Just thought I’d put a link up for THE LUREFAIR 2012 at Derby University on the 28th of April.
Britain really needs more shows like this especially in the South West. If you have the day off and are local then please come along and support the lure angling communities, all the information can be found on the home page (click here). Hope to see some of you guys there..
I went to the County Game show at Shepton Mallet last year and had a blast walking round the fly fishing stands, but I was frankly disappointed at the amount of stands representing the lure fishing market. You only need to scan the forums and online shops to see how bass fishing, HRF and LRF are taking off in the uk and abroad.
When I’m out on my travels along the coast, I keep coming across more and more anglers switching over from the mainstream Course fishing, Sea Bait fishing an Fly fishing and enduring the harsh terrain and challenges of Bass Fishing. Its these anglers I take my hat off to, to take a step out of the norm and setting them selves new challenges is inspiring in its self. When I first moved to Weymouth the ocean was like the ultimate challenge for me, I spent days sat behind rod rests chasing carp or watching a float on the harbour, but put a lure rod in my hands and let me walk miles of coast line and I am never more happier..
I Cant emphasize how much I get a kick out of fishing LRF, for a method so simple and adaptable, it doesn’t take much to learn a few tricks and bag a few fish. the fact that the air temperature has dropped below freezing this weekend and the wind has swung round bringing the cold air from the North East, LRF was in my opinion my best chance of a fish or two. I also had a chance to pass along the little knowledge I have of this style to an old school friend of mine and partner in crime Lauren. Who is more used to hauling up fish on a boat or using a tree trunk to find mackerel on chesil. I wasn’t sure she would like the concept of standing at the harbour side in -3 conditions. But she stuck at it until we both couldn’t feel our feet and fingers anymore. She’s a Trooper!
We decided we could get out of the harsh as nails winds by fishing the south side of the Weymouth pleasure pier and taking shelter on the small steps in front the condor. I’ve fished here many times fishing LRF and had plenty of Pollock on small hard lures and SP`s. One of my favourite lures to fish this mark is the Savage gear prey 69 lure for mackerel and school bass in the summer using light tackle.
I decided to make a few changes to my standard routine, keeping things as simple as I can not to make things to complex for Lauren to learn I decided to use 1g size 6 jig heads with a size BB split shot 2 inches up the 2LB fluorocarbon leader. The one last major change I made from the norm was to use ragworm instead of sp`s, reason being I didn’t want to waste time showing Lauren different retrieves and swapping and changing lures.. I wanted her to feel for shy bites in the dark and not to rely on watching a rod tip. It didn’t take her long before she pulled out her first ever LRF caught fish the humble Pollock. She played this fish like a pro, and it was a welcome sound to hear the spool spinning as this fish dived amongst the wooden pier stands.
A few things that we noticed as the night drew on was the different depths that different species were feeding. Pollock were feeding very high up in the water, deeper than 5ft an all we could catch where micro Pout, to trigger a bite from the pout we had to activate the rod tip with a 6 inch sink and draw letting out a little more line every few lifts of the rod tip.
After a few hours of Pollock and Pout I decided to fish the jig head on the bottom, I mention earlier that we used a BB split shot 2inches from the jig, reason for this was when fishing on the bottom, the heavier BB hits bottom first effectively letting your lure sink more naturally and to rest on top of any weed and snags..
After a few cast this stunning Rock goby rattled our rod tip. I haven’t ever seen a goby with such a bright dossal fin before, makes me think a little harder on what colour lures I might try using next time I go out with the HRF gear….
Fingers crossed this weather warms up soon..
