gandalf

Hi Gentlemen,

Can anyone give me the low down on types and use of pellets. Being older
than life itself it seems I now need to know about these things as they are
the in bait that works. I would prefer not to use a hair rig if possible but
it seems it is the preferred way to fish them.

Oh yes, since when have we had blue maggots and why? The only ones that work
seem to be red for me and my local bream are certainly not patriotic as they
did not touch a red, a white and blue on one hook.

Is it me or does the whole idea of make things simple and natural gone out
of the stain glassed window.

--
Gandalf

derek moody

Pellets are compressed meal, oil snd some sort of binder, forced through a
die and sold in bulk. Prices are rising fast due to the recent lurch in
international fuel, feed and grain market prices. Despite this it should be
possible to get a ten ton load delivered for around 25k ukp - (eg about
25p/kilo in bulk.) Pellets are made in a range of sizes depending on the
diameter of the die.

Uses:
Repackaged in portable packets.
With 'posh' label and high price tag:
* Large - sold to unthinking anglers as *special* hookbaits.
* Small - sold to unthinking anglers as *special* groundbaits.
With 'downmarket' label and medium price tag:
* Large - sold to unthinking anglers as *cheap* *special* hookbaits.
* Small - sold to unthinking anglers as *cheap* *special* groundbaits.

Sold loose from a 25kg sack:
* Large - sold to gullible aficionados as *extra-cheap* *special* hookbaits.
* Small - sold to gullible aficionados as *extra-cheap* *special* groundbaits.

Once sold they are of no further interest to the tackle trade.

No. They're what the *repackagers tell you* are the in bait that works.

If you want to create a real stir invent a new way to use them: I suggest
you carefully heat individual Pontefract ('Pomfret') cakes (Licorice sweets)
in a greased teaspoon until they go really sticky then inset the ends of
three or four small pellets and allow to set. Now you have a licorice
enhanced hedgehog of pellets with a tough undercase through which you can
pass a hook. Add a few Pontefract cakes to the prebaiting pellets that you
put out daily for a couple of weeks and fish the new hookbait over them.
When you've caught a couple you can gradually let slip the secret and
finally write the definitive article for the angling press. If you're
sensible you'll patent a self-heating spoon and assembly jig and arrange a
bulk supply of Pontefract cakes which you can repackage as a kit with your
own designer label.

Oh. This -will- work. Chuck enough of anything reasonably edible in front
of a few hungry carp and sooner or later some will take it.

Otoh you could use some of your leisure time in collecting and chopping
worms and slugs - prebait with them and you'll do rather better.

Or find the place where crusts the ducks and swans miss drift and collect
and fish bread in an area that has been prebaited for you for weeks...


AIui many of the fish that will take a maggot are colourblind in any case.

It's the cash-rich time-poor syndrome. Those with too little time to fish
properly** or who are too impatient, think they can buy the secrets to
success. The trade are delighted to supply them.

The usual quote is something like: 90% of the fish are caught by 10% of the
anglers who are the ones that buy 5% of the tackle. I reckon the true
figures are more likely to be 95%, 5%, and 1% respectively.

I bought a (remaindered) supermarket loaf this evening for 10p - revolting
stuff, -I- wouldn't eat it. I'll take about a third of it fishing in the
morning - should be enough bait for a couple of hours after which it'll be
too bright.

Cheerio,

** Which doesn't mean you fish -more-, just that you fish at the -right
time- which may occur unpredictably.

--
Fishing: http://www.fishing.casterbridge.net/
Writing: http://www.author.casterbridge.net/derek-moody/
uk.rec.fishing.game Badge Page:
http://www.fishing.casterbridge.net/urfg/

