Soft Lure Fishing

[paulus 26]

On 20/11/2023 at 20:19, neil r said:

You want to try the canal near me , virtually no boat traffic so gets really weedy , it’s soul destroying at times when you’re lures in weed before you’ve even got chance to retrieve and if you try fishing on the bottom you’ll lose your end gear nearly every cast on the rubbish that’s been chucked in over the years and then once it gets into summer the floating duckweed takes hold meaning mile after mile is unfishable for months on end . 

Its totally the opposite here, No weed at all due to the amount of boat traffic, Silt and leaves, branches and all manor of crap are on the bottom. The water is always coloured in the winter you might get 3" of visibility in the summer. After heavy rain its zero again, Blanked the last three sessions but hey that's canal fishing Lol.

[mackem 26,268]

Just went past Cabelas and popped in for their Black Friday price lift brochure.

[neil r 1,848]

8 hours ago, paulus said:

Its totally the opposite here, No weed at all due to the amount of boat traffic, Silt and leaves, branches and all manor of crap are on the bottom. The water is always coloured in the winter you might get 3" of visibility in the summer. After heavy rain its zero again, Blanked the last three sessions but hey that's canal fishing Lol.

The Macclesfield canal that I fish aswell is like that because of the boat traffic , virtually no visibility as opposed to the tap water clear L&L near me . Once the seemingly endless lines of boats start coming through about 10-11 I just give up and go . I do catch a lot more bigger perch on that canal but once it’s colder there’s large parts of it that are prolific in summer that appear barren in winter but once you find them you’ll get multiple 2lb plus perch . I still start on the 40mm nimbles with a 3gm jighead but if there’s nothing doing I’ll go up to a 65mm and 1.5-2gm jighead so there’s a bit more presence and slower drop but no weight increase . Darker colours do well in coloured water aswell and colours like morning dawn , junebug , motor oil and blue ruby do alright for me , especially the morning dawn colour , most of the perch and pike I catch are on that colour 

[paulus 26]

11 hours ago, neil r said:

The Macclesfield canal that I fish aswell is like that because of the boat traffic , virtually no visibility as opposed to the tap water clear L&L near me . Once the seemingly endless lines of boats start coming through about 10-11 I just give up and go . I do catch a lot more bigger perch on that canal but once it’s colder there’s large parts of it that are prolific in summer that appear barren in winter but once you find them you’ll get multiple 2lb plus perch . I still start on the 40mm nimbles with a 3gm jighead but if there’s nothing doing I’ll go up to a 65mm and 1.5-2gm jighead so there’s a bit more presence and slower drop but no weight increase . Darker colours do well in coloured water aswell and colours like morning dawn , junebug , motor oil and blue ruby do alright for me , especially the morning dawn colour , most of the perch and pike I catch are on that colour 

Had an hour just after dinner. walked a couple of mile twitching a small creature bait, Nothing at all, Got back to where i started, A bridge with a basin for the boats to turn round, Decided to change to 70cm fox rage shad, silver with a red head. had to rig it with a ched style weedless set up hooked through the side as i had no jig heads heavy or large enough. Cast out and just done the classic up, down, dying fish style retrieve. It was hammered by a low double figure pike right under my feet. It was on for a few seconds before the 9lb fluro leader snapped.  I have ordered some Knott able wire but in the mean time i have stepped the leader up to 12lb fluro. I hate it when a fish is left with a lure in it. 

[neil r 1,848]

1 hour ago, paulus said:

Had an hour just after dinner. walked a couple of mile twitching a small creature bait, Nothing at all, Got back to where i started, A bridge with a basin for the boats to turn round, Decided to change to 70cm fox rage shad, silver with a red head. had to rig it with a ched style weedless set up hooked through the side as i had no jig heads heavy or large enough. Cast out and just done the classic up, down, dying fish style retrieve. It was hammered by a low double figure pike right under my feet. It was on for a few seconds before the 9lb fluro leader snapped.  I have ordered some Knott able wire but in the mean time i have stepped the leader up to 12lb fluro. I hate it when a fish is left with a lure in it. 

It happens occasionally and there’s not a lot you can do about if the leader goes in the mouth but at least it was just a single  which it will probably get rid of . I always crush the barbs on jigs just in case and anything with a treble I use single strand titanium . If you are wanting to catch pike don’t bother with the up and down retrieve and just straight retrieve it slow enough to keep it coming without hitting any weed or snags . When it’s cold they won’t be up for chasing any distance but you’ll not be too far away to get one that’s half interested on shallow canals . Perch will be where’s the small fish are holed up and marinas are a good place to look , casting between boats and up the sides of them and around any decking, even underneath if you can 

[mackem 26,268]

Just saw these when we went to buy Christmas tree lights £4 equivalent,rubber mice lures for pike.

