Watershed in Fehérvárcsurgó is a beautiful home of wonderful fish. It is very famous of its catfish population, there are huge amount of other predators living here. Furthermore, plenty of capital carps are under the water, breams in this lake are really amazing. It happens very often at each of the annual float fishing competition organized here that total amount of fish caught is above 20 kilogramm during the six hours time of capture! I'm keen on visiting this lovely spot for a fishing, which is not only a nice and calm place to relax, but has an unique fish fauna.

Watershed in Fehérvárcsurgó is famous for its beautiful fish and windy weather.

I used to chase those finnies with feeder rod in most of the cases, the reason for this is mainly the weather. In Fehérvárcsurgó, the wind is often extremely stormy, therefore huge waves can arose due to the large surface of the lake. Float fishing is very difficult under these conditions. Nevertheless, tips of light feeder and picker rods are shaken many times by the elements. As practice makes perfect, it can be learnt how to differenciate between bites and actions or movements caused by waves. Tip signals delicate bites of breams very well, these are always little horizontal (left and right) lugs, while tip is moved slowly, but vertically (up and down) by the waves.

Feed for breams with all the goodies.

How it looks like before riddling.

his action has to be performed anyhow...

...in order to get a fine-textured mix.

I have never blended too much mix for a bream fishing, 1 kg is fairly enough for some hours. Essentially, the mix should be sweet, extra flavouring can be applied in case it is necessary. I used to add 1 dl per kilogram in summer, 1,5-2 dl early in spring and late in autumn as these enhancers spread slower in cold water. The mix itself can be varied in terms of ingredients, do not over wet it, always push it through the riddle to handle it easier afterwards. Small pellets, sweetcorn are also good choices to use, those will be acknowledged mainly by larger freshwater breams.

Beautiful freshwater bream in the net.

Smaller ones can be caught easily with picker rod...

...and the tiny ones as well.

Feed for the breams is nothing without live bait, therefore it should never be left out from the mix. As a recommendation, you should use more live bait in re-balling rather than in pre-baiting. After preparing the mix, split it into two parts. Add few maggots, pinkies to the first half, this should be used at the very beginning of the fishing as an initial balling-in. The second half should contain more maggots than the first one. Put this second half near to your hands and continually pack the feeder from it. Round cage feeder is advised to be utilized in this case, it keeps the feed in one piece since mix is alive with maggots. In this way, more live bait can be made accessible for the fish than in form of balls.

Best choice for this kind of bream fishing is a feeding cage and a medium hook.

The leader should be thin and good in quality, less line breakoff will happen, thus less leaders are needed.

Pretty simple rig..

Colorful cavalcade of maggots and pinkies on a small hook.

Its worth a try to nick inflated rice onto the hook for bait floating.

The rig is pretty simple. The round cage feeder hangs on a float stopper, which is blocked by a rubber bead above the swivel, so it is a free running setup. On the other side of the swivel there's the leader of 50-70 cm long. Hook size is 16 in most cases, but can be bigger or smaller, depending on the distance we are fishing at. For long distance, such as 30-40 meter, hook can be larger (12 in size) as fish are not so suspicious there compared to the ones near the shore.

Amazing environment.

Giant freshwater bream approaching.

Beautiful, huge one. Their growth is ensured by the shells living in this clean water.

We need to talk a little about the soil. Breams like foggy feed very much. They can hide in it from predators, they can feed upon calmly, moreover they think other fish are feasting at the same place in this yellow soiled, cloudy and foggy groundling. There is no more better bait than a feeding fish – exception might be piranha, but I doubt any of them are living in this lake in Fehérvárcsurgó. The long and short of it is, yellow soil is our best friend! Don't hesitate to use it if you have the possibility to do so.

Perfect hookup shows I guessed the length of the leader right and the bait as well!

Another fair catch.

Let's get back to the rig: main line should not be too fine, you can choose from 0.14 mm to 0.20 mm without any problem (use shockleader below 0.18 mm). You should keep in mind that more fine lines are more sensitive: tip of a Competition Feeder indicates bream bites very well from 30 metres with 0.18 mm nylon. As main line lays on the deck, fish are not bothered at all. The leader is another story, useful if thin as hair. However, there's no need to be afraid of thinner lines than 0.14 mm, I usually make my choice of 0.12-0.10 mm ones. A pound (approx. 0,5 kilogram) freshwater- or flat bream can be caught smoothly with this set-up, even a 5 pound carp (approx. 2,5 kilogram)! Most important thing is to adjust the drag appropriately, angle with anti reverse system turned off and do not force the fish! Enjoy every minute of playing the hooked fish!

Carps can be caught with a fine and balanced set-up. Be careful when playing with the hooked one!

Catching bream with feeder rod is a very entertaining and successful method. There's no gambling in it at all, this is also important in terms of our self-confidence. As breams are less sensitive for fronts, you can have a lot of fun by chasing them on those days when there's no bite from carps at all. I do recommend you to try this method out at this lake in Fehérvárcsurgó, a water which is rich in fish and has beautiful surroundings! In case you have some free time, it's worth to visit this amazing spot!

Author: Talabér Gergely