Bomb and pellet fishing remains one of the most misunderstood methods on commercial carp waters.
It’s seen by many as an approach strictly for winter, when bites are at a premium, and by others as a ‘chuck it and chance it’ attack when all else has failed.
Nothing, though, could be further from the truth and even in summer, straight lead and a banded pellet in conjunction with loosefeed can outfish the pole, pellet waggler and even the Method feeder.
This is especially true now as autumn is on the horizon and there’s a definite cooling down of the weather.
In the coming weeks, carp won’t want as much bait thrown at them as they did a month ago, and the regimented minimal feeding approach of the bomb comes into its own.
Maver man David Burley fished the bomb to winning effect in the recent Maver Mega Match This final at Hayfield Lakes.
He won a cool £60,000 in the process, so who better to guide you towards the finer points of bomb and pellet fishing?
BITES
“Patience is key here, as you’ll get plenty of indications on the tip. These can be slow liners that pull the tip right round, and on a harder day, it’s tempting to lift into them.
“I’ll wait until the rod quite literally goes off the rest, though – you can’t mistake those and they’re hard to miss!”
HOOKLINKS
“For all my bomb fishing I use an 18ins hooklink of 0.18mm Silstar Match Team. If I felt that a shorter link would work, I’d probably change to a Method feeder to put the bait closer to the feed, but as I don’t keep feeding tight, my bait is never far from some pellets.”
FEEDING
“At Hayfield, where the carp are big and plentiful, I believe that you have to outfeed the anglers around you, so that means loosefeeding a good amount each time and on more than one occasion every cast.
“I’ll cast the rig out and fire out two dozen 8mm pellets, and if I’ve not had a bite after five minutes, I fire in the same amount, give it another five minutes and then wind in and repeat. You need to get the fish in your peg and keep them there – giving them six or seven pellets each cast simply won’t do this.”
HOOKBAITS
“I’m not one to have a tray full of hookbaits, and I’m in the ‘match the hatch’ camp of fishing on the hook what I’m feeding. That means a hard 8mm pellet fished in a band, and the only other hookbait I may try is a wafter.”
CASTING AROUND
“There’s the temptation to search the peg to find the fish, but that’s not something I do.
I try to create a decent area over which to feed and cast each time, roughly the size of a table top. I don’t want the fish to be too spread out, but nor do I want them to be competing for the feed, stacked on top of each other on too tight a spot.
“By casting to and feeding the same area I’ll be drawing the carp in to me, rather than wasting time searching for them by casting to different places each time.”