka and already brought close to the hole, suddenly moves to the side, and you bring it back with an effort. In this case, the sliding mormyshka will also move to the bottom, and the fish will help to unhook it with its movements.

It should be recognized that hooking with an upper mormyshka, which is fixed in a sliding way, will be effective only if this connection is elastic enough, but not so much that when the mormyshka moves, the fishing line is deformed or, worse, torn. If the mormyshka easily walks along the line, the hook may not reliably enter the lip of the fish when hooking, and then a descent is possible. Therefore, it is necessary to find the optimal method of movable fastening. And there is such a method of attachment. It is quite simple - you need to install a tightly sliding knot below the mormyshka, made from a piece of fishing line (its diameter should be equal to the diameter of the main fishing line or be slightly larger). Another option is to cut off a piece of telephone cambric (2-3 mm long), put it on the fishing line below the upper mormyshka and jam it with a copper wire that would crush the cambric well. After that, the ends of the wire are cut as close as possible to the cambric. This is how the emphasis is made, by moving which the distance between the mormyshkas is set. If desired, you can make a similar upper stop, which is used to press the mormyshka to the lower cambric, but it is only necessary when the upper mormyshka lies on the bottom or plays near it - then the fish is forced to lift the bait. But more often bream, roach, perch and other fish take after the upper mormyshka, dragging it down, so only the lower stopper is enough.

It should be added that cambric can play an additional attractive role if it is properly colored. When catching bream, silver bream, blue bream and perch, it is best to use red cambric, and for roach, ide, dace - white. If it is necessary to install the upper stop cambric, then it is better to paint it black. Combinations of white and red with black are the most attractive for most fish.

The use of a sliding rig on the upper lure allows you to quickly change the distance between the mormyshkas depending on the fishing conditions.

Tandem hook and mormyshka.

It has been noticed more than once that even the tiniest mormyshka alarms large fish on the last ice, and using a hook instead of it is effective only when wiring or at least moving the nozzle. For fishing with a nodding rod, you can use a hook:

In tandem with a sinker or mormyshka, fixed on a fishing line above the hook;

In tandem with a sinker or mormyshka attached to the end of the main line, when the hook is tied higher on a short leash;

In tandem with a sinker or mormyshka, when the hook is on the fishing line in a sliding position and is fixed at the required distance from the lower mormyshka by clamping cambrics or sliding knots (Fig. 2).

Rice. 2. Ways of sliding hook fastening

Let's take a closer look at the second option. If the current in the pond is not noticeable, then making a leash longer than 1–2 cm is not advisable, since the hook will cling to the main fishing line. A short leash of stiff line, tied up, will lead the hook away from the main line. Some anglers install a cambric 5–7 mm long at the junction of the leash with the main line. It rests on the connecting node. The leash passes through the cambric and exits either from above or into the side hole, which is made in the upper part of the cambric with a needle (Fig. 3). Cambric fixes the leash better. With a short leash, the better the hook will be located in relation to the main line, the smaller it is. However, here it is necessary to take into account the fact that very thin hooks may not withstand large fish. With a short leash, the weakest bite is clearly visible.

Rice. 3. Ways of attaching a leash with a cambric

When fishing in the current, anglers often tie the hook to an elongated leash, which makes it possible for the nozzle to move more naturally under the pressure of the water. In this case, it is good to put on one or two beads on the shank of the hook. What color beads should be used depends on the type of fish that is supposed to be caught and the characteristics of the reservoir. In the current, it is sometimes possible to fish with a fixed tackle, although it happens that luck brings it down in the direction of the bottom and up.

The presence of an additional hook, as in the case of an additional mormyshka, is fraught with hooks on the lower edge of the ice, so the leash must be movable. Such installation is provided by attaching the leash to the cambric (Fig. 4).

Rice. 4. Movable leash attachment on the cambric

Consider now the third option. In order for the hook to be on the fishing line in a sliding position, it must have an eye. It is necessary to ensure that the edge of the eye is pressed tightly against the forearm, otherwise the hook may come off the fishing line. You can make the mount more secure. To do this, you need to tightly push a short cambric onto the eye of the hook, so that part of it is on the forearm. The cambric in the eye area is pierced with a needle, and a fishing line is passed through it. You can fix the hook with the help of sliding knots installed on the fishing line on both sides of the hook. It is also possible to use two beads and stoppers (what color to combine beads, the angler decides).

Tandems with "devils". These types of tandems have long proven themselves in spring ice fishing at various depths. The fish likes the combination of two “devils”, as well as the combination of “devil” and mormyshka, tied in one sequence or another. You can combine the "devil" with a hook Of all the options for equipment, a tandem with two "devils" will be more prone to hooks than others. If the "devil" has a mounting eye, and you decide to use the deaf snap of both lures, then the top one can be attached with a loop. With a sliding fastening, the upper "devil" is put on directly on the loop of the sliding knot (Fig. 5).

Rice. 5. Sliding fastening of the upper "devil"

For a tandem, "devils" of different sizes can be used. The most common combination is when there is a large “devil” below, and a small one above. In some cases, this type of bait can be used with additional weight. For example, it can be used when fishing on the current to reduce the drift of the "devil".

Small "devils" have more advantages with a bad bite, but there are situations when large ones are preferable. Take, for example, fishing on underwater islands among great depths, where fish are kept scattered in small flocks. For example, on the Kozhukhovsky backwater of the Moscow River, some anglers catch roach in March exclusively on a tandem of pot-bellied "devils" about 1 cm long, tied at a distance of 0.5 m from each other. This is due to the search for "navels" - local underwater hills located under water at a depth of 3–4 m among 8–10 m depths. Yes, for fishing at a depth of 3–4 m, it is enough to have small “devils”, however, bites often occur on the slope of the “navel”, so you have to constantly probe great depths, move a lot. The result here depends on the number of holes drilled and on the speed of "checking" the place, and this can be done quickly only when the tandem is heavy enough and sinks instantly. By the way, the following pattern is observed on the Kozhukhovsky backwater: you caught a roach, step back 30-50 cm and drill a new hole, otherwise you will not wait for a new bite soon. For heavy "devils" you need to use hard nods made of a metal plate.

Tandems of "devils" of various sizes have proven themselves well when catching any fish. They can even catch relatively large zander, bersh and pike (the young of these fish are constantly caught, and, of course, they must be released back into the hole).

Often, such a combination turns out to be catchy when one of the “devils” has an artificial replanting in the form of beads, a bead on a hook or fishing line, and the other has a natural one, that is, a bloodworm, a larva of a burdock moth, a small maggot. Although the fish will not necessarily bite on the bait with natural replanting.

Seeing a tandem "devil" is in most cases just a slow climb with very short stops and jerks along the way. In the spring, wiring is often carried out to the middle layer of water, and sometimes even higher. Usually five or six twitches are enough for the entire lift. Once again, we note that success during spring fishing ensures constant movement around the reservoir with fishing for new holes. To find fish faster, it is not advisable to make more than five wires in each hole (at the same time, two or three wires must be made so that they capture the middle and upper layers). The fishing of each new hole should begin with a slow descent of the bait, while making twitches or small fluctuations. During the descent of the mormyshka, you can make stops. After the bottom "devil" reaches the bottom, the game must be stopped. Often a bite follows either at this point or with the resumption of play.

Good spring bream!

On the last ice, the angler has a good chance of catching selected bream. Much depends on the right choice of location, gear, time, fishing tactics, bait and bait.

With the flow of melt water under the ice, flocks of bream leave deep places in reservoirs and lakes, moving to where the water is best enriched with oxygen. On a fresh stream, metabolic processes in the body of fish intensify, and they begin to actively move in search of food. Therefore, a promising place for catching bream will be the place where, among other things, there is a good food supply.

Choice of location. In late March - early April, bream often feed in the coastal waters on the channel edges of flooded streams and rivers, as well as on tables adjacent to them. Flocks of bream also like to enter bays, the water in which is refreshed by tributaries and where the bottom has a multi-level relief with areas of solid ground. And if in the middle of winter the bream mainly prefers channel areas with a depth of 6-12 m, then in spring it most often stays in similar areas, but no more than 5 m deep, and enters the pre-channel tables, where the depth may not exceed 2.5–4 m. m At this time, bream can often be found where the channel comes close to the shore, to the coastal snag or flooded forest. Often in such places a good biting of bream and scavenger occurs when large edges have already formed near the coast, and you have to move onto the ice along the decks. In addition, at the end of the freeze-up, flocks of bream, and sometimes quite large ones, go to the tributaries for fresh water, even if the depth of this tributary is not very large. More than once we have caught bream and whitefish in the rivers of the Ruza, Ozerninsky, Rybinsk and other reservoirs, when the depth at the place of fishing did not exceed 1.5 m. In some cases, bream and whitefish can rise quite high along the tributary. On the Sukhovetka River (Rybinsk Reservoir), we had to catch kilogram bream 3 km from the mouth. Moreover, in such years, when the river was very shallow and the depth of the rifts rarely exceeded 0.5–0.7 m, and the depth of the channel depressions, which local fishermen call bochags, did not exceed 1–1.5 m. By the way, when searching for bream flocks on shallow tributaries, it is very important to take into account the presence of bogs - sometimes they are literally packed with large fish, including bream.

When choosing a place on an unfamiliar body of water, you should also focus on local breeders. Their catch often shows where the bream is concentrated at a given time.

Tackle. On the last ice, the best results are obtained by searching for bream and bream using a fishing rod equipped with a nod and mormyshka. In the spring, when frosts are rare, a fishing rod with a comfortable handle and an open coil is quite suitable. It's good when the reel has a key brake - this makes it easier to release and reel in the line. A balalaika-type closed-reel fishing rod is also quite suitable. A nod is best made from lavsan, caprolavsan or metallized lavsan. It should be made “on a cone”, without sharp corners at the ends and bent under the weight of the mormyshka at an angle of 35-40 degrees. The passage of the line through the fastening parts of the nod must be carefully adjusted so that at the crucial moment the line does not get tangled or jammed.

For catching bream on the last ice, small and medium-sized mormyshkas are most suitable. If the water is clear and the day is clear, it is better to take low-key mormyshki: black, gray, gray-black, gray-green, green, brown, brown-green. If the lighting is poor, the color of the water is greatly changed or it is cloudy, bright mormyshkas (for example, nickel-plated) or mormyshkas of a combined color (say, with copper or brass scales on a lead body) will be good. The shape of the mormyshki can be different. Most often, bream breeders use "ant", "uralka", "lentil", "shotgun", "devil", "goat", as well as flat and flat oval mormyshkas. Pretty catchy drop-shaped mormyshka - with a ball near the hook (Fig. 6).

Rice. 6. Catchable bream mormyshkas

In spring, the bream is quite lively and strongly resists when playing. However, when fishing with small and medium mormyshkas, it is necessary to use a fishing line with a diameter of no more than 0.12 mm, otherwise it will not stretch enough, which will significantly worsen the game. Considering that today some foreign companies produce especially strong fishing lines made using special technologies, you can even pick up a fishing line with a diameter of less than 0.12 mm, which will quite withstand a kilogram bream. For example, the Japanese monofilament “Hair frog”, made using gamma technology, has proven itself well in spring fishing for large fish.

As for ordinary fishing lines, for confident fishing of a kilogram bream, you need to use monofilaments of well-known manufacturers with a diameter of 0.12-0.13 mm. To catch a larger bream, you need to take a larger diameter line, based on this calculation: for every 500 g of fish, 0.01 mm of line thickness is added. When buying fishing line, you should always check it for breaks, as counterfeit tackle and fishing accessories are often sold in “non-branded” stores.

The selection of a nod, mormyshka and fishing line is carried out at home - in the bathroom or in a deep bowl of water.

Catching time. The best fishing time is an hour or two after dawn. In the spring, there are many old holes in the reservoirs that do not have time to freeze overnight or are covered with just a thin crust of ice, which is easy to break through with the heel of a boot. This greatly facilitates the search for fish and allows once again not to make noise, which is inevitable when drilling new holes. It is also important that among the holes left by the fishermen there are those that were properly fed the day before. In such places, bream often concentrates.

Sometimes the peak of biting occurs in the afternoon and is very short. After a few fish are caught from the hole, the troop of bream may move away. The nibble of the scavenger is longer.

Since in spring the bream stays at shallow depths, it avoids crowded places. Therefore, closer to dusk, when the anglers begin to leave the pond, the bream approaches the baited holes, where it was afraid to approach a little earlier. During this period of the day, active fishing of abandoned holes with the “devil” sometimes provides a very solid catch. By dusk, bream flocks can move away from the shore and feed on fairly distant pre-channel tables, as well as on channel edges with a difference in depth. However, here, too, breams often prefer tables at a depth of 4 to 6 m with a hard bottom with ruts and small pits, where various aquatic organisms, such as bloodworms, can live in a layer of silt.

