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Peter Waller

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Posts posted by Peter Waller

  1. In truth, have reels really come that far since the 1980's? Some tweaking, I don't doubt, but a good 80's reel is still a good reel. Mind you, I did buy a little Maver reel a couple of years ago, just for the sheer pleasure of owning and beholding it, not because it was 'better'. 

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  2. It's been fishing its socks off for whatever reason. The 'sludge' as you call it is dependent on the winter weather, there one year and gone the next. Things aren't perfect but the bream and the rudd are back in large numbers. The perch are also doing well but the pike fishing is a shadow of what it was, seals, ignorance and poor handling practices.  

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  3. Down on the Broads we have had the usual saltwater surges driving the fish off the main rivers. The salt also sours the water and the fish go off the feed. However, if you know where to look the fish will hold up away from the salt, they will also get hungry!  A good time to be out fishing but success is not guaranteed, at least not on the Waveney. My neighbour went out for the day, just one fish, a three-pound roach, jammy sod!

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  4. My immediate reaction is to yet more John Bailey, a serial writer of increasingly bland 'how-to' books, churning out yet more of the same. On the other hand, I have enjoyed Paul's previous outpourings. I shall wait and see but JB's predictable input doesn't exactly excite me, 

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  5. Standards were sought after by atlaest one person, me! When mine finally wore up, to be replaced by a resplendent ABU 505, the bits lay in a box of bits for far too long. Many years later I picked a Standard up at a car boot sale. Then my 'sought after' days really took off and I finally re-discovered E-bay. Finally, from three used and clearly abused old bangers I rebuilt a Standard to factory finish, save for being well run in. Gone was the history and life-defining dings and scrapes but the memories were rekindled, and I have two spare spools and a box of vital spares!  As for the lines of the days, the names 'Luron' and 'Platil'  both ring bells, by today's standards, horrific stuff! Now only 978 pre 1973 rods and I'll catch up with Chesters tally of vintage rods! Actually, using this old crap has brought a new dimension to my angling, seriously. Yesterday it was stunted rudd from a farm pond on a circa 1870's dog's hind leg of a rod. That the surely dried-out tip section did not snap was the cause of some amazement  Now, I just need the hi-viz jacket to complete the image! 

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  6. I just drifted away, seemed to me that we were just going round in circles, answering the same old how-to questions. That said, I miss the friendships and the odd fish-ins and heartfelt discussions with Jerry Castles for example. Having signed up to the the ancient order of boring old fartdom I now browse vintage and traditional angling face-book groups, remembering when Capta Leads, Intrepid Standards and Model Perfects were must-have gear! 

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  7. I haven't been on AN for a long time, only just stumbled on this topic. I met Dave when he parked his dormobile in my driveway. He'd driven up to The Broads to take part in a pike fish-in starring that all-American friend of AN, the indomitable Newt & his wife who had flown to the UK for a fishing holiday.  Dave was also something of a bird-watcher, and was suitably impressed by what he saw from the end of my garden. A wonderfully interesting man, I'm glad I met him. 

     

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  8. Cheap reels can be good, I recently bought a 5 1/2" Lewtham Leeds centre-pin for a mere £20.01. Used it yesterday, brilliant, already promoted it to my first choice reel when out on the river! 

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  9. 12 hours ago, chesters1 said:

    PS its worse than you think 2003 was 18 years ago !

    A crap investment then! Re Intrepids, I recently inherited a box load of the things, most in good order and complete with their clamshell boxes. In recent years I suspect that I would have sold them for rather more than I did. Seems that what is collectable now is 70's carp tackle and that as far as Intrpid is concerned I have obviously missed the boat. Judging by the turnout at my local carboot sales people have turned their back on junk and stuff.

  10. I see that on E-bay £3 to £4 still appears to be the going rate for single copies so after 9 years old AM annuals are proving to be less than good investments! Indeed I have just bought a full set plus three duplicates off E-bay, all in really excellent condition, for a mere £20.00, somewhat surprisingly. Although I rate the first few Angling Times annuals my taste was always for Anglers Mail. Perhaps it was more of an angler's read than AT. Anyway, in my nostalgic dotage, I'm rather pleased with my purchase, like meeting up with old friends after a few years. Perhaps us Crabtree Kids are inevitably hanging up our rods for the last time thus the interest in that era is literally dying off, sadly.

