How to Deal With Bird Life Whilst Fishing
Birds can be a pain when fishing, having them diving on your spots and scoffing your bait. They can easily wipe 5kg of boilies in one sitting and not to mention damage your rigs. This blog should tell you ways you can avoid bird life.
Bait Up At Night
In my experience, I've found that baiting up in the pitch black doesn't seem to entice the birds to feed. Wait until it's as dark as it's going to get and then put some bait out!
Find Deeper Water
This obviously is not as ideal when you want to be fishing shallower water but on deeper water birds are a lot less likely to dive on your spot. With the water being deeper, it means that it takes longer for the birds to clock that there is bait there.
Stealth
If you're fishing close in then use a baiting spoon to bait. This is a quiet way of baiting. The sound of a spomb landing is essentially a dinner bell for the bird life. If you can put bait in quietly then they are a lot less likely to notice!
Dark Baits
Darker baits stick out far less than brighter baits on the bottom of the lake making it harder for birds to spot your bait. If you're fishing brighter baits then these are going to be a lot more visible to the birds. Darker coloured bait's like Mainline Link Boilies, Nash Scopex Squid Pellets and the DNA Crayfish Mini Hookers are the perfect colour. Be sure to check out what additives you can add to your bait to make them darker as well as more smelly! If you're fishing darker baits its essential to make sure they are packed with flavour!
Bird Scaring Torch
The Carp Life Torch is perfect for scaring birds away and keeping them off your spot. They don't hurt the bird but it scares them off your spot. You may think it's expensive but not when you consider its roughly the same as 5kg of boilies!
Scare Lines
Scare lines are a perfect way to scare off the gulls. Simply use your marker rod to cast a lead past the area you are wanting to bait and then put the rod as high as possible. This will mean that your line will be going over your spot but make sure you've cast far enough so that your line doesn't go in the water until you are past your spot. For this to work effectively ensure you are using a yellow braided mainline!
Leave Your Spomb Out
If there are gulls about when you are spombing then leave your spomb out for a minute or so after every cast! The spomb and the yellow line being on the surface prevents them from flying to your spot and snatching the bait as it falls down the water column. Leaving your spomb out gives the bait a chance to sink to the bottom making it impossible for the gulls to muller your bait. As well as this the less gull activity means the less chance you're going to have coots diving!