At night, when the water temperature drops, the bream goes into the pits and simply retreats to great depths, however, it does not stop feeding, periodically going to the feeding areas on the edges. Particularly good for night fishing are places where the underwater channel bends and places where there is not one, but several different levels of edges. Night activity of bream falls on the period from 23:00 to 2:00. The bite is often uneven, it either arises or fades. It is best to fish at night with float rods with standard or combined equipment. As lighting, a gas burner or a lantern is suitable. For normal hook baiting, it is good to have a headlamp.

Nozzle. The most common winter bait for bream fishing is the bloodworm. For spring ice fishing, large bloodworms are most suitable. Two or three larvae of the fiber mosquito are put on the hook of the mormyshka under the head or behind the middle. The latter method is good when the bite is capricious. But it happens that the bream touches the tips of the nozzle, but does not capture them with its mouth. Then you should bait the bloodworm on the hook with a ring, so that both ends of the bloodworm are pierced with a hook.

But in the spring, when revived insects begin to get into the water with melt water, other nozzles can also “work” well. So, when fishing in the tributaries of various reservoirs, as well as in the reservoirs themselves, Chernobyl, small maggot, small red worm are successfully used. As for Chernobyl, several larvae are baited on the hook at once, usually two or three are enough to catch bream. White mugwort larvae “work” well in combination with black mormyshkas such as “ant”, “devil”, “droplet”. The same applies to small maggots - one or two larvae are baited on the hook.

A worm for spring ice fishing is a special bait. A bream can either take it very well, especially large ones, or not take it at all. A large bream is less alarmed by a worm than a bloodworm, since the vast majority of anglers use the bloodworm as a bait, and the fish must have seen this bait on the hook. Plus, a fat worm is much more nutritious than a thin bloodworm for fish that replenish their strength during active spring movement.

search tactics. Having chosen a suitable site for fishing, the angler must drill 5-10 holes. If there are unfrozen holes made by other anglers in the place you have chosen, then the scheme for passing new holes should be planned taking into account the existing ones. It is desirable that the depths at different points of the site you have chosen be different; the distance between the holes can vary from 10 to 30 m, it depends on the vastness of the chosen fishing area.

With a large amount of feed, all prepared holes need to be fed. It is enough to pour one small feeder into each hole, opening it 1–1.5 m from the bottom, if the current is not noticeable. If the current is strong enough, the bloodworm or bait mixture is poured onto the ground. They begin to catch in the hole 20–30 minutes after feeding. If there is little food, then you can feed the holes selectively. As a rule, only those holes are fed, under which the most promising bottom topography.

You can practice the trial fishing method, when holes drilled in a selected area are caught until the first bites, and then the “working” holes are baited. If the search area is extensive, then first determine the hole in which the most bites are observed, and then, if necessary, additional holes are drilled near it. In addition, the angler should notice at what depth most bites occur. In the future, when planning the scheme for the passage of holes, this fact is primarily taken into account. While the fish is active, you should not add food to the hole.

If you came to the reservoir for a couple of days or are going to stay even longer, then, having found the place where the bream comes out, you need to feed the catch holes daily, including at night when you leave the reservoir.

Lure. The main rule of feeding is to do no harm. Some anglers scare off the bream flock with the noise made when the feeder is lowered, others overfeed the fish too much or force them to move away using an improperly prepared mixture. If a flock of bream is found, it is important to add bait in a timely manner when the bite weakens, while giving the hole a “rest” for some time so that the fish calms down and gathers at the place of fishing. With a small depth of fishing and an imperceptible current, you can feed fish without a feeder. In this case, bloodworms, small maggots or soaked plant mixture are tossed into the hole in pinches. To attract bream by smell, bloodworms and maggots can be crushed.

When fishing at depths of more than 4 m, if the fish gathered in a baited place, additional feeding should be carried out from the middle layer of water or, at least, do not open the feeder closer than two meters from the bottom. Otherwise, the appearance of a foreign object will alert the bream, and it will leave.

For the preparation of bream bait, the angler should carefully select the components. You can offer the following recipe (the weight of the components is indicated based on one fishing trip).

Ingredients: 400 g of breadcrumbs, 200 g of ground cake, 100 g of semi-finished dry cakes, 100 g of powdered milk, 100–500 g of small, unwashed bloodworms (the amount of bloodworms depends on the activity of the ruff and other small things; if it is high, then this component of the mixture is sometimes should be ruled out altogether).

Honey, vanillin, ground hemp seed, corn or olive oil, dry aquarium food, strawberry essence, etc. can be added to plant mixtures. The dosage of these specific components should be minimal. Usually, no more than two or three of the listed additives are mixed into the feed mixture.

The main components are mixed at home, and bloodworms, additives, spices and oils are mixed in a pond. After all the components are thoroughly mixed on ice in a special bowl, water from the hole is added to the feed mixture and mixed again to make the bait wet. After that, it can be used.

Fishing technique. Mormyshka with a nozzle is lowered to the bottom with smooth, unhurried movements so as not to alert the fish. In addition, the fishing of each new hole with a planning stepped descent sometimes makes it possible to determine the level at which a flock of bream or white bream is kept, since in spring this fish is often found in the middle layers of water. After the mormyshka is lowered to the bottom, first you need to make it move on the ground, and then, making smooth, slow vibrations, raise it 40 cm from the bottom. At the highest point of the wiring, you need to make a short pause, after which you very smoothly lower the bait down. Upon reaching the bottom, the mormyshka should freeze and remain motionless for several seconds. It is at this moment that the nod often suddenly bends upwards - this means that the bream has captured the nozzle with its mouth. Further, if no bites have occurred, you can tap the mormyshka on the bottom - this will create a cloud of turbidity, which may attract bream. But in order for him to find the mormyshka, it needs to be raised above the ground by 5-10 cm. After that, you can do the usual sweeping wiring, raising the mormyshka 40-50 cm from the bottom. At the same time, it is necessary to ensure that the oscillation frequency of the mormyshka and the speed of its rise remain approximately the same both during one posting and during repetitions. This is due to the fact that the organism that imitates the mormyshka moves in the water in one manner inherent to it. It is necessary to try to pick up a new way of playing on the rise after long pauses, during which the mormyshka should hang motionless at the bottom or imitate the natural fall of food to the bottom. So, after three or four identical postings, you can practice the technique of smooth lowering - several times raise the mormyshka into the water column, then lower it smoothly, working wide enough with a brush. You can also attract the bream to the mormyshka by moving it in a horizontal plane. To do this, the fishing rod is tilted relative to the ice plane at an angle of 30 degrees and smoothly driven from side to side so that the fishing line alternately touches the opposite edges of the hole.

Playing. A bream caught on a mormyshka actively resists. When jerking the fish being pulled out, the fishing line should slide elastically between the thumbs and forefingers. Yielding centimeters or even meters to a bream that does not give up, it is also necessary to absorb its jerks with smooth hand movements. Having sufficiently exhausted the fish, it is introduced into the hole and picked up under the gills. You can also press the bream against the wall of the hole with your palm and then push it to the surface. If the diameter of the hole does not allow bringing the bream to the surface, it is hooked with a hook with a long handle and pressed against the lower edge of the ice, after which the working hole is expanded with a pick or a hole of a larger diameter is drilled close to it.

With a "garland" for spring fish

At the end of March - beginning of April, when the fish "drunk" from fresh streams become noticeably more active and begin to move around the reservoir in search of food, the peak of ice fishing occurs.

This is the best time for lovers of ice fishing. It is also the most dangerous. That is why it is required from the fisherman in early spring, as has been repeatedly said, special care. While the bright spring sun warms the ice from above, the current is already undermining it from below. The icy morning crust is deceptive. A light night frost seizes not only the still safe places of reservoirs, but also the polynyas formed the day before.

March ice, unlike December ice, does not warn the fisherman with a crackle about a real danger, but simply instantly falls under his feet. Therefore, it is so important to go on spring fishing not alone, but with friends and keep the whole company at a slight distance from each other. Before going out on the ice (when the rims have already appeared or have just appeared), it is advisable to throw a couple of long slings on it from the shore so that there are no problems when returning to the shore.

Now about where and how you can find fish in early spring. More precisely, how to determine the places of its greatest accumulation. After all, luck during spring fishing is largely ensured not so much by luck as by the ability of the angler to find a flock of fish.

Correct, in our opinion, will be the tactics of "search for the horizon", which, by the way, is also used in other seasons. However, only in early spring is it possible to fish with coarser equipment than, for example, in winter. Therefore, when searching for places of accumulation of fish at different depths, it is not necessary to use only one mormyshka or hook.

In the spring, it will be quite reasonable to use a somewhat complicated gear. Such a rig may consist of a small bait, “working” at the very bottom, and a jigsaw with or without a bait, located on the same line 15–20 cm above the bait (it is advisable to try to fish with different baits). Such equipment can also be equipped with a third hook, which is located above the mormyshka. Of course, there must be a nozzle on the hook, for example, a small bloodworm (Fig. 7).

Rice. 7. "Garland" for perch

Playing with this "garland" in late March - early April, we do not risk scaring off the fish, because during this period they are not as careful as at any other time. But in this way, you can quickly determine in which layer of water the flock is currently located. Having found it, you need to switch to ordinary tackle with one mormyshka or hook. This is done for quite understandable reasons and it is more convenient to fish - nothing extra will cling to the ice edge - and the game of the bait itself will become much more attractive and tempting for fish.

One more detail. It should be remembered that light falls from the hole to the bottom of the river, and fish of different species react to it differently. The perch, for example, not only is not frightened by the light window, but often rises for the bait to the very ice edge and, almost from the hands of the fisherman, snatches the prey that eludes him with a greedy mouth.

The light disturbs the roach. This fish is much more shy than striped robbers. Sometimes it is enough just to cover the hole (at least with an old fishing cloak, if there is no snow) in order to start fishing for the silvery beauties of roaches in a short time.

The passage of fish from the reservoir to the rivers

The Rybinsk Reservoir has long enjoyed well-deserved attention from anglers. The fish here are varied. The main task is to find the point where it concentrates, which is sometimes not so easy to do on vast ice expanses. It is much easier for an angler to look for places where the fish come out when, with the onset of the first spring thaws, they begin to actively move around the reservoir in search of a fresh stream. At this time, large flocks of "marine" roach, blue bream, white bream, silver bream approach the mouths of rivers, small rivers and streams, to the places where springs come out. After some time, a significant number of fish rush up the tributaries of various sizes. Experienced anglers say about this process: the fish went to wash from the thick mucus that covered it during the winter in order to acquire a healthy appearance by spawning. After washing, the fish returns to the reservoir or to large rivers, such as the Mologa, Volga, and after the ice has melted and the water has warmed, it spawns there.

If the winter was stable, with severe frosts, and too thick ice prevented the enrichment of water with oxygen, then even in such large reservoirs as the Rybinsk Reservoir, freezes can occur closer to spring. Fish then massively enter some rivers not in March - April, as usual, but already in February. And although it can be caught in large quantities in this case, you are unlikely to get satisfaction from such fishing, since the meat of the kill fish is tasteless and smells (as a result of metabolic processes) unpleasantly.

On the tributaries. Having risen upstream of the river saturated with oxygen and having spent a lot of energy at the same time, the fish begins to eat intensively. She constantly moves in search of feeding places and, having found them, can stay there for a long time. A good place for fish parking is almost always located away from the fast jet. The fish rests here, while waiting for the food carried by the current. On Sukhovetka, City and other tributaries, we found good fishing spots:

Below the narrowing of the banks, where the river became much wider;

Below the rifts in the pits, behind the coastal ledges, beyond which there were quiet waters (Fig. 8);

Rice. 8. Places of concentration of fish in tributaries

In the area of ​​the coastal snag;

At the confluence of a brook into the river;

Where the coastal spring beats;

Near the shore on the bend of the river away from the blast jet.

Flocks of bream, roach, blue bream and other white fish here often stick together. It happens that the fish stands close to the shore, and then the depth of fishing may not exceed even 20 cm. Often, in such places, anglers catch a closer look. We have repeatedly witnessed how whole crowds of adult uncles, lying on the ice with gear lowered into the water, looked into the hole, covering it with their hands in order to better examine the bottom. This behavior of anglers is largely justified, since they can determine which movements of the mormyshka the fish are responding to. And visibility at the same time is excellent, since the water of the rivers flowing into the Rybinsk reservoir is very transparent at the time when the ice is holding. The main thing is that the sun shines brightly.

Having experience of such observation of roach, bream, blue bream, perch and other fish, we concluded that the largest specimens often eschew even not very rough gear. For example, an impressive roach or roach may not react to a mormyshka tied even to a line with a diameter of 0.13 mm, not to mention a coarser line. They will bypass it, as if not noticing. And if you tie the same mormyshka to a fishing line with a diameter of 0.08 mm and play the bait correctly, the fish will immediately become interested in it. Moreover, this is more typical for large individuals - solid roach, bream, perch, etc. What to do - sit without hope of biting a standing specimen or take risks - the angler decides for himself. Recently, for catching large fish in the rivers of the Rybinsk Reservoir, we use the Japanese line "Hair frog". The fishing line with a diameter of 0.08-0.01 mm justified itself when fishing for bream and roach weighing up to 900 g.

