Great bait tips: chopped deadbaits for pike fishing

It’s often commonplace in most types of angling to use some form of groundbait, but in predator fishing it is often an ignored tactic. However, it can be very effective, especially on low stock waters or rivers.

For pike it’s a simple case of chopping up a few old deadbaits and catapulting them around your float – smaller pieces are best as what you are looking for is to create a scent hotspot so any foraging pike that come over it will look around and hopefully pick up your bigger deadbait.

If you’re fishing at long range, you can put chop out with a baitboat, or alternatively with a carp anglers’ Spomb!

For zander, I like to fish with chopped bait in a block-end feeder when legering as this creates a nice tight scent trail right next to the bait, and offers no free offerings in the water to distract the fish.

It’s not just pike and zander that can be caught using groundbaiting tactics, catfish respond amazingly well to large beds of smelly groundbait – with plenty of pellets, chopped fish and liquid amino acids.