Fishing on rivers with a lot of current water is quite a challenge. There are quite a few things that you should and can take into account. Just throwing out your lines and waiting for fish does not work in this situation. In flowing water it is not only a challenge to catch the fish, but also to keep your lines on the bottom. For example, think of boats or the water and dirt that your line can take with it. In this blog I will show you how best to fish on running water and I have made a handy tool against floating dirt, with a work description so that you can get started yourself.
Keep the lines in place
I myself have been fishing here for years on a channel that can flow quite a bit. At the end of this water are three pumps and a lock. That’s a lot of violence when these go on. And what makes fishing not easy. It does provide an extra nice challenge. You cannot fish with the lines out of the water on running water because shipping also passes here. So you have to fish with the lines over the bottom. I’ll explain to you how I keep everything in place on a flowing channel.
On my main line I use 200 grams of grip lead. To let the line run further over the bottom I use double top lead and 20 grams of lead over the main line. This one goes into the fairway. This way your line will be well pressed to the bottom. The second top lead 115 grams with line clip is placed as close as possible to the side. When you have a bite, it will shoot off your line. This way you always drill with top lead.
Tackling floating debris and false beeps
In the above way it is a lot easier to catch your fish, but I got another challenge. Floating Dirt! It flowed along the side and caused false beeps. Now it is manageable during the day and also because I have been lowering the lines under the side for quite a short time.
During the day you can still remove it with a scoop net before it hits your lines. But sometimes quite a bit of seaweed or islands of reeds pass by. At night it gets more difficult. All those false beeps keep you from sleeping unnecessarily. Your line is lifted out of the water top lead and all. To prevent this I made a kind of board that serves as a blockade to keep that floating debris out of my lines.
You need this to make the floating dirt block yourself
- Sheet of plywood of 20×70 cm 3mm thick
- 3 Sheet of plywood of 20×70 cm 3mm thick
- Coach bolt M8 of 8 cm long
- 2 Bolts
How you make it
- Cut a 33 mm slot in the length of the 70 and 100 cm spars
- Drill a hole of 8 mm in the 100 cm log at 40 cm
- Insert the 8mm bolt here
- Make a notch in the sheet of plywood, which falls over the bolt to glue the plywood in the slot of the 100 cm and the other in that of the 70 cm long stick
- Once that is secure, drill an 8mm hole in the 80cm long stick, almost at the end
- Now you can put it over the bolt and secure it with the bolts.
- To attach it to the water’s edge, drill a hole at both ends of the round sticks through which the banck sticks fit
- Then paint it to protect the wood, I chose black, but green is also fine of course. Just what you still have and what doesn’t stand out too much in nature
You can make this board as you wish and of course it is also easy to adapt to the situation of the waterfront where you fish.
Good luck!
Marcel Dolderman