fishfingers

Marc, it’s a small world. The photo these guys were banging on about, was taken in January this year at Shelly Beach! The boat was one of ‘Awesome Charters’, and the head guy took me out. (Is he your man?), he was very, very competent and needed to be! Given the size of the breakers that was the most controlled, proficient, and scary, beach launch I’ve ever been on. Those South Africans know how to fish! Fortunately the wind dropped a bit in the afternoon. But the landing was pretty high speed stuff as well. Quite something that Mozambique current and those Bull’s on the reef! You’d be mad to play on a kayak out there, though apparently people regularly dive it. (…and Die!) My point with the Blue shark was that it was very improbable that 15lb mono would stand up to the teeth and skin of the shark, this coupled with all the other points made about ‘that picture’ lead me to genuinely believe it to be a hoax. Blues will swallow an small bait instantly so unless it was foul hooked, which even that photo looks like its not, the small hook would have been in the mouth even a small blue and a minute Mako, would have bitten him off instantly. Bye the way, for both mine and the sharks safety, boating/releasing is a two man job. Attempting this on a kayak would be very dangerous and someone will get hurt badly if they try. To my thinking tope are pushing it a bit too, but I suppose if they never leave the water there ok. I not too keen on the photos of those guys holding their tope up for the camera on their kayaks, one slip and the topes soft underside can get bashed, killing the fish some hours later. These creatures are , in fact, very delicate. On a boats we only ever lift the small tope by the tail for unhooking. This is done standing so no part of the fish hits anything hard. If the fish is large it is unhooked, or on very rare occasions, cut off, while still in the water. I would like to think kayak anglers have thought this through. I except that there are rare occurrences when sharks have been accidental hooked on the external mouth parts and some quite sizeable fish being boated. It’s just that I’m very sceptical in this case, as apparently he didn’t know what type of fish it was……(hummmm?)

What have I started ? There certainly is some angst out there. For the record, arguments are a pretty inefficient way of exchanging information, but anyone wishing to be constructive (thanks marc) my like to know: Tuna don’t have a swim bladder, and give their all in the fight. Trying to release them is folly. They either sink to the bottom and die, or get eaten by sharks. (All the fish here were eaten, most of them by the local population, who from the sounds of it needed it a lot more than some on this forum.) Buy the way ‘hungryfisherman’, Darodo are the fastest growing and tastiest fish in the sea. The big bull in the foreground leapt into the boat on his own. How’s that for fast food and probably only 2 years old to boot? A fish right up your street I think as they taste much better than Bass. By the way all the fish here were caught on trolling lures or Rapala slivers, not live bait. ( The sliver in its smallest size is a good trolling lure in the UK for large Bass but I don’t think anyone’s listening to me anymore.) Live bait would have caused a lot of pointless shark hook-ups. I am proud of the fact that I used tackle capable of getting these fish to the boat fast and safely before the circling Bulls had them. I did not want to put the skipper in the unfortunate position of having to deal with one of these bad tempered fish in what was a big sea at the time. Also I would not have slept well with the thought of any shark, even a Zambezi, swimming around with his mouth gagged by my lure. The only ‘half’ fish I lost that day to the sharks was a large king mackerel. These, due mostly to how they fight, having a habit of getting eaten on the way in more often than not. As far as conservation is concerned using unnecessarily light tackle prolongs the ordeal for the fish, and greatly reduces the chances of it being returned unharmed. Any considerate angler, and I know a few, would have played that tope on ‘bream tackle’ hard. If he lost the fish, which 9/10 times he would have. The fish would have swam away unharmed. By playing him on unsuitable tackle you risk tiring the fish to exhaustion, and worse still if your kit fails, as it is prone to do at the end of the fight, that tope will sink like a stone and certainly die. I wasn’t there so don’t know how the guy played the fish. Shame on the man if he didn’t play that fish real hard. And I hope there is something to that effect stated in the glossy article. I very much doubt it though, as they are in the business of selling stuff, mostly pipe dreams…….. As far as the Blue is concerned: Try and tell me that an angler who has invested in an expensive angling kayak has to go on a web forum to ask what type of fish he has hooked. If its was a rhetorical question, he has some major issues with which no one can help him. If he doesn’t actually know, then he should not comment on other peoples thoughts as he is quite obviously a ‘novice’. Someone should tell him that expensive consumer electonics and saltwater don't get on! With respect to Bass teeth: What I actually said was that the main problem with ‘big’ bass was their gill plates. Not their teeth! They do have them, a nasty set of vomerine teeth, there smallish granted, but sharp and perfect at grasping sandeels as you would imagine. As far as GB is concerned: I suggest that anybody kayaking at sea with GB does so with some care, he doesn’t appear to be a man in control of his emotions. Aggressive types are almost always cowards, and you can’t depend on them when things go wrong. Think hard about this one.. your life might depend on it someday!