ian hooksem

as Derek suggests, pellet is not essential. they feed it to fish in
nurseries (farmed trout, for example, can taste just like pellet!)
It is a convenience product for anglers. To buy cheap you need to buy
large quantities (I have bagfulls 3 years old still in the shed. To buy
in sensible quantities teh price goes up and up.)
Being hard & solid, it slowly breaks down in water to a dusty mulch
within 10-40 minutes, so it is a useful way of getting some attracting
ground bait out, at medium distance. Its available in different sizes,
and the bigger ones need longer to break down in the water - so with a
mixture of sizes, you have an automatic time-release mechanism - even
more convenience because you don't need to top up your ground bait so
often. You can catapault some out around yoru hook.
the big ones (some people call them donkey chokers) can be attached to a
hook with a rubber band, or drilled gently and put on hook.
If you want to go hi tech you can put the lead and trace and baited hook
in a PVA bag and fill it up with pellet - so in theory when the pva
melts, hook line and sinker are in a small area surrounded by freebie
pellet.
In summary, pellet can have a useful role to play, but is not at all, an
essential piece for your armoury.

gandalf

Many thanks Ian, as you will see in my reply to Derek I have been given some
soft ones to try. They have halibut oil in them which the sales blurb says
is a fish attractant. We will see and as you can tell I am not too
optimistic especially after I know all but red maggots seem to be the thing
at the moment.

--
Gandalf

gandalf

I like your humour Derek as it rings so true.

You raised a memory though and I have already done the liquorice thing in
principle anyway. One day whilst walking home along the Thames after a
reasonable fishing trip I saw a couple of nice chub under a tree. I had no
bait left but I did have one sausage sandwich but it was covered in mustard.
Ignoring that I set the rod back up and climbed the tree as it was the only
way to get the bait to the fish and I temped a 4 lb chub of sausage and
mustard. At that point I also wished I had thought ahead a bit more as I was
now fighting both the fish and gravity as I was stuck in the tree. I did
land it without getting wet so allow as well but maybe I should market this
"never fails" chub bait that is 100% successful ( tried it once and it
worked ).

Here is a good one for you Derek, the lake I fish has a rule that one half
of the lake is left free for matches on Fridays which I observe. Most of the
people fish it every week and are mainly OAP's, they do not catch much as
they are worse than kids and make so much noise I can feel the vibrations on
the other side of the lake. Most of them have had chats with me and told me
I am doing it all wrong and I should try to fish how they fish, I may
disagree with their methods but I am polite and carry one catching fish, the
last few times I have landed fish while they are telling me I am doing it
all wrong which went down like a lead balloon. Last Friday I was the other
side of the lake and my methods worked yet again as I landed 10 or so fish
most of which ranged from 2 to 3 lbs, nothing great just an enjoyable days
fishing but I could hear them muttering every time I banked a fish. Other
than catching when they can not I have not done anything wrong, have I? (
well other than feeling smug when one of them started glaring at me when I
was chatting with the owner who I have known for years )

Going again next Friday.

Thanks for the info on the pellets, I took a look at them today and they are
expensive and odd flavours as well. I have to say that a guy in a market
stall put his money where is mouth was as he has given me a small packet of
halibut hook pellets ( sonubaits.com ) and says that if I do not catch with
them I get them free and if I do catch and want more I can pay him for them.
Unusually trusting that me thinks but I will live up to his challenge and
try them for an hour next time. He says they can be used directly on the
hook and they seem soft enough but firm enough to stay on. Time will tell
and at £3 for a 140g packet ( enough for a three or four sessions with light
feeding ) it is not too bad.

Thanks again Derek.


--
Gandalf

derek moody

Why do you never have a camera when you need one :-)


Yes, you've shown them that their lack of fish is not because the water's
rubbish, the light/weather wrong and the fish off the feed. You've taken
away their excuses. They would much prefer it if you were using a new,
highly secret bait - it would supply a new excuse.

If you have a similar session allow yourself to be heard muttering that all
those **** carp keep getting in the way of your roach fishing.

- that works out about 21k ukp per ton - or to put it another way, he's
charging you three quid for about 4p worth (in bulk) of pellets...

Fyi: With about 4p worth of bread this morning I took 18 fish in just under
two hours, eight of which I kept for eating (slightly OT as I wasn't coarse
fishing) - four of us will eat one each tonight and the others will be
frozen for another day.

Cheerio,

--
Fishing: http://www.fishing.casterbridge.net/
Writing: http://www.author.casterbridge.net/derek-moody/
uk.rec.fishing.game Badge Page:
http://www.fishing.casterbridge.net/urfg/

gandalf

It was that long ago Box Brownies were far too expensive and getting the
fish to stay still that long never worked.

