with KINGFISHER

JULY and August are, arguably, the two best months of the year for roach fishing locally. I am sure it has not escaped your notice, but July is just a couple of days away!

So that means roach for me, though it is a very difficult decision to make. For not only is it a great time for roach, but there are plenty of skimmers about and the 'proper' bream are about to feed in earnest, after spawning.

The carp in commercials locally are 'crawling up the rod' and the rivers are just wakening up to the fact that anglers are throwing bait in again.

In short, there really is no better time of the year to go coarse fishing. The days will be getting shorter from now on so make sure you do not waste any of this valuable time. That brings me, very conveniently, back to the subject of roach.

They have not really made any impact since spawning in the spring, but all waters containing this most important of all coarse fish will now start to produce.

That includes many that may not strike you as a roach water, like some commercials, and others that you may think contain only stunted fish.

The one thing that they all have in common is that the appropriate use of hempseed will produce more and bigger roach for you than any other bait, though you might need to use tares to sort out the pound fish from the half-pounders!

I am not sure I would use seed on the hook on a commercial fishery, preferring caster or maggot whilst feeding hemp. On further thought I would not use either -- I would not fish the commercial for roach in the summer -- there's much more satisfaction to be had from a double figure canal bag or 30lbs from a reservoir.

So it is the canal then, or maybe one of the local reservoirs such as Foulridge, Rishton (H&B AA members only) or Elton. Any stretch of the canal locally has the potential to produce 10lbs of hemp caught roach, but they all do not. That is, in part, because not many anglers are fishing them these days (shame) and of those that do, few will persevere with hempseed (if they use it on the hook at all).

They really are missing out but, I have to admit, it can be much easier to 'bag up' on the reservoir.

There are, generally, more fish for you to go at and they do shoal in greater numbers -- especially in about two metres of water close to the bank! That means that the first 20 or so pegs on Foulridge match bank are the ones to go for, with the late twenties best.

As it happens these are also some of the best pegs on here for early summer skimmer/bream action, so it is possible to 'kill two birds with one stone' so to speak.

Single or double red maggot fished with a groundbait feeder and cast 25 metres or so will do it. Keep re-casting to make sure that feed is going in , whether you are catching or not and you soon will be.

Meanwhile feed hempseed, via your catapult at first (they will come within 'chucking' range eventually) continually, about 20 grains at a time, whilst fishing the feeder.

You can use pole or waggler with the seed, but I prefer a five or six metre whip so you can see how close I expect to get them. It is possible to get a bite immediately, though it usually takes a bit of feeding first.

When you do get them going the action can be hectic, to say the least. You will quickly forget about the skimmer swim, if you are not careful, so continue to put feed in here if you intend to come back to it. From personal experience I am pretty sure that once the hemp bug has bitten skimmers will hold no fascination for you at all, so I do not bother.

Anyway, back to the canal. The best thing you can do to to give yourself the best chance of taking a net of roach on hemp, is go armed only with hemp. Sounds fundamental I know, but it really takes some doing, when you do not have enough confidence.

If you take anything else I can guarantee that you will not give the seed enough time. Fish it down the channel, on the pole, and try early morning or late evening sessions.