Another point is the correct selection of the game. We observed more than once, guided by the method described above, that is, looking into the hole, like a roach, a scavenger, a perch accompanied the mormyshka, rising behind it from the bottom, but did not touch it. However, as soon as the mormyshka, having slightly wiggled at the bottom, freeze, barely touching the ground, a bite immediately followed.

When fishing with a mormyshka, a lot of holes are usually drilled. But if the depth at the place of fishing is small, and the ice is thick, the fish can be frightened by the noise of the auger and leave, so it is better to use the existing holes, since during the spring run of the fish a fair amount of them can be drilled by visiting anglers. Sometimes on a coastal shallow or a channel depression with holes in the ground, you can find a very good place just a meter from the hole in which no bites were observed at all for a long time. This is due to the fact that a group of fish in small streams always hides behind some kind of shelter. In addition, silt deposits always accumulate in the uneven bottom relief of any river, in which fish find food for themselves - larvae, crustaceans, etc. The same applies to snag - there is always more bottom sediment.

If the bite of the fish is very capricious, it is sometimes useful to replace the jig with a float. The thinnest elements of equipment, the lightest float and sinker, a tiny hook instead of a mormyshka sometimes do wonders - the fish suddenly begins to take the nozzle fearlessly. But it is good to use such tackle only when fishing in the quietest whirlpools.

However, in the tributaries of the Rybinsk Reservoir, fish sometimes concentrate in atypical places. In this regard, we will give one example. It was on the Sukhovet. Near the shore, a snag stuck out from under the ice, near which two holes were drilled. The fisherman lowered a mormyshka with a bloodworm into one hole, and right there on the hook was a small roach. He changed the bloodworm for a piece of worm - the same story. The fisherman released all the roaches back into the river and then saw another hole drilled closer to the middle of the river. There must be a strong current there, he thought. But at random he lowered in that place a small light mormyshka with a couple of bloodworms. When she touched the bottom, the current still carried her along, dragging her along the ground. Suddenly - a confident rise of a nod, hooking, and now a roach weighing about 250 g was taken out of the hole. New dragging along the bottom - and another good bite. This time the fisherman caught a heavy dace. In this place, dace and roach took confidently. Obviously, they had no doubts about the naturalness of the food, which naturally rolled along the bottom in the course. On another rift, we once successfully caught chub weighing up to 400 g in the same way. However, it was noticed that during ice fishing, this fish stays close to a flowing stream or spring. The same applies to ides, but they, like trout, often stick to shelters. Returning to the dace, we only add that they rise higher than other fish along the tributaries and can choose rifts and pits even where the river is already turning into a stream. For catching dace and other fish in areas with a fast current, a combined equipment is suitable: a nod, an end sinker, and above it - a leash with one or two hooks or a mormyshka plus a hook. In this case, the hook is used No. 15-18 with a long or short forearm, depending on the nozzle, mormyshki are used with minimum sizes with hooks No. 18-22.

But still, most anglers use the classic equipment of a fishing rod with a nod and a mormyshka for fishing in tributaries. Such models of mormyshkas as "droplet", "zemussel", "shotgun", "uralka", "lentil" work well, and from the vertical ones - "devil", "goat", black or gray. In some cases, in poor lighting conditions, mormyshkas of a combined color are used, that is, when the bait has a copper or brass overlay. Some models with contrasting colors also performed well, for example, when there is a spot in the form of an eye on a black background or one red or yellow scale is drawn.

We will not touch on all the fishing techniques, we will only say that in most cases a good catch is provided by the descent with periodic holdings of the mormyshka for 1-2 seconds in the water column. This is probably due to the fact that melted streams running along the ice surface during a thaw carry particles of interest to fish, including revived forest insects (after all, most rivers flow in the forest). In addition, many aquatic organisms at the end of winter rise to the lower edge of the ice, from where they can be carried away by the current. Accordingly, the gliding mormyshka here imitates the natural movement of a leech, crustacean or larva, which, having weakened, sink to the bottom, at times trying to fight the force of gravity.

Most often, bloodworms, a piece of red earthworm, a larva of a burdock moth, and a small maggot are used as nozzles for mormyshka. It is characteristic that during a bad bite, a large roach pecks not at a whole maggot, but only at its half, cut off with a sharp knife. Moreover, the nozzle needs to be changed quite often: obviously, the fish reacts to the smell that comes from the cut maggot; soaked in water, it becomes useless as a bait.

The worm helps out in places where there are not a large number of anglers, and large fish are not scared. In this case, weighty roach, bream, blue bream often prefer a more high-calorie worm to small bloodworm larvae. This is understandable: ahead of spawning, and you need to gain weight faster.

Another bait not quite common for ice fishing, which has more than once rescued anglers in the most hopeless situations, is a dragonfly larva. Any white fish and perch respond well to the green goat. You need to bait the larva with a stocking, leaving the tip of the tail free. However, it is extremely difficult to find this nozzle on the tributaries of the reservoir, it takes a lot of time, and not everywhere there are algae in which it is kept. Therefore, you should prepare an exotic nozzle in advance - go to one of the early opening rivers near Moscow and collect larvae in coastal algae.

To the reservoir. After the coastal zones of the reservoir are refreshed with melt water and the fish begin to actively move along the coast in search of food, fishing becomes much more effective. During this period, fish often stay in shallow water, where tributaries or melt water carry food. On dammed rivers, where the speed of the water flow is very weak, but the depths are large, roach, blue bream, bream, having taken a sufficient sip of oxygen-enriched water, can return to feed on deep edges, where there are colonies of mussel mussels. Such places are typical for the lower reaches of fairly large tributaries, such as the Ild, Sutka, Sit, Poshekhon, etc.

"Sea" roach, blue bream, bream, perch, ide are very fond of visiting medium-sized bays. True, there are often such bays in which numerous small perches and the same roach do not allow a decent fish to bite. In such conditions, in order to be more likely to catch large roach, you need to choose the deepest places in the middle part of the bay and at the exit from it, for example, 3-4-meter holes near the steep bank. Sometimes, however, moving into the upper reaches of the bay along the channel of the inflowing tributary, one manages to come across a flock of large fish there too. At the same time, roach and perch prefer to stay in a snag, standing apart in a large clean area. It happens that in some places the zone of the snag chosen by fish is quite extensive. However, it has been observed that roach and perch avoid thick snags, and it is better if individual snags are widely scattered on riverbed irrigations. A large roach prefers to stay as far away from the perch as possible - it irritates her. But this does not mean that if perches come across, roach will not bite. It's just that the bite will not be as stable as where the roach is kept apart. Sometimes, once in a catchy area, you can drag up to thirty roaches from one hole, some of which are very impressive in size. If the snags on the riverside table are scattered widely, then the area for catching roach is often quite extensive. Then it is recommended to drill several holes at once over the entire area of ​​the snag with an interval of 5-10 m and methodically catch them, do not forget to let them “rest” when the bite is weakened. This is due to the fact that with the constant drilling of holes, large fish often leave their chosen place, besides, it is alarmed by the movements of the fish being fished out.

The more actively the fish moves under the spring ice, the more difficult it is to keep it in place with bait. During this period, in order to succeed in fishing, you have to combine feeding methods. So in quiet waters, you can first lower one or two feeders with a feed bloodworm or a mixture of feed bloodworms with mixed feed to the bottom, and then attract the attention of the flock with a bloodworm spreading in the water column, throwing it directly into the hole in pinches.

in the channels. There are a number of artificial channels in the water system of the Rybinsk Reservoir, where fish like to enter from mid-March.

The most convenient access to the canal is near the village of Borki. Reeds grow along the banks of this canal; All this is attractive to spring fish.

At the same time, ending in a dead end in the area of ​​the village, the canal is, as it were, a trap for fish - it enters the canal, but does not immediately find a way out.

The most important thing when fishing in a canal is to guess the time when fish enter it, and different flocks come here: blue bream, large sea roach, large perch, bleak, bream, bream, ide; sometimes there is a chub. The listed species of fish prefer to stay at depths from 1 to 3 m. We have found good places more than once at the edge at a depth of 1–1.5 m, which is located behind a narrow coastal shallow starting from reeds. Often, fish trails intersect where the canals branch off from the canal. (Fig. 9). Sometimes large roach goes to shallow water with separate snags.

Since the accessible places of the Rybinsk Reservoir are too crowded, shallow areas should be chosen for fishing, away from groups of anglers, otherwise the fish will quickly leave, frightened by the noise. Gear for fishing in canals and the reservoir use the same gear as for fishing in rivers: a fishing rod with a nod and a mormyshka. The same range of nozzles and mormyshek. In periods when there are a lot of fish under the ice, but it does not take, a baitless mormyshka helps out. Each angler chooses the technique of the game himself. Sometimes fast wiring “works”, and sometimes slow with fluctuations of such a frequency, which is typical for catching a particular type of fish.

Rice. 9. Crossing point of fish trails when fishing on the canal

II. AFTER THE ICE IS GOING OFF

Behind the spring ash

Spring ide fishing can be very exciting and rewarding, provided you know the behavior of this fish, know where to look for it and how to catch it.

The ide spawns after fattening in the same tributaries at a water temperature of 4 °C and above. It lays eggs on floods and rifts at a depth of up to 0.7 m. Obviously, with the fall of water, a lot of eggs die, but some of it remains in the shallow waters of bochags and rifts. After the water subsides, the ide returns to the main river, lake or reservoir. During the spring run, the ide can also enter floodplain quarries, lakes, channels and oxbow lakes, where it also sometimes spawns.

After the water subsides and becomes clear, the ides come out to feed on coastal shallows with a hard or sandy bottom.

It is very important to get to the exit of the ide, decide on the place and method of catching it. The tactics of fishing during this period is to search for places of concentration of fish or waiting for it in passing places.

Wiring. Having entered the dammed river from the reservoir, where the current is not so strong, a flock of ide usually makes a move to the upper reaches along the border of the upper edge. Also, the ides like to move along the rocky ridges, a series of hollows - in a word, the ide prefers to walk along the relief. Therefore, the wiring must be done taking into account this fact. Upstream, where the flow of water becomes fast, the ides begin to huddle to the shore calms. The path of the flock often lies along the coastal grass or submerged shrubs.

In the fast tributaries of lakes and rivers, the ide, starting from the very mouth, enters, moving along the coast. The course of the ide from large rivers to tributaries is also explained by the fact that in a large river, turbidity, carried by a strong stream, clogs the gills of the ide. Therefore, the ide chooses areas of the cleanest water both in the river and where the flow resistance is the least. It is in such areas that you need to look for yaz paths. But biting sometimes have to wait a long time. Feeding doesn't help. But if you wait for the approach of the sore flock, bites can follow one after another.

Sometimes the ide lingers on a stream that carries some kind of living creature washed out of the shore. Usually he chooses a swaddle, where a strong jet abruptly turns into a smooth one. In such a place, the food smoothly settles to the bottom and the fish can easily profit from it. When fishing on suvods, the nozzle is first launched into a fast jet, so that the stream takes it to a slow jet. And since the flow in the spring tributaries is very fast, you have to use a thin fishing line to make the equipment more manageable. Therefore, the fishing line is used with a diameter not thicker than 0.12 mm. It takes a lot of work to fish a strong ide with such thin tackle, and, of course, you should only use a Bolognese type rod with a well-adjusted reel. Fishing is usually carried out at depths from 0.5 to 2 m. A float for a fast current should be taken with a short body and a long weighted keel, with a dough of 2–4 g. The float should be fixed motionlessly at three points. A 15–20 cm long leader is attached to the main line through a swivel. As a sinker, one lead pellet of the same test as the float is used, installed near the swivel. The hook for catching roaches is used No. 10–12, and for catching a relatively large ide, No. 6–8. As a nozzle, two or three maggots on a hook, a bark beetle larva, are suitable. But often all kinds of earthworms are more suitable for effective catching of large ide, since earthworms in the spring are the usual food for any white fish and do not arouse suspicion in it.

For its short-term fattening, the ide also likes to choose various winds, with or without current twists, and small coastal bays. (Fig. 10). On the river, there may be various kinds of hollows flooded with hollow water, in which the current is also not strong. In such places, food washed off the shore often accumulates, and it delays the feeding ide.

Rice. 10. Places of spring exit of ides

In calm waters, it is quite possible to catch an ide with a long fly rod with a main line with a diameter of 0.22 mm and a leash with a diameter of 0.18 mm. Such tackle, with skillful playing, can withstand a large ide. The load can be distributed, consisting of shots fixed at intervals of 15–20 cm from each other. The weight of the pellets decreases in the direction of the lead. This allows the bait to sink more smoothly. The float is used weighing 1.5–2 g with a shortened keel and an elongated body.

