All good things come in threes

High water is THE keyword for surface mounts. The current becomes stronger, the water becomes turbid, shore areas and sidearms are flooded. This creates many attractive feeding areas for our barred friends. It is not even necessary for the water level to rise a few meters. Black Cat team angler Johann Troppacher has been fishing the upper reaches of the Po for some time now, where the conditions mean that there are very few large water rises. Here it is enough if the water becomes cloudy and rises only a few centimeters to put the catfish in a feeding mood. If you now know what to do, the high water phases are always extremely promising.

In the following, Johann describes a variation of the surface mount with which he was able to entice the catfish to bite even in the middle of the spawning season. He opted for the most inconspicuous bait presentation possible, namely a freestyle mount with single hooks. He fixed the Gripper Hook on a 1.2 mm Mono Leader, furthermore he used a 50 g lead, which he mounted with the help of the Rubber Tube at a distance of about 40 cm from the baitfish. Now comes the key piece of this assembly: the ball-bearing three-way swivel. This connects the leader to the main line and the ripcord. The baitfish is poked at the back and the mount is finally mounted on a well-chosen spot with current shadows, for example, on a branch. This is a perfect, very natural presentation without much frippery.

The clue is that the special swivel prevents the main line from twisting. The baited fish can now swim criss-cross, up and down and the line still remains, guaranteed twist-free. Especially when fishing on natural shores with many obstacles, a line twist must be avoided at all costs, because otherwise there is a great risk of an unwanted break, should the hooked catfish pull into the wood in the fight. This freeline mount also has a small disadvantage, because the swivel is of course fixed and you can not vary the leader length, as with other mounts. Johann therefore likes to choose the leader a little longer, about 2 m. Of course, this depends on how close to the surface the lure should swim, or how high the branch is to which the ripcord is attached. By the way, the ingenious three-way swivel can be used for both surface and stone mounts. Freestyle fishing is basically a very simple, but at the same time an extremely effective method to catch capital catfish. Just give it a try!

By the way, in the photos you can see very well the "before" and "after" of a hook coated when new. The innovative DG coating, which has a 4-foldhighercorrosion resistance compared toconventionalcoatings, protects the hook for a long time, but also not forever. Especially if it is fished for a while on the Po, a so-called sediment river. Since even the best coating comes off at some point. Without such a coating, the hook would no longer be fishable, but so he is still in perfect condition and simply "top"!

Johann Troppacher, Team Black Cat