Ali Edgar

LOCATION

It seems that almost all venues you visit magically have a stock of perch in them. Whether it’s a lot of small fish or a small head of large specimens, there’s always something to fish for. Getting to a venue at first light can be a massive advantage for spotting prey fish topping or being attacked, these are obvious areas to make a start on, especially if this is occurring around structure. Perch love structure, which can be categorised into visible, above surface objects, such as locks, weirs, bridges and boat moorings and although they do produce perch, sometimes it pays to try and locate the not so obvious features that everybody isn’t fishing.

Covering lots of water and using the right lure to search a venue can soon open your eyes to what features lie beneath the waterline. Things like drop offs, deeper holes and weed beds are all fantastic ambush points for perch to rush out of. If you can locate one of these features then I find the perch quite readily take a lure irrelevant of what time of day it is or what the conditions are. The equivalent is like somebody dropping a McDonalds in to your front room when you’re watching TV, you’re definitely more likely to eat it that way than having to jog up the road after it.