Sometimes the ide comes out to feed on shallow spills, where it is preferable to use a 7-meter fly rod made of lightweight carbon fiber for catching it. At the same time, the equipment is put on an increased strength (the main fishing line is taken with a diameter of 0.23 mm, the leash - with a diameter of 0.18-0.2 mm), since it is often necessary to fish from the bottom, overgrown with tall grass. If you use wading boots, then with such a fishing rod it is not difficult to throw the bait to areas with a depth of 1–1.5 m, where ide is usually kept. When moving on spills, it must be taken into account that the bottom is often muddy, so movements must be careful.

In spring, a medium-sized ide can enter streams, where it is successfully caught in barrels and windmills on the finest equipment using various nozzles. One of the most catchy nozzles is considered to be a caddisfly - if, of course, it is found in this stream.

Match catch. In spring, flocks of fattening ide can be found in wide channels, canals, oxbow lakes and not far from the mouths of dammed rivers. For example, ide fishing near the village of Borki in a technical channel is successful, where it sometimes enters en masse in early April from the Rybinsk reservoir. Here, local anglers catch ide for a large forest ant with a long-casting rod. When fishing with a long cast, it is desirable to use a long, unloaded leader, with which the nozzle takes off smoothly and attractively with short pulls of the tackle. In order for the nozzle to be more noticeable to the ide, some anglers plant the ant along with the maggot. However, when a large flock approaches, the ide bites well on a “clean” maggot (2–5 larvae on a hook), and on a bunch of bloodworms, and on a worm. But in those places where there is a lot of bleak, it is better to catch the ide on the worm. The maggot is very quickly discovered by the bleak, and then there is no end to it.

When fishing in oxbow lakes, canals, dammed river mouths, it is often necessary to fish at a depth of 3–5 m. These can be quite remote areas from the coast, so casting sometimes has to be done at a distance of 25–35 m from the coast. If at depths up to 2 m it is quite possible to catch an ide with a fixed float, then for fishing at depths from 2.5 to 5 m it is already necessary to make a sliding float mount. The float test depends on the casting distance: the farther you need to cast the nozzle, the greater the capacity of the float is taken. When fishing at depths from 2 to 5 m, a float with a 3 + 2 test is taken; 3+1; 4+2; 5+2. The first number here means the mass of the built-in weight on the keel of the float, the second - the additional weight on the fishing line. Any other combination will do: everything is determined empirically. The better the tackle is balanced, the easier it is to work with. Sometimes, instead of additional sinkers and a hook, anglers use a mormyshka with a small body in the form of a larva or an ant, equipped with a hook No. 12–13.

Mormyshka, baited by maggot, caddisfly, worm or bloodworm, the ide finds faster if you smoothly play along with it, giving the bait a small tremble with a rod whip.

When fishing with various types of float gear, it is necessary to take into account the brightness of daylight. If the sun is not hidden by clouds, then the ide often stays away from the coast, under the edge, in the shade of a steep coast or under the protection of a bush. In cloudy weather, and especially when there are ripples on the water, the ide is not afraid to go out into shallow water.

At midnight. The ide can settle in the gaps between the bushes. Here he also finds a lot of food, especially if a stream runs from the shore. In such a place it is good to catch an ide on a half-bottom. In addition, with the help of this tackle, you can successfully catch ide in areas with a calm current, directed along the coastal reed. It is advisable to choose a solid bottom without snags and algae. The poludonka is thrown to the periphery of the fast jet so that the equipment is carried to the calm water to the reed. The ide often bites when the nozzle is slowly dragged along the bottom. After stopping the sinker, the nozzle begins to move attractively on the jets from side to side. In order for the equipment to stop at the border of the currents, it is necessary to accurately select sinkers by weight; To do this, you can use a carabiner fixed on the main fishing line in a sliding position. The carabiner rests on the swivel of the leash or on the sinker-shot, installed on the border of the connection of the main fishing line with the leash. A spinning sinker "Cheburashka" of the required weight is easily attached to the carabiner.

Having chosen a suitable site for fishing, you can place two or three half-bottoms on stands on it. Half bottoms can be used in combination with container maggot feeders, the weight of which is chosen according to the strength of the current that tends to carry the rig (Fig. 11). Sometimes the container feeder is placed closer to the main stream, so that the maggot is washed out better, for this it is lowered almost vertically and its location is adjusted by the tension of the fishing line.

Rice. 11. One of the ways to equip a semi-bottom with a container feeder: 1 - a loop for a leash; 2 - swivel; 3 - carbine; 4 - container feeder; 5 - lead plate; 6 - feeder ring; 7 - leash

Side nod. A rod with a side nod and mormyshka is well suited for ide fishing, provided that the length of the rod, mormyshka and bait is chosen correctly.

For fishing in streams and small rivers, where the ide comes in the spring, it is enough to take a light carbon-fiber rod 6 m long. But on condition that the angler manages to hide behind the bushes on the shore, as the ide is very cautious and immediately leaves when he sees the silhouette of the angler. In open areas you have to use rods with a length of 8-9 m. It is difficult to work with such a rod if it is not made of the lightest materials, so the choice of rod must be approached carefully. At the same Rybinsk Reservoir, we caught ide on a nodding bait wading, choosing areas with a depth of 1–2.5 m. A good bite was observed for maggot, worm and bloodworm on shallow coastal edges, along which all white fish passed. So we caught on dammed rivers - Ildi, Sutka, City in their lower reaches.

Since the floods on the tributaries of the Rybinsk reservoir are very shallow, it was important to reach the depth difference and fish at least at a depth of 1–1.5 m. 8 m

Occasionally, ide could be found near submerged shrubs, islets, or sedge coastal walls. Apparently, in these places, he comes across larvae and amphipods, which are successfully imitated by the game of mormyshka. Of the techniques of the game, the following are usually used:

Smooth uniform oscillation of the mormyshka at the bottom and then its slow rise with oscillations of 30–50 cm from the bottom;

Uniform rise of the mormyshka from the ground with its unhurried rhythmic fluctuations by 50–60 cm from the bottom;

Planning a jig from the surface of the water with its smooth uniform oscillations (usually such a game gives a good result in areas with a depth of up to 1.5 m).

Mormyshkas are used in different types - usually in a shape that resembles an amphipod, a nymph, an ant, or some kind of forest larva. Mormyshka hook No. 12–18 must match the size of the nozzle. Greasing large ide usually prefers a bulky bait.

Usually, the ide takes decisively in the spring, the nod can be slightly bowed, but then it bends sharply, and at this time it is necessary to cut. The ide actively resists, therefore, usually a nodding fishing rod is equipped with a fly reel, which is convenient to work with when releasing and reeling in the fishing line during the fight. After catching an ide, you need to wait a while for the fish to calm down. The tank for caught fish has to be tied to a waist belt or to a stake stuck into the ground. A landing net with a short handle is also needed.

Early time on the ponds

After the ice melts and melt water enters the reservoirs, fishing in ponds is ineffective due to the fact that the fish need time to adapt to new conditions. But as the water clears and warms up, the biting of the fish becomes more and more intense.

Carp. In central Russia, if spring came early, a good bite of crucian carp in ponds and quarries begins as early as the twentieth of April. With a long winter, but a sharp warming, this fish begins active life from the first days of May. If the weather is stable, with slight fluctuations in atmospheric pressure, then soon the bite of crucian carp becomes intense. The spring bite of crucian carp is sometimes observed without interruption throughout the day. This zhor can last a week or two, but then subsides. Closer to the third decade of May, crucian carp, as a rule, actively bite at dawn, some outbreaks of activity of this fish are sometimes observed in the middle of the day.

When the water is still cold enough, it is better to look for crucian carp in deep places - closer to the dam, in a flooded channel. They catch him during this period with a match rod, on various donks, while fishing with a container feeder is effective.

As for feeding crucian carp in early spring, the following rule must be observed: a small amount of bait plus its very weak aromatization. This means that in the spring you should not add odorous attractants to bait mixtures, but it is even better to use bait on a live basis. So, if you are fishing on the bottom, then it is better to use containers for bloodworms or maggots; and if you have an open type feeder, then bloodworms or maggots can be mixed into a small amount of a vegetable mixture (say, from breadcrumbs and a small amount of ground oatmeal). Some types of volumetric feeders allow you to deliver a mixture of coastal soil and small mobile earth (dung) worms to the place of feeding the fish. In cold water, extraneous odors can be very alert for crucian carp, so it is important not only not to overfeed the fish, but also not to oversaturate the bait with odorous mixtures.

As the water warms up to 15–18 °C, crucian carp shift in search of food to shallow tables, closer to coastal shrubs and snags. From mid-May, he constantly visits well-warmed bays in search of awakening food organisms. With the beginning of spring rains, crucian carp is a frequent visitor to the wooded shore, dotted with fallen leaves, from under which the rain stream washes forest insects, their larvae and worms. Here it can be effectively caught with a short fly rod with the simplest equipment and a light float, using bait from a mixture of clay sifted through a fine sieve and bloodworms or from a mixture of coastal soil and chopped worms. In sufficiently warm water, crucian begins to respond well to various store-bought baits marked "Carp" on the package.

In addition, after rains, running fishing with a fishing rod equipped with a side nod and a mormyshka can be very productive. Crucian carp, getting used to the food washed off the shore, responds well to moving bait with replanting of a leafworm, a bunch of bloodworms or maggots. It is preferable to use black or gray jigs of small size and oblong shape. Sometimes accumulations of feeding carp can be found in the coastal snag. For fishing in such places you need to have a strong equipment. The fishing line on the nodding rod is set with a diameter of 0.12-0.14 mm, and if a large crucian pecks, then it is thicker, since this fish must be pulled out quickly to avoid hooks. In order not to tear the weak lip of the crucian, it is advisable to equip the mormyshkas with a thick wire hook.

With the appearance of shoots of young algae at the end of May, crucian carp begin to look for food in their zone. There are ponds where islets of pondweed, sedge, uruti and other vegetation are located far from the shore. In this case, you will need a fishing rod for long-distance casting, and where it is not prohibited, you can use a boat. In young algae, by the way, it is good to catch crucian carp from a boat with a nodding bait.

In the second half of May, reasonable flavored baits can already be used for crucian carp, including bottom bait from crushed boilies. They are packed in a PVC bag, which can be bought in specialized stores. But since the bag is completely fragile, a neat short cast is necessary for such equipment. (Fig. 12).

Rice. 12. Donkey equipment with a PVC bag: 1 - a PVC bag with crushed boilies; 2 - flat-oval sliding sinker; 3 - lock bead; 4 - swivel; 5 - carbine; 6 - leash

Roach. After the ice melts on the ponds, the roach begins to feed in local areas where the clarified water begins to be well enriched with oxygen. These are the mouths of streams, rivulets, places near springs. For example, in the Sredny Tsaritsynsky Pond in the spring they successfully catch small roach near the shore near the beach - in front of this place there are many springs. And in the Kutuzovsky pond in the Domodedovo district of the Moscow region, roaches are caught at this time at the mouth of the river flowing into the pond.

In streams and rivers flowing into ponds, roach is well caught with a fly, Bologna or nodding fishing rod. The Bologna rod is good because it allows you to quickly adjust the length of the fishing line. Sometimes, when fishing under the crowns of trees, you have to make the length of the line much shorter than the length of the rod. The fly rod must be equipped with a miniature reel on the second or third knee of the rod (from the tip). The fishing line in this case is passed through a miniature tulip, which allows you to quickly adjust its length by winding it on a reel or winding it off.

Having entered the river from the pond, the roach keeps on jets of different strength, but it is better to make casts closer to the shore, especially where there are winds, so that the wiring is slow at the very bottom. Of the nozzles, preference is given to bloodworm, maggot, bark beetle, a piece of worm, dragonfly larva, caddisfly. With clarification of the water in the pond, roach fishing can be successful in areas with a hard, sandy or slightly silty bottom. It is preferable to choose even or pitted irrigation near last year's algae. In shallow areas far from the shore, it is good to fish with a pole rod, using minimal point bait. As a feeder, you can use a container from photographic film, which is put on the tip of the rod. In the container, you need to drill a lot of holes through which the maggot will gradually fall out into the water. Of course, in order for the rod whip to bend less, it will need to be shortened to create rigidity. (Fig. 13).

Rice. 13. Container for maggot from a film box on the whip of a plug rod

Successful catching of roach in the spring is below the spillway of the dam. Here, roach is caught in a fairly fast current, choosing the border between fast and less fast water. Along this border, the nozzle is launched, so that it goes at the very bottom and sometimes drags over the stones. The most catchy nozzle is found right there under stones or in washed-out coastal roots. This is a clepsin leech, amphipod, dragonfly larva, sometimes a worm, bloodworm. To catch roach below the dams, you need a float with a weighted keel and a load concentrated at the leash. The leash is placed from 12 to 20 cm long. Bait is not used in this case. Later, with the appearance of young filamentous algae, roach fishing with this bait can also be successful. The principle of fishing is the same - fast wiring of the bait near the very bottom with a touch on the stones. The bite is usually sharp.