I can assure you gentlemen I'm no troll. It would probably help if I new what one was? My advise to any junior anglers reading this, is don't listen to this 'pap'. Join a proper organised sea fishing club; there are plenty all over the country. These clubs served me well and you will learn a lot more about fishing, life and how to interact sociably. I warn you some of these guys are faddist, with woolly thinking, they are the techno tackle manufactures fodder. Learn to fish slowly, and enjoy the processes. You will have a lifetime of memories and many good friends at the end of it.

GB, Take a trip to Penzance; Newly harbour has a sea wall on the southern side. The rocks at the base of this wall are infested with small Pollock around six inches. The water is crystal clear and with good polarizer’s you can see exactly what’s going on. Get a 2” eddystone eel, these came fitted with and Aberdeen about size 1. Jig the eel up and down count the number of fish strikes and the number of fish hooked. Try this for fifty strikes at the lure. I got 22 fish. Now take the hook and bend an offset into it and repeat. Hook ups to strikes 30. Assuming these fish are basically the same and their parents, this is good enough for me. I would suggest you criticise a little less, be a bit more open-minded, and enjoy the fact that most people, if your polite to them, will tell you what they really think. You may learn a lot more. As a ‘real man’ you can then quietly decide for yourself if you choose to follow advice or not. I don’t have a monopoly on the truth; if you feel you need to go prove me wrong, then reply with some sensible, reasoned argument for your case, not just a childish empty rebuke with the woolly term ‘bait presentation’ as a foil. I think some people have read to many glossy fish mags. As for sharks, it’s foolhardy to fish for them with inadequate tackle. If sharks are likely to be present proper precautions should be taken. If its not a joke, then you need you’re a**es kicked. Its not something to be proud of and post on the internet. I don’t care if you decide to kill yourselves on your kayaks but please have some respect for the poor shark. I’ve seen that macho crap to rock music that some American anglers put out. If you have half a brain, ask yourself were the filming platform is. Invariably it’s a thirty-foot powerboat not a kayak on the open ocean. Are they filming because they want to show how they fish to the interest of others, or because they have deep rooted personal inadequacy? I thought this was a discussion forum, looks like it’s a self-appreciation society. I doubt now if I will learn anything from this forum as it seem to be populated by the ‘Texting’ generation that have never bothered to learn how to construct arguments and reply openly to alternative views. I don’t want to be part of your schoolboy cliques. Unsubscribing, I think I’ll just go fishing you meet nicer people.

I had always wondered about circle hooks. I knew about their so-called ‘lip hooking’ features and this is not in doubt. I assumed that their ubiquitous use on long lines was down to that trait alone. Then I actually met a commercial long line fisherman, who happened to be beach casting (bit of a busman’s holiday if you ask me) in SA he set me straight. My motto is ‘if you don’t ask you don’t get.’ Anyway, after listening for the first half hour about how the Asian fishing fleets are plundering their waters, he enlightened me on circle hooks. Apparently the ability to lip hook is useful in getting fish to market in better condition as they don’t bleed so much when hooked (i.e. Not eaten by the sharks!), but the main reason they are used is that once hooked its very hard for a fish to throw a circle hook on a slack line, in fact almost impossible. Also the circle hook will catch both smallish and large fish with a large hook. This probably explains why they are so difficult to get hold of in small sizes. As anglers we never have slack line on a hooked fish, as we all know how that ends. The only possible use I can see for these hooks in UK waters would be for flatfish sessions, or possibly drifting for sharks. Both these fishing styles usually entail some slack line, though the slack in a shark bite isn’t there for long! Flatfish invariably sit still and eat you bait right down. I don’t’ know about you but I have lost count of the times I have reeled in to change bait and found a small flatfish attached. As I doubt I loose a lot of these flatties to hook shape, and you can’t seem to get small circle hooks I can see no real benefit to circle hooks in UK sport fishing. I may be wrong, as I haven’t tried them for myself. Has anyone used true circle hooks? I would love to know if I’m right or wrong? Talking of sharks I did read a topic on the forum yesterday about a guy who claims to have hooked a shark on 20lb mono, ‘accidentally’ on a kayak, and then taken a very dodgy photo as evidence (convenient!). I would check it out if you haven’t seen it. It made me chuckle. I would suspect that he is one of those very strange people who practices his humour for his own gratification, nothing wrong with that, just strange. Some small probs with the hoax thou, you don’t accidentally catch blue shark, no 20lb mono will stand up to the first run, and the ‘clincher', you wouldn’t dare to hold your rod with one hand to take that picture on an aircraft carrier let alone a kayak. Fishfingers.

