Fish don't have to be big to give a great account of themselves. But what they do need is spirit. And when it really comes down to it, few fish can match the pound for pound comparative fighting abilities of black bream. Once a much admired major sport fish off the south coast, black bream have steadily expanded their range ever northwards into areas where they have never been regularly seen before. A few years ago I saw one taken off the north end of the Isle of Man. Rhyl charter skipper Tony Parry now has a small patch where he picks them up regularly. The same is true of Ian Burrett north of the border in and around Luce Bay. But when it comes to devoting large amounts of time to bream in the knowledge that you are going to get a big enough return to keep the interest levels up over a full day, then the reefs of upper Cardigan Bay are about as far north as the big shoals go, with Pwllheli based Dave Carey aboard the Judy B the main man specializing in targeting them in this corner of the world.

When it comes to fishing potential, Dave is a very lucky man indeed. There can't be too many ports with a different but equally impressive potential for both the spring tides and the neaps. The smaller tides are used for offshore wrecking. On anything bigger than around 26 feet, the run is too much to fish properly in over 300 feet of water. But inside the bay, particularly on and around St. Patrick's causeway, the spring tide fishing is absolutely superb. When the water is running over the top of these shallow lying bouldery, kelpy heaps, bream in their thousands are on them looking for a good meal. Then as the tide eases, if the boat is positioned in the slightly deeper water along side the causeway, tope and bull huss are an option if you want them and are willing to scale the tackle and baits up a couple of notches to accommodate them.

Over many of these patches, 25 to 35 feet of water is about as deep as it gets, with the bream in attendance from around the end of June through to the middle of September. Even on a big tide, the run isn't fierce enough to force the use of tackle likely to out gun these game little fighters. In fact, last time I fished the area, I took along an ultra light rod bought over in America for striped bass fishing, coupled to a Shimano Stradic fixed spool reel, both well capable of handling any bream that might come along. Even if you are an avid fish eater, you only need so much to put in the freezer, after which the fish ought to go back. So investing a little more into each by fishing light and getting a greater measure of personal pleasure isn't going to cost. That being the case, why not then fish ultra light and let these little power packs show what they can do given half a chance.

Bream are the kind of fast feeding fish that are sure to keep you on your toes at all times. They can hit a bait so quickly that by the time you have reacted, the fish has let go. Fortunately, they can be very positive and determined feeders too, and it's very easy to stack the odds of a result in your favour. The best way of doing this is scaling hook and bait sizes down. Hooks need be no bigger than say size 4 with just sufficient bait to encourage a fish to eat it in one go without either the hook size restricting that outcome, or the bait size forcing them to first nibble it down to a more manageable size. Baited mackerel feathers will most certainly catch bream, particularly the smaller versions. Better though to rig up a purpose built trace with just a couple of hooks. Sticking with the baited feathers theme, string the droppers out above the lead. Twelve inches of dropper will give sufficient encouraging movement to the baits with a gap of around 18 to 24 inches between them.

Dave brought the boat to anchor at around mid point in the flood. His preference however is to have the baits in the water much earlier just when the flood is starting to pick up. The slacker periods appear to fish the best. Fortunately for us we did not have long to wait for signs of the run easing. And even more fortunately, fish were onto the baits right from the first drop. They were a bit patchy at first, but would undoubtedly attract others into sticking around, and in any case would be more interested in feeding with each now drop. But Dave had another card up his sleeve. Bream respond particularly well to swim feeding. But not just any type of swim feeding, and certainly not in this case when the tide was still running hard. The previous evening he had boiled up quite a few pounds of white rice which he was going to put into a net bag of sufficient mesh size to allow the grains to fall out. This is suspended on a short rope at the surface rather like a rubby dubby bag when sharking. The grains are washed out and dispersed by the tide, falling under their own weight which is why the tide has to be running slowly if this loose feed is to hit bottom close enough to the boat to take fullest advantage of it.

The lads on board who were all from Staffordshire were doing quite well without the loose feed, particularly down one side of the boat and towards the stern. Putting the loose feed in didn't do much to alter this fact as the tide was also taking the rice in that direction. But once you found where the grains were settling out and put your bait into their midst, it was a bite a throw. The bream were going mad for the stuff. Then as the tide dropped right away, secret weapon number two was brought into play. Instead of dropping the baits down and waiting for the bream to find them, Dave decided to give the baits a free ranging role by sending them out in search of fish. This was done with a slider float weighted by a bullet lead of sufficient size to cock the float. Initially the lead was allowed to touch bottom with the float on the main line, before being brought back up a couple of feet and a rubber band stopper put on the line to ensure the bait was being automatically fished a foot or so off the bottom.

To do this properly you really need a light carp rod and fixed spool reel. The bait and weight plummet towards the sea bed until the float cocks, then it is allowed to creep down tide in the bit of remaining current, covering the ground and fish as it trundles along. This I have to say is nerve jangling stuff. Bites come just as quickly on the float as they do when simply dropping down. Only when its visual, you can feel your arms un-controllably twitching trying to strike quickly enough with each bob of the float. Real edge of the seat stuff, but great fun none the less. But even more importantly, a very effective way of catching more fish when things go quite around slack water on the standard drop down rigs by giving the bait movement and taking it to the fish.

Pwllheli bream are not big fish. Don't expect to be seeing fish in the 4 to 6 pound category that might be a sub conscious target down on the south coast. A good fish here would be anything over 3 pounds, with quite a few throw backs, though always enough to pop a few into the cool box for home, which is exactly what I did. Bream are beautiful fish to eat served with a nice sauce, and of course, you've guessed it, boiled rice.