home of the wels catfish

Cork Ball Rig	Polly Rig

welscatfish.co.uk

I have tried several rigs now, some work well and others are more trouble than they are worth! The best thing to do is keep it simple and minimise the chance of tangles as much as possible by using a stiff hooklengh material or some form of tubing. The first rig i used was similar to the dumbell rig which looks very good caught me a few cats but did prove to cause a quite a few problems in practice, especially when putting the rig out with a baitboat. I have also experienced problems getting the rig to pop up to the correct depth and have found myself having to reel in and re boat on several occasions. This may have been due to the fact that i use a braided mainline and not mono. Having said that i have modified the rig to suit my fishing requirements and now the rig works perfectly fine with leeches and worms alike, see worm rig. The best all round rig I have used so far is the cork ball rig (diagram 1) which is very simple, effective and has caught lots of cats with only a few missed or dropped runs. I use a 20lb amnesia hooklength tied to a light size 4 owner circle hook one end and a 100lb swivel at the other end. The cork ball is tied to a short lengh of 4lb mono and then tied to the eye of the hook. Simply thread a lead onto your mainline followed by two rubber beads then tie your hooklengh on via the swivel, attach your leech and you are ready to go! Once you have cast out, take up the slack line until you can feel the lead and the leech will be popped up to the same lengh as your hooklengh. If you want to fish higher in the water simply pull some line off your spool allowing the cork ball to raise the rig up higher in the water.
The Polly rig is pretty much the same rig apart from the cork ball being replaced with a polly ball which you attach a longer lengh of 4lb mono. The idea is that the polly ball appears on the surface suspending your Leech below the water, the longer the lengh of mono the deeper the leech is fished. This rig is also very good for livebaits fished below the surface.

I have pictured these rigs above to make them easier to understand.

Now go out and give Leeches a go, they do really work that well!!

2007 Leech rig

Finally I have had chance to detail my leech rig we have been testing over the last few months. I wanted to make sure it performed without problems in various conditions and situations and I am pleased to report it has been a success. All the Catfish that have been landed on the rig where all hooked perfectly in the corner of the mouth and none came off during the fight.

Items required for the hook length: Amnesia mono, Hooks, Swivels and silicone tubing.

Cut a length of amnesia and attach your chosen hook to one end and a swivel to the other. Cut two small sections of tubing and push them over the hook. One is to cover the knot by the swivel and the second is to cover the eye of the hook.

Items for the main rig section: 4 cork balls, stiff rig tubing and silicone tubing.

Drill holes in the cork balls so they can be pushed onto the stiff rig tubing. Then slide a section of silicone tubing over each end of the stiff tube.

Now you have the two main components of the rig. You can now attach the mainline direct to the hook length along with your lead and bead.

This is how the rig looks on the surface from above, baited with a Leech.

Click on image for large diagram

Leech info kindly supplied by Biopharm Leeches where you can purchase your fishing Leeches.

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