Full of cold and desperate to get out chub fishing, decisions need to be made. Options seemed limited due to recent rain followed by a cold snap. My local river, The Warwickshire Avon, was an obvious choice but was running with a fair bit of colour. I love the River Test and recently enjoyed a great day landing seven chub to over 4lb, a couple of large bream, a big eel that luckily was easily unhooked and a superb hybrid over 3lb. Another suitable option would have been the Thames, which has been producing some great chub recently. In the end, I decided that I really didn’t feel up to an early start and long drive, so I would risk a blank on the Warwickshire Avon.
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The Avon chub aren’t keen on coloured water, as is the same on many rivers. I find it strange that such an often greedy fish would stop feeding, and my only explanation is that there must be a lot of natural food present. Whatever the reason(s), reliable sport isn’t normally resumed until the brown tinge gives way to a green tinge and its then confidence soars. As far as chub are concerned, temperature plays a lesser role but will nonetheless affect behaviour, this was most evident as my day panned out.
At this time of year when the river is in good condition, I often look no further than bread as a choice of bait, cheap, reliable and quick to work. A green tinge to the river and a big tub of liquidised bread, confidence would be high for a single-minded approach and most likely most of the time spent fishing a float. This day, however, was different, a clearing colour yes, however, more brown than green, overnight temperatures down to -5C and daytime temperature barely above freezing, the all-important confidence was not at 100%.

I mentioned earlier that temperature was not that important, but still plays a part in the chub’s behaviour. Although they will still feed, they will often not chase a bait around, expending energy, rather picking up more static baits and often smaller offerings, there may well be a short window during which they feed. What is important is a period of settled temperatures, and unfortunately, it had now swung over 15°C in two days. For this reason, plus the water colour, the float rod was left in the car and static or a bait bounced slowly down the peg was going to be the way today. I’m also not particularly confident using bread solely and often find a piece of Spam or even cheese will produce a bite, so some alternatives were taken. The day before was one such day when the only two bites I had were on Spam, resulting in one chub.
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The title of the blog is Roving (a bit). Let me explain. For many chub anglers, roving is about fishing a lot of river, fishing many pegs often for only a short time using a method they have utmost confidence in until they catch. There is absolutely nothing wrong with this! The success these proper roving anglers enjoy, speaks volumes. I, however, struggle with that, previously my knees prevented me from walking very far, which certainly reinforced what I do, in the last year, I have had two new ones which are superb, the real problem I have is the years I spent match fishing. When you fish a match, you are on the peg for the duration and need to make the most of it, you can’t move.

This means that rather than a method you have confidence in that you try in many pegs, you need to have a plan then adapt as the day pans out. Match fishing is more about decisions, roving is more about confidence. I cannot shake off the match angler in me and nor do I want to, I just find it difficult to move until I am sure that a better option exists. That I have all but exhausted existing options in the peg, my decision now is when to move and, of course, I have the pick of the pegs!
As the river was still carrying some extra water, I needed a rod that could cast up to 3oz accurately and not be too heavy when fishing a light lead on a nearside crease, tackle for the day was a Cadence 1.25lb Specimen Rod with a 3oz tip and this rod fits that bill perfectly. I find this a great all-rounder and a match for any chub, soft enough in the tip/middle, so I am not pulling hooks or suffering crack offs from lunging chub trying to get in nearside vegetation.
All the Cadence Specimen rods have a great medium to through action, making them very versatile, match the test curve to the required casting weight rather than the size of fish you are after, and you won’t go wrong. Some people are fixated with lighter quiver tips, but remember, if it is bent more than about 20° from straight it is too light for the conditions, a slight curve is ideal. The tip will be pulling on the rod blank, and bites will be harder to read as it will now actually be stiffer overall, fishing for drop back bites it isn’t so much a problem! The Cadence rods have a good selection of tips, and a great feature is the larger Fuji K series eyes that don’t block up with debris all the time!

