Maggot Fishing - AvidCarp.com

Maggot Fishing
This is the fi rst of a new series from carpcatching
machine Ian Russell, where he’ll run
through various tactics and fi shing styles and
teach you how to up your game for the specifi ed
tactic. The fi rst is maggot fi shing, so read on
to up your game when it comes to goots.
Maggots seem to have
become a massive part of
carp fi shing, and although they
are used more as a cold-water
tactic, they are a cracking bait
for catching carp all year round.
I tend to use the maggots more so
in winter, or simply when catching
carp becomes that bit trickier, when
the fi sh tend to shut down and stop
eating boilies. Autumn through to
early spring is the best time for me
when it comes to maggot fi shing,
and they are a big part of my attack.
Once early spring arrives though, I’ll
be back on the food baits, such as
boilies and pellets. In the past I’ve
seen fi sh swim over a bed of hemp
and not give it a second thought,
but with maggots I’ve never seen it
where a shoal goes over the patch
and at least one doesn’t dip down
on the wrigglers. Whether it’s the
aNgleR pRoFile
ian Russell
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Age 50
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Hometown
Wokingham
...........................
Occupation
Angling tutor/
consultant
...........................
UK PB
43lb 9oz
...........................
Favourite venue
Any lake
with carp!
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Rods
Shimano Tribal
Longcast 12ft
...........................
Reels
Shimano
Technium
Magnesium
...........................
Alarms
Delkim TX-i
movement or the smell that does it
I don’t know, but it’s defi nitely not
the nutritional value; that is pretty
much nil due to maggots being
made up of water, so they’ll never
take over from boilies. The anglers
who do bother with maggots
tend to catch lots of fi sh with
them, so let’s have a look at how
to do it right.
Crafty Carper 95

Maggots
Obviously you
couldn’t maggot
fish without
some of the
little blighters,
whether you only
need enough to fish bags on a
day session or really spod up
an area with lots of them.
spoMb/spod/
Rocket
If fishing maggots
at a reasonable
distance and
you want a nice
patch of maggots
for the carp to root about for,
these are definitely essential!
catapults
I always have a
catapult with
me; they’re spot
on for getting
a few maggots
sprayed around
the area if I’m fishing closer in,
which in winter is highly likely.
96 Crafty Carper
Up Your Game
Ian Russell
Rig bits
Avid Carp Highlites
are a definite must
when maggot
fishing. I use one
on the Hair to keep
the maggots away
from the hook, and it also acts as a
buoyancy aid. A sewing needle and
dental floss are also needed to help
me create my maggot ball hookbait.
pVa
A definite musthave
item for
me is PVA, and
it has to be a
wide micromesh
style. This is always
a great method of attack to
put a mouthful of the little
grubs around the hookbait, and
I always double bag my PVA
mesh bag to ensure it doesn’t
melt before it hits the bottom.
Watercraft
When using maggots and going to the
lake knowing that I’m going to be using
them as my main attack, a good bit of
watercraft comes into play. For this
feature we’re fishing on Farlows, it’s
freezing cold, and I’m not taking any
chances by spodding maggots to the
middle of the lake because it’s pretty
quiet and there’s not been a fish pop
its head out to tell me where they are.
On arrival I check the corners of the
lake for fish, as well as any snaggylooking
places around the margins.
The corner I’m currently fishing is a
perfect example; there are snaggy
trees in the water a matter of 35yds
away from this swim, and when I
turned up I spotted a dozen or so 20s
moving in and out of the snags. Fishing
to this will hopefully result in one of
them being a bit inquisitive about the
maggots and trip up to my hookbait.
Other good places to concentrate on
are dead lily pads, the margins of any
islands, or any other construction
that’s below the surface. Think about
where you’d like to be if you were a
carp in these temperatures, and all of
the above will be on your list. The only
thing that would make me fish towards
the middle of the lake at this time of
year is if I see fish showing at distance.
Signs like that really can’t be ignored.
RIGHT Use your watercraft to look
for fish in snaggy corners, etc.
INSET After locating a number of
carp around the snags, Ian fished
both rods towards the feature.
pros and cons
The downside to fishing with maggots
is obviously the price, but to be fair, it
probably equates to about the same
in weight as boilies. On the plus side, I
have used maggots in quantity to great
effect, both in my own fishing and
matches. It was actually a few years
ago, when fishing the BCAC with Phil
Da Silva right here at Farlows, where
they really came into their own for us.
