Many anglers turn and head for home at the first sight of weed, but Lewis Porter’s top tips will help you succeed where the green stuff takes a hold…Following EU restrictions, fisheries these days are not allowed to use effective weed killers and, as a result, more and more venues are presenting the modern angler with the problem of overcoming weed. Some places use blue dye, but this has its limitations especially in shallower lakes. The only thing to do is to gear up and tailor your tactics to fishing effectively and landing the carp once you’ve hooked them. Hopefully, these few tips will help you do exactly that.

Finding Spots

Casting a lead around in order to find some sort of clear spot is the first port of call. If it’s a busy venue, which sees plenty of anglers, then there will be spots that have been produced by the application of bait over a period of time. Choose the most obvious far-bank marker in any given swim and the chances are, somewhere on that line, there will be a spot that you can target – usually at comfortable casting distance. On waters that maybe have a lower stock and see far less pressure, you may have to consider fishing areas of lighter weed or even creating some spots of your own, which I’ll get to later.In terms of a spot that may have light weed on it, you can still effectively fish, especially if it’s onion weed. I like this stuff as the carp seem to happily feed in and off it, and with a reasonable length hinged stiff rig, for example, you can fish it effectively without too much fuss. In terms of finding the spot, presuming you are not using a boat – which is obviously the easiest way – use a braided main line straight through and cast a 4oz lead around. If the lead is landing and being suspended in the weed then forget that area. You’re looking for some sort of drop, and not necessarily always a real whack as the lead touches down on clean gravel. Try and find lighter stuff or no weed at all – you’ll still get a ‘drop’ from that aforementioned onion weed. Once this spot is located, swap the lead for a Grappling Lead so that you can further investigate exactly what is down there. Cast it on the same clip, feel it down and whip it quickly before retrieving so you don’t pick any other weed up on the way back.