tench fishing in winter help!!!!!

[dave fish]

fished a new venue today called cornfeilds beutiful little pond with mudy /gravel bottom used a marine groundbait with half a white shelfish boilie topped with corn had a tench on within ten minutes but shook loose about 2 metres from the bank gutted

[new fisher]

yer there is a tackle shop 5 mins away

[ben lee]

Id use maggots for tench this time of year and a maggot feeder or float for close in. Also scale down your end tackle.

[Tyke]

River fishing for Tench, in winter, is probably your best bet. Rivers do not lose temperaature as fast as ponds or lakes. Below 10C, tench slow up , markedly. Below 7C I find sport is very slow. Worm works best for me, I think this is because they move around in all temperatures and this movement attracts Tench. I would use a leger rig. Using a method feeder with a 4" hook length acts as a 'bolt rig' and probably helps to hook the tenuous bites of a winter Tench. An 'exploding' ground bait tends to provoke most response. Look for slow, deep, pools - often found at the side of weirs. In really cold weather, fish deeper pools, as they do not 'super cool' as water in shallower(6' or less) tends to do. The little bit of relative warmth may just encourage some fish to feed. Because of a lack of weed, you can use 2lb hook length and 16 /14 hook, when the Tench become really lethargic. Hope this helps. You have restored my faith, I thought I was the only 'crazy' angler to deliberately fish for Tench, in winter. Good luck.

[Tyke]

Following on my last post. The question of 'where do tench go in winter?' is very relevant. Answer, I believe they don't go anywhere. For many years, the perceived wisdom was that tench hibernate or bury themselves in the mud. I would suggest that this is not really a tenable proposition for the following reasons.
a. Pike do not hibernate, but any fish that did would stand a better then average chance of not seeing next spring. - guess why?
b. Tench in rivers would be washed away by any flood water - presumably to be caught at the end of the local pier( joking).
c. In many of the slow rivers and drains of Lincolnshire, tench frequently feature in match angling catches - so they can be caught in winter.
If the hypothesis that tench hibernate, rather than demonstrate a lowered metabolism, was true; then points above would not hold true.
I have caught enough tench, in winter, to know they can be caught on a regular basis, providing certain conditions are met.
In common with many creatures, tench do slow up in winter. Therefore, they will not feed with the same alacrity as they do in summer. High pressure seems to be the key. My own observations suggest that a rising barometer, producing a more oxygenated environment, followed by a rise in WATER temperature-even a few degrees - can cause most coarse fish, including
tench, to feed - not as enthusiastically as they do in summer. By corollary, a falling barometer tends to 'put the fish down.' Because of the lowered metabolism, their demand for food is less. This implies that smaller particle baits on a correspondingly adjusted terminal tackle is called for. Ground baiting or swim feeding still works, but, again the quantity must be reduced. Nor should the feeding be as time intensive as summer fishing.

[Lman]

i managed to catch a tench last month just after the cold spell temp had started to rise
was fishing cage feeder with groundbait and pellets and double maggot on the hook.