WINTER MEASURES
When does a frosty canal become unfishable? Enterprising anglers still catch by breaking the ice, but such extreme action is not always required. Areas such as inflows, marinas and urban sections are often slightly warmer, making them good winter holding areas and less prone to freezing over.
This intimate style of fishing can be truly thrilling however and being able to watch and cast to visible fish is a huge advantage. Since we are no longer fishing blind, the bigger fish are also easier to single out.
Russ Hilton plays a good fish at the edge of a turning bay, a classic area to find bream and other good-sized fish.
Uk Canal Network Map Pdf Photo Gallery
Larger Canals
When discussing the main types of canal, another aspect that can vary greatly is their size and depth. As well as the narrow, cute little channels, Britain has some much larger beasts such as the Gloucester, Exeter and Manchester Ship canals designed to take sea-going vessels.
The sheer scale of such waters can represent a daunting challenge. With much greater depths to contend with, methods such as long pole, feeder and specialist legering techniques come to the fore. The same rules of finding features and accurately assessing the depth still apply however. Perhaps the biggest problem on ship canals is finding, or intercepting, the fish in the first place where there is simply more water for them to hide. For specimen anglers, pre-baiting is a good ploy, so long as you have done the groundwork and found a promising spot or two. The more occasions you can do this before fishing, the better, and introducing bait into two or three areas is a more failsafe idea than putting all your hopes in one location.
Taking on a hulking great ship channel is probably no place to begin your canal fishing career. For those who persevere, however, the biggest canals are capable of producing some huge fish. Large carp, bream and pike thrive here, including fish that would smash the current canal records.
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