Fishing and Reading

At last, a weekend that was just about fishable. Salar has been back in the water waiting patiently for a sea trial, so I combined the two and headed for a sheltered corner of the Solent for an hour or two. You don't have to go too far offshore for cod at the moment, there has been a string of reports coming into my boat angling in-box from anglers reporting cod catches about a mile from the shore along the eastern side of the Solent. The cod didn't oblige for me this time though, but I had plenty of whiting and they are just as tasty if a bit more fiddly to prepare. A tip from the cod-catchers: don't go all traditional with huge baits - try small ones alongside, you may be surprised which one old bucket-mouth goes for.

It was my birthday recently, and with all that windy weather I had used up my store of reading matter, so I spent my birthday tokens on a few books. If you are wondering what to put on the Christmas pressie list, here are a few I can recommend. If you have been fishing for 40 plus years like me, you may remember Mr. Crabtree Goes Fishing - and if you lost the copy I'm sure you once had, you can buy a reprint. All coarse fishing, but it brings back happy memories. Another find is 1001 Top Angling Tips by John Wilson. About a third is devoted to sea fishing but there are plenty of useful ideas in the coarse section too. Finally, Chris Yates goes back to sea fishing with Out of the Blue: On Fishing at Sea . This is more of a read than a reference book, but it's a nice one to lose yourself in as you nestle in your favourite comfy armchair while the wind howls outside.

PS If you like Peter Gander's drawing above, you can get it on a t-shirt or mug from FishPrint.

Boat Angling Web Site Survey

As if to prove a point from my previous blog - that if anglers aren't fishing they are probably thinking about fishing - the recent spate of windy weekends has resulted in a lot more activity on fishing forums and web sites, including my own http://www.boat-angling.co.uk/. Although it is not a commercial site (apart from my t-shirts and mugs!) I want to keep it useful for local anglers, and judging from the high visitor statistics I must be doing something right. Things can always be improved, so I have introduced a short survey on the home page using Polldaddy to find out what people want (great name, no wonder the young guys that set it up sold it recently for £millions).

When it has run its course I'll publish the results but already the first flurry of responses has been very interesting. For example, I never realised another local site has introduced subscription charges for those that don't send in catch reports! Rest assured, http://www.boat-angling.co.uk/ will always be free. We have also had opposing views on a forum. Although the idea of a contact exchange forum is a great idea, there are already a lot of sea angling discussion forums available and they take a lot of volunteer work to keep any troublemakers under control. A club meet maybe? Fishing buddy exchange? Summer beach bash after a fish-in? Charter boat reports? All great ideas - please keep them coming in, 2009 could have a lot more action!

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PS Do you think that if I changed the name to Fishingdaddy I could sell it for £millions too?

Why do we do it?

This bad weather is dangerous because when you can't go fishing you start thinking, and we all know thinking leads to trouble. I was reading a forum post recently about charter skippers having to limit the amount of clobber anglers bring with them on board, and I started pondering why we need to buy so much fishing stuff. The only bit of tackle that really matters is the last few inches of line, the hook and the bait. If that is the right sort in the right place at the right time, you'll catch something even if the rest of it is attached to string.

So why do we spend so much on different rods, reels, lines, weights (OK, pass on that one, we keep loosing them!) and every new-fangled thingmy that is a must-have? I have a theory, well two actually. The second theory is that we like to extend our fishing pleasure far beyond the act of dangling line in water, and we do that by browsing shops, magazine averts, mail order catalogues and the Web. We fish for tackle and when we start unwrapping our purchase we get the same little rush of excitement as landing a fish. That is all pretty obvious, and no different from any other sport surrounded by clever merchandising. My first theory is more significant and it is to do with attitude, and attitude creates (or is derived from) confidence. Sorry if this is getting deep, I did warn you. So this is how.

If you have lashed out a wad of money on the best tackle and bait money can buy, you know that it is down to you and the fish. So nothing distracts you, you concentrate, you persevere, you guessed it, you catch fish. On the other hand, with a hook that might be too shiny, a line that you think might be too thick and spook the fish, or with a rod that is just a bit too long/short, you mentally almost give up before you start. You don't believe you will catch, you inwardly blame the gear, you flip about from one mark to the next and go home early, fishless. Your attitude translates into behaviour, and it is that behaviour that catches (or doesn't catch) fish.

If you can buy confidence in the form of £100-worth of black carbon with rings on, sure why not. But if you saved yourself the money and instead convinced yourself that your bait was well presented and in the right place, (and assuming it was) I bet you'd catch something good. Even with a crummy rod.

End of the Red Era

If you use petrol in your boat you won't care about this, but us smug diesel-buyers have finally come to the end of our run of luck. Instead of paying 9.69p a litre to the tax man, we'll have to pay a whacking 40.66p from 1st November. Most boat owners are queueing at the pump to squeeze every last drop of red diesel into their tanks before the end of October. There are a couple of odd anomolies though - red will still be sold and used but you will have to declare (usually by signing a form at the pump) that you have paid duty on it if you are using it to fuel the propulsion of a pleasure craft. This is because the same pump is used to fill the next boat which could be a commercial craft and not liable for the new rate of tax. If you have a heater on board powered by diesel (and most boats use the same fuel tank as the engine fuel), you don't have to pay the new duty on the fuel used for heating. The powers that be have decided that heating fuel can be up to 40% of the total fuel used by a pleasure craft, but that claim will have to stand investigation should they decide to have a close look.

