Bailiff Comments

Week Commencing: Sat 06/04/2013

Welcome Gents to what is effectively, the first report of the fishing on Gigantica for the 2013 season. As some of you may be aware, the lake has been flooded for some time, which prompted us to take the right action and close the lake for health and safety reasons.

The weather’s dragging here as it has in the UK, has ensured that we’re well behind the seasonal norms and to be fair, personally Id guess we are about 6 weeks behind the weather as per an average year. Water temperatures are still incredibly low, and as such I am, and have been advising everyone to use the Zig rig. Bottom temperatures are incredibly low and as such, as the sun rises in the sky and warms the upper layers, obviously, the fish follow suit.

Personally, I would not bother fishing on the bottom for some considerable time. Adapt to the situations in front of you, either here or in the UK and get your hook baits where the fish actually are. No point being on the bottom if the fish are mid water of higher, especially in 25ft of water as we have here.

I Know it takes faith to break from tradition and fish Zigs, many people have never used them or have very little faith in them but believe me and there are an incredible method for catching early spring fish. As the sun warms the water, we will start to see hatches of insects that will obviously draw fish to the upper layers so they can gorge themselves on nature’s free feast. A perfect time too be presenting zig baits very high in the water column.

A lot of anglers have asked, or brought Zig 'BUGs' feel free too use whatever you have faith in. Myself, I use simple foam or cork, having great faith in both. The warmer and brighter the sunshine, the better, this early in the season. You will see or hear fish crashing, as they awaken from there winter lethargy. The crashing, I believe, helps clean the collected parasites from the colder months, but this very action in itself burns energy, energy that fish have to replace as they both, warm up as the suns shines and the now, endless building of spawn for the coming sexual antics.

Personally, small hooks, with either the N-Gauge hooklink from the Guru range or the Kruiser control hooklink from the dedicated surface range that Korda sell are my preference. I also only ever use a hybrid leadclip, as light as lead as I can get away with and I DO NOT use a tail rubber. I’ve been shown, a small ( 3-4mm) section of 2mm Silicone that Korda sell, gently pushed on the hybrid clip in place of a tail rubber discharges the lead every single time, which I feel, when using hook lengths of more than 10Ft is absolutely necessary.

Don’t be afraid too use the zigs through the night either, last year some stunning fish were caught through the night. I’ve also found, that adapting to the conditions has a massive effect on the chances you will get. Bright sunshine, go high, if it clouds over, drop them slightly, rain, again, I drop them even deeper in case the rain effects there comfort zone and the fish sink a little deeper to suit. There’s no doubt that zigging is a very difficult and time consuming method, but, it really is an awesome string too your bow this time of the year.

So, to what’s happened. Unfortunately, the cold persistent winds and dour weather played havoc for the first weeks anglers, and on there very last day, the sun broke through. But it was too late, as home time saw them drive through the gates fishless.

Danny T