How tempting or tell me about catching the little things that inhabit our waterways, still these trophies among anglers will never be considered prestigious. But all these numerous gudgeon, verkhovka, bleak, minnows are valuable because they “fed” all the predators. Therefore, they should be able to produce in sufficient quantities to use as a bait fish. A special place in this series is a minnow — the most hardy and desirable for most of our baitfish predators.
Despite the obvious changes occurring in the living world, still somehow believed that the only massively minnow inhabits clean and fast rivers and streams. Here flocks of variegated fish usually occupy areas with a hard sandy or rocky bottom, where they feed small vegetation and animal food, all the family together rushing to any moving near the bottom of the particle. Of course, about fishing minnows on light float rod is known and written a lot, because it has already become a fishing classic.
However, in modern conditions considerable interest and the fate of the minnows, and the nature of their behavior after the overlap of many rivers by dams at the time of the global irrigation. Then there was a lot of ponds where the water stopped. As it turned out after a dozen or so years, gudgeon proved to be extremely adaptable fish: he has gone through a radical change of habitat, significantly changed behavior, increased standing water in abundance, and even acquired a more respectable size.
Of course, the minnow is best feel in the clear waters, where you do not come here and do not accumulate from year to year harmful effluents polluting water and bottom sediments. As a result, sometimes you have to get to the ponds with a good environment, where the bait peck real “monsters” passarinho community, which weigh 150 grams, which can not be found on the rivers. Such “thick” minnows are usually not caught in the upper reaches of the pond, where the still river conditions, namely at considerable depths near the dam.
And yet, the presence of fish in a standing body of water was a great sign that here feel comfortable and pike, and large bass, and sometimes even perch. Moreover, to detect the concentration of predators is possible only in those areas of the reservoir that are “liked” fish for life during a particular season, because he dwells in the pond not everywhere and not all the time. So, it is massively cold sometimes fades into the deepest parts of the reservoir near the dam, where water near the bottom a little warmer. In these places it is possible minnows to successfully catch winter light on a fishing rod with a bobber or on a jig with bloodworm, but not throughout the reach, but mostly in narrow zones Svalov deep steep ditches flooded riverbed of the river, where almost do not stay muddy sediments.
In addition, the winter tends gudgeon and the underwater slope of the dam, especially if there is a rocky or gravel dumping. We must remember that in the winter and open water, lazy in a standing body of water the fish quickly responds to complementary feeding, but soon enough eats and starts to peck it is not true, only picking at bloodworms on the hook. So to lure minnows, even in the area of their tight Parking lot, should be very sparingly, only arousing the appetite of the fish, and the bait should consist of extremely small particles and disperse on the bottom is literally “in the dust”.
Characteristic shifts in the life of fish starts in late spring, when fully melt the ice cover and will end the flood of very cold water. At this time swarms of minnows, followed by other pond fish, large quantities go to the upper reaches of the reservoir where water is heated faster. Then they obviously gravitate towards the coastal shallows with a hard bottom, but such places attract them not only with warm water. There will be the spawning of pike, perch, roach, crucian carp and gudgeon will be deferred to feed caviar to which he’s a big hunter. In these same areas will subsequently spawn and the fish when many fish will become victims of predators of all kinds. But usually such distant migration is characterized by mostly medium-sized fish, and his more respectable colleagues remain at the dam and only shift in the coastal zone is extensive on the glaze with a shallow depth and warm water.
It follows that both in winter and summer, many ponds for a good catch of decent size minnows have to rely mainly on the extensive stretches at the dam. Pond and minnows in still water, unlike the river kin, ceased to be a purely demersal fish and at certain points a good pecking in the water column. Often, minnows grab the bait at half depth during the mass departure of a mosquito, when its larvae come out of the bottom soil and float up.
As for the spawning of the minnow, it is sometimes even later than that of carp, due to the rapid development of the caviar of this fish in well-heated water. The usual sign of the beginning of the spawning of the minnow is often raised large fish vertically upward near the shore. Spawning within a very short time, but this period will bite only small fish. But then the minnow activity will increase dramatically, and it will be noticeably interfere with catching other fish, quickly driving into disrepair on the hook not only bloodworms, worm or maggots, but plant nozzle, for example, semolina “mash”, barley and even large grains of corn, “sucking” them up to the skin.
To get the minnow float rod in the pond in the absence of flow, much easier than on the river. However, as elsewhere, it is difficult to catch minnows a lot. Obviously, success in large measure will depend on the quality of the tackle by the resistance which it will have fish at the moment of take. You have to understand that if for dimensional snap-in carp with a combined weight of three grams is quite capable, and he so confidently takes the bait, the minnow, and one gram of excess. Feeling of excessive opposition in the capture of food, he will not be her to swallow, and will only be hard to pull, creating the illusion of a confident bite, when cutting time does not work.