We were on the Point Swim and the
ABOVE Lots of maggots can be a
winner – the downside is the cost.
lads next door were leading the way
by a fair bit, so we went and put out
3 gallons of maggots in the hope that
the second night would be our night,
and we’d take a good number of fish
once they’d got on them. One of the
lads next door actually popped round
on the afternoon of the second day
and said to us that bringing maggots
“When you have shoals
of carp preoccupied
on a bed of wrigglers,
it can result in
bite after bite”
was like taking a Mini Cooper to a
Formula 1 race. The next morning the
current standings came around; the
lads next door were on 70lb, while
we were around the 170lb mark. In
fairness to Wayne, he came round to
us, shook our hands, and said, “Fair
play, your Mini Cooper won the race.”
It just goes to show that if you have
a venue that is dominated by carp,
it may be worth getting a big bed
of maggots out, because when you
have shoals of carp preoccupied on a
bed of wrigglers, it can result in bite
after bite. Game on! I’ve done really
well in the BCAC and other matches
with maggots when I’ve kept them
going in. I must say though, those
were the days when I was running
the bait company and I could get
them at a very good trade price.

tactical
Recommendations
I used to always use the
Mag-Aligner when maggot
fishing, which brought a
hell of a lot of controversy
into my world. Don’t get
me wrong, I caught a lot of
fish using it, but found that
around half of my captures
were hooked in the face
rather than in the mouth,
and I mean actually dotted
around the face, gill plates,
and the like. The worst case
of this that I’ve seen (and
it was the last time I ever
used a Mag-Aligner) was
when I was fishing Mayfields
and brought a fish in, only
to find that I’d hooked it in
the eyeball. This made me
move away from fishing the
Mag-Aligner totally, and I
haven’t looked back since. I
still see a lot of people use
it, especially on venues like
Sandhurst, as this is where
this rig was pushed a lot
back in the day. Even now,
I still see upwards of 50%
of the fish caught on this
rig actually hooked outside
of the mouth. I’d say this is
1
TIE IAN RUSSELL’S FAVOURITE MAGGOT RIG
After experiencing unsatisfactory hookholds with the Mag-Aligner, Ian switched to using this rig when targeting carp using maggots
My rig of choice is a simple blowbackstyle
rig with a longshank hook pattern.
5
Now thread 15 or so maggots onto the
needle and bunch them up together.
9
A standard knot is now tied to secure
the ball of maggots to the Hair.
because it’s very lightweight
and balanced, and when
a fish comes to the spot
and has a little root about,
the rig goes airborne (or
waterborne, as it should be),
which results in fish being
foul-hooked in the face.
Since moving away from
the Mag-Aligner I haven’t
looked back, and I now opt
for a heavy longshank-style
hook, as well as around
15 maggots and an Avid
Highlite, so the hookbait
sinks quickly. All I would say
is just be aware that THE
maggot rig, which is used a
lot, does hook plenty of fish
where they really shouldn’t
be hooked. I fish a lot and
come across this quite often.
Try dropping the Mag-Aligner
and watch how it changes
the way you hook carp.
2
Take a Highlite and trim it off a
little to create a flat edge.
6
Once they’re all on it’s time to thread
them down onto the dental floss.
10
Simply snip off the tag ends
of the dental floss.
ABOVE Ian stopped
using the popular
Mag-Aligner rig
after finding a
large percentage
of the fish he
landed using it
were actually
hooked in the
face rather than
the mouth.
common errors
The most common error I see
on the bank is after someone
has gone and tied a lovely little
effective maggot rig and a
double-skinned micromesh PVA
bag. It all goes to pot when they
attach the bag by hooking the
rig into the side of it. Firstly,
this will pierce some of the
maggots, and because they are
made up mainly of water, this
makes the PVA mesh bag melt.
The maggots that have been
pierced then, more often than
not, mask the hookpoint, and
therefore decrease hooking
potential. There’s an easy way
to rectify this; tie an extra knot
to give a longer knot and then
weave it around the hook a
couple of times to secure in place,
so no maggots are pierced.
RIGHT A Not good! The watery
maggots have melted the PVA.
RIGHT B Wrong! Some maggots
have ended up on the hook
and may mask the point.
