100 BOTTOM FISHING IN THE NOTTINGHAM STYLE. 



mixture is made fresh just "before it is wanted to be used, for 

 it is apt to turn sour. Mind and make it up as stiff as you 

 can, for if it is too soft it will rise to the surface and swim 

 away. The cost of this ground bait is only trifling, and I 

 have proved its efficacy to my own satisfaction. The quantities 

 I have given will make about a dozen lumps the size of your 

 fist, and will be plenty for any ordinary swim. It is all the 

 better if you can manage to drop two or three lumps of it in 

 your swim the night before you fish, a round stone about the 

 size of a large walnut being placed in each lump, which 

 should be dropped in quietly. Be sure that the bran is 

 sweet and not musty when this ground bait is being made, 

 or your chance with the roach will not be a very good one. 

 When this ground bait is used and one is fishing with gentles, 

 a very few of the latter scattered down the swim will be an 

 improvement. A little wrinkle I will also give you now : 

 the biggest fish very often lie at the extreme end of the 

 swim, and so don't be afraid to let your float go a few extra 

 yards. I have seen splendid roach struck time after time 

 when the float has been forty yards away, ay, and hooked 

 too. 



Of course, paste, creed malt, or wheat, can be used in this 

 style of fishing, and with that ground bait ; but good roach 

 anglers adopt a different plan for paste baits. They use 

 the paste and grain in nice quiet waters by the side of 

 streams, just over some flags or weeds are very good spots, or 

 where a corner or any obstruction forms a slow eddy ; in 

 fact, anywhere in a very lazy stream that they know or think 

 contains roach and is of four or five feet depth. Paste 

 baits are fished as a stationary bait, and this style is locally 

 known as " pegging." The tackle is the same as for the 

 other method, and is hardly ever used or practised above a 

 yard from the bank, unless the rushes or weeds extend 

 further out. Your pill of paste is put nicely on the hook 

 and then thrown out, the slight stream gradually works 

 the float and bait down till it is from five to fifteen yards 

 below you, according to circumstances, and it is then held 

 stationary, the float indicating when you have a bite. I 

 have taken good roach by this plan when the stream has 



