Oz Holness: The Evolution Of My Angling

Change 1: Rigs. How Oz’s thoughts have changed

For many years, certainly through the early days of my carp angling, pop-up fishing formed the mainstay of my approach. I always loved the efficient hooking arrangement and the ability to present the hookbait above any detritus or weed that may impede the mechanics of the rig or mask the hook point from taking hold. With a real love of straightforward boilie angling, the pop-up rigs certainly suited my style of approach and I was always confident in my presentation.

Experience and experimentation has encouraged him to use different rigs

A straightforward pop-up on supple braid with a shot pinched on a couple of inches from the eye of the hook was soon made redundant with the advent of the first coated braids, and over time, the ultra effective Stiff Hinges made such a huge impact they were impossible to ignore. Opting in later years for the simplicity of the Multi Rig, using a soft coated braid, it felt so versatile, with its sliding loop forming the D section and a tied-on corkball pop-up, this soon became my staple pop-up rig. By simply lengthening the loops or the length of the rig itself, I felt at ease fishing it over a wide variety of substrates. I caught many carp over time on the Multi, increasing my faith and confidence in the arrangement whenever I chose to fish a pop-up.

Oz has always been a fan of coated braids, but does like to use a stiff nylon in his fishing too

However, in more recent times, my pop-up angling has become somewhat reduced to specific times of the year. As the lakes become ever more busy, and larger quantities of bait are being used, I found that the simple pop-up rig is becoming less of an appealing proposition and the slightly more subtle approach, of a bait as close to the free offerings as possible, is a quicker way of encouraging a bite. In fact, when I look back on it, my best seasons of angling have come when concentrating on the balanced bottom bait style of rig.

His go-to Multi Rig isn’t used as much as the Amnesia-D, but both have caught him a lot of big fish

The evolvement in my own armoury of bottom bait rigs came about originally from a simple eye-tied Hair. I then began to secure the Hair opposite the barb with a couple of hitches and eventually used a small piece of silicone to trap the Hair round the bend. As time went by, I took the Hair out of the equation altogether and concentrated solely on the D loop to attach my baits, via a rig ring.

Nailed!

I had become more and more obsessed with using critically-balanced baits, and this method and style of rig worked so efficiently for me. From around the mid-2000’s, I was using a coated braid with a longshank hook, and a long D that gave good travel to the hookbait and great hooking mechanics. This was the mainstay of my approach on baited areas until I began to use a lot more particle at certain times of the year, and at that time, I began using stiffer, shorter hooklengths of either Amnesia or fluorocarbon to create a quick reacting boom style rig. Almost like a long straight Chod, and that rig has served me well on many occasions now.

I very rarely cast out a bottom bait rig that isn’t balanced to some degree. That buoyancy is what gives me most confidence with the rigs I have chosen, and the wafter style hookbaits available today are so consistent and work ever so well. Even so, I still love to get some powder and liquids and create my own hand-rolled hookbaits with either small 8mm corkballs or some cork-dust and customise the colour, buoyancy etc. at times. Rig mechanics have thousands of variables so when it boils down to it, and there really is no right or wrong, if it works for you then brilliant!

Change 2: Bait. How much and when

Back in the day, I always loved getting a bit of bait out there, it was something that served me well for many years. The simple equation of finding them and letting them ‘have it’ was firmly ingrained in my angling psyche. I had seen it pay off many times; if you had a bait they really had a taste for and it was soluble and digestible, it was almost a done deal! The more you got out there, the more they wanted it, and the best baits would have longevity and keep the fish coming back for more overtime.

Pre-baiting is a lot harder nowadays but should be done if possible

I was fortunate to be around when the fishmeal boom really kicked off and those pungent, oily baits with the correct protein content and good amino profiles were almost like a drug to the carp! All these years later, a properly constructed fishmeal bait is still king in my eyes. They offer the best package possible to the carp, and trigger all the right responses from those wise old big ‘uns that really know what they want in terms of nutrition, handed out on a plate from us giving them the boilies on a regular basis.

A mixture of everything

These days, I’m far more reserved when it comes to bait application and that comes from a variety of reasons. Turning back the clock, we never really had the chance to fish the spring period and I remember well over doing things with bait in the early days once the close season was abolished. The early spring was a time for exploration and energisation after the cold months, the carp regularly moving around the pits with the sun and weather, rarely spending too much time in any area. It therefore become the ideal time to stay mobile, active and fish for the moment. I soon learnt from experience that the baiting game was best left until the water warmed considerably and the real feeding began in earnest before the spawning rituals kicked off.

Single hookbaits are something that he uses a lot, but isn’t a tactic he used years ago

The opportunistic and mainly single, bright hookbait angling became the mainstay of my early spring fishing and only at night would I trickle a bit of bait over a few spots to fish through the dark hours, before chasing them about again as the sun rose in the morning.

Fishmeal boilies still make up the bulk of my baiting regime throughout the year; the main thing that changed was my use of particle for pre-baiting areas and spots. This mainly came from the travelling. I simply couldn’t get back often enough to trickle bait in on areas, and so I used the mass particle approach, incorporating as much liquid food as possible, along with salt in the spring. This should increase the time they spent visiting my spots and keeping those small items of food available would hopefully keep them back and forth until I could return.

