Tiddler.

I have had a bad run lately and have only caught tons of lesser Weever fish.

I did manage to get out again last night with Ben. There was a big tide with a lot of suspended weed in the water which made things seriously hard going. There were fish breaking the surface occasionally yet the only method we could use was weightless and weedless soft plastics, even then we were retrieving into and picking up lots of weed.

The only fish caught was a tiddler which fell to my unweighted, weedless O.S.P. DoLive Stick in bluegill pattern.

I hope things pick up again soon.

YGK G-Soul WX-8

I think it fair to say that most saltwater lure fishermen in the UK use braids around the 1-1.2PE mark, some will even go for a 30lb braid here. Now for some circumstances I can see this may be entirely appropriate, but for some time I have felt using such heavy braids is just overkill in our waters.

Fishing light game has taught me a tremendous amount about my Bass fishing for example, as a result I am of the view that balanced tackle can be used to tame pretty much any fish that swims and that will take a lure in the UK.

Yes I can see the point if fishing for Wrasse in heavy ground of going with heavier line, in such circumstances you need a line you can trust in order to pull them away from cover quickly. 

Even then, most of the ground I fish is far from the terrain people fish in South Devon or Cornwall and the Wrasse are generally not as large. The worst abrasion I am going to experience is on weed rather than big boulders.

Honestly though, most braid will cut on a barnacle covered rock, a decent fluorocarbon mainline would probably offer far more advantages in such situations.

With all that in mind I decided a while ago to step down the breaking strain of my Bass lines and recently bought some YGK G-soul WX-8 0.8PE (12lb).

G-sould WX-8 retails in the UK at around £50 and is more than I was prepared to pay for some line. I  therefore bought some off an eBay seller in Japan for £30 including shipping and it took just four days to arrive.

What can I say about this line? 

Well firstly having used the 4 strand version before I knew I was not going to be using an inferior line, but I did not quite realise how good this line would be. This G-soul WX-8 really is good stuff, it feels just silky smooth and very strong. The line really is thin, yet handles very well and casts like a dream. I do like the bright colour and it is easily visible in poor light conditions. 

On using a light surface lure I did get one wind knot, yet unlike other braids I have used, it was easy enough to pick out. Well as yet I cannot find fault in it. I am not sure what the coating YGK use is, but it really does not absorb water like cheaper braids can and is therefore very nice for using surface lures, yet it also gives good feedback when fishing deeper water with soft plastics.

I guess the only gripe I might have is, I would still be reticent to pay the price of UK retailers, though I would definitely pay the extra over many of the cheaper braids out there.

Of course I have only been using it a couple of weeks though and whether it stands up to the abuse I'll put it through long term remains to be seen, time will tell I guess.

Tight lines.

Olympus Stylus TG-2

I'd like to write about some amazing fishing I have had lately, but sadly I have not enjoyed any remotely good sessions. The bright weather conditions, water clarity and lack of wind have made things hard going indeed.

However, if you have been reading my humble little blog, you will know I ruined my camera a short while ago. 

Fishing over sand a lot of the time does have its consequences and kit does tend to et ruined quickly if not looked after.

With that in mind and the other potential hazards that can happen in other places I fish also, I decided to get one of these tough cameras.

After some deliberation, I decided on the Olympus Stylus TG-2.

Now I am certainly no Henry Gilbey when it comes to photography, like most things I do I am mediocre, yet I enjoy fishing and taking photographs.

Now I am not going to bore you to death with all the technical details (I don't understand them all anyway), I shall just say that the Camera is shockproof, freeze proof, waterproof, dustproof, crushproof and thankfully for me, fairly idiotproof. It also has GPS functions (which I have turned off to prevent giving away marks) 12- megapixel BSI CMOS sensor, a TruePic VI image processor, oh and it's capable of shooting videos.
Anyway I am so far quite impressed with the image quality of this little compact, allow me to share some pictures;

Low Light.

It was important to me that the camera took fairly decent photo's in low light, as often the best fishing is to be had in such conditions and everyone likes a dawn or dusk shot right?!

Macro.

Again, a good macro shot was pretty high on my wanted list and was one of the reasons I chose this camera over its competitors.

There are many other functions which I have yet to use and get to grips with, but so far I am liking the camera a lot. 

The beauty and portrait functions are great and very clear, just the ticket for family use, as well as taking pictures of your mates cheesy grin and his fish!

Even as a general point and shoot though, the camera takes some pretty good pictures on the auto function;

One of the thing I love so much about saltwater lure fishing is, the landscapes I see and changing conditions. The landscape feature is pretty good too.

I have yet to use the camera underwater, I am a bit of a Jesse there and the thought of sticking a camera in saltwater still seems pretty alien to me.

Anyway, you'll now know what camera I'll be using for my reports and I hope to bring you some fishy pictures soon.

Tight lines.

A small session after work.