I like the progressive nature of this Kayak forum, and having never actually been a member of any forum before I’m finding the whole experience enlightening. It has just occurred to me that my first topic on catching bass is just how easy things can be misinterpreted, guess this is the limit of written English. It’s funny but reading the piece again I can see how it would sound a little ‘preachy’. I assure anyone who’s read it that this was not the intent. Anyway this a second stab at a different topic, provoked by a question asked by yakerbass, don’t bite my head off! Now, thanks in most part to the Jap’s, modern hooks, the materials they are made from and quality of the finishes, mean that if you by a good reputable brand you can’t go wrong. Come to think of it, I can’t remember the last time I had a packet of duff hooks, must be at least 15 years. Anyway, some of these slick bits of computer manufactured technology do however miss a an important features that less ‘perfected’ hooks did have. As my grandfather pointed out to me, all hooks, this is the seventies remember, had a certain amount of offset. Offset was cause predominantly by heat treatment of the hooks, or in by some manufactures deliberately. Now, take a look at your hooks. How many of then have an offset ? I would recommend that you take a pair of pliers to those that do not. This used to be hit and miss in the old days but now hooks always seem to bend rather than snap. Any hook that snaps rather than bends, regardless of how much they cost or were hyped, you do not want to fish with ! Put a serious offset in all your hooks, I can’t think of a situation were not having one will not improve the hook-up rate. I have proven this to myself, when lure fishing with rubber eels. An offset hook will out-fish a flat hook every time. The only drawbacks are that they no longer sit flat in your rig wallets and you have a tendency to hook yourself more, but this is a small price to pay for boated fish. The only reason I can think of, and I have given this a lot of thought over the years, why modern hooks have gone away from this is that you can’t sell them safely in flat plastic packets. They used to come in small card boxes? Give me your thoughts, Fishfingers

It would initially seem like a good idea to have your Transceiver exposed in an Elile 4.5 style, but if you dropped your kayak on a chair leg you would be looking for a new transceiver instead of fixing the old one back on. I don’t think the transducer will hold up to an emergency 'seal' landing on rocks. But then I suppose if things get to this, you won't care about your fishfinder. I like the potential of the Elite 4.5, but from a technical perspective the recessed under mount transceiver will cause drag, just how much is in question, but when your supplying the motive force you could seriously effect the top end speed of the kayak negating a bit/lot of the benefits of going to a long hull shape? Time will tell on this one.

Yakerbass, sorry for showing my age again. By Aberdeen hook I mean any light wire long shank hook. With this type of fishing you need a light hook in order that the baitfish swims without sinking or tiring to much. I do use the obligatory 2/0 Kamassan for dead bait fishing frozen eels from some rock marks. These are excellent modern ‘bass’ hooks which I would also call light, its all relative. I would however urge anyone from becoming complacent in their hook selection. The Kamassan have the advantage of not straightening when you need to lift fish up a long way on rock marks for safety reasons. On the other hand when you snag bottom with a hook, half the time you lose the whole rig at the point where the shock leader joins. If I have a net with me or know I can get to the water, I use Mustad Aberdeen’s, as you pointed out you can straighten these hooks on snags but better this than loose your whole pulley rig and spent 20 minutes before your fishing again. If your giving a fish so much stick that you straighten a Mustad Aberdeen in the fight from a kayak I would suggest better drag setting, lighter tackle and more patience. (I get too excited more times than I would care to admit, and I have straightened hooks in fish before now.) As far as big fish baits are concerned for bass. It would appear all the ‘really’ big fish do tend to fall for fish baits intended for other species. The topic was aimed at guidance on catching mature, sporting bass say 5lb to 10lb, and avoiding schoolies. If you want to catch a record bass then I would whole heartedly agree with your comments about mackerel heads and squid, problem is there will either be a lot of either fishless days, ,hundreds of dogfish, or some very fat crabs before you bag your record. I’m not that patient but respect to the man who is, he deserves his record fish. Fishfingers.