Of course, these days it has become far harder to pre-bait which brings us nicely on to…

Change 3: Location. Looking in unlikely areas

The art of actually locating carp obviously hasn’t changed at all over the years. Simple watercraft and a keen eye will generally find you carp in warm weather pretty quickly when walking a lake at the right time of day. What has changed things for me personally over the years, is where I decide to fish for them on a regular basis. Over the years I have fished, the lakes have become increasingly pressured, not only at weekends but during the weekdays, making it a job in itself to consistently get on carp, let alone get one of the favoured or more popular swims for bites. To give myself half a chance of angling how I like to, over a pre-baited spot that hasn’t been pressured, I have found looking to the quiet corners and out of the way swims that often provide sanctuary at times on busy venues.

Quiet, neglected corners of the lake are good places to target now the lakes are busy

Of course, you may not find the carp sitting there on show at midday or even rolling and showing at dawn, but come 2am they are often to be found creeping in an out of shallow bays or cuts, using the quiet times to evade detection.

It may take a while to find these areas or even get a feeding response, but with a little patience and careful application of food, a really good result can be had. I get far more satisfaction from a capture after a little prep work and observation than I do from slotting in behind matey in the going swim who tells you, “It’s all going off at 22 wraps on the tall tree where matey before whacked in 10kg of the going bait!” I would rather chuck two rigs in the edge than go down that route.

Observation has always been key

It’s much better to go your own way and know you have achieved your result through watercraft and thinking for yourself. A prime example was a little excursion to Linch Hill’s Christchurch venue late last year. A pressured day ticket water with a stack of big, tricky carp and only small at around eight-acres. I dropped into the famous Point swim and with the host of information available, I knew there was a regularly fished area out in the swim. On leading around, it became clear this was a huge, polished gravel area and so immediately, I set about finding the smallest spot I could, well away from this heavily fished zone and close to the forest of marginal Canadian weed. This work paid off, with the handful of bites I had over a couple of trips all coming from the one small spot tight to the weed!

A Leney mirror from a quiet neglected zone

Change 4: Feature-finding. From clipping-up to baiting

Well, this one has changed fairly radically over the years since I began fishing for carp, and certainly has become refined over the past ten year for so. I remember clearly whacking out a clumsy marker float set-up on a spare rod, slowly dragging the swims and popping the float up at every half rod length, plotting and charting the swim as best as possible. We fished to the float for the most part, and quite often this would be positioned on top of a bar and the lead cast next to the float or into the adjacent gullies before baiting up began with the catapult or stick. Electrical tape or power gum markers would keep the distance correct should you get a bite during the dark hours. The difficulty was that most reels didn’t have line clips on the spools! My old Cardinal 55s really were a cherished old workhorse but oh for a line clip! Elastic bands were one of the safest and most line-friendly way so after popping the spool off, you would wind the band around before casting to slow the line at the critical moment and allow the lead to plop in on your baited spot. I can’t remember anything being all that accurate back then and I certainly have always been happy to cast to areas by feel and sight but the weedier the lake and the smaller the spots things changed for the better!

The efficiency of things like wrapping sticks makes us so accurate as anglers

Feeling for drops was a real game-changer in weedy situations and for finding the best areas within a feeding zone. Gone were the days of needing to pull back after casting in to feel the smooth spot… how we ever caught a thing is incredible! These days we have beautiful polished line-friendly clips on our spools and a variety of ways to plot out a swim. Braid has changed the game entirely and the incredible transmission of feel through the stiff marker rods is insane!

And then of course the wrap sticks! For years my friends and I would pace out our rods or tie little markers on fence posts etc. to enable efficient casts onto our carefully prepped areas. Of course, the wrap sticks have made precise angling from the confines of tight swims an absolute breeze and everyone should be fishing accurately and precisely! Maybe it’s time to go back to those big spreads with the stick, and angle just where you see ‘em!

Hook sharpening has been a revelation

Change 5: Tackle. How it's all improved

Well, where hasn’t tackle development gone in the last few decades?! Incredible advances in technology and materials for all aspects of our angling. Clothing and materials that allow us to angle in the coldest, wettest, wildest weather Mother Nature can throw at us 12-months of the year.

Super lightweight reels, rods capable of 200+ yards… with a rig! Plastic balls with echo-sounders linked to smartphones! Internet access on the bank and more information than you can possibly absorb! It’s all down to personal choice now when, where and how we fish. Where does it all end?!

Items like the Spomb have made a huge impact

For me, a few really great advances that have enhanced efficiency for many anglers over the last few decades are the safety clips, Spomb and the hook sharpening kits.

The first is really self-explanatory and fish safety remains paramount to us all as anglers and fishery owners alike. Used correctly and with the wealth of information at our disposal we are on the right tracks. The Spomb really has made the job of baiting accurately and efficiently a pretty straightforward task. Very little in the way of spillage, nice and accurate even at range and even avoiding the dreaded gull attacks! I imagine there are not many carp anglers without at least one in their tackle bags.

Even line clips on reels makes things so much easier

The hook sharpening phase has enabled many to tweak their rig efficiency and hone hooks to hypodermic qualities; undoubtedly an edge in certain circumstances, but always be aware there are times when it can go against you. There is always a fine line between enhanced performance and a point that turns over the moment it hits the lakebed!

We can use much to our advantage these days, we have it all at our disposal within the world we live, but you know what, as the old saying goes… “You’re not rich until you have something that money can’t buy.”