I am pleased to report that Ben caught his first Bass of the year last night. A good achievement in my opinion, as it was on a totally new mark to him and he sussed it all without help.

I asked Ben if he'd like to meet up and have a fish at one of my marks, being enthused by his recent success he agreed to meet at 20:00.

We fished a rising tide under a setting sun, there was lots of surface activity and we felt optimistic. I was using my Yamaga Blanks Blue Current 80 and was therefore fishing a bit lighter than Ben.

For a time we were getting follows and bites but no hook ups, well aside from a Weever fish for me.

But as high water arrived and covered some of the boulders, we caught some fish.

I was in first, snaffling a schoolie on my Aldente 95s.

Then Ben caught one on his Xorus Patchinko.

Then I caught a couple more and lost a couple;

We called it a day after a few fish, as we both have work in the morning and were being eaten alive by Gnats!

None of the fish were any size at all, but fun on the Blue Current and light lines nonetheless. It was also good to meet up with Ben and show him some of my haunts.

Thanks for reading.

Tight lines!

Snap, Cuckoo and Plop.

Very recently I have acquired a fishing buddy; Ben Edwards whom I know through the Lure Forum has moved ho my neck of the woods. Its very good news as I have been wanting a fellow angling nut to do trips with for a while.

We met up today and had decided to head on to the Llyn Peninsula for a spot of Pollock fishing. We set out this morning at 09:00 with the sun beating down on us.

We arrived at our mark on an ebbing tide around 10:30 and tackled up. Having been to the mark before I knew there were Wrasse to be had there and I started fishing with a Jika rigged creature bait, whilst  Ben was using a heavy carolina type rig with a drilled bullet sinker.

We fished for an hour or so without much action at all, we had changed lures and tactics several times and both ended up fishing a heavy carolina rig. We were literally about to move to a different location when Ben's rod hooped over and a spirited fight ensued. At this point I gave Ben some coaching in the words of "stop fannying about and get it in!" Ben being the type to heed good advice landed not only the first fish of the day, but also the biggest!

Strangely as Ben was unhooking his fish we notice that the tip of his new Savage gear BushWhacker had snapped, this did put a little downer on the experience but thankfully Ben had bought a spare setup.

Ben tackled up again and before I knew it Ben was in again, this time to a smaller fish. When surfaced,  it had Ben in a confused state; "what on earth is this blue and orange thing" said Ben, right before it dawned on him that he had caught a Cuckoo Wrasse, and a cracker too!

It was truly an exciting moment, neither of us had ever seen one in the flesh and we haven't heard of many, if any being caught from shore in North Wales before, let alone on lure!

With this all going on I asked Ben what lure was doing the damage, he told me "its a cheap curlytail from AGM" and I promptly nicked one off him! Sure enough they were doing the damage and with it I managed to beat my blank.

It was great the fishing had switched on and we both had a fairly decent numbers of Pollock for an hour or so before the fish seemed to switch off again.

Around 14:00 we made the decision to move to a different mark. We had originally wanted to go and fish for Wrasse and Bass on the North coast, but with a stiff northerly blowing this was not going to be possible.

At this point we went on an exploratory trip around the coast and found a nice shallow reefy looking mark. Ben had his heart set on Bass as he has yet to catch one on lure this year and I had my heart set on Wrasse, as I am missing catching them in a big way. 

We split up for a short time and I went off in search of Wrasse. I clipped on a Fiiish Black Minnow 90 and made my casts. It wasn't long before I had a small Ballan.

It wasn't exactly the size I hoped for, but thats the story of my life, nevertheless it was the target species!

From there I had a succession of small Pollock, which fell to either the Fiiish Black Minnow or the Madness Bakuree Tail 86, which I rigged on a 10g Cannelle articulated head.

As the tide rose, myself and Ben found ourselves being cut off on our reef and had to make a speedy retreat, myself getting wet feet and Ben making a hairy jump to avoid getting wet.

After getting ourselves out of our predicament, we headed to Pwllheli Kebab joint for a bite to eat and discussed our next move. We decided to fish a spot on the way home in the hope of some Bass. We unfortunately didn't catch any but it did give me the chance to try some new lures, most of which were used to try and retrieve my expensive suntan lotion that I lost to the sea!

With that last plop, we decided to return home, satisfied with a few fish, good company and a good day in the sun.

The next mission will be to get Ben his Bass, so watch this space!

Thanks for reading and tight lines.

The Ima Aldente 95S

I've been using the ima Aldente 95S for a while now and it seems to be pretty good. I find it works best on a painfully slow retrieve with the rod tip held quite high.

Unfortunately I have only had small Bass on it and originally had bigger expectations of it, especially seeing some of the lunkers that Japanese guys seem to catch on them. I'll keep trying for the big girls with it though, as it is still only mid season.

The lure does come in very handy on nights like tonight, where you can see the fish are small and you just need to "match the hatch".