Perch. This fish begins to be well caught with water clearing in ponds near dams and spillways. Here you can successfully use light flat baubles with a size of 25-40 mm with two hooks. (Fig. 14) and catch fry with replanting. Such a lure is launched onto a jet of a spillway or a fast stream of a different kind flowing into the still water of a pond, and the wiring is made at the border of very fast and medium-speed jets. Sometimes luck is brought by small spinning baubles, on which perch are caught using jerky wiring: two or three turns with the reel, and then a pause for 1-2 seconds. The free fall of the spinner often provokes the perch to throw.

Rice. 14. Perch lure with two hooks for replanting fry

On small twisters and vibrotails, you can successfully catch perch on the edges of a dam pit and a flooded channel. To do this, use jig heads of a classic pattern or with an offset hook, which gives additional mobility to the bait. For small baits, jig heads weighing 2, 3, 4 and 5 g are suitable. Jig lures can be green, yellow, white, red, pearl, and also have a combined color.

If the spring is warm, the perch soon comes out to feed on last year's reeds, coastal shrubs in relatively shallow places. Here it can be successfully caught both with a fly and a nod fishing rod for a worm, bloodworm and for a “sandwich” of maggot with a bloodworm. Near the spillways they catch perch in the wiring, letting the nozzle close to the bottom. In feeding areas with calm water, forced wiring is often used, pulling herringbone (Fig. 15).

Rice. 15. Herringbone wiring

Perch nod can be caught quite successfully, especially after young algae have emerged. At this time, flocks of striped predators begin to feed on caviar and hatched fry in them. As the water warms up, many small organisms appear in the algae, which also attract perch. From the second half of May, perch can often be found near the young coastal sedge, in the roots of which live leeches, amphipods and dragonfly larvae. These organisms are very attractive to perch, and therefore catching them can be very successful, the main thing is that the mormyshka should not be large compared to the nozzle. The wiring is done from the very bottom, with frequent even fluctuations, raising the bait 40-50 cm from the bottom. Sometimes it is useful to fidget with a jig on the ground, creating a small cloud of turbidity.

Gudgeon. As the water becomes clear, this fish begins to actively feed near the coast, both in the tributaries flowing into the ponds, and in the ponds themselves on a sandy or sandy-gravel bottom. Often the minnow comes across in the area of ​​\u200b\u200bthe beaches when catching other fish with a bait.

Minnow spawns in late April - early May. At this time, minnows rub in dense flocks on the sand or near dam plates and boulders, which attract various predators - rotan, pike, perch.

A week after spawning, the minnow begins to peck well at the mouths of tributaries flowing into water bodies, in the area of ​​​​weirs and spillways on the simplest float fishing rod equipped with the lightest equipment. The float should be taken with dough up to 1.5 g, the main fishing line - with a diameter of 0.1 mm, the leash - with a diameter of 0.08 mm, and the hook - No. 15-18.

In the spring, the minnow usually pecks greedily, and it is noticed that after the first rains it takes well for a piece of a worm, a bunch of bloodworms, and by the end of May for some plant attachments, in particular for a roll of white bread. They usually catch by the method of fast or slow wiring, letting the nozzle near the bottom or dragging it along the bottom.

It is good to catch minnow near the dam, where there is a noticeable draft of the current, as well as on the rocky-sandy bottom below the dam. So on the Tsaritsynsky Ponds, a lot of gudgeon comes across in the area of ​​the spillway of the dam of the Upper and Lower Ponds. At the same time, flocks of gudgeon for their habitat often choose depressions on the bottom in the form of pits and ditches away from a strong jet or below the main stream, where a fast current turns into a slow one.

In the second half of May, you can successfully catch minnow in small tributaries. To do this, the fisherman enters the water in a wading suit or high boots, becoming higher than the habitat of the gudgeon, and raises the turbidity from the bottom. The gudgeon is usually quickly going to a fast stream, so they catch it with a short rod using the short wiring of the nozzle. This kind of fishing is exciting.

Carp. This fish is quite heat-loving, so in the ponds it begins to show feeding activity in the second half of May, when the water becomes warm enough. Carp usually spawns in early June, and shortly before spawning, they begin to regularly visit the feeding areas of the pond known to them. And these can be muddy brows with bloodworm deposits, coastal cliffs with the release of water larvae. Often a carp feeding spot can be identified by bubbles that float to the surface. This may mean that the carp are digging through the silt in search of food.

With the rapid warming of the water, the life of food organisms in shallow water is greatly activated. Various small crustaceans, nymphs, worms, awakening, appear from under the stones, from the rhizomes of plants, from the silt. Knowing the places of accumulation of live food, carp is a frequent guest in shallow snags, in small creeks, near rapidly growing plants. Here he is caught on float rods and, if the bottom does not threaten with hooks, on bottoms with feeders intended for the feed mixture.

Carp fishing is also successful with various boilies, when bait boilies (in the right amount) are delivered to the place where the donkey is cast. Sometimes the baiting effect is achieved by combining whole boilies with some crushed boilies, which spread a stronger smell in the water and attract carp from afar.

Usually carp biting in late spring is observed early in the morning at dawn and lasts up to 8-9 hours. Evening bite is observed after 16 hours. In May, night fishing for carp is widely practiced on bottom gear or on a match rod. In the second case, to observe the bite, a special luminous nozzle for floats is used - the “night pilot”. At night, the carp does not move far, but continues to feed on the channel pits with a weak current, and since the flooded channels of the ponds are, as a rule, far from the shore, it is necessary to use a medium or heavy matcha class. And since carp prefer to take bait lying on the bottom, it is not necessary to use self-loading floats. A quite catchy carp rod consists of a float with a short pear-shaped or olive-shaped body and a long antenna visible from afar. For fishing at great depths, floats are used with a sliding attachment to the fishing line by means of a swivel and carabiner. The stopper is a sliding bead and a sliding knot. The main sinker - a lead olive - is on the fishing line in a sliding position. The stopper for it is a pellet installed near the junction of the leash with the main fishing line.

All elements of the equipment must withstand a sharp load well, because the carp is a very strong fish. To connect the leashes to the main line, it is recommended to use reliable knots, such as a “grinner” or “nameless” (Fig. 16). Hooks are better to take well-known companies, say "OWNER" or "GAMAKATSU".

Rice. 16. Knots for connecting leashes: a - "grinner"; b - "nameless".

Pike. Pike spawning begins about a week after the appearance of coastal edges on the pond. And her zhor resumes only two weeks after spawning. So, if on the ponds near Moscow the edges most often appear in the last days of March - in early April, then the pike bite should be expected in the twentieth of April. According to L.P. Sabaneev, there is a sign among the Komi peoples that the zhor of the pike coincides with the numbers in which it spawned. He also adds that large pikes spawn at the same time as frogs. Based on the foregoing, it can be assumed that if the pike spawned, say, from April 10 to April 20, then in the second decade of May, its zhora should be expected. This is confirmed by fishing practice. More than once we happened to get on a decent pike zhor on forest dams in the period from May 10 to May 20. It should be borne in mind that pike spawning can be extended and young pike spawn first, and then older ones.

In general, as you know, it is forbidden to fish with live bait in spring, but on wild ponds and dams, where there is enough pike, its spring fishing with live bait, as it seems to us, cannot bring much damage to predators (if we also take into account the sportiness and unpredictability of this fishing and how many pike are exterminated in the spring with nets).

Sometimes small pikes are caught when catching a wire on the worm of another fish, as well as on a nodding fishing rod, especially if fishing is carried out with a "devil", to which young pikes are not indifferent.

But, of course, basically when fishing for pike in ponds, you need to rely on live bait rods designed for long-distance casting, and on vents. In spring, pike often migrates along the canals connecting ponds and dams in search of accumulations of forage fish; The predator is also a frequent guest in the rivers, where roach, ide and other fish come to bathe. In rivers, streams and canals, vents are placed on barrels at night, because here the pike often feeds in the dark or early in the morning. When installing bait baits on the current, the bait is baited by the upper palate, but it is better to choose calm barrels for the bait baits, where the bait bait will walk widely and attractively on the fishing line. To do this, you will need to use a long leash and a minimum load that does not restrict the movement of the live bait.

The equipment of a pike rod designed for long-distance casting depends on the size of the pikes living in the pond, and, of course, on the size of the live bait. Usually, you can’t count on catching very large individuals in small reservoirs, therefore, bleak, roach, perch, gudgeon, bitterling, crucian carp 4 to 8 cm long are used as live bait. Accordingly, the fishing rod must be equipped with a float that corresponds to the total weight of the live bait and small sinker. The hook is used single No. 1/0-5 with a long shank. A soft metallic leash is a must. And the thinner the leash, the better: it will be less noticeable, and this is important, because before the algae ascend, the water is very clear, and the pike is often cautious. Live bait should walk on a long leash 40–50 cm from the bottom. Sometimes it makes sense to use a short, 10-12 cm leash. Then the sinker is set 30–40 cm above the junction of the main fishing line with the leash. The leash must be connected to the main line through a swivel and a carabiner, so that you can quickly replace one leash with another; this is necessary, since thin multi-haired tungsten leashes tend to curl like curls. There are some problems with other types of leashes. In addition, if a perch suddenly began to peck at the live bait, it becomes necessary to replace the metal leashes with monofilament leashes - this significantly improves the bite of any predator.

Often in ponds, pike guards its prey near thickets of grass and in snags. For fishing in such places, you will need reinforced tackle with a thick fishing line with a diameter of at least 0.4 mm and a very rigid and reliable rod. A good reel will allow you to better deal with the fish when playing it.

In wiring for roach

In the spring, before the flood and after the water becomes clear, the roach likes to feed on fast and medium streams. For roach fishing in small field and forest rivers, it is preferable to use a Bolognese rod up to 6 m long. On rivers 25–50 m wide, despite the fact that roach prefer to stay away from rapids, it is already necessary to use longer rods. When fishing in quiet-water oxbow lakes, backwaters, coastal waters of closed reservoirs, sometimes you have to use extra-long rods, 9-10 m long, since here roach often chooses places that are far from the coast for fattening.

The tactics of catching roach in fast and medium speed currents are very different from the tactics of catching this fish in weak currents. The equipment of the fishing rod is also different. For fast and medium water, we use a float with a short spherical or slightly elongated body. Moreover, the faster the flow, the more the body of the float should approach the spherical shape. Such a float is more stable on the water; in addition, the roach takes quite sharply on the current, and the float with a spherical body signals a bite well. The body of a float for catching roach at medium speed jets may resemble an olive, an onion, or a short, significantly thickened candle. For a calm and very calm current, you can take a foam plastic float in the form of a cigarette, if fishing is carried out near the coast, or a float with a short elongated body and a metal elongated keel, if fishing is carried out far from the coast and at great depths. The fact is that a heavy float flies further, and this makes it easier to cast. In addition, when the roach reacts only to a falling nozzle in calm water, it is necessary to have as few sinkers as possible on the line, and a float with a long metal keel is already self-loaded to some extent. In this regard, slightly loaded floats of the “Stik” type are suitable for fishing at a long distance. (Fig. 17). They are good because they are very sensitive to roach bites, which often show caution in calm waters.

Rice. 17. Slightly loaded float type "Stile"

The weight for fishing on fast and medium speed jets can be concentrated when all sinkers are shifted to one place near a short leash, and distributed when the main sinker is placed 20–25 cm from the leash, surrounding the float by about a third, and additional pellets of the same weights are set on the fishing line with an interval of 5 cm. For the second option, it is better to use leashes from 20 to 35 cm long - then during the hold, the nozzle takes off more smoothly from the bottom, and this does not alarm the roach. The main fishing line should be 0.14-0.16 mm in diameter, the leash should be 0.12-0.13 mm in diameter, the hook should be No. 13-18. The size of the hook is selected depending on the nozzle; Since you often have to experiment with a nozzle during spring fishing, leashes with hooks of different sizes should be easily attached to the main line through a carabiner. A small swivel at the end of the main line also comes in handy. Leads should be stored on a wide, comfortable reel from which they can be easily removed. Hooks on the reel are conveniently fixed with the help of stationery gum.

Carrying out the wiring, the nozzle is allowed 3-10 cm from the bottom. Supports must be done after every 2-3 m of swimming. You need to stop the wiring for only 2-4 seconds, depending on the speed of the water flow. The faster the flow, the shorter the delay. A fast stream in 1-2 seconds can lift the nozzle 60 cm from the bottom, and this is quite enough for it to then begin to attractively plan to the bottom. The gliding movement of the nozzle looks natural for roach, since in spring its main food is aquatic organisms emerging from winter shelters, which often break into the current.

In calm waters, especially in areas near trees overhanging the water, it is possible to successfully catch roach with a bait gliding from the surface. In order to get to the habitats of large cautious roach, on narrow rivers, casting has to be done to the opposite bank. For ease of casting, you can use a float in combination with the main sinker, which loads the float on half of the body, but it must be shifted at least 1/2 of the distance from the float to the hook. Below the main sinker on the fishing line, you can place another 3-4 pellets with an interval of up to 50 cm, decreasing in the direction of the hook. In the same direction, the mass of pellets also decreases. (Fig. 18). Sometimes it is enough, in combination with the main sinker, to use the tiniest pellet, fixed near the leader. The recommended length of the leash for this kind of fishing is 30-50 cm.