MJB, there is an easy way to tell the gender of a bass. If you bass fell for something expensive and shiny, and played hard to get when you got alongside it………,wait for it,…..It was a female! Seriously, this is obviously an emotive subject, which is encouraging. I just wish anglers would stop wasting energy fighting each other. Both those anglers who let all their Bass go, which is what I do unless they are damaged, and those who like to take the odd one for the table (within the law) have a vested interest in keeping fish stocks in the sea. It’s the average voter at Tescos fish counter, who is blissfully unaware of the plight of fish stocks, and perhaps more importantly the whole marine ecosystem, that will kill the seas. As a long standing member of the wildlife trust, just appreciate how hard a problem we have getting people to care about the sea bed damage done by trawlers, let alone the fish these trawls catch. Without the habitat protection, its mute focussing on fish size alone, the result will be the same in the long run. I would be a lot happier if some of the angling groups widened their lobbying a bit to include the whole marine ecosystem. This is not to say that some of these organisations don’t do this, its just that some of their members, due to their passion, are transfixed purely on the end product, Fish! Passion is a good thing, and without it you cant achieve anything at all. It just needs to then be transformed into resolve, followed by personal action, to do any real good. I do tend to spend a lot of time thinking about fish myself, as you can probably tell, and have in my past had a tendency towards environmental ‘fishism’. By the way, environmental awareness is why I like the idea of kayak fishing. Plastic logs are both fuel efficient (if you don’t eat too many ‘legal size’ bass), quite, and totally recyclable. I don’t know about you guys, sometimes I feel unless its cute ‘n’ fury and in Disney’s latest movie, theirs little chance for most creatures on this predominantly ‘BLUE’, not green, planet. I lobby so my children’s children will have not just Bass on a spinning rod, but crabs in their buckets, puffins on their cliffs and corals on their reefs, long after I’ve gone the way of all flesh/fish. ‘nuff said, Fishfinger. (aka Fish Hugger)

I was under the impression males matured at between 32cm to 35cm (Typically 4 years old in uk waters) . Below the 36cm limit. The female however only mature around 42cm (typically 5 years old) unfortunatly above the limit as currently stated. I will however bet that there are a lot more 5 year old fish in the water than 10 year old fish, these are just natural fish population distributions. As each of the fish has, with commercail fishing pressure, about the same chance of making it to next year, I would much rather take the small fish over the large fish. Of course I never actuallyintential go to take bass for the table, just like I don't eat north sea cod, patagonian tooth fish or pandas for that matter. Fishfingers

Zippy, it takes bass a long time to reach spawning age. The size limit is there to ensure that even with commercial fishing taking a big chunk, enough of these ‘just size’ fish continue to live long enough to grow big and spawn. (A head start if you like!). Every large fish you leave in the water, statically speaking, greatly increases the overall number of spawning adults, as they spawn this year and every year for a long time. That’s why with stocks just recovering, its not clever to take the big fish if you can help it. Obviously if the fish is seriously wounded, say damaged gills (its life, it happens), their would be no point in throwing it back to die later. You just have to live with the guilt and get out the BBQ. I hope I haven’t offended anyone with the catch and release stuff, obviously the vast majority of anglers love the fish they catch and respect them accordingly. The thought was meant only as a reminder to those who would abuse information and we should all continue to state this over and over until we reach 100% awareness of catch and release. Sermon over, sorry to be a bore, Fishfingers

Just an afterthought, if conditions and location are right, you will catch a lot of fish live baiting. This is good, but only take fish you really want and need. I can forgive novices in a fit of excitement, but there is no place in fishing for greed or **** contests. These larger bass are the real breading stock. If you’re going to take fish, take the ones that are just over the size limit. They make a reasonable family meal without waste, and the large one left in the water will produce another hundred 'limit' fish in 4 years time. Most fish caught live baiting like this will be lip hooked, and need never leave the water. Enjoy catching your fish, and enjoy the thought of them still swimming around out there. For the future, fishfingers

