ANGLING: With just about all local fisheries providing decent sport, anglers of all persuasions must continue to take full advantage.

Even though the weather is set to become much more unsettled over the weekend and beyond, there is no reason why prospects should be regarded as anything but good.

If anything it has been a little too bright over the past week or so and a change is welcome in this respect, we could also do with the odd stiff breeze. This would help to re-oxygenate shallow areas of larger expanses of water, such as Foulridge Reservoir, and stimulate the fish into a strong feeding mode.

Very often I have chosen, when the breeze is blowing, to fish the most turbulent peg I can find. On lakes and reservoirs where sailing takes place, this is usually the windward buoy, when the yachts turn round.

You will find that many anglers treat this peg as though it was the worst on the lake, and that it is always vacant. Well now you know different!

I don't think this will be a problem over the next few days but, when the days are hot and particularly bright, the best sport is always either very early in the morning, late in the evening or, and this is the BEST time, through the night.

This applies to all fisheries, including canals! Not many anglers fish through the night, though there are some - and they get some very big eels too, so early and late sessions are most popular. No special tactics are required but, since you very often encounter bigger specimens, the strength of your tactics may need adjustment.

Peg selection is critical and, if you are not experienced fishing at these times, it can be extremely frustrating.

Regular canal anglers will have noted a fairly dramatic increase in the boat traffic lately. Not surprising really since this is the heart of the main holiday season.

To those of you fishing in the day-time they represent a damned nuisance generally. They usually come through just when you have the fish feeding and always "too fast," down the wrong line or even both. Often there is a mini "armada" of them.

Now that's pretty frustrating I'm sure you will agree, but it can be even more so for the early/late angler.

Just think about it. All those boats churning up your swim during the day tie up for the night! If you choose the wrong swim in the evening and spend a couple of hours getting the fish "queuing up," you can guarantee a boat or more will decide your peg is just the place they were looking for.

It has been known for anglers, knowing that a particular place is brilliant for bream, to put in some groundbait the night before an early morning session. Pre-baiting, as it is known, works brilliantly on canals!

In this case however, having put in their couple of pints of casters/chopped worms, plus some sweetcorn all incorporated into £5-worth of special continental groundbait, in the same knowledge that the fish would be ready for the hookbait at 3am, the anglers turn up to find three boats moored right over their pegs just 10 minutes after they left.

This, of course, makes peg selection very difficult. You must steer well clear of pegs near to bridges, they are a boaters favourite. Anywhere near a pub is out of the question and your favourite, the turning basin, seems to be a magnet for holidaying boaters.

Eliminating the boaters favourite may mean a long walk for you. Even then you are not guaranteed a stress-free session, but you have a better than even chance - thought I've always been a shade unlucky somehow! It is worth giving it a try - even the pre-baiting - for there are more, bigger fish in our "cut" than you might think. All my best summer night catches of canal fish have been bream. They really are a night fish, on lakes and reservoirs as well as canals. There is no reason why you can't catch 50lb (or more) of them from basin pegs on the canal.

Roach, however, are feeding well everywhere right now and must be the number one target for daytime anglers. Hempseed is the "ace" bait and is best fed on a little and often basis until, and after, the fish turn up. At this time of year I often take no other bait with me for a canal session.

Anglers practising on the Rochdale Canal for the forthcoming 4th Division National Championship will be happy with that news.

Such as the 99 who fished the Hebden Bridge Open last weekend (well some of them anyway!)

All locals will have known that the resident bream on the Red Acre stretch would probably produce the winning weight, but many of the unfortunate ones not pegged here managed a few roach, to punch, caster and chopped worm.

Caster is the bait for the bream and it produced three (plus a few roach) for the 13-5-0 of winner Derek Plant (team Eclipse).

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.