Description : This species is common in lakes and slow rivers, usually in shoals near weedbeds, feeding on plant material and invertebrates. They have a prominent covering of protective slime, a deep laterally compressed body, long anal fin compared with the dorsal fin, a forked tail and a relatively small head and mouth. Bream are silver when young (known as "skimmers" ) but turn a darker bronze colour when they mature. During spawning from May to June, the male develops white tubercles over the head and upper body and defends territories in marginal weedbeds were spawning takes place with much splashing. When living in a mixed community the roach will often interbreed with other species, creating hybrids such as the roach-bream hybrid. A smaller species is also found in the UK, the Silver bream (Blicca bjoerkna). These are smaller then the common, or bronze bream, and are silver in colour with red anal and pectoral fins.

Angling information : The current UK record for the common bream is 16 lb 9 oz 0 drm, and anything over around 6.5 lb is considered to be a specimen. The UK record for the smaller silver bream is 15 oz 0 drm. Bream are primarily bottom feeders, travelling in large shoals, rooting around in soft bottoms of the deepest stretches of water. They will shy away from anything suspicious so fine tackle and a good bait presentation is essential to temp the better fish. A 4 lb main line will be adequate even for specimen fish as bream are not hard fighting when hooked. As distance and / or deep water fishing is required with a static bait then the favoured method is legering. As bream love groundbait you can't go wrong with a swim feeder approach. Use a fine quiver tip and strike at even the smallest bite. The best baits include : caster, maggot, sweetcorn and worm.

Tip : Add chopped worm to your groundbait mix - this is a real favourite. Accurate casting is essential, keep all your bait going into a small area.