Bait Fishing

Here's an interesting thing i found i on top Zander baits

1) roach live
2) bream live only
3) gudgeon live
4) roach dead
5) perch live only
6) rudd live
7) rudd dead
8) eel section
9) lamprey
10) trout

This is my top tens bait list there are other coarse baits like crucians ,chubs ,bleak even ruffe which are good although i rate all four which are not on the list but do all work.
the reason i probably don,t use them is cause i don,t catch enough of them.

others have but this could be that these are more commonly what they are able to catch so this might be why they use them.
roach are by far my most used baits as they are the most commonly caught .

and with the big shoals on the fens these are probably the zeds most naturally taken food so have become most anglers number 1 choice for bait selection .these i will use on all types of rigs
small bream i think are a fantastic baits and some times i will choose these over roach first especially if i,ve been fishing an area and i feel they are getting finicky with roach i change to bream and i,ve had good results when doing this in certain area,s
i tend to use these more on fixed or sunken float paternosters to keep of the bottom

it may surprise you that gudgeon appear high on my list but if i could catch more of these little fellows believe you me i would use em they are brilliant especailly fished up off the bottom as they work harder and give off good signals .

but again are not very good when used dead
and i,ve had a few very good fish on live gudgeon up to 11lb 14oz
also you may again noticed certain baits i,ll use dead or alive but others only alive , like bream and perch and gudgeon these seem to go really stiff and get washed out quicker again this is only my opinion again other might had different results .
but i can,t remember when i,ve used either as deads ever catching
this also could change when fishing a different venue to as again certain baits seem to get taken more than others .
this might be as that type of fish is more readily available to the zander so they are taken first .

now i,ve put perch in the middle of the list as most zed angler use them as these are very good and work well as lives but i actually don,t use them now myself , but others rate them highly .
now again i,ve put eels near the bottom of the list although i find these work well during early season .but small eels are a absolute awesome bait alive but to fish them properly alive you have to cut a inch off the tail end .
but a fresh eel section will outfish a blast frozen section in my opinion but frozen eel sections do still catch .
around november in my own results eels tend to start to not get taken this could be because eels migrate away or if land locked become inactive over the colder months but again this is how i,ve found it with my own results .

so from december onwards i tend to use lamprey more and these tend to work very well and in part i think its because of the blood and juices they seemed to release for long periods and this makes them a very good choice indeed .
i mostly use eels sections on ledger rigs hard on the bottom but will pop them up occasionly .
interestingly when it comes to size of baits used i personally will used baits between 5 to 7 inches now this is noway the rule of thumb and a few of the lads like to use baits up to 8oz and have caught some goods zeds .

another reason why i like to use smaller baits is that with a big bait some times its hard to time when the fish has taken the bait properly and some times on striking if they don,t have the bait right you can pull out of the zed .
so again with smaller baits i like to think i miss less but it still happens .
really there is no hard a fast rules with what type or what size you use and even sea baits to turn up the odd zed or too but not enough to warrant me using these over coarse baits.
but again certain venues could catch you a good zed on them so don,t totally dismiss them .

so size is really going to have to be what you would like to prefer to use .
as you rightly pointed bigdave fish chunks work well especially if the zeds are that finicky .
so as you can see there is a lot of scope for experimenting with different baits, sizes and where in the water layers you actually fish them not all zeds come off or near the bottom

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