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Posted 06:00, 30 April 2010
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- I have surely used, abused, owned, tested and loved more 13' scaffold pole beachcasters over the years than a lot of UK sea anglers put together, indeed for many years I used little else for my fishing (mulleting aside). Ten years ago I would never have imagined being so into lure and light tackle fishing as I am now. Three years ago and I would never have imagined seriously fishing with lure rods under 10' long. Bang on the present day and I am becoming more and more interested in lure rods for my bass fishing that are around 7' to 8' long, and I am increasingly playing around with various rods that are rated somewhere in the region of 7g to 35g. Either it's my inner "finesse" crying to get out, or else the voices in my head are messing with me........
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- There are no hard and fast rules here, and there is certainly no cut and dried right or wrong - you either subscribe to shorter, lighter rods as being easier, more effective and more pleasurable to fish lures with, or you don't. All ways will catch you fish, but if I did not strive to learn as much as I can all the time and do different things then I think my love for fishing would stagnate. I think I was really interested in the ins and outs of fishing gear early on in my fishing "career", but then I suppose the rods and reels I was using tended to blend into a mass of out and out skull-dragging tools that gradually became less appealing to me.
- But it seems to have come around full circle - once again the ins and outs of (modern, light tackle) fishing gear is really interesting me, and I am loving finding out more about it all on an almost daily basis. To think it was only at the 2009 Nantes bass show that the idea of a roughly 8' "do it all" bass lure rod really began to make sense when my friend Bruno Pebe (above) of Ultimate Fishing put me onto the Tenryu Super Mix 240.
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- And then later on last year the same guy put me onto the 7' Tenryu Injection which you will have noticed that I have resisted purchasing - marvel at my self-control !! By no means am I advocating that every bass angler needs to look at shorter and lighter rods, rather I am interested to see if lots of us end up going down a similar route whereby we begin to realise the merit in weapons like these for some of the fishing we either do now or might be doing soon. Like many things, it's not until you play around with these kinds of "finesse" rods that the lightbulbs go off in the head - or perhaps they don't............
- Anyway, back to these more "finesse" kind of rods - bearing in mind that my learning curve here is really steep, I am coming to a kind of (temporary) conclusion that there are two kinds of shorter, lighter lure rods that can literally be used like wands, yet I reckon deal with any kind of bass we might run into. I know there are any number of fishing rods out there, but I am trying hard to simplify things........
- "Finesse" rod 1 - somewhere between 7' and 8', generally rated somewhere around 10-35g. I am playing with this exact kind of rod at the moment and it is certainly opening my eyes up. A lure rod like this will deal with nearly the full spectrum of lures we might use from the shore, and if it's good it will give you a lot of "feel" for working all manner of hard and soft lures. This kind of rod should be dealing well with the larger bass lures like say an Xorus Patchinko that needs a bit of grunt in a rod to really power it out there. Granted, not the rod if you use only the heavier spectrum of bass lures and never scale down, but it is a kind of rod that a lot of us could use very effectively.
- "Finesse" rod 2 - again, usually 7'-8' long, but rated somewhere in the region of 7-20g. In my mind, an out and out "finesse" rod that is perfectly suited to the lighter side of lure fishing (LRF etc. aside of course, another matter entirely), but having now played around with a rod or two, I am finding that they are just a joy to fish with, and that they seem to cope well with a wider range of the lures we might use than I previously thought. I don't know close to all the rods out there, so in this category I can't help but put that 7' Tenryu Injection as the benchmark against which I measure the stuff I play around with. Granted, the law of averages says there might well be better rods out there (personal things after all), but I can only talk about the gear I actually know. Speculation is not much use here. Without doubt this is not a rod to cover all eventualities, but the sheer "feel" you can get does open up a few doors.
- One thing I am utterly blown away is my little "finesse" spinning reel - if there is a reel out there that offers more quality for the money than my Shimano Rarenium 3000 then I have yet to come across it. OK, so the Stella is still at the top of my tree, but I don't do enough of this "finesse" fishing yet to justify actually getting a Stella 3000. The moment that little Rarenium 3000 went on one of the rods I am playing around with and I fell in love. Sublime. So incredibly light and smooth. Seems like a lot of reel for the dosh, almost custom-made for my inner "finesse" coming out.........
- All "finesse" aside though, I have a couple of meetings in London today, and then on Saturday evening it's time to get all proper and bang my head hard to the mighty Bolt Thrower and Rotting Christ (I am simply not worthy) who are playing at the London ULU. Rock on. Real music for real men with no inner "finesse" !!
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Posted 06:00, 28 April 2010
- There are some mighty fine fishing magazines from all around the world out there, but the Australian based Fishing Wild is something seriously special - to put it mildly, it's just mind-blowingly impressive, and I am somewhat chuffed/stoked/over the moon to have just got the latest issue through the post with a big article of mine in there on that Mongolia trip I did last September with some guys from Aardvark McLeod. I get a huge kick out of seeing my words and photos in a publication as downright awesome as Fishing Wild - the fact that I have never done any kind of photography classes or stuff like that must prove that more people in fishing should be having a go at making our sport look as impressive as we all know it to be. If I can do it...............
- I have been aware of Fishing Wild ever since a mate brought me a copy back from a fishing trip he did to Australia a few years back - I am sure there are loads of us who are fascinated by all the different kinds of fishing that goes on around the world, and this stunning looking publication just takes the breath away. I have heard the magazine being referred to as the National Geographic of fishing magazines if that is any help. The editor Col Roberts (some info on him is here) has got a scary amount of talent for making fishing look hugely impressive, and it makes me seriously proud to have some of my material in a publication like this. Mongolia itself was one of the most special places I have ever had the fortune to visit, from both a fishing and a photography point of view.
