Chris Bishop's caught a few since he moved to Norfolk five years ago but he's still yearning for his first drain 20. We asked him to write us piece on rigs because he's got a way with words and rarely sits still more than five minutes when he's fishing. 

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Ask a Fen piker to show you his rigs and he'll probably smile and say: "Yew don' wanna worry about all that fancy stuff..."

He's probably got a point as well, because in most cases it's just a rod with a dead or live fish on one end and a bloke with ants in his pants on the other.

Fenland is one part of the country where having the latest in-rig matters a lot less than being geared up to go looking for the fish.

Fenland is criss-crossed by drains and rivers of all shapes and sizes and they all pose the same problem - location.

Even experienced Fen pikers struggle with this at times but most agree keeping on the move and keeping an open mind can help you crack it.

The "leap-frogging" style of mobile fishing developed on the drains as anglers realised the more water they covered, the more chance they stood of finding feeding fish.

While some waters have good road access, others require a hike so it pays to prune your gear down to what you can comfortably carry.

It pays to prune your rigs down too, because keeping it simple cuts the chances of something going wrong when you do find the fish.

Tackle needs to be up to the job of casting bit baits and heavy leads around and most people favour through-actioned rods with a test curve between 2.5 and 3lbs.

Couple this with a reliable fixed-spool reel, preferably of the "baitrunner" type, and a minimum of 15lbs mono or 30lb braid.

Other essentials include a strong trace of at least 18 inches, with two semi-barbed trebles of between size 8 and size 4, depending on bait size.

You can actually get by with just one or two rigs, which can be quickly altered to suit changing conditions.

A drain could be standing still when you get on it and pumping through half an hour later.

If it's still, then float-legered deads take some beating on any size of drain. Start off with a rig stop threaded up the line to set the depth, thread on a small bead and a link swivel to attach the float to, and finish it off with another bead, a rubber rig sleeve and a strong cross-lok, like a 60lb Berkley.

Slide the rig sleeve down to cover the knot and off you go.

Make your rods up the night before, secure the sections with rubber bands or rod bands and all you have to do when you get to the water is put the rods together, clip a float and a trace on and you're fishing.

If the drain's standing still, just use a pencil float fished a foot or two over-depth and nip a couple of swan shot on the trace to tighten up to.

Cast in (it can sometimes take a couple of casts to get the depth right...), put the rod in the rests, tighten down until the float cocks and off you go - simple and sensitive.

By the way I make my own floats out of balsa dowel and they cost around 30p each. I've usually got a few long, thin ones for days when it's really windy and you need to put the rod tips low and stick a couple of more swan shot on the trace to hold it still.

It's easy to explore a drain with this rig. Just cast it up the drain (into any wind helps the float cock because it blows it against the stop and puts a slight bow in the line which helps heep the float tight to the weight...) leave it five minutes and twitch it back a yard or two. Takes often come as the float's settling down after a twitch, so be ready.

A few casts without a take and it's time to up sticks for the next swim, or the next likely-looking bit.

The beauty of this rig is you can react quickly if the drain starts pumping. You change from float fishing to legering a bait in the few secconds it takes to take the float off and clip a bomb on. Just stick the rod on a bite alarm, with a drop-off indicator and carry on.

So that's one rig. The other's just as simple. Instead of a swivel for a bomb or bottom-end only float, follow the rig stop and bead with a through-the-middle float and you can trot a dead or livebait, paternoster or float leger a dead in moving water.

I make my own floats from the polyballs you again get for 20 or 30p on craft shops. Push a hole through with a skewer and glue some rig tube through it. Then just paint the top half red and the botttom half black and you're sorted.

Start off with rig stop and bead, put another bead and a strong cross-lok below the float the night before and you've got a rig you can fish three ways on rivers.

Want to trot it - fine. Just clip the trace on, stick enough weight on to keep the bait down and off you go. Those egg sinkers with the slits in are great for this - just stick one on the trace via the slit and trap it by pulling a rig sleeve tight over the groove until it slips inside.

You can move it up and down without damaging the wire and change weights if you change bait sizes or the flow picks up and you want to slow the trot down.

I often fish with one rod like this, trotting the margins or the middle of the river with a live or dead, with just a landing net, my baits and a few bits in a shoulder bag.

If you want to float leger a dead, just set the float overdepth and cast it upstream. You may have to experiment with the rig stop to take account of depth and flow, or increase the weight to hold the bait still, but get it right and the current helps keep the float tight to the weight.

Prop the rod up with the tip off the water, take up the slack and you should know as soon as a fish picks the bait up - the float will either lie flat and come towards you with the flow, or just head off upstream or across the river.

If you want to paternoster a bait in a likely-looking hole, just swop the hook trace for an uptrace around three feet long, clip a short hook trace and a lead link to the swivel at the bottom end and once again you can change rig in a minute or two.

It pays to keep mobile on the rivers too. Pike aren't always in the text book swims. With so much water around, it's no big deal if one drain or river doesn't produce the goods, because you can sling the gear back in the car and head off to another one.

I usually take the bare minumum in a shoulder bag, the rods go in a light quiver with bank sticks and landing net and the only other thingss I carry are an unhooking mat and a coolbox or bucket.

No chair..? I hear you ask. I usually wear waterproofs and either stand, kneel or sit on the unhooking mat.

The more you carry, the more likely you are to have a half-hearted bash at leap frogging or swim hopping, then find an excuse to plot up until it's time to go home or the pubs open.

Fenland doesn't give up its secrets easily. I'm still waiting fo my first "proper" drain 20.

But if you like to explore a water - or even three or four in a day - and are always itching to find out what's around the next corner, you'll soon find a bend in the rod.

"Please remember that there are two essentials in any kind of bait fishing for pike - reliable bite indication and prompt striking".

More information on rigs can be found on the Pike Anglers Club website, go to www.pacgb.com