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  11. Thank you for your endorsement, John. 

    Dicks, especially old ones, need to realize that hanging up their rods for a while is nothing, indeed less than nothing, when compared with the life changing pressure being forced upon front line NHS staff & their families. I have a daughter who is pharmacist in a local hospital, her life is in a frazzle, she could so easily take the easy option and go home but she doesn't, she sees that risking the lives of herself and her young family as being her duty. She's now working six days a week, often a twelve hour day, comes home both physically and mentally exhausted. Both my wife and I are shielding so she won't let us help with her two boys, at least not until we have had our jabs. Talking of which my daughter is also training folk to handle the vaccines and to inoculate, that is on top of her duties on the wards.  The pressure is constant and immense. So we can't go fishing . . . . . . . . . 

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  12. It's not that you are fishing, it's that you are out of your home. Whilst on the bank you might have a heart attack which might entail the fire brigade, the ambulance, a paramedic, even an air ambulance and probably the Police. Stay at home, varnish all your rods and service all your reels. Only six months until the start of the season, if we are lucky! 

     

     

     

     

     

     

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  13. Britain's angling writing heydays have left us with a rich library of second hand or republished books, such as this one by Dennis Pye:

    https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/PYE-DENNIS-PIKE-FISHING-BOOK-THE-WAY-I-FISH-LITTLE-EGRET-NORFOLK-BROADS-paperbck/382225347917?hash=item58fe67f54d:g:AC0AAOSwyLFZt-RF

    The man writes logically and presents his conclusions in a convincing manner. Okay, so he and I are both Broads anglers thus have a common bond but what's good for the Broads can be good for other waters. We have a lot to learn from our forebears. 

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  14. One good thing about old tackle is the sometimes ridiculously high prices it gets on E-Bay! 

    Granted that some old stuff has stood the test of time but those items are relatively few and far between. My ABU Severan Centre Drag reels being an example. 

  15. On 11/21/2020 at 8:31 AM, chesters1 said:

    If your into old reels get yourself a copy of "fishing reels ,collecting for all". . . . . . . . . . .

    I can understand why folk collect old reels but not so sure about using them when modern ones, some centre pins excluded, are so much better! After very many years languishing in my tackle cupboard  my once much loved Intrepid Standard came out for an airing. It had served me well, sixty plus years ago! In truth it worked today just as well as it ever did but why did I bother? Nostalgia perhaps, but in practical terms all I was doing was in hampering myself so why do it? My old reel has gone back where it belongs, in the cupboard. My old rod back in its bag, maybe I'll put it on E-Bay. 

  16. Like all fisheries the Broads has its ups and downs. At the moment it's generally riding high. Whilst there is plenty of waterside accommodation, much with good fishing, there is even more if you holiday afloat. How's that for next year's holiday?

  17. Several rudd the right side of two pounds and a healthy number of bream in the five to eight pound bracket. What has been good is that many of the bream have been hooked in less than two feet of water and when it is that shallow some, not all, have gone off like rabbits in headlights. Have had bigger in years gone by but not in the same quantity. Our local Broads Authority have been dredging nearby which I suspect has interfered with the bream's usual patrol route thus they have holed up for the summer in my corner of the broad. I hear that other anglers have had good roach fishing, several fish well over two pounds elsewhere on the broad but such fish have evaded me, perhaps excluded by the bream? 

  18. On 10/18/2020 at 12:00 AM, Martin56 said:

    Hi Peter, scroll down this Link to the bit about Black Groundbaits for Winter.

    I haven't given it a go myself though (I tend to give the cold weather a miss these days) but there seems to be plenty buying it.

    https://www.anglingdirect.co.uk/community/beginners-guide-groundbait-101

    Thank you, Martin. Never sure about AD's guides, are they trying to help me or are they trying to sell me something? I rather fear that it's the latter! 

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