UK Coarse
Rig
A bait on a hair of line, not on the hook shank. The reason wafers, corn and boilies get sucked in with the hook.
A hair is a short tag of line with a stop or a band, so the bait sits off the hook. When a fish sucks the bait, the hook follows. It is standard on method, bomb and boilie fishing.
You don't need a hair for a single maggot on a canal. You do need one for a wafer in a method mix.
Hook with an eyed or spade end, a hair of the hooklength material or braid, a bait stop or band, a needle.
A knotless knot is the usual: hair the length of the bait plus a bit, stop on, bait on, whip the knotless knot, tag away from the point.
A hair so long the bait waves. A hair so short the bait sits on the gape. Nailing the bait on the shank and calling it a hair.
Technique
Specimen carp basics
Fewer, bigger carp: a baited spot, a hair-rigged boilie or a single, and time. Not a method feeder every eight minutes. Fish care scales with the fish.
Technique
Method feeder
A small frame of groundbait or damp pellet with a short hooklength and a bait sitting in the mix. The most reliable commercial catcher of the last twenty years.
Technique
Margin feeder
A small method or pellet feeder in the edge, late on. When you would rather a frame at your feet than a pole in the bushes.
Technique
Rolling meat
A cube of luncheon meat trundled through a river crease on a light lead or a baited hook, so it behaves like food in the flow. Barbel and chub after 16 June, where meat is allowed.
Technique
Hybrid feeder
A method-style frame with a more open, slower-release mix. Pressured carp and F1s that have seen a thousand flat methods.
Technique
Bomb / leger
A straight lead, no cage, no frame. When the splash of a feeder is too much, or you want a PVA bag and a single bait on the spot.
Technique
Barbel fishing
A crease, a bait on the gravel, and a fish that pulls harder than its size. Rivers after 16 June. A mat is part of the tackle, not an extra.
Technique
Pellet feeder
A window or blockend packed with pellets rather than maggots or groundbait. Commercial carp, F1s and bream on a tight clip.
Species
Catfish
A heat-loving imported cat of some UK stillwaters. Huge, powerful, and a welfare job — only fish waters that actually stock them.
Species
Barbel
The prize of running water after 16 June. A fish of creases, gravel and a bait put in the right seam — not a stillwater method with a bigger lead.
Species
Carp
The fish that built modern UK commercials — and still the one most anglers actually want to hold. Commons, mirrors and leathers, from mid-doubles to the fish of a lifetime.
Bait
Boilies
Cooked, round hookbaits. A pit and specimen tool more than a 6-hour day-ticket method — but small boilies have a place.
Bait
Wafters
Slow-sinking hookbaits that sit over a method mix. The default commercial carp and F1 change bait when corn and pellet are ignored.
Bait
Corn
Cheap, bright, and eaten by almost everything that swims in stillwater. One of the best 'I've only got this' baits in British coarse fishing.