You may think this is all daft and the rules have so many holes in you could use it to trawl for sandeels. Who am I to say? All I can suggest is that you are very honest about the tiny amount of diesel used in the heater alongside the massive turbo-diesel engine you have in the back, and that the idea of sneaking a few cans of low tax diesel into your tank at dead of night where it can't be identified among the same red diesel which you have paid tax on, absolutely never occurred to you. If you want the full HMR&C pitch on it, have a read of Brief No 4098.

Mixed Bag

I thought Summer was over but suddenly it is calm, blue skies and 23deg C. Despite that, the cod have arrived in exceptionally good numbers, with loads of reports of double figure numbers in the boat. What a change from the last few years where a catch of one or two was more common. Many of the fish are in the 6-8lb bracket like Wayne's on the left, but Arron had a 20 pounder which he made a point of phoning me about while I was under Salar painting on antifouling!

Before I forget, I came across a good tip for unhooking mackerel when spinning. As with feathering, you'll be in a hurry to get the lure back in the water but a thrashing fish and treble hooks doesn't make that easy. You can grip the fish by putting it tail-first into a cool box and gripping the head by holding the lid down on it. This makes it very steady for unhooking and when you are done it just drops back into the cooler. No mess either.

Finally, there is a new section on http://www.boat-angling.co.uk/ for Fishing Boats For sale. You get a full page, photos and all, and there is no charge although a donation to the RNLI would be nice. There is a tidy Orkney on there at the moment. If you have a boat for sale, just email me for details via the site .

Rescue

Salar is now out of the water for the annual antifouling, so no fishing stories today. Here's one that I saved from the Summer, sorry I mean July, that was both a mistake and a lesson. I always think it is very handy to learn from other's mistakes, it saves the pain of having to make them yourself. Here's what I learned, maybe it will help others.

Anyone familiar with Langstone Harbour entrance will know that the area from the Ferry Boat pub to about 200 yards out to sea is where the jet-skis play, and they usually go out, make a noise for a while then go back to the pub. I was coming in from a fishing trip and I found one with two passengers on and a donut bobbing about with a third person in it. They had managed to get the tow line sucked into the jet drive. How? Beats me, these things are supposed to be idiot proof. Perhaps not all idiots are equal, as you will see.

Anyway, they needed a tow so I hooked a line through the tow-hole and pulled them in to the Hayling slip. Here is the mistake. I assumed these fellows had at least one grey cell between them but I should have told them exactly what to do and what not to do. I was towing, I was supposed to be in control. They asked me to get them as close to the slip as possible (they had no engine remember) so I nosed in carefully, then ran back to the stern to slip the rope and reverse out allowing them to drift in to the shore. Suddenly it was an "Oh S..." moment, those three muppets had jumped into the water and were happily splashing about...right by a contra-rotating prop driven by 164 galloping horses. What to do? I couldn't go back without making a large quantity of people-burgers, and forwards was into a hard thing, the slipway. With a lot of shouting and some very delicate maneuvering I managed to get clear of them, the rapidly shallowing bottom and the concrete slipway by mere inches.

Lesson - even if you are the good guy and helping people, things don't always go right by themselves. Make sure everyone knows what to do even if it is blindingly obvious. If it goes wrong it is still your fault. And what happened to the three jet-skiers? They were last seen heading into the pub.

Trigger Happy and Trigger Happy

There I was on Sunday, quietly drifting down on a flock of feeding birds, spinning for mackerel with maybe a chance of a bass if I'm quiet. Then this boatload of anglers roars up, without a glance in my direction, right between me and where I was spinning. My response was reasonably restrained in the circumstances - "Hey, do you mind??" Now if that had been a yottie, he would have said "Gosh I say, terribly sorry old chap, didn't realise...etc". But they weren't yotties, they were anglers of a less genteel nature and all I got back was "well we're all after mackerel aint we?" There is a point beyond which is is unwise to push Salar. I gave him at least three lungfulls (I can remember drawing breath twice) of the language reserved this this special sort of occasion.


On to happier matters, I was delighted to catch my first trigger fish today, of good eating size so he's now in the fridge. They are the weirdest creatures: thick skin like a wrasse, a stomach that goes up into the body instead of along like other fish, a gill opening more like an ear-hole and teeth like one of the more undesirable monsters on my son's computer games. I have it on good authority they are very tasty. I will let you know.

The Fishing Priest

Here’s a fishing joke I came across recently.

Father Michael was an avid fisherman, and whenever he was not fulfilling his priestly duties he would be out on the lough. One summer (2008) there had been weeks of stormy weather and he hadn’t been able to go fishing at all. He was desperate. One morning, the day dawned calm and mild: he could go. But - it was Sunday! He was supposed to be taking Mass in the church. “I know”, he thought. “I’ll pretend I have the ‘flu and Father O’Leary can take Mass for me. I’ll drive 50 miles to a river where I am not known, and have my day’s fishing.”

So that is what he did. However, he could not hide from God. One of the angels spotted him, and immediately snitched on him to God. God peered through the clouds and frowned.

“Are you going to punish him?” asked the angel. God nodded. The angel watched, expecting Father Michael to step in a wasp’s nest or fall in the river. Suddenly, Father Michael struck into a huge fish, and after a lengthy struggle the fish was on the bank. It was a huge salmon, almost certainly a record.

“But...I thought you were going to punish him?” asked the angel.

“I did,” said God. “Now who can he tell?”