Rice. 18. Rig with main sinker and distributed shots

In the pre-spawning period of roach fishing, bait is not used or is used extremely rarely. When young algae have not yet risen, roach feeds exclusively on animal organisms. However, in shallow sections of the river, bait from a small fodder bloodworm mixed with clay sifted through a fine-mesh sieve can be useful. Once my friend and I caught roach on the Yauza River (near the village of Liptsy) immediately after the ice melted. A lot of roach entered the river from the reservoir, but it was not so easy to find a large one. When our comrade went on a rift with slight differences in depth, from time to time he began to come across measured specimens of roach interspersed with ide and large scavengers. When we approached the place of fishing, we decided to attract fish to one place with bait from a mixture of small, unwashed bloodworms and store-bought clay. After some time, at the baited place, bites of measured fish began to follow one after another.

By the time the roach spawns and, having rested, begins to peck again, the algae are already beginning to quickly rise to the surface. At this time, the roach often stays away from strong currents in various backwaters, near rising water lilies, between submerged branches of shrubs, in local snags, under the crowns of trees that have fallen into the water. On rivers, you should look for areas where some kind of obstacle blocks a strong flow of water. There, the roach feels comfortable, periodically swimming out to the river to profit from the food passing by.

Immediately after the ice melts, the roach takes mainly on bloodworms (bait up to four larvae of the fiber mosquito on a hook), sometimes on a medium-sized red worm (bait with an accordion). Later, the roach pecks at the "sandwich" of maggot with bloodworm, at the nymphs (barn, grandmother, caddisfly). At the end of the season, along with baits of animal origin, a small, cut strand of mulberry, steamed grains of barley and wheat begin to provide a good catch.

At the end of spring, when fishing near a fast current and on suvods, phased bait begins to “work” well. As a basis, you can take steamed wheat (500 g) or a mixture consisting of 500 g of breadcrumbs, 250 g of cornmeal, 250 g of maggot and a small amount of ground oatmeal (the amount is determined experimentally and depends on the strength of the current; a large amount of oatmeal makes a bait less crumbly). For a bunch of bait, instead of ground oatmeal, you can use sifted clay.

The tactic of baiting in the middle and fast currents consists in the phased feeding of several zones. So, when fishing in a fast current, you can, starting from the place of casting, lay out the stern path with steamed wheat or a weighted vegetable mixture (you can replace it with high-quality branded bait; in both cases, maggot is added). It takes 6-8 100 gram balls of bait mixed with local water and weighted with clay or gravel. The second part of the bait - 5-6 balls of the same mixture, but not weighted and with the addition of maggot - is thrown into the same zone, and this bait lengthens the feed path downstream. In the third part of the bait, consisting of breadcrumbs and coarse rusks, mixed with bran and feed additives that easily bind the mixture, a small amount of maggot is also added; it contributes to the rapid destruction of the ball and the removal of light particles by the current, which attract roach from afar. At the same time, the maggot can itself be carried away by the current, if the bottom is even, not pebbly.

With active bite, the roach eats the bait rather quickly, so about an hour after the heavy, medium and light balls went into the water one after another, they throw three more heavy balls or three handfuls of wheat plus two balls of bait of the second stage of baiting and one ball of light stern. Further, the frequency of feeding depends on the intensity of biting, but heavy bait should not be abused, otherwise the fish will be oversaturated. Roach can only be supplemented with medium-heavy and light bait, so as not to saturate the fish, but only to excite her appetite.

When fishing in quieter places, the bait, consisting of breadcrumbs (500 g), coarsely ground crackers (300 g), finely ground seeds (200 g), powdered milk (100 g) and maggot (300 g), proved to be excellent. "Hercules" is added in a minimal amount (it is necessary that when it hits the water, the ball of bait immediately crumbles, forming a cloudy suspension).

When feeding plots in quiet backwaters near aquatic vegetation, it is necessary to create a cloud of turbidity that spreads well in all directions, and it is desirable that one edge of it goes to the current and is carried away by it - this will be followed by a quick approach of the fish. When a flock of fodder competition is created in a fishing place with a concentration of fish, it begins to greedily grab the nozzle, preventing it from sinking to the bottom, so the equipment must be set up for catching in a fall (necessarily with a long leash).

III. WHEN THE ALGAE RISE

Fishing for perch from hydraulic structures

Spring is a very promising season for catching perches of various sizes, and one of the most catchy places is the waters near the hydro facilities.

In the spring, during fish spawning, flocks of perch of different sizes often concentrate near bridges or old piles, locks, piers, dams, dams, water collectors and other hydraulic structures, where there is always a fast or even raging flow of water, enriching the adjacent water area with air bubbles, due to which algae grow violently. And in algae, fry quickly develop from laid eggs, which, together with eggs, serve as food for the ubiquitous perches. Piers and other coastal structures serve as a shelter for both fry and perch, which sets up their ambushes here.

Piers, moorings, hotels on the water and similar structures attract fry with an abundance of food. Where ships are constantly moored, there is always a breaking and breaking wave, washing away various food from the shore and from the branches of coastal shrubs. In addition, in such places various food wastes can get into the water, which also teaches small fish to the place. On the Volga, Oka, Don and other rivers, you can always see boys with fishing rods, who prefer to catch small fish, in particular perches, from piers and moorings. And their catch, I must say, is quite decent.

A lot of fry, and accordingly perch, also always happens in the area of ​​​​yacht clubs and in the parking lots of various ships. In yacht clubs, yachts are launched in mass quantities, usually by the end of May - the beginning of June. Before that, they are being prepared - painting, puttying, checking the operation of gear and motors on stocks and in boathouses, so the adjacent water area remains calm. The perch guarding the fry and pecking the eggs from the fouling remains almost undeterred. He hides under the shade of numerous berths and piers, feels great there and bites well on various baits.

In May 2007, our friend was visiting a friend at a dacha located on the banks of the Klyazma reservoir. Nearby, in a yacht club, his friend kept a yacht, and they went to see it. Just in case, our friend took with him a fly rod - a six-meter rod and a minimum set of equipment. While he was walking with a friend through the forest, he picked up red worms under the old leaves. After inspecting the yacht, he went along the long coastal bridges to the far corner of the yacht club under the overhanging crowns of trees, where, at a depth of 1.5 m, he began to drag small perches one by one. The striped ones responded well to the planning nozzle, so he left only the minimum weight of the shepherd on the fishing line and increased the length of the leash to 30 cm. The worm was baited on a small hook, with an accordion, leaving no hanging ends. It can be assumed that perches in that place were attracted by fry that fed on some kind of larvae or insects falling from trees, or maybe the perches themselves ate this food.

But even more interesting happened later, when our friend replaced the float equipment with a nodding one. On his rod, the equipment changed easily: he removed one foam reel with the equipment wound around it from the third from the top of the knee and put on another. For ease of fixing the fishing line on the tip of the rod, he installed a large-diameter passage ring made of hard copper wire, in which he made a cut on the side to pass the fishing line. I put on a cambric on the ring, which moves with effort (Fig. 19). When running fishing, when depths, casting distance and, accordingly, fishing tactics are constantly changing, you often have to use alternately nodding and float equipment. However, you can get by with an ordinary ring at the end of the rod, but then you will have to completely unwind the reel and pass a loop of fishing line (it clings to the reel horn) into the end ring of the whip. This takes time. You can fasten the line to the tip of the whip without the help of a ring, wrapping the line with tape. However, this is also not very convenient, since each time you have to use a knife to release the fishing line, cutting the wound tape. Another option for quick-release fastening of the fishing line - by means of a long cambric cut along, which is wrapped with a thin copper wire - is shown in rice. 20.

Rice. 19. Ring of the rod tip with a slit and moving cambric

Rice. 20. The method of attaching the fishing line to the tip of the rod using cambric and copper wire

When our friend began to catch places near the piles with the help of a jig and a nod, suddenly large perches, weighing up to 300 g, began to come across one after another. It seemed that it did not matter to them how the bait plays. As soon as the mormyshka was in the field of view of the hunchbacks, the nod almost immediately curved smoothly, and the fight with the strong fish began.

In general, large perches are well taken on mormyshkas (of various shapes and colors) near other types of hydraulic structures. So near the upper part of the dam of the Sredny Tsaritsyno Pond, many fishermen in the spring often came across perches weighing about a kilogram. At the same time, the game was predominantly smooth, with a wide amplitude and a slow rise of the bait 15–25 cm from the bottom, and then a rise with increasing acceleration followed without changing the amplitude and frequency of the game. But it happens that the perch also responds well to a uniform or gradually accelerating during the rise, the wiring with a minimum amplitude and an increased frequency of play. This way you can fish with a tandem of small black bastards without replanting, located at a distance of 15–25 cm from each other. "Devil" can be used tungsten or lead - the most important thing is that their total weight straightens the line. It is curious that large Tsaritsyno perches resist very little when fighting at any time of the year; this was confirmed by our friend, who successfully catches pond perches in the fall on spinning using small spinners.

Sometimes the perch pursues the “devil” from the very bottom, but does not dare to peck or touches the bait quite easily. In this case, you need to play longer with the upper "devil" near the bottom, reduce the distance between the devils, and after the second "devil" is separated from the bottom, immediately begin accelerated wiring. Then the predator gets the feeling that one organism is chasing another organism, and the perch instinctively takes the lead.

In the spring, many anglers catch perch near dams, but not many explore the adjacent water area with a jig, and with it you can catch perch on the border of a seething stream and calmer water. It is necessary to pick up a mormyshka of such weight that, held on a stretched line with a nod, it slides along the gravel and stones along the stream. So, with the right choice of location, it is possible to carry out wiring for 3–5 m, and sometimes more.

As a bait for this method of fishing, a red worm, a bunch of large bloodworms, a “sandwich” of a bloodworm with maggot, a dragonfly larva, a clepsin leech, an amphipod, including fry on special large flat-oval mormyshkas, are used. (Fig. 21).

Rice. 21. Flat oval mormyshka for catching fry

Sheer glare method. It is not customary to talk about perch flashing in spring due to the fact that spinning fishing is prohibited in spring. However, sheer lure with small baubles is unlikely to cause damage to the fish population, especially when it comes to perch. After all, this predator, as already mentioned, in the spring actively feeds on caviar and fry of various fish, including fish of valuable species, which is why catching it is even encouraged in the lower reaches of the Volga.

At this year's All-Russian competitions in winter lure, held at the Ivankovskoye reservoir, the organizers, together with the fish inspection, also encouraged the catching of small perch (after all, it is known that athletes make a test even on five-gram perches). They explained the need for this by the fact that in spring, in spawning places, small sailors cause enormous damage to fish offspring.

In our opinion, catching perch by the method of vertical baiting in water bodies is quite justified. At the same time, it is not necessary, and in many cases even impossible, to fish with a spinning rod. It is better to equip a rod with a hard whip with the same foam reel. If this is a “telescope”, then with the help of a light lure, you can successfully catch both areas close to the angler and those far from him.

Flashing can be carried out at several levels. Often the perch feeds near the bottom, but sometimes it takes a bait at a distance of 60 cm to 1 m from the bottom, or even in the water column. The game at the bottom should be carried out with a uniform amplitude (10-20 cm): the lure is rhythmically raised with an interval of 5-8 seconds and lowered to the same level. But sometimes perch respond well only to fast play. It can be carried out at different levels, but consists in sharp rises of the spinner with the tip of the rod from its original position by 10-15 cm with a second interval. Often, if there is no bite for a long time, it is this method that allows you to find out in which layer of water the perch is kept.

Particularly good conditions for catching perch are created where old boats, barges, motor ships and steamships that are unsuitable for driving are laid up. Successful in the spring is fishing from landing stages. So, once my fishing friends and I rested in the Volga delta in May at one of the bases. The landing stage, on which the hotel was located, stood on a deep channel. There was no need to go somewhere far away - humpback perches weighing up to 500 g were actively pecking at small planning baubles right under the side of the landing stage. The perch took well on a silver lure, but reacted best to a silver trihedral (lure dimensions 12 × 40 mm, both sides are slightly concave) with a hanging tee. A red fly made of silky threads had to be tied to the tee (Fig. 22).

Rice. 22. Perch trihedron with hanging tee and red fly

Here is what is characteristic: a strong current pulled under the landing stage, and most of the large perch stood on the border of a strong and slow current under branches accumulated under the side, floating reeds, snags and other debris. Before sunrise, a flock of large perch went aground to frolic, located between the landing stage and the shore, where the humpbacks immediately threw themselves at a worm brought from Moscow, thrown into the water with a Bolognese fishing rod with strong equipment and a short release of the nozzle.

