Simple Match Fishing Forum

&quot ead pigeons and milk, best gozzers ever, there yer go, your starter for ten"

You may well have cracked it there Bill. If the dye won't take in milk, and it probably will as it is oily, I bet it will in single cream and what I have left over I can use on the strawberries. The cream that is not the dye!

would you do them nower days

If necessary yeah. Plenty of pigeons in our back garden

Well done Choppy and Bill,your on the right scent trail now.Part 2 of the article shall be on soon.

Vic Bull, I remember him, is he still about?

Drew by him on some shallows on the Derwent.

He was standing well out in the river and wanted a piddle. He fetched somat out and committed that act. I swear blind the flow stopped for a while

Well Gents,the wait is finally over (had an issue with some rechargeable batteries that wouldn't recharge).
Feast your eyes on the answers.



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Well at least his picture was there

DAVE DOWNES he still drinks in the woodies  he still tells the old jokes 

I've still got some annatto. It keeps for years and you only need a small amount just to give the gozzers a tinge of colour. More years ago than I care to remember I tried mixing it with some Rhodamine (pink) dye and the resulting gozzers came out a very interesting peach colour. I suppose they might have been forerunners of fluoro maggots. They were brilliant fish catchers, especially on the Kentish Rother. With the sour brans getting the first batch was always the hardest. They key, after that was to let quite a few turn to casters, then hatch into flies so that there were always a few in the vicinity. Breeding them was no problem then, but I never found them to be great fish catchers. One great tip from the past - from Ivan, was to take a slice of white bread, soak it in milk, then put in on top of your squatts. The next morning all but the crust would be gone, and your squatts would be a lot more plump. Another tip of his was to get a handful of that green 'cott' weed that you get on a lot of fen rivers (Nene, Welland etc.) and put it in your worm box. On hot days it kept them alive, and it also kept them in good nick for several days after.

Still do the bread trick with squatts.
It certainly fattens them up. I found it only works on fresh squatts though.

If they are really fresh they will chomp through several slices.

I've still got some annatto. It keeps for years and you only need a small amount just to give the gozzers a tinge of colour. More years ago than I care to remember I tried mixing it with some Rhodamine (pink) dye and the resulting gozzers came out a very interesting peach colour.

Interesting stuff that, I haven't tried to get any annatto yet but have found out where to buy it via the web.

You need to mix a bit with warm water to make a runny paste, then spoon it onto the feed once the maggots start really feeding but while they are still very small. It helps if you mix a good tablespoon of sugar in with it.

Still do the bread trick with squatts.
It certainly fattens them up. I found it only works on fresh squatts though.

If they are really fresh they will chomp through several slices.

Me too Bill and Trypewriter i also sprinkle a teaspoon of suger on the wet slice

I can remember chopsing to some Belgians at the World Club Champs in 1987. They reckoned the best way to keep bloodworm fresh and it A! condition was to keep it in spagnum moss. The moss needed to be washed in cold water thoroughly and the bloodworm stayed fresh. Ther Belgians, had a very good team at this time and kept it in shallow tins.

That's reminded me of a good trivia question.
What was the French 'secret weapon' bait in the 2001 World Championships on the River Seine?

It's something I've NEVER heard of being used over here, or anywhere else for that matter, and it is usually banned over there!

Baits on the Seine.

I might be thinking of somewhere else but was it these tiny worms that came out of horses guts.

i remember Kevin having a small sack of these over in Ireland. An Irish angler (well known) ask him if he could have a look so Kevin showed him. He asked Kevin where he had them from and Kevin replied, "Can you keep a secret", the Irish angler said, "Of couse I can" so Kevin replied in time honoured fashion, "So can crappity smack I". It were dead funny if you saw it.

On second thoughts though I think that was somewhere else. Wasn't it a sea bait or a sea fish or something like that on the inSeine?

You're right Bill - horse worms! They looked more like maggots but were translucent red like bloodworms.

Weren't they a bit like wireworms?

Not the ones I saw Bill, course, there's all sorts of parasites. BTW do you remember those giant 'gozzers' that Robin Tooth bred? I think they were actually beetle larva.

They were definitely from sort sort of beetle; bit like a small wasp grub. If you put one on a hook they shrivelled up,; I think they were full of water

I remember Toothy catching a tench on one on one of your favourite cuts Bill, can't remember the stretch now though. Used to have a lot of crucians and rudd in it, as well as tench. I had my usual delightful day. I'd been flirting casters across to the far side, gently building the swim amongst the brambles. Then a boat moored up against them and 'mam and the kids' started picking blackberries!