Marvin, as you rightly pointed out this method is not permanent. The hot melt adhesive does not chemically fuse to the components, it kind of acts like millions of tiny bungs in the pores of the plastics which holds the two together. I would imagine that over a period of a couple of months the bond my well come off. You just stick it back down again. Interestingly if you have a large area to cover and no glue gun, just heat some sticks in an old tin can on a low oven. Trowel it on, and mount your transducer. (Jamie Oliver eat your heart out !) If you note in the topic starter I recommended that you did not sand paper the transceiver. In doing this the glue puck should just peel off totally cleanly, a bit like the glue they use to stick freebies to the front of fishing mag’s. Because of the low adhesion properties of the rotomolded plastics, I recommended that you roughed the surface of the hull. This in effect will increase the mechanical ‘bung’ grip on this component. It should however still peel away totally cleanly if needs be. If the glue puck is still fairly clean you can reheat it in the oven again and reuse. Try this simple experiment at home first before you try it on your fishfinder. Use the melted glue to stick the plastic bottle top off a plastic milk bottle to the side of the same milk bottle. Now peel the bottle top off. This will give you a feel for the bond that will be achieved in your kayak. Hope this clarifies, us engineers can be a bit woolly sometimes. Regards, Fishfingers

Now, I know this may not be new to some of the seasoned anglers out there, but it seems that a lot of people in the forum are asking how to catch a big bass…… a worthy mission in life! Put simply if you want to catch a big fish,use a big bait,…………and make sure its still thrashing around like crazy if your after a bass! (i.e. don’t **** about with worm baits, crab, etc. for big bass, there are too many nuisance fish about.) I shall now explain how I do it. ( Can’t claim any credit for this one as it was shown to me by a South African guy who had just boated a 20lb Cob off Cape Town. ) Take one large, but light, hook (4/0 Aberdeen) and make sure its razor sharp. Tie it to foot length bite trace of TYGER (apparently you use more if there are sharks about. I had the distinct impression he was yanking my chain.). Tyger, for those who don’t yet use the stuff, is a wire trace line made up of very many, very fine, stainless steel wires with the result of being totally bite proof, as flexible and thin as nylon ( this being the most important feature here) and can be tied with standard knots,……..Obviously its not cheap. Big bass have very sharp teeth, but their main problem are their razor sharp gill plates, hence the bite trace. ( As an aside, watch your fingers novices ) I have watched anglers in Spain shore fishing at long ranges with 8lb line and 16 foot rods. These same guys complain about rocks cutting there lines when they hook a decent fish. I suspect the Bass are doing the line cutting? Tie this small trace to your standard down tide flying collar set-up. Now, here is the clever bit. Take some six pound clear mono and a small hook, tie the nylon to the big hooks bend and with a three inch length tie on the small hook. Now bait the small hook with something you know a bait fish will like. I have had good results in UK waters with my home-made size 10 white feathers, this also means you can set out for a quick session with no bait at all. Paddle to the top of a sandbank ( The kayak man will probably have a distinct advantage over us boat types in shallow estuary mouths, even small motor boats have a habit of getting grounded here as tides ebb, and the extra stealth is sure to be beneficial. ………I really am going to have to get a kayak!) , ‘feather’ the rig until you feel a bait fish is on. This will almost certainly be a sandeel in the UK. Bye the way, don’t bother with any hooked mackerel, with this method they invariably come off the small hook if you try to fish with then. Now hold on tight and bounce the little fella down the side of the sand bank………bendo! You really need to try this, it works a treat. I landed my personal best Turbot doing this and Bass 5lb plus are very common ! The reason why this is so effective is twofold: Firstly, if you can’t catch sandeel in your chosen fishing spot then chances are there aren’t any Bass there either. You won’t waste time fishing a ‘fishless’ mark. Contra to what some anglers would have you believe, the big bass don’t lie some 10 miles offshore from were you caught the bait. Nine out of ten times the bigger bass are on the edge of the bait fish areas waiting for a straggler to get careless. Secondly, because you didn’t wrench the poor thing up from the depths tearing his face and squishing his swim bladder, knakering him out on the way up, grasping him with your dry sausage fingers, keeping him for hours in a blood stained tank with his dying mates, inserting a hook back in him and squishing his guts again as he takes an express elevator ride back down to a depth he has never been before, he is still a ‘Live’ livebait. This method will ensure the fit little trooper will now wiggle like crazy for hours, meaning your bait will be in the water were the fish are longer, and his thrashing around will attract something in the deep water channels………I guarantee it. Please note that if the livebait is a sandeel don’t static fish the bottom, he’s so fresh he’ll just bury himself and you wont catch a thing. Now if I can only devise a way of keeping a joey on the small hook…hummm? Try it and let me know how your kayaks perform, I have a hunch you will be able to reach the spots where us boat boys can’t …………You know it, dam the expense, the new OK Elite 4.5 has my name all over it.

Thats what I like too see! A man with his priorities straight. Nice shiny new fishing machine, abused automobile...... Respect.