- Fishing Wild deals with all kinds of awesome looking fishing, with a big emphasis on what goes on Down Under - I can't imagine how fishing can look or be any better than some of the stuff they have got in Australia. I know lots of us will not be doing the kinds of fishing that goes on in a magazine like this, but I just love reading about and looking at cool photos of exciting fishing. If you are interested, you can subscribe to Fishing Wild right here.Check out some of the prints they are selling here. Just a top notch fishing magazine that should be seen more over here in the UK. "Our" fishing might not be in there I can hear some anglers saying, but there is never anything wrong with a bit of dreaming..............life's too short to be closed off.
- I work for lots of different people in lots of different places, but never for one second have I lost the thrill at seeing my work in print - I guess that this comes about principally because I have never had any training, and a part of me keeps on expecting to get caught out because of this !! I really love pushing my work out there and seeing what happens. Scary at times when you are trying to make a living, and very occasionally I do wonder what it must be like to have a guaranteed pay cheque every month, but I just love the buzz of working for myself and making it happen. It does take a certain amount of self-discipline, but I would struggle to do anything else.
- A couple of months ago somebody asked me if I was tempted to watch TV all day because I worked from home !! To which I replied "I can't fake this. If I don't do the work, I simply don't get paid". They looked a bit surprised !! Much as I am proud of those TV fishing shows I have done, nothing gives me more of a kick or a buzz in my working life than when clients who don't have a second clue who I am take my work based purely on its quality. We all need to be stimulated to work effectively and more creatively, and seeing my stuff in a publication like Fishing Wild certainly stokes the old fires in a really positive way...........
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Posted 08:27, 26 April 2010
- You couldn't have asked for better plugging conditions late yesterday afternoon - a bit of south west wind coming in, that "fizz" back in the sea, great clarity, awesome ground, building tides, yet not a bass to be seen !! I was nearly running down to the mark when I pulled up in my car and copped an eyefull of how good it was looking. I love the kind of weather we have been having lately, but it's hardly ideal for some kinds of saltwater fishing. Yesterday though was close to perfect. Every single cast and I am utterly convinced a bass is going to jump on the end of my lure. Pretty sure I had a bump, but that was it. Gutted to be honest.
- But, driving back home and the light just kept getting better and better - I had to keep pulling over and framing a bunch of photos up, like the one you can see above.This I guess was my reward for having blanked so spectacularly !! Much as I was questioning either the complete lack of fish or my utter inability to catch them, the light breaking over the coastline was that impressive that my frustrations were soon forgotten. As I said last week, I get a huge buzz from living near to the sea and having the chance to experience it in so intimately in all its many different moods. I guess the places where the land meets the sea always have some extra significance.
- Here's a shot of Mark fishing yesterday afternoon. Is it just me or have we been getting the most fantastic ranges and varieties of light a lot this year ? I can't help but think about the quality of the light virtually all the time. Either we picked the wrong spot and somewhere close by there were hundreds of hungry bass looking for non-existent lures, or else it's just a case of the fishing surely being very close to firing up, but just not quite yet in this area. I even took a bit of a punt with a mate on Saturday afternoon and threw some soft plastics around for wrasse - blanked then as well !! My fishing is currently going great guns !! But all that aside, I did learn something about this lure fishing for wrasse in the first few minutes - it's vital to fish with a rod that has just the right amount of "feel" to transmit what is going on with your lure, otherwise you are essentially guessing. That is no good at all. I simply could not feel enough and I felt that I was fishing particularly badly.
- The rod thing is important to me at the moment because I have just been sent some rods to play around with - the people concerned have asked for my honest opinion. I took one of them wrassing, the one that I thought would be the best suited to it. Felt nice in the hand, I reckoned it might just do the job. But I put an XLayer on with a little 7g jig head and the rod just felt "dead" when I was fishing with it. Upped the jig head weight and still I could get no feel at all. Messed around with some bass lures and it still felt lifeless. Weird how the rod had felt so interesting wiggling it around at home, but in my mind it just felt completely dead when I actually fished with it. Rods are personal things, but I was a bit gutted to be honest..........
- So I took another of the new rods out bass fishing yesterday afternoon - what a difference. Just the most fantastic bit of kit to fish hard lures, soft plastics, at range, close in, crank, twitch, pause etc., this rod just ate it up. You know a rod is a bit special when fishing with it actually makes you smile because it just feels so "right". If I had to categorize it I would say that it lies in between say the out and out "finesse" Tenryu Injection and the "do it all" Tenryu Super Mix 240 or indeed the Grauvell Teklon Concept Spin 8' 10-40g 802ML. I was working XLayers on 7g and 10g jig heads yesterday and I could feel exactly what was going on. I also worked a number of different hard lures and the rod worked just fine with them as well. An interesting bit of kit, and so completely different (and so much better) than the other one.........
- On the subject of photography, take a moment to brighten up your Monday and check out a small gallery that is called the "Top 40 Nature Photographs of all time" - have a look here. This kind of thing fries my brain it's so awesome. On the one hand it massively inspires me to keep on trying to get better and better at what I do, and on the other it makes me realise how far I have to go to get anywhere close to being qualified to even carry one of these photographers' bags !! The natural world is one seriously special place, and the more time we all spend in amongst it the better if you ask me.
- I have gone and started one of these Facebook pages - check here. I have been thinking about it for a while now and I guess I have been avoiding it for ages, but eventually I signed up and did what most of the world seems to be doing. I am not completely sure about it all yet and I don't really "get it" yet, but at least it's there and I can begin to learn about what it might or might not do.......