[paulus 26]

Ordered some lures and jig heads off Temu, arrived today so i thought i would pop out for a couple of hours and give them a try, 4g jig head and a 50mm green shad, Managed to hook a small Zander that i lost trying to swing in rather than using the net, Then got bitten off by a pike again, That's twice in a week now, Anyway these cheap Chinese soft lures are every bit as good as the ones that cost 4 times the amount in a regular shop,  

[Daniel cain 45,150]

38 minutes ago, paulus said:

Ordered some lures and jig heads off Temu, arrived today so i thought i would pop out for a couple of hours and give them a try, 4g jig head and a 50mm green shad, Managed to hook a small Zander that i lost trying to swing in rather than using the net, Then got bitten off by a pike again, That's twice in a week now, Anyway these cheap Chinese soft lures are every bit as good as the ones that cost 4 times the amount in a regular shop,  

Ive had loads of gear for my lad from that temu,some decent kit there when you have a look

[neil r 1,848]

47 minutes ago, paulus said:

Ordered some lures and jig heads off Temu, arrived today so i thought i would pop out for a couple of hours and give them a try, 4g jig head and a 50mm green shad, Managed to hook a small Zander that i lost trying to swing in rather than using the net, Then got bitten off by a pike again, That's twice in a week now, Anyway these cheap Chinese soft lures are every bit as good as the ones that cost 4 times the amount in a regular shop,  

I used to buy crazyfish nimbles from agm till I saw the supercontinent copies on aliexpress and that’s all I buy now . They are brilliant and there’s no difference between them and the originals . Never bought off temu but it wouldn’t surprise me if supercontinent didn’t sell on there aswell 

[paulus 26]

12 minutes ago, neil r said:

I used to buy crazyfish nimbles from agm till I saw the supercontinent copies on aliexpress and that’s all I buy now . They are brilliant and there’s no difference between them and the originals . Never bought off temu but it wouldn’t surprise me if supercontinent didn’t sell on there aswell 

I spent around £40 and got 6 different jig head of various weights, 2 packs of Tungsten Carolina 5g weights, 3 different weights of Texas rigs, 5 different weights of drop shots, 30 2" shads in 5 colours, 40 and 60cm crayfish, 5 in a pack, and around half a dozen packs containing various sized shads in numerous colours. To be honest the quality is on par with the likes of Fox Rage and that. In fact i was speaking to a mate who owns a tackle shop, He has given up trying to get lure fishing stuff from UK suppliers, He now deals direct with 3 Companies in China, He told me these 3 companies manufacture for all the main UK Brands, He ordered 500 small hard lures last week and they asked him if he wanted Fox Rage stamping on them and packaged as that brand. He obviously said No but they do actually supply the same lures to fox rage, Only problem is now, When i get bored at night i will be shopping on Temu Lol

[paulus 26]

32 minutes ago, Daniel cain said:

Ive had loads of gear for my lad from that temu,some decent kit there when you have a look

There defiantly is, Keep looking at there baitcasting reels, Only trouble is, Its the not knowing if there as good as they look and sound that is putting me off ordering one. 

[neil r 1,848]

1 hour ago, paulus said:

I spent around £40 and got 6 different jig head of various weights, 2 packs of Tungsten Carolina 5g weights, 3 different weights of Texas rigs, 5 different weights of drop shots, 30 2" shads in 5 colours, 40 and 60cm crayfish, 5 in a pack, and around half a dozen packs containing various sized shads in numerous colours. To be honest the quality is on par with the likes of Fox Rage and that. In fact i was speaking to a mate who owns a tackle shop, He has given up trying to get lure fishing stuff from UK suppliers, He now deals direct with 3 Companies in China, He told me these 3 companies manufacture for all the main UK Brands, He ordered 500 small hard lures last week and they asked him if he wanted Fox Rage stamping on them and packaged as that brand. He obviously said No but they do actually supply the same lures to fox rage, Only problem is now, When i get bored at night i will be shopping on Temu Lol

It’s well worth getting the soft plastics from there , there’s always something that are copies of bigger brands but just as good . I get braid off aliexpress for my bfs setups aswell . It’s called kingdom microfly , it’s about £3.50-4 for 150m and it’s spot on . I’m not as keen on the hardbaits from there though . I’m a sucker for high end jdm lures but saw some copies being recommended on Facebook as being just the same so I bought a dozen to try and while they looked the same the build quality wasn’t close and they also more importantly didn’t fish the same , the 12 only cost the same as 1 of my jdm lures though so no great loss .They will still catch though and I’d rather use them than anything fox put their name to 

[neil r 1,848]

1 hour ago, paulus said:

There defiantly is, Keep looking at there baitcasting reels, Only trouble is, Its the not knowing if there as good as they look and sound that is putting me off ordering one. 

I’m on a budget bfs page on Facebook and there’s loads of the lads using the reels from tsurinoya , soloking/dovella  etc . If it’s for ultralights the tsurinoya dark wolf ultra and genius , soloking accura hicc50 which comes with shallow and deeper spools and bearking zuess get a lot of good reviews 

[mackem 26,268]

4 hours ago, paulus said:

they asked him if he wanted Fox Rage stamping on them and packaged as that brand. He obviously said No

I get stuff,packaging,that’s exactly the same as the original,the Chinese also copy holograms,no such thing as intellectual copyright in China.

[paulus 26]

23 hours ago, neil r said:

I’m on a budget bfs page on Facebook and there’s loads of the lads using the reels from tsurinoya , soloking/dovella  etc . If it’s for ultralights the tsurinoya dark wolf ultra and genius , soloking accura hicc50 which comes with shallow and deeper spools and bearking zuess get a lot of good reviews 

Right i have made my mind up a bearking Zuess, what would you recommend for a rod to go with it, small canals like yours.