Tim Kelly

Peter, I still think you've got the classic cliched Mr Crabtree view of the closed season and more importantly the 16th. I love fishing on the 16th as well, not just because I've been deprived of the pleasure of going fishing for 3 months, but because I know the fish will be at their easiest to catch and it is such a tonic to be able to look forward to after the often lean days of winter. I'd like to be able to fish through the spring as well though as many of the places I fish are practically unfishable once summer proper arrives as they are so weedy. I can fish maybe 6 weeks at the beginning of the season before it's weedbound, then there's usually a few weeks in the autumn when it is fishable and the fish are catchable, then there's the winter when the lake is fishable but the fish aren't very co-oporative. In effect I probably get about 12 weeks a year when it's worth fishing this particular water and the closed season probably deprives me of at least another 6 weeks when it would fish well. I don't think there are many places where the fish are actually that pressured, certainly not the wilder waters, and the stocked ponds don't have a closed season anyway. The closed season is an anachranism which should be abolished on all waters.

Tell me how the great appeal of the 16th is not the thought that the fish haven't been fished for for 3 months and will be easier to catch? Maybe the appeal to the pro closed seasoners is some righteous glow from giving the flora and fauna time to breed, but then many of them go straight out and fish for the carp that usually haven't spawned yet anyway.

It seems to me that fish are pretty much uncatchable when they're spawning or the water temperature is too hot for them, so the whole fish protection arguement is bogus. If people want to stop fishing for 3 months they are perfectly entitled to, but it is ridiculous to impose your strange view of the world on everyone else just so you have some easier fishing when you decide to start again! Salmon and seatrout are only available to be caught when they're preparing to spawn....

Why on earth do "rivers deserve a break"? Complete sentimental nonsense. As usual Newt gets to the nub of it.

The closed season is a complete waste of time. Mainly designed to keep me off the water at probably the best time of year! Since it has been abolished on stillwaters (except any stillwaters owned by any club I've ever belonged to) and canals I really doubt it has had any adverse effect on the fish. It might even have helped as they still get fed pounds of maggots and groundbait when people are actually fishing! The river closed season is only in place for a few wooden rodded Chris Yates accolites to keep the "magic" of the 16th alive like when they were kids. Grow up. Hardly anyone fishes the rivers anyway!

Just looked at the website. It's a ridiculously over complicated over engineered cross between a swimfeeder and a method feeder! I think some people imagine problems which they then take great pleasure in solving ingeniously!

Sounds like a very over complicated, over engineered spod to me. What are the supposed advantages? As long as it's ridiculously expensive with high running costs (the pva bits) I'm sure it will sell well!

It happened again yesterday. I couldn't get to the new forums from my favorites, or by doing a search on google for anglers net. It took me to a front page from January and the forum link went back to the list of instructions. This morning it works fine off my favorites. The computer's been on all night, so it's not even that it's had a chance to re-set itself.

They're designed for trolling, not casting, so unless you're going to be trolling the lures you won't find it very useful. If the water's only 17ft there are a vast array of lures which will achieve that sort of depth with ease, so it would probably be easier to use them than an arrangement with the vane. If you want to troll something like a spinner, spoon or unweighted soft plastic at that sort of depth it might be useful, but only if you need speed, otherwise a spinnerbait can easily achieve that depth.

Fishteck make 6" and 9" shads from memory, so it would be a doddle to rig one up. The plastic they use is buoyant too, so you can easily control the sink rate. If you have trouble with the hooks ripping out of the storm shads either remove the belly hook altogether or put an external bit of trace wire from the hook tie to the split ring of the belly hook as insurance against it being ripped out and the fish lost.

Storm do a suspending wildeye that's about 7" long and cheap as chips. Any superglue will attach soft plastic to a hard lure body very securely. If you're making your own lures putting a corkscrew or spike of wire in the lure body where you want to mount the soft plastic tail would make it a real belt and braces job. There are soooo many hard bodied/soft plastic tailed swimbaits out there at the moment ranging from about 4" to 12" which are mainly designed to run on or just under the surface at the moment. Have a look at TackleTour.com for a small taster.

There are quite a few swimbaits which run on or just under the surface. Bass anglers in the southern USA and Japan use them a lot, especially on stocked trout lakes. Huddleston make swimbaits ranging from full floating to various degrees of sinking, though they are pricey. Castaic make baits in two sink rates, even Andy's baits at the Lure Shack are available in slow or fast sinking versions. It's fun making your own soft plastic baits, but once you get into importing plastisol from the states, along with the various coloured dyes and glitters, not to mention mold making you will be into a lot of time and money for any satisfactory results. In fact it actually makes Ken Huddleston's baits look like a bargain!

I would have thought a medium action spinning rod of about that length would do the job admirably?

Ah! Thanks for that Si. You don't work for some dodgy porn site then do you? Seems to be working more reliably now, though my log in info doesn't always keep me logged in. Tiscali BTW Elton.

It was odd because it had the AN heading but the body of the page had all these instructions about what to do in windows, including adding files with "anglersnet" included in the file name. Have tried what you suggested Newt. Peter - I can't imagine what you're on about. My optician says the diminishing eyesite is a natural part of the aging process....

Over the last week or so whenever I've tried to log onto AN I've been getting some strange page emploring me to do all sorts of dodgy looking things to my computer. I've resisted the temptation assuming it to be a hackers prank, but am I alone or has everyone had this for the last few days?

I think the implied bad science is that red line would disappear, as red is the first colour to be filtered out by the water. Obviously, rather than disappearing it would actually turn black as it was reflecting no light!

Blenheim Lake (at Blenheim Palace, Oxford) has boat fishing for a variety of species.

Very soft wires like the 49strand ones can be more awkward to use if you're using a livebait as they are so soft the bait can cause tangles. Stiffer wires solve this problem. If you really think that pike are sensitive to trace wire it may have its uses for deadbaits, though still more likely to get tangled that stiffer wires.

You drop them in the water beside you and as you walk along pay out line as it swims across the water. Once you've got the right amount of line out the planer will follow you along the opposite bank. I should imagine that trying to cast them is virtually impossible, you need to be moving (walking) to work them, or I suppose you could use the current in a river to feed it out, but I can't see how that would be particularly useful?

Pulling for a break with a spring balance is a pretty sure fire way of killing the spring balance! They specifically say not to do that in the instructions when you buy a new one. (Guess how that lesson was learnt?)

Easy twist is one of the less reliable wires, especially the 20lb size. Any of the drennan wires are more reliable if you don't want anything as robust as carboflex.

It depends on the brand of wire really, but I think the simplest and most reliable method, and the one I use for bait traces, is to use 30-40lb Fox Carboflex. Carboflex comes with its own crimps and if you buy the excellent Fox crimp tool (about £10) you will be able to make very strong very easy traces very quickly. Sorry for sounding like a Fox advert, but for once I really think they have a superb system with the carboflex and their crimp tool!

If you can take it back to the builder I'm sure he could easily put a bit of lead in the butt to balance it better and re-fit the butt cap so you'd never know.

You're right Budgie, I was being pedantic. If he is happy to buy rear drop offs though as he is getting more serious about his piking why not encourage him to go with the system you use yourself which has been developed specifically for this style of open reel fishing? Front alarms are carp fishing equpiment, developed for carp techniques, rear drop off alarms are pike fishing equipment developed for pike fishing in the same way that quality modern carp rods are entirely different to quality modern pike rods.