My second hobby is photography and I always get the best shots when the
camera is missing. I had a kingfisher fly by the other day and although I
had thee camera the bird jsut speeded up the closer the camea got to the
eye. SAme in Zoo's, every bloody animal tunrns it's back to me as I
approach. These is a theme me thinks.


I would have to shout with all the noise they were making. I will certainly
make a lot more show of the catch, say weight each one shouting the size as
I put them back. It has been suggested I enter their competition which would
be interesting but I want to enjoy my fishing.

Got to be the cost of the oils used to keep them soft, I took a look and
they smell horrid.

So you had a few trout on bread then, not tasted fresh trout for years and
the farmed ones really do live up the joke as they taste so muddy.


Gandalf
----------

steve walker

In message <ant0804410b0BxcK@strongarm.dereks.pad>, Derek Moody
<derek.moody@clara.net> writes

Very funny, Derek, and very true. Obviously much of their popularity and
effectiveness is owed to the fact that they are used by anglers who fish
commercial venues overstocked with small farmed carp; the pellet is the
natural food of the commercial carp, as far as the fish are concerned.

I must confess, however, that I have found that they have their uses. I
loose feed with them, or add them to groundbait, when fishing for tench.
They seem to be very effective at drawing fish into the swim and
inducing them to feed. Likewise, I loose feed with them for barbel, and
when stalking in clear shallow water I've seen barbel move into the swim
very quickly once the pellets have been fed. Good in the very small
sizes in conjunction with hemp, as both sink quickly, tend to stay put
and don't particularly attract minnows.

I sometimes use the soft pellets (more like a pellet-flavoured boily,
I'd say) as hookbait, but I'm far more likely to fish a nice fat
lobworm. The thing I do like about pellets is that they keep more or
less indefinitely, so I always have a bag of them and a small tub of
soft hook pellets in my rucksack. Handy for spur-of-the-moment fishing,
when the tackle shop is closed. I keep tins of sweetcorn and luncheon
meat in stock for the same reason.

--
Steve Walker

derek moody

It's amazing how few anglers have pictures of themselves fishing (as opposed
to holding the pick of the catch) - and pictures with the rod bent into a
decent fish are even rarer.


Hmmm. You took stale buns last time you visited?

No - you're taking the wrong angle - keep on operating quietly, they'll
still notice. Then let slip that yoy're not satisfied that you're getting
the full potential of the water; which, come to think of it, is probably
true or you'd have moved on to a bigger challenge.

Or you can use the 'two tiddlers' ploy, see: http://www.fishing.casterbridge.net/method/brag1.html

You smell volatiles - chemicals which dissolve in air - fish smell the ones
that dissolve in water. Something that pongs to you might be scentless to a
fish and vice versa.

I'm lucky to have a stretch of chalk stream close where a busy footpath
makes fly casting too dangerous and duck feeding provides continuous
groundbait. Every now and then a fly fishing purist sneers at the method
but I confuse 'em by talking about flyfishing for coarse and saltwater fish
- and inviting them to try baitfishing for trout - which they mostly find a
lot harder than they thought.

And that'll be the last trouting session for the season - I'll be ready to
start serious coarse fishing once we get enough rain to perk up the rivers.

Cheerio,

--
Fishing: http://www.fishing.casterbridge.net/
Writing: http://www.author.casterbridge.net/derek-moody/
uk.rec.fishing.game Badge Page:
http://www.fishing.casterbridge.net/urfg/

gandalf

"The thing I do like about pellets is that they keep more or
less indefinitely, so I always have a bag of them and a small tub of
soft hook pellets in my rucksack. Handy for spur-of-the-moment fishing,
when the tackle shop is closed. I keep tins of sweet corn and luncheon
meat in stock for the same reason."

A good idea, I do the sweet corn and bread standby for the impulsive session
but the soft pellet may have a use that way. You mentioned that they were
good for tench, my record for tench over the last three years is abysmal
with only one 3 lb in all that time. Bit late in the season now but any
advice on pellets other than just as groundbait.

--
Gandalf