RIGHT C Sorted! That’s the way to
do it. Simply make a long tag end
between two knots, and nick the
hook through that before casting.
3
Thread the Highlite onto the Hair, flat
side facing out; the maggots will sit here.
7
Tie a knot in the floss, like this, so that
the maggots form into a ball.
11
The ball of maggots also acts
as a Hair stop – sorted!
a
b
c
4
Up Your Game
Ian Russell
Take the dental floss and thread it
through the eye of the needle, like so.
8
Thread one end of the floss
through the Hair, like so.
12
If you get the maggot/Highlite balance
right, the rig should sit like this.
Crafty Carper 97

98 Crafty Carper
Up Your Game
Ian Russell
Quashing Myths
One myth that tends to crop up when people talk about fishing
with maggots is the age-old ‘Don’t fish maggots in the silt or on
a soft lakebed, as they just crawl into it and bury themselves.’
What a load of rubbish! Moving away from maggots and talking
about bloodworm beds, the bloodworm don’t exactly lie on top
of the lakebed waving at the carp (they don’t have arms so
they wouldn’t wave anyway!), but they aren’t exactly sitting
on top of any debris shouting, “I’m here!” Maggots burying into
the silt? To be quite frank, I’ve never seen it happen. Generally,
I find that they spend 3-4 minutes trying to crawl away from
the spot where they were put, before giving up and just laying
there. Even fishing maggots in the thickest of silt wouldn’t
bother me, because whatever it is that maggots give off, the
fish will definitely find them. I’ve found that maggots are more
inclined to sneak under stones on clean gravel bars rather than
crawl into the silt. When carp come over the top of maggots,
even if the goots did bury into the silt, they steam it up and
dig around to get at them. If fishing them over a soft lakebed,
I would just adjust the presentation to put them on the top of
the bed rather than in it, and try balancing them. In my eyes
this is a total myth and one to take no notice of whatsoever!
team crafty says:
Well, Ian has given you the lowdown
on maggot fishing so it’s
now over to you guys to go and
put it into practice and catch some
chunks. There are some great tips
within this piece and definitely
some information that we here at
Crafty are going to put to good use.
His rig is easy to tie up so you’ll be
on your way to upping your game
in a matter of minutes. The piece
on the popular Mag-Aligner is very
interesting, and definitely opened
our eyes about the use of a rig that
is so commonplace when fishing
with maggots. The one thing left
to do now is take this cracking
advice, get out there, and get on
the goots! CC
RIGHT It all came right for the feature,
and I managed to catch this pretty
double from the snaggy area.
BELOW No matter what
the lakebed is like, carp
will find the maggots!
Each month we’re going to
Q ask Ian a question from one of
our readers about the topic he’s
covering. This month’s question
is this: A fair number of anglers
on my local water use lots and
lots of maggots. Before I go and
spend my hard-earned and buy
them by the gallon, I just want to
know if this is really needed.
aNow that’s a pretty good point,
but it depends on the water that
you’re fishing. If
there are lots of
silver or nuisance
fish in your local
lake, then I’d say
that the anglers
who are putting
all the maggots in
have a good chance
of getting a bite, because maggots will
still be in the area by the time the carp
come and muscle the silver fish out. On
BELOW Ian would only really consider
spodding/Spombing out a large
quantity of maggots if the venue
held a large head of silver fish.
“if it’s predominantly
stocked with carp,
you may find that you
have a better chance
by just using a mesh
bag of maggots along
with the hookbait”
the other hand, if it’s predominantly
stocked with carp, you may find that
you have a better chance by just using
a mesh bag of maggots along with
the hookbait. I had this exact instance
the other week when I was fishing an
overnighter. I didn’t realise just how
many silver fish the water held, and
my maggot hookbaits alongside PVA
mesh bags of maggots were annihilated
by the morning. I brought the rods in
the next morning and had nothing
but a Highlite on the Hair – the silvers
had done me over
and even had the
maggots off the
dental floss. They’d
obviously mopped
up what was in
the PVA bag in no
time, and by the
time the carp came
to it there was nothing to be had. If
I’d put five or six pints out I reckon I
may have had a bite. If there are lots
of silver fish, put the maggots in; if
it’s a carp-only venue then I’d be more
than happy just fishing the hookbaits
alongside a mesh bag of the maggots.