ALLURING CHUB
by Ralph Walker

Fancy a Fly ?
Fat fuzzy flies are a big favourite of mine when it comes to luring big wary chub. I do quite a bit of fly fishing for trout and I find that this method can work very well for chub, better at certain times of the year than others, depending on what's hatching out at the time - the mayfly hatch is one of the very best times because many species, especially trout and chub, seem to put their brains in neutral and go absolutely crazy for them!

So if you fancy trying your hand at some fly fishing during the Coarse Season, I'd put chub on the top of your list ! The other bonus with flies as with all lures, is that you never quite know what you're going to catch — I've had pike, perch, trout, rudd, skimmer bream and even some over-optimistic dace. A 5-7 AFTMA fly-rod, a RimFly reel, some backing, fly and leader line is all you need to put your flies where the chub like 'em best !

It seems to me that flies and other lures are both very good methods of catching the sort of size of chub that you might otherwise have to wait simply ages to catch using conventional baits. I've done a lot of bait fishing for chub over the years and I still get a tremendous satisfaction every time I manage to fool those big, wily and wary chub with my fat flies and lures instead!

Lures are mainly associated with fishing for pike but I personally think that you can get just as much satisfaction from catching nice fat chub on lures as you do pike - I often wonder just how many anglers actually go fly and lure fishing specifically for chub - I do for one !

Surface Success
Although you can catch chub on lures when the water's cold and when they're deep down in the water, but I think that's just making life unnecessarily difficult. I like my fishing to be as much fun as possible although I don't necessarily mean making it that easy. I've found that the most success with these big fat chub, and tiny ones too, is to be had when the water's warm and they're feeding off or close to the surface. It's then that they most readily go for big fuzzy flies, surface and shallow-diving lures.

Some of my most favourite lures for chub are small and medium sized, jointed & un-jointed, shallow diving minnows such as Bomber, Rapala, Nilsmaster and Rebel but at certain other times of the year, lures such as a small Heddon Moss Boss, Crazy Crawler or Arbogast Jitterbug can also very effective for chub. And I always remember to have asurface Popper of one kind or another in my lure box when I'm out after Chevin The Chub.

I've read a lot of things on the various excellent Forums where people have asked "What's the best fly or lure for this and that species?" and so on, but in truth, I don't really think that there is a "Best" fly or lure - success depends on so many things, not least your own particular venues, the fish in them and the way that they feed at different times of the year, and most importantly, how you go about tackling them, where you cast, how accurately and non-spookingly, if that's a word.

Stalking, and not Talking !
Personally I've found that to stand much of a chance of catching big wary chub on flies and lures, you've got to almost stalk them, preferably from downstream of them. I camouflage myself as well as I can and use the cover provided by any bankside bushes or other vegetation and I walk, or rather creep along as quietly as possible, without talking: it sounds a bit anti-social I know, but you've really got to be very quiet when you're after big chub, or any other specimen species for that matter.

This is one of the main keys to success in my opinion - I think that if you can get within casting distance of big chub that are feeding confidently from the surface without spooking them, then it doesn't matter too much exactly which fly or lure that you use because they'll grab almost anything that looks vaguely like their normal food sources, but chub love to live under the cover of things like rafts of floating debris, over-hanging bushes and so on, and this can make casting to them very challenging, all part of the skill and fun of fishing.

Lures, Great and Small
Although light lures work well for chub, medium-sized ones may lure the bigger specimens for you (I caught my Personal Best chub on an 11cm jointed Rapala minnow when I was fishing for pike !) although the smaller 7 and 9 cm Rapala minnows and suchlike are very good chub catchers as well.

Despite everything that I've heard and read though, I never like to fish too light whatever I'm after, because there are some seriously big pike in the waters that I fish. In fact I've lost a good few nice chub at the net when they've been grabbed by cheeky opportunist pike. I've even had pike grab pike as I'm netting them! So this is why I usually fish with braided main line because you can get good strength e.g. 30 lb B.S. with an amazingly low diameter, ideal for lure fishing. Incidentally, even though it can quite badly affect the action of some lures, especially surface ones, I always use at least 15 lb B.S. wire trace even in waters where I've never seen a pike, because sure enough, sooner or later, one will turn-up, hopefully a biggie!

Also I mustn't forget to mention another of my favourite chub lures, the Manns 1-Minus; originally it was just available in the standard size which I sometimes find just a tad over-sized for my own personal preference, but now there are two smaller variants, the Baby and the Tiny and so I usually have a couple of each size with me whenever I'm chubbing.

Modest Rods
Nick has also asked me to mention briefly the sort of tackle I use, but I only have a very modest little collection of lure rods that seems to cope with most of my chub, pike and other predator fishing with small and medium-sized lures. As a general guide, I go for rods with a claimed lure-weight casting range of about 0.5 to 1.5 oz (approx 15 to 45 gm) because if you use braids, this increases the practical casting weight range quite a bit at the lighter end and, if your rod is strong enough to cope, at the upper end of the weight range too.

I have a small 6 ft baitcasting rod and multiplier reel but I only tend to use this type of tackle when I get the chance to fish from a boat, which sadly isn't very often. Usually I use one of my rods designed a fixed-spool reel - I have a 7 ft, 8 ft and a 9 ft rod, and that's it! I prefer to use a fixed spool reel because I find that casting's easier especially with light lures which I often have to resort to, to avoid blanking !

Oh, and I should just add that I keep a telescopic rod, reel and a small box of lures hidden in the boot of my car so that I can get "out and at 'em" at every available opportunity! And by the way, tackle theft from vehicles is a big problem and that's why telescopic rods are so good because they're easily concealed from prying eyes.

Spinners & Spoons
I must admit that I'm not a big fan of spinners and spoons when it comes to my own chub fishing but this is probably a misjudgment on my part because I tend to use flies and plugs more often, and therefore catch more fish with them, hopefully. I think of using spinners and small spoons for chub when the water is colder and more coloured, and the chub aren't feeding on the surface.

Like I said, I don't think there are any Best Spinners or Spoons, just the ones that work best for you on your own venues. I have three main favourite types of spoon for my chubbing: Abu Tobys and generic Atlantic and Blair spoons. And I don't use anything very special either when it comes to spinners for chub, just the usual Mepps Aglia, Abu Reflex, and Ondex of course.

No "Best" method
Equally, I don't think there is any "Best" method for chub - baits, flies or lures - but wichever method you choose, I'm sure that you'll find that your chubbing is very rewarding! I sincerely hope so, anyway.

Ralph Walker.

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