A new Cadence CS7 reel, a great looker and performer which now has a lower gear ratio which I like for adding cranking power, is loaded with 0.26mm 8lb Edge Specimen line. I have just started using this line as per the floating line I have been using for stick float and bolo fishing. It is very impressive. 0.22mm Edge Fluorocarbon to a size 8 Kamasan B920 completed my set-up.
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I like to use a link swivel to attach my hooklength, the weight / feeder goes on a clip swivel and a rubber stop goes above. Using this semi fixed rig, I can adjust the distance the feeder runs as fishing conditions dictate. Generally, if I am fishing close in with a link ledger, I will have the stop tight to the swivel, so it doesn’t run. When using a feeder I will have a larger length, up to a foot or so, to let it run with little resistance. This helps to read bits on the quiver or fishing shorted. Also, if I am fishing further out and want a drop back, which is self-hooking against the feeder weight in the flow.
I started the session on what, I thought, would be a “banker peg” if there was one in these conditions. However, a couple of bait changes and a biteless hour during which the temperature crept over freezing, and ice stopped forming in the rings reduced my confidence!
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Next peg, at least it’s warmed up! Another great peg and over the years – and I’m going back to the 80s, probably the most consistent chub peg on the venue, produced another blank. It was pushing through a bit mind! The right colour and temperature and the extra water would be negated, but I reckon they had dropped back into a steadier area much further down.
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Swim three, a toss up between two. I reckoned I had time left to fish two more and would try the second choice first, leaving me more time on what I now thought my best bet. With no thoughts that the fishing might be better elsewhere, and, I should up banksticks and move. The peg I was now in is at the top of the venue and does hold some very decent chub. It is where the river drops off slightly and the flow is steadier across but has another nice steady area next to some bushes and a steep bank on the inside. A classic chub spot and this is where I started. Again, half an hour later, changed baits a few times and still biteless. I say classic spot. However, this is not normally where I would fish on the Warwickshire Avon for chub. I do find that although they like to be near such areas when feeding, they will move into the main flow, which makes sense as that is where most of the food will be coming down.

The main flow here is about a third across, I slid my stop to about 2” from the link swivel and added some clip-on weights to the feeder. I cast at about halfway across where it was slightly steadier, as well as down the peg to where the peg levels as it drops off. I angled the rod up, so there was a gentle curve in the tip with a bit of extra line out. The idea is to fish for a drop back and the chub hook itself against the weight of the feeder, so you tighten it enough to just hold.
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The method is best fished straight out in front of you, but experience has shown me that the fish on this peg live primarily further down and reasoning that they may, if there, and feeding, be loath to compete for or follow the bait trail up to the feeder. I had in the coloured water more confidence in Spam, so a few small cubes on the hook and some loose offerings in the feeder was my starting gambit. A few casts later and the tip bounced sharply, I lifted the rod, no need for a hard strike when fishing like this, wound down and could not believe there was no chub on the end! The bits of Spam were still on the hook, which is unusual, it had me doubting it was a bite.

There were a couple of tiny chunks missing which I discounted, and subsequent casts produced no more indications. I changed to bread on the hook, still wondering if I had missed my only possible opportunity. After only a few minutes a classic drop back, I wound down and felt a decent chub hanging on. It was certainly no monster but very welcome and just reward I thought. No monster it may be, but care still needs to be taken as they will find any snag and expertly transfer the hook. The water under my feet was quite pacey, when it is like this, putting a lot of pressure on the hook hold must be avoided. To achieve this, I will draw the chub slightly upstream and then lift them to the top before netting them directly in front of me. I see many anglers with the fish downstream and often quite out of the water as they strain and stretch to net them, I also see plenty of hook pulls when that happens!


When I looked at the chub in the net, I was glad I took the care I did, as the hook was just in the top lip and easily came out. The question now was ‘are there more feeding?’
In order not to spook any, I rested the chub in my landing net and re-cast. I didn’t have to wait long for a repeat and a slightly smaller chub again, lightly hooked in the top lip.
Next cast another then frequency of the bites lessened, and I started missing a few before another very positive bite resulted in a three pound plus chub again, only just hooked in the top lip.
Time was getting on now, and I wanted to try the fourth and what would be the final peg, as although the line hadn’t started freezing in the rod rings again, it was getting colder.
It didn’t take me long to move pegs, and I decided to try Spam again. No bite after about 10 minutes and I went onto bread, almost instantly I started getting bites which I kept missing. The chub were obviously wanting to take the bait and eat but were moving off with it in their lips, the cold taking its toll along with, I think, a small average size.
Eventually, a longer hooklength and a small piece of bread barely covering the hook resulted in a hooked chub that shed the hook after a few seconds. By now it was getting dark and cold, so I called it a day and went to muse over the day’s fishing.

I had tried a light feeder which bounced a bit, which had not worked the heavier, about 3oz proving most successful, but how to make some chub that clearly wanted to feed take the bait properly?
Unfortunately, I ran out of time to really try and find an answer on the day. I think a link ledger fished on a big bow might have worked, as might a smaller piece of punched bread. I would have liked some maggots to try, but hindsight is great and there is probably no definitive answer to what is quite often a problem when chub fishing. At the end of the day, it was both interesting and challenging, I caught a few but no monsters and most importantly, I enjoyed it, and I hope you enjoyed my musings.