Lee Swords Fishing

The Lamprey is a bait I have never done very well on, I would say that until recently I had caught more chub and barbel on them than I have pike, in fact I would say that if push comes to shove and I was pressed on the matter lamprey wouldn’t even make my top 5 deadbaits.

My top 5 would be

1 Sardine

2 Mackerel

3. Roach

4.Bleak ( For zander)

5. Sprat ( I have caught thousands of pike on them…they can’t be that bad)

But when the lamprey is fished in the Kebab Rig style my luck seems to change with it.

Now before I go any further the Kebab rig is not something I have invented, that honour as far as I am aware must go to Mick Brown although my rig is set up differently the idea stems from his version of the kebab rig therefore I will accept no credit for it whatsoever

What I find with the kebab rigs is that because of the extra leak off and unusual shape pike seem less wary and more likely to have a pop at it.

When I went out to Lincolnshire with Ron Clay a couple of seasons back after I had landed a very nice pike of 17lb 10oz the week previous he laughed at the set up and said ” No self respecting pike would ever take that”

Well, I guess the pike is a shameless fish then,  because to the left is the rig ( Mackerel not Lamprey)and it was only out 5 minutes before some poor and unfortunate pike suffering with food poverty was forced to abase itself and pose for candid catch shots to make ends meet.

We should always strive to provide for the most vulnerable and so I suggest we anglers set up our own version of  food banks and  throw in a few chopped up free offering on leaving to provide for those that are not able to make end meet as easily as we can.

( I think I am spending too much time talking with politicians…keep it real lee and refrain from the politjabber and soundbites)

And further to that it is my opinion that this habit of giving out “alms to the poor” in the shape of chopped up fish  could also work in our favour as pike become more accustomed to finding  sections of fish rather than whole fish!

When I fish the Lamprey in this manner I tend to do it on the deck with bite indication coming via a drop off and an alarm, I use the Txi plus from Delkims but there are purpose built predator alarms out there that do both aspects of the job, I suppose I should buy myself a couple but in all honesty I like my Delkims as they are a bit more versatile plus they were expensive so I am going to get as much use out of them as possible otherwise the wife will be asking questions.

The kebab rig I use is very easy to put together as it is simply the addition of a wire hair on to the eye of the back treble, I use a crimped wire hair for the rig rather than a loop of mono as it is hard wearing and can take the pull and tug of getting the tough skinned chunks of fish onto the hair, although I expect a loop of coated braid work work quite well also.

Anyway as you can see the Lamprey kebab rig I tied up worked a treat, the pike may not have been very large but is stopped a blank and was one of three that fell to that rig that, which means that it has merit that needs exploring!

I will continue to add to this short article in regards to what I catch so stay tuned…