So there you are sitting expectantly by your rods, suddenly the tip slams round, the bobbin starts to rattle, the float slides away or whatever. It’s the perfect take. Whoosh! Followed by the perfect strike. Unfortunately the result is a disappointing lash at thin air; the perfect missed bite, or was it? It is never a good feeling when you miss a take, particularly if you are watching a large fish swim off with your bait in clear water or on the surface. We are all likely to have bad experiences and fail to connect with the fish, even on a really positive take from time to time, but what if this starts to become a frequent occurrence?

I am sure that many anglers will disagree with my conclusions but I have to say that these days I am very much of the opinion that if excessive amounts of bites are being missed, then they are likely to be liners. I know that if the tip has gone right round or the Baitrunner is screaming, it is easy to believe that it could not possibly be caused by a fish fouling the line. I have been as guilty as anyone in the past for thinking this. 

However, experience has now taught me that I was wrong on this one. A large proportion of these phantom bites, fresh air takes, call them what you will, are in fact liners. If you doubt this, a simple test will show one way or the other. Cast your tackle into the swim without bait on. Yes, this is actually quite hard to do, as it means that in effect you are no longer fishing, unless two or more rods are being used. It is often amazing to see how many apparently perfect indications you can get on a bait-less end rig.

I recently did this whilst float fishing for tench and had four sailaway bites before I even baited up. This was particularly interesting, as I was fairly sure that there were only two fish in the swim at this time. Having witnessed this, I was a bit unsure what to do after casting the baited hook into the same area. I did not want to strike at a false indication and risk spooking the tench out of the swim, but on the other hand, delaying the strike too long would allow the fish to reject the bait.  I opted for a traditional lift method set up with about six inches of line between the shot and hook. Having set this slightly over depth and tightened up so that the float sat up nicely, I decided that I would ignore all movement where the float just slid away without first lifting and lying flat. This is just about my favourite all-time method for close range fishing anyway, so it was not a problem to just wait for the classic tench bite rather than adopting the trigger-happy approach.

As it happened I had another four false indications, with one moving the float about four feet, before it finally popped up again. Eventually a lift bite did develop and the result was a nice tench of five and a half - pound in the net. It is almost impossible for the fish to create a lift of the float by fouling the line between float and shot.

Give it some slack
I have come across this multiple false bite problem many times over the years and sometimes it is really difficult to resolve. I remember fishing the Broads for bream on a number of occasions where the hoards of fish in front of me were so great that it was hard to sink the line to the lead or feeder without fouling a bream. We had tried using bobbins of various weights and waiting for the tip to pull right round, but most strikes resulted in fresh air or the odd foul-hooked fish, all of which was likely to move the shoal on. In the end we opted for a heavy fixed (oops semi-fixed) lead or feeder coupled with a drop back indicator between the rings. Striking was then delayed until either a slack line indication developed or the reel handle started to spin so fast that you just had to pick up the rod. These tactics were extremely effective, as once again it was very difficult for the bream to create slack line by brushing against it between rod top and lead.

Similarly when we were confronted by a large group of barbel, which were hanging out in mid-river on the Severn one summer. We found that slack line indications were the ones to react to. Forward pulls, as would be the norm with downstream fishing were best ignored as they were usually the result of barbel getting caught in the line as they swung back and forth across the current. A large fixed (oops semi-fixed) lead was again the solution hear along with a weighty chain type drop back bobbin. Fishing like this is a bit like uptide boat fishing, as you tend to let a bow of line out, allow the lead to bed-in and then wait for a break-out bite that shows up as a slack liner with the tip nodding and/or bobbin falling rapidly. I am generally a fan of running leads, where possible, but I have to say that in many situations, fixed ones do help to distinguish between real and false bites.

Guilty fish
I am also convinced that some fish are far guiltier of fouling the line than others. This is not out of carelessness, or even bloody-mindedness for that matter. It is just a simple fact that their shape and behaviour tend to cause the offence. Barbel, tench bream and carp are by far the worst culprits, as the fins, and in particular the pectorals, are very prone to picking up the line. Chub trout, roach, and pike, on the other hand, seem far less inclined to do so.

Of course, there are exceptional circumstances, like spawning for instance, when just about anything will bump into your line and I suppose that this is no big surprise.

So should we be bothered or worried about this phenomenon? In my view certainly not. I love line bites, they tell me whether the fish are in my swim or not. They can often show me that I have been putting my bait in the wrong part of the swim. Maybe too far out or on the unpopular side of the gravel bar and so on. I now find that I am getting tuned in to liners and would go as far as to say that it is often possible to tell by the type of movement on the line, roughly where the fish is moving. For example, sharp movements with the tip or bobbin returning quickly to the original position usually indicates that a fish has moved close to the tip. A more steady pull, with the tip or bobbin slow to return to the original position may mean that a fish at the far end is brushing your line.

I much prefer to see some sort of activity on the lines rather than none at all. In fact, when I am barbel fishing these days I will often move out of a swim if I am not getting liners. These small knocks and nods are so much a feature of my more successful sessions that I doubt the barbel's ability to avoid bumping my lines when they are active. I know that many experienced barbel men insist that these pulls are tentative takes from shy fish, but I can only say that this does not appear to be the case on my lines. Having watched barbel on numerous occasions now in clear swims, I can tell the tail slaps and the fairly frequent slow pulls caused by the line catching momentarily around the pectorals. When observing this, the fish are often not actually feeding at all, but if I could only see my tips I would have once confused the movement with bites.

Classic liner
The classic barbel liner is the tail slap; the tip moves round quite steadily then springs back as the line pings free. These can be distinguished from chub taps with practice. When braid is being used these tail slaps sometimes make the tip vibrate back and forth; pulls from chub are usually quite violent or sharp. I now find that I am so confident at reading these line movements that I am almost moving from swim to swim fishing for liners. Obviously, this approach would be of no use on waters that have a population of three barbel per mile. However, it is surprising how often I start to get these tell-tale signs prior to catching a whisker or two, even when it is likely that only on or two fish are present.

I am currently just sitting by my rods on what I suspect is one of these scarcely populated stretches. Nothing is happening, even though I have my two baits in ideal positions near to a big weed raft that is hooked up on some trailing willow branches on the far side of the river. I really do like a challenge, but sometimes I think that I have bitten off more than I can chew. It is at times like these that I would be delighted to see a line bite. 

It is frustrating just sitting here with no action to encourage me but it is a really pleasant sunny afternoon and I have been dozing in my chair and dreaming about line bites. There is nobody around for miles and I have been watching the wildlife, which as usual keeps me entertained during theses fish-less hours. Earlier on I was watching a fox that had not seen me in the undergrowth and just a few minutes ago a hobby hawk passed low overhead, it’s great really. The only company I have had today is a heard of Frisian cattle that have befriended me, more out of curiosity than anything else and this further strengthened my suspicions that this area is seldom fished. It is fine having a heard of cows for companions as long as you can keep them off your gear and I must say that number 609 has abused her privilege by running off with my waterproof trousers a short time ago. Must go and retrieve them shortly. I have got this swim baited up well and there is always the chance of a monster whisker turning up this evening. But maybe even here I should be wandering from swim to swim casting into all the likely holes and gaps between the streamer weed, without bait of coarse.

Hang on a minute, was that a chubby tap on my right-hand rod or was it a tail slap from our old friend the giant whisker?   

This article was originally published in Coarse Angling Today