A pre-baiting campaign on his local River Itchen paid off handsomely for specimen hunter Roman Vann – when he put together an astonishing haul of roach to 2lb 5oz.

Priming his swim with hemp for three days prior to his session, Roman waited until a low pressure front had moved in and he could see numbers of roach in the swim.

This resulted in a catch which included three fish of 2lb-plus to 2lb 5oz and half a dozen over 1lb 12oz.

He told Angling Times: “The last three relatively calm and mild winters seems to have bolstered populations and weights on the Southern rivers.

“The plan seemed to work perfectly as each time I checked the swim the concentration of roach was increasing.

“When roach are feeding actively there is no need to fish too fine as you will just loose more large fish to hook pulls.”

Romans haul fell to maggot feeder tactics with three maggots on a size 12 hook tied to a 5lb hooklength.