Another successful perch fishing was in his youth with one of the authors at the Khvoyny Bor pier, when, while on a campaign, he made a fishing rod from hazel, tied a home-made lure to it and, waiting for the Rocket to Moscow, unexpectedly caught five weighty perches. With the manufacture of homemade spinners, he then had to be smart. As a spinner, he used a nondescript brass emblem from jeans. The emblem was a short narrow strip and had holes at both ends, through one of which your author attached a small double with a copper wire, and tied a fishing line to the other end. To make the lure shine better, he wrapped it in chocolate foil and wrapped it with the same copper wire for reliability. (Fig. 23).

Rice. 23. Homemade spinner with double and foil wrap

The perch stood in the corner between the pier and the landing stage, where the drop to the depth was located, and reacted well to short strokes at the bottom, attacking the bait on the move, so fishing turned out to be very exciting. Maybe your author would have caught more fish then, but the “Rocket” soon approached, and it was time to leave ...

With the help of spinners designed for sheer lure, you can also successfully catch perch in the already mentioned horizontal streams near dams and water collectors, casting the bait in the same way as a mormyshka. The tension of the fishing line very clearly controls the contact with the ground; wiring can be done in steps. Greater catchability is given by replanting the fry on a flat lure, for which a second hook is soldered onto it. The lure is taken in an elongated shape, narrow in the upper part and expanding downward, towards the hook. Suitable length is 30 mm, 35 mm, 37 mm, 45 mm, 50 mm, sometimes more. The lure should roll attractively with the fry from side to side, so when making a lure intended for replanting fry, you first need to experiment on some kind of fast flow of water.

Catching perch with a running bottom. It is also successful to catch perch in places where ferries moor, where deep-water areas are adjacent to shallow depths. For example, on the Moscow-Volga canal, you can successfully catch perch from ferry piers. Here it is possible to use various tackles - fly and Bolognese fishing rods, a plug, a fishing rod with a side nod and a mormyshka, a half-don and even a winter nodding rod equipped with a mormyshka or a hook with a sinker. But one of the most effective ways to catch perch is to catch a running donk.

For a running donk, a spinning rod 2.4–2.8 m long with a test of 10–40 g is suitable. For casting on a strong current, it is better to take a spinning rod of increased power with a test load of 20–60 g. A reel is selected with a spool diameter of 35–45 mm. with adjustable speed wiring. But in general, any spinning reel will do. It is better to use a braided line with a diameter of 0.12–0.14 mm, since it sails less in the current. But at least 1 m of monofilament fishing line with a diameter of 0.35 mm with a locking swivel, a bead and a sliding sinker must be tied to it with a reliable “greener” knot. Attached to the swivel is a carabiner for a changeable leash. Depending on the strength of the current, leashes from 15 to 50 cm long can be used. For strong currents, a long leash is preferable, on which the nozzle moves better. Loading weight - from 10 to 60 g. Usually one or two olive sinkers installed one after another or a flat diamond-shaped or oval sinker are used. The hook is usually placed one No. 8-10 with a long shank (Fig. 24).

Rice. 24. Rig for a running donkey with a light load of two olive sinkers

Earth or red worms are used as bait in the spring. The earthworm is good because it is tough and keeps well on the hook when wiring. Since the perch has a large mouth, the bait should be voluminous. Therefore, they take a worm up to 10 cm long and put it on a hook with a tight accordion. You can tear the worm in half and bait two halves on the hook, piercing them in two or three places. When the bite is sluggish, and the casting is not far, you can hook a bunch of small dung beetles or leaflets on the hook. Attractively wriggling free ends, they are sure to provoke a perch to bite.

Casting is done, as a rule, on the lower part of the dump, and fishing is carried out using the method of stepwise wiring: they tear off the equipment from the bottom and, after making two or three turns with the reel, stop the reeling. Pauses should last several minutes, as the perch is not always active, but it happens that he grabs the bait while moving. If the bottom does not threaten with hooks, then you can carry out wiring with careful short pulls, which often gives an effect with a bad bite. But usually near berths and piers, as well as in ports, the bottom is replete with boulders and other bottom heaps, so when fishing on a running bottom, a large supply of leashes on a reel is always required.

For pike perch in the lower reaches of the Volga

Do not believe it if you hear from the “experienced” that in Akhtuba all the fish have long been “knocked out”. In that amazingly beautiful Volga arm, the fish will never run out, because the places there are very good for it.

Today, many fishing bases have been built on the left bank of the famous Volga branch. The most beautiful time for fishing in those parts is spring. In April, it is already warm on Akhtuba, the abundance of birds pleases, every awakening life, and this creates a great mood.

In the spring in the lower reaches of the Volga, you can successfully hunt for zander. There is a lot of it not only in Akhtuba, but also in other Volga tributaries, including the Enotaevka River. (These two rivers are separated by only a few tens of kilometers, but they flow into the great Russian river from different directions.) Moreover, both settled pike perch (these fish are distinguished by their small size and faded coloring with dull stripes along the body) and sea pike perch (its also called "running"). Representatives of the second population are noticeably larger in size and weight than their smaller relative, and the color of the “running” pike perch is brighter: green, black and silver colors are so mixed with each other that it is difficult to distinguish the boundaries of their transition, and the stripes on the body cannot be called pale. Another “running” pike perch is interesting in that it can be caught in the lower reaches of the Volga only in early spring, since it enters the rivers for spawning from the Caspian Sea, its permanent habitat, in April. Its course begins with the rise of water in the rivers and ends when the water begins to overflow the banks. The period is quite short, since much depends on the release of water at the Volga dam, and sometimes even a week is enough for the spring waters to begin to spread over almost the entire Astrakhan region.

In addition to pike perch, there are a lot of bersh in those rivers; Catching these fish is very similar.

In spring, bersh and pike perch (both migratory and sedentary) peck recklessly and greedily. Pike-perch resists violently, especially when fishing with spinning bottom lures - twisters, vibro-tails, foam rubber fish: it rests its head on the bottom and does not move. For some reason, when catching fry, he does not behave like that, although he also bites well at fry. It is impossible to say unequivocally which bait to give preference to, live bait or artificial. Both of them have their pros and cons. In our opinion, both methods of fishing are quite interesting and deserve attention.

Much depends on the right choice of location. At this time, the current sweeps away all debris from the banks, including silt mixed with coastal mud. Therefore, there is such a turbidity on the “big water” that offering fish to try to find a vibrotail there is most likely a hopeless task. Hence the conclusion: you need a live bait. Moreover, with the beginning of the rise in water, it is on the fry that the very “running” pike perch, which will be larger than the local one, willingly takes it. For successful fishing for fry, it is necessary to find a section of the river with sharp changes in depth. Funnels and whirlpools on the surface of the water will help to determine such places - it is precisely them that the strong current of the river creates in those places where there are significant differences in depth at the bottom.

For fry, catching pike perch is successful both at dawn and in the daytime. The bait should be sent directly to where the current "swirls".

For catching zander on live bait, spinning rods up to 2.4 m long are successfully used, with an average test weight of 150 g. An ordinary old time-tested Nevskaya reel is well suited for them. Using such fairly powerful gear, you can be sure: in the case of a bite of a large sea pike weighing, say, 2–4 kg, the safety margin will be sufficient. Whatever the diameter of the main line you choose, a leash is required. The strong current of the Akhtuba rolls a lot of snags along the bottom, and a hook on an absolutely clean bottom is a common occurrence there. The use of a leash will save you from the hassle of replacing all the gear, since all that remains is to tie the hook on a thinner fishing line or replace the entire leash if it is attached through a carabiner. The latter option is certainly much more convenient and practical.

The diameter of the main line when catching zander on live bait usually does not exceed 0.4 mm. The leash is used with a diameter of 0.35 mm. We do not recommend using thinner lines for the donk line (of course, we are talking about monofilament line now, not braided line). Leads with hooks are best passed through a sliding sinker, and not placed above the sinker - so even the slightest pull of the fish immediately becomes noticeable. The hook is taken at least No. 1 and is necessarily thin, durable, sharp.

A narrow-bodied fry is selected as a live bait when catching pike perch. Small bream or white bream is not good. Perch with a ruff, despite its progonist, are also not a perch delicacy. But a minnow or a roach, or even better a chick or a bleak, is likely to please the angler with bites.

True, there is a problem with bleak: it does not hold well on the hook and, as a rule, flies off when recasting. Therefore, you have to stock up on a sufficient amount of live bait, taking into account the fact that you often have to change a sleeping fish alive. In general, it is necessary to take it as a rule: took out the equipment from the water - change the bleak. This can save you a lot of valuable time. By the way, it is best to put the fry on the hook across the back, but always in two punctures; with this method of attachment, the fry will hold on stronger. Hooking pike perch when fishing for fry should not be done immediately. Usually the approach of a pikeperch is indicated by a “nervous” jerk of the top of the spinning rod. Then a few more such characteristic short jerks may follow, which end with a smooth and slightly slow pull of the fishing line. This is the moment for cutting.

Now a few words about catching the Lower Volga pike perch on spinning. It is carried out in those places where the current is not very strong, and the bottom is free from bottom sediments. It is necessary to choose areas of at least relatively clear water so that the angler can offer artificial bait to the predator. Such places can be found along the edges of deep river pits or sand bars near a weak current. If pike perch is successfully caught in the pits during the day, at night, in the morning and in the evening, then it is better to catch it on spits in the early morning or late evening, since pike perch is a shy fish that avoids shallow water during the day.

To play zander, you will definitely need a hook or landing net, as this fish is often caught from a steep bank. Usually, a cut-down predator first rests its head on the bottom, and then, when it is still possible to move it, it goes measuredly and heavily, but without any special frills, almost to the very cliff. But when only a few meters remain to the shore, his true fighting qualities seem to come to life in the fanged one, which he demonstrates to the fisherman without any hesitation. And trying to lift a fish out of the water on a fishing line is not even worth it. When playing pike perch, the choice between landing net and gaff depends in most cases on whether there is an assistant next to the angler. If you are fighting a fish alone, it is better to use a landing net.

Spring attachments

No matter how perfect modern float tackle is, it still ends with a hook. And you need to put something on the hook. So, nozzles that can be recommended for spring fishing.

Nozzles of plant origin. Let's start, oddly enough, with the usual bread crust. Buy a loaf of white bread at the store. Then you need to cut off the crust from it and cut it into small pieces, preferably in the form of cubes, so that one side of the cube does not exceed 10 mm in length. The crust should be not only well-done, but also moderately elastic, because it will have to hang on hook No. 10 or No. 15 for some time. The better the loaf crust is fried, the more fragrant the smell of baking coming from it in the water, and the faster a bream pecks at her.

You can also use a bread crumb bait to catch bream. Preparing such a nozzle is quite simple. To do this, a piece of bread crumb is plucked from the loaf, slightly flattened and bent in half, covering the hook. After making such a nozzle, you should not touch it with your hands anymore - the less foreign smells on the bread, the faster you will see a bite.

How does such a cake behave in water? It is enough to lower the hook with the bread crumb into the water, and you will see how in a couple of minutes the cake will turn into a fluffy lump. The same thing will happen with this nozzle and at the point of casting the tackle. What kind of bream refuses such a delicacy ?!

If you need to cast the bait very far, for example, fifty meters or further, and if fishing will be carried out at night, then you need to use ordinary boiled pasta. This bait will not fly off the hook even when casting over long distances. Sugar, salt, cake, vanilla - all this can and should be added to the pan when cooking pasta for fishing.

In the spring, you can not ignore another popular nozzle - "talker". It is prepared from semolina surprisingly simply, you just need to be patient. In the evening, pour one tablespoon of semolina into an ordinary faceted glass, fill it with cold water and stir the cereal thoroughly with a wooden stick. After 20 minutes, stir the semolina again and add a little dry cereal. Add the cereal, stirring it each time, until the dough begins to stretch after the stick. It is important to have patience here, because each time you add cereal, you need to stir the semolina for at least three minutes, and not in a hurry. When you get the mass of the desired consistency, transfer the "talker" to the jar that will go fishing with you, and close it with a tight lid, always hermetically.

Already on the pond, just before fishing, you need to mix the “talker” again, but at the same time, as in the case of bread crumb, you can’t touch it with your hands. The “talker” is attached to the hook using the same thin stick with which you stirred the bait. The “talker” thread stretching behind the stick is literally wound on the hook (it is enough to make a few turns).

"Chatterbox" works well from May to September. Many anglers, however, believe that this bait has one very significant drawback - it must be changed with each recast. And we, on the contrary, are of the opinion that the need to replace the "talker" is precisely its main advantage. Yes, it takes time, but the fish is offered fragrant dough every time.

The queen of fields, corn, is also not the last delicacy on the fish table. In the old days, anglers as active as they are today did not use corn as bait, but when fishing on cultivated carp ponds became popular, canned Bonduelle corn came into play. I must say that the carps are really good at pecking at this bright and fragrant bait, and it’s easy for the angler to use it - open the jar with a can opener and put the grains on the hook.

Canned corn in some places does not disdain even bream. And in the Rybinsk Reservoir in early spring, our friends have more than once caught large roaches for grains of canned corn.

