As with any trip out, email conversations between me and my fishing guru turn to bait and tactics. Bleasby is a Notts AA stretch of the Trent and one that Col has fished before so with his consummate knowledge of water craft he suggested a spot of feeder fishing. We used feeders on the Trent when we fished at Gunthorpe weir on the last day of the 2010-11 season and that stretch was full of snags so we lost a lot of gear and had no fish on the bank. I am assured that the Bleasby stretch is more forgiving and has less snags. We are also going to take a pike setup and see if we get any tugs on that, an opportunity for me to finally try out my Okuma Interceptor reel I posted about previously. Will let you know how that holds up if it comes into play.
OK so we know we are going to use feeders so what baits are we going to use? So to keep the fish interested we need to 'lay the table' and it was suggested that we use a groundbait that we can ball into the river quite regularly that will hopefully entice the Chub, Bream and any other fish that fancy a feed. So Col has made a foul concoction of "brown crumb, crushed marine halibut pellets, the aforementioned liquidised Spiny Eels, hemp, hemp oil, sweetcorn, liquid worm, trout pellets and horse molasses all mixed up with pond water. Should be absolutely humming by Saturday morning."
A note about the Spiny Eels, he told me got them from an Asian Supermarket a few years ago and thought they may work well as deadbait. They have languished in his freezer ever since and so they make a guest appearance in the groundbait mix for tomorrow. It sounds like an absolutely minging mix and hopefully it will prove to be a winner with the fish.
The other bait we talked about was cheese paste and the methods to make it. A quick search on the internet comes up with many varied approaches some people even favour molding processed cheese slices onto their hooks. We decided on blue cheese as the base flavour, the smellier the better and it is at this point that I hand you over to the cheese paste maker himself:
You will need:
200 to 250 grams blue cheese, the smellier the better
A drop or two of vegetable oil
Plain flour
If interested in colouring your paste, the food colouring of your choice, available from the baking section of your supermarket
Disposable latex gloves
Everybody tells you to grate blue cheese – have you ever tried it? It’s like knitting fog. I just get a large plate and a fork and keep stabbing away until it’s all crumbled. If you don’t mind washing up, you can whizz it in a liquidiser/food mixer.
Put your gloves on and pour on the plate a drop or two of vegetable oil – this makes the paste flexible, not vital this time year BUT ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY in Winter when the water is so cold it makes the paste brittle if no oil is added. (It should be noted at this stage that cheese paste, with liquidised bread in the feeder, is a classic Winter Chub bait). Sprinkle over the crumbled cheese 5 or 6 teaspoons of flour and start kneading. (It’s not really kneading – it’s messy – just grab and mix up everything on the plate and keep squeezing and pumping and mingling together for a minute or two.)
By now it will be similar to putty in texture. Flatten it out and add food colouring if you’re going to. Then knead and squidge some more. Value judgement required at this point… is it too squidgy? If so, add more flour and get squidging. Is it too stiff? A very small drop of vegetable oil can be added, or, if you’d rather not and probably better, add more colouring.
When you are satisfied with the texture, put away. The smellier the better so make it at least three days, preferably more, before you go fishing, and at no point refrigerate – room temperature will really boost the bait’s appeal. If you have no shed put it in a sandwich bag or foil then in a carrier bag and hang by a window so the Sun can get it baking.
So that sounds absolutely minging and hopefully it will stink to high heaven seeing as it has been 'maturing' nicely in a garden shed for the past 3 days.
So I look forward to the day by the river tomorrow and will post a 'match report' to let you know how we got on with our array of foul smelling baits.