The list of baits of plant origin will be far from complete if nothing is said about pearl barley. At the end of spring, steamed barley grains help out even when any other bait cannot tempt picky fish. It is necessary to cook barley for a long time, until the grains acquire elasticity. There is also a simpler, but reliable way to prepare barley bait: you need to put the grits in a thermos and pour boiling water over it. If you do this in the evening, then by morning the nozzle will be ready.

Nozzles of animal origin. Broomstick, mayfly, wingfly - a favorite spring delicacy for many fish. Handle these nozzles when baiting a hook must be extremely careful.

Let's start with a description of the mayfly larva - grandmas. The mayfly itself is a small, white-winged butterfly with three hairy antennae and three bristles on its tail. Mayfly larvae live in colonies in the water. They dig minks in steep clay banks at a depth of 1 to 2.5 m or hide under the roots and rhizomes of algae. They get a grandmother with a long-handled scoop - they take out pieces of clay, put them on the shore, break them open and collect mayfly larvae. Store them in a damp cloth. Large larvae are planted one by one in a ring, hiding the sting in the tail, and small ones - several pieces, piercing them behind the head. Any white fish bites on them.

In the spring, some anglers like to harvest insects for future use, then mix them into bait as a dry additive. The effectiveness of the use of such additives is obvious, but the extraction of nymphs is a laborious task, especially in such rivers as the Volga, Oka, where the water level often changes and it is necessary to extract the larva from decent depths.

wispfly also lives in the floodplains of reservoirs throughout the European part of Russia. The fisherman knows the larva of the widow fly under the name "cuttlefish". It comes out in early July. For future use, the larvae of the widow fly are not harvested. But on the other hand, they catch fish on it with success, especially large roach. You need to look for cuttlefish under the stones.

When one of your authors was on a business trip in Mongolia, a friend taught him how to collect this larva in an original way. They entered the cold water in wading boots, one of them stood one and a half meters below the other downstream, rested a home-made small-mesh net on the bottom, while the other began to actively “trample” the bottom of the river. Dozens of larvae rose from under the stones above the bottom and were immediately carried away by the current towards the catcher waiting for them. It wasn't difficult to collect them. Then grayling pecked at them well. However, the wingfly is also to the taste of many fish of cyprinids.

Chafer- the first nozzle in the spring for catching a large chub. In May, in the evenings, there is a massive departure of this insect. In flight, the cockchafer emits a characteristic heavy buzzing, which immediately attracts attention. During the day, the beetles hide under the leaves of trees, and if you shake the flexible trunk of some birch, then the beetles will fall from the tree in hail.

Before you put the cockchafer on the hook, you need to tear off its hard wings. They catch a chub with the help of this nozzle on top, letting it go with the flow to those places where the fish take cover.

Shitik- the larva of the caddisfly, a small brown butterfly - is a short worm with a dark head. The body of the larva can be white, greenish, yellowish or brownish. This is one of the best nozzles for catching fish that live in the current. Shitik lives in clean streams and rivers, in houses that he builds from grains of sand and debris of plant origin. Shitika is well taken by roach, dace and some other fish that live in clean forest streams. Where small tributaries flow into large rivers, fish are also accustomed to this nozzle, and it is a delicacy for them. Good places for fishing for caddisfly larvae are estuarine areas of tributaries. Here, large roach, bream, podust, silver bream, dace, bleak, perch peck well at shitik.

Bark beetle larva. This is a small fleshy yellowish worm. Lives under the bark of old trees, in rotten logs and stumps. You can find the larvae of the bark beetle by the holes-moves that they make in the wood. This is a great bait for catching any white fish in early and late spring. Fishing is carried out with a float rod, as well as a fly rod in calm water near coastal shrubs and trees. On the hook, the larva of the bark beetle is baited under the head or ringlet.

Kazar. This is a green dragonfly larva. May have different shades. It is to the taste of most river fish, especially in spring. Kazara is harvested in the roots and on the stems of algae. One of the methods of extraction is to run a gauze net along the stems of plants. On the hook, the barn holds quite firmly, but a trifle often knocks it down. It is baited on the hook with a ring or under the head one, two or three pieces. They catch on a barn at the bottom or on a bait with a side nod and mormyshka near aquatic vegetation.

Leech-clepsin. It has a brownish body covered with yellow speckles. Its length is only 2-3 cm. The clepsin leech lives on algae, for example, it can often be found on the reverse side of the leaves of water lilies, as well as under stones and in the rhizomes of plants. Perch, roach, chub and some other fish are successfully caught on clepsina on fast rifts. They let the nozzle into the wiring at the very bottom. Sometimes rock-drawing brings success.

Maggot. The blowfly larva is successfully used as a bait both in early and late spring for catching most river fish with float and nodding rods, as well as with a bottom. One larva or several larvae are baited on the hook. Often maggots are added to vegetable bait mixtures. Store maggots in a box with sawdust. And so that the blowfly larvae do not pupate for a long time, the box must be placed in the refrigerator.

". In today's article, we will consider catching bream in the spring.

As soon as the ice melts from water bodies, bream fishing enthusiasts go to rivers and lakes in the hope of catching their spring trophy. Let's figure out how, where, how and when to catch bream in the spring.

When to catch bream

You can start fishing for bream immediately after the ice melts. Unlike other fish, the bream does not take a break in feeding at this time, and it can already be fully caught. With gradual warming, the biting of bream only intensifies, and reaches its peak at a temperature of 12-14 degrees.

After the temperature exceeds 15 degrees, the bream begins to choose the time of spawning, and the activity of biting decreases. Upon reaching 16 degrees, the bream begins to spawn and at this time he is not interested in food, at least the one that the angler offers. With stable weather at 16-17 degrees, spawning of bream takes place in 4-6 days.

If the temperature drops, the bream goes into a stupor and stops spawning until the temperature is restored. In general, roughly speaking, bream needs 6 days with a temperature of 16 or more degrees in order to spawn.

After spawning, the bream begins to feed actively again, but already in the coastal zone. After spawning zhor lasts about a week, after which the bream rolls into holes, in which it is caught all summer.

Where to look for bream in spring

In order to find this fish in the spring, you need to know the features of the bream movement depending on the time of day and temperature. All these features are again associated with spawning. The warmer the weather, the closer the bream to the shore and vice versa.

• Happy bream stands far from the shore in the shallows, where the water is warmer. In the daytime, you need to look for it in such places.
• For the night breams go to a depth where the water does not cool so rapidly. At night, the bream does not feed, and it is useless to catch it.
• In the morning if the sun is shining, the breams come closer to the shore to a depth of 1.5-2 meters. It is here that you need to catch bream in the morning. In such places, the water warms up faster, and with the gradual warming of the water, the breams move to daytime camping sites.
• In evening time the bream again approaches the shore, but already in places where there is more vegetation. He comes here not to warm himself, but to determine whether it is time to start spawning.

In the evening the biting is unstable. The best periods of fishing will be the moment the bream approaches the shore and the moment of transition to the depth. It's pretty easy to determine this. When the sun ceases to illuminate the pond, the bream begins to approach the shore. With the gradual disappearance of the sun, the bream also leaves the shore, usually this period coincides with the beginning of the soaring of the reservoir.

It is during this period that there is an opportunity to catch a decent bream that will not refuse to have a bite before going to bed.

Gear for spring bream

In the spring, bream can be caught with a variety of gear. It can be a float rod, a donk or a feeder. In this article, we will consider the first two gears, since I wrote about the last one in the article.

float fishing

As you probably guessed, in the spring you can catch bream on a float only in the morning and in the evening. In this regard, sliding equipment is not needed, since the depth of fishing does not exceed 2-3 meters.

The rod should be fairly long and light. The optimal length of the form is from 6 meters and above. The bream is very shy, and the bait must be delivered to the fishing point as quietly as possible. In this regard, long fishing rods are used. Ideally, it is better to catch with a plug, but since this tackle is quite expensive, we will not consider it.

For these purposes, a Bolognese fishing rod is perfect. This is due to the tactics of catching, which will be discussed below. The coil should be used inertial, as it is better to control the equipment.

The main line must be strong. In my opinion, the best option would be 0.2-0.22 mm. Leads can be used much thinner, for example 0.16. Since no long casting is required, the chance of overlapping a thin leader is very small.

It is better to choose floats with an elongated body in the form of a diamond. Such models show good bite on the rise. The carrying capacity of the float is selected depending on the wind and the waves of the reservoir. If the waves are strong, it is worth using long hollow antennas, and loading the float to the limit, no matter what the equipment rides on the waves.

It is best to use an elongated fixed olive as the main sinker. Such a load will not create unnecessary bursts and scare away the bream. Be sure to use a shed, as most bites of bream occur on the rise.

Again, if there are waves on the pond, you can put a heavier shed and a smaller main load. This technique will allow you to see the bite on the rise, even with strong excitement.

Hooks should be chosen according to the size of the bait. If you have a large worm, the hook should fit. The only thing to remember is that the hook must have a long shank in order to make a voluminous bait.

Donkey fishing

Donk fishing requires more fishing time, but this tackle usually comes across worthy trophies that go alone or in a small flock. The best time for donkey fishing is the day and late evening.

Strong is not needed here. A Chinese telescope 3-4 meters long is enough. It is better to use braided line as the main line. Spring bites are extremely careful, and braid shows them in the best possible way.

There is no need for long leashes, since the sinker does not scare away the bream, and we do not use bait. 20-30 centimeters will be enough. The breaking load of the leash line must be at least 5 kilograms.

As we know, the bream feeds from the bottom, in this regard, it is best to use. The usual classic equipment, although it will not scare away the bream, bites may not follow. Try to experiment with placing another leader above the sinker and you will see that bites occur only on the lower hook.

The requirements for hooks are the same as for the float rod, so I see no point in mentioning this.

Lures for catching bream

In the spring, the bream bites only on animal baits. The best of them are the worm, bloodworm, and maggot. If there is bleak in the pond, it is better to refuse maggot. Since fishing takes place in shallow areas, bleak will eat maggots. Various combinations of baits also perform well, such as bloodworm and maggot, worm and bloodworm, etc.

The bait for bream should be voluminous. In the spring, the bream is not exchanged for trifles, you will no longer get off with 3 summer maggots. Therefore, do not be afraid to make bulk bait. The bait should be planted in such a way that it constantly moves.

But at the same time, it is not advisable to leave long ends at the worm in order to exclude bites from ruff and other fish that also actively feed.

float fishing tactics

For successful fishing on a float, you first need to choose a place. In the morning and evening the bream approaches the shore and tries to stay close to the vegetation. The best place for fishing will be the border of vegetation and clear water.

Remember, for successful fishing for bream, silence must be observed! Even a branch crunching under foot can nullify all fishing.

Quite often, you can visually determine the location of the bream. If you see a cloud of haze in a certain place, or air bubbles rising from the bottom, this fish is definitely standing there. If the place cannot be determined, choose any place with a depth of 1.5 meters, and a clear boundary of vegetation.

In float fishing it is better to use bait. You can take the bait recipe, although the bait is feeder, it is also suitable for a float. Only before catching it should be darkened so that it matches the color of the bottom.

If you find a fish, you need to go upstream by 10 meters and feed the point. After that, it is worth moving even higher, and casting above the baited place, so as not to scare away the fish.

If the fish is not found, choose a promising place and feed it, then again move upstream.

After waiting a bit, it is worth starting to fish. Casting is done on the same line where the bait lies, after which the wiring is performed. On a baited place, you can make a small holding, after which a bite usually follows.

After pulling out the fish, do not rush to immediately cast the tackle. Most likely, the fish got scared and swam away from the bait. Spend a few minutes clearing the slime off the line and setting up the bait. Usually after 10 minutes the biting resumes, when earlier or later.

It is not necessary to force and pull the bream with all your might. Much more effective to try to raise it to the surface. So the bream will give up faster and will not cause a strong panic in the baited point.

Donkey fishing tactics

Without bait, bream has to be searched all over the reservoir, and since fishing takes place during the day, it is problematic to determine the parking lot. The place should be chosen based on the approximate depth. Very good bream is caught near a sharp dump. In such places, there is usually a border between a fast current and practically stagnant water.

The depth at the place of fishing should be at least 1.5 meters, this can be determined by counting the seconds from the moment the load falls into the water.

A weight of 30 grams is approximately sinking at a speed of 1 meter per second!

The bites of the bream on the bottom, as a rule, are confident, but sensing a catch, the bream often spits out the bait. In this regard, you need to be constantly on the alert, and at the slightest blow or pull, cut.

In the case of the bottom bream, you need to catch it quickly. If you try to tire the bream, it can go over the edge, and from there you most likely won’t get it. The bream is a strong contender, especially in the spring, but after taking a breath of air, it usually gives up, and this must be used.

That's all dear anglers. As you can see, bream fishing in the spring is very exciting, and not as difficult as it might seem at first glance. I wish you successful fishing trips dear friends, and do not forget to leave your comments and ratings!