JDP

I think one of biggest mistakes people make is fishing to heavy braid, which then needs heavy lures to stay in contact with the lure. Going to heavy increases the fall speed and action, rather than a slow fall flutter it then becomes more of a high speed jig. The reason I knew I would be able to out-fish those people on the boat last week was simply because of the line class they were using.

Not worried, you get some very big sea's MrC, just curious as to where the measurements come from as it was always more an opinion back when I boated and less from the accurate measuring stations.

Any pic's ? how is the 3m sea measured in your area. This is under 2m swell with aprox 1m wind wave measured by the floating wave height buoys out at sea. Are yours measured the same way. When I was in the UK and surfing we would of called these waves 3m, when I moved over here I got a shock what true 3m waves are!!!

You could get a storm gomoko rod fro 50-100 quid and either use a spin or multi and out fish the action of a temple reef, you really don't need to spend big money to get good action working lures. Ive been onboard boats only last week where I used a cheap little ugly stick and out fished everyone onboard using $1000-$1500 outfits. I only took the outfit onboard the boat to prove a point, and that it comes down to time on the water learning what actions get reactions from fish. I have a young lad that comes out with me who will out fish all of us on just about any rod and reel he picks up. Fish don't care how much is spent but I must admit using high end quality gear is very nice.

Not going to be happening here. Had a look at getting out today with just 5kts of wind but the swell was pushing constant sets with virtually no gaps to sneak out through. Forecast is set to get 4x this for the weekend, which should be interesting 🤨

Also sold bass once I got the boat, was the thing to do back then. Parents didn't give a hoot what we did, mum buggered off with another fella and my dad was sleeping with my sisters best mate (aged 15). Glad to be 10,000 miles away from them, you can keep them over there !!!!!

I owned my first boat at aged 11 from the sale of rabbits. By the time I was 13, I was well into my shark fishing even though my boat was only 12ft!!!!....in saying that I had been spending every moment working on charter boats and any other boat I could get on (IOW) from a much younger age. I was obsessed back then.

Fished the solent for many years as a kid growing up on the IOW, had some pretty good fish over the years. Unlike many parts of the world, we are seeing the fishing improve over the last few years and you don't have to go far decent fish, especially pelagic's. Going to take another youngster out this afternoon after school, chasing marlin for a couple of hours.

To be honest, this young fella has been fishing since he could walk, I've known him his whole life. This isn't his first marlin or his biggest, not to mention numerous tuna over his years of fishing. He recently started working as a dekie on the charter boat my daughter skippers and landed a bigger marlin last week on a 4000 spin outfit, he also drives boats like a seasoned charter skipper. Last winter he pulled a 30lb trout from New Zealand river, his family are obsessed fishers.

Haven't bothered with the camera much lately but I did on this trip been as it was the young fellas birthday.

From yesterday. Headed offshore to try and get a friends 13yr old onto a marlin for his birthday. First patch of bait to show on the sounder were at about 120m which also showed two marlin rounding them up on the sounder. As soon as the first string of mackerel came onboard we bridled two up as live baits and started a slow troll around the bait with a dredge teaser to hopefully bring the fish up from deep water. About 15 mins later both marlin had taken both live baits, with one dancing around the surface and the other heading deep to slug it out for the youngster!!! Released the surface one in under 10mins but the one from down deep kept ripping back to the bottom every time we got the leader knot to the surface. Unfortunatly the deep fighting fish had managed to get the circle hook wrapped around its stomach which as a result we decided to keep take the fish. We've kept a few over the last few weeks as they are in extremely good numbers here (literally some boats catch and releasing over 10 per day). They are also a very quick growing fish and pretty tasty, in my opinion better than the tuna species, also it was a relatively small striped marlin. Had to come straight in to get the fish on ice so no fun with light tackle of the dolphin fish, which like every other species have been in numbers not seen before. Ive probable done at least 20 trips in the last 3 weeks, with each surpassing previous seasons. The fishing has been going crazy here with game fish such as marlin and sharks venturing into the shallow reefs, where they are steeling smaller reef fish we target on light tackle.

Maybe it's just an age thing but I find having Garmin, Simrad, Fusion and my phone all networked together to be a bit of pain. Phone call comes in which pops up on the network which turns down the radio and needs to be canceled before I can see my full screens again. My phone is kept in a waterproof pelican case which means either stopping fishing (fighting fish, trolling and jigging etc) to get the case and answer the call etc. So now I rarely bother turning bluetooth on but this does mean missing out on crisp clean radio from anywhere in the world through the radio garden app. There's also the fact that most of the time Im out of phone and radio range and have to rely on the iridium satellite network for communication.

No but they look just like the 10kg haul she caught before this one, a prawn is a prawn, unless they are those alien ones they get in South Africa (District 9).

Rain and floods over here, hasn't stopped the bite though

Quick run offshore again today, within 30 mins of leaving harbour had a double hookup on striped marlin again ( first two baits in the water). Unfortunately one managed to get the circle hook into its gut so we ended up having to kill it and head straight back home with it to get it on ice. Left my daughter out there with her boat who was extremely exited having caught and released a tiger shark which are not common this far south. She had also tagged a few other sharks that didn't manage to bite through her mono marlin traces, not sure how she finished up yet. We've kept three marlin over the last three weeks which are surprisingly good to eat but would much rather release them. Todays fish was a small one of around 80kg which I passed my rod over to a youngster on his 13th birthday to land. Conditions were not the greatest for pic's due to cloud and rain but I will sort a few pic's when I down the pics onto my main computer. Hooked a marlin and bronzy in 12m of water last trip out that both took kingfish we were trying to land on light tackle!!!!! Oh almost forgot, my daughter pulled 7kgs of prawns from the lake across the road from our house two nights ago, Im sick of eating prawns!!!

Mates are still getting cod and pollack fishing out of Bembridge IOW.

Was out Sat and Sunday, marlin, sharks and dolphin fish on both. In lock down now thanks to my sone giving a covid leper a lift on Sunday 🤨

Are you targeting fish under its rating or above ? example 10lb braid on fish way bigger or something like 50lb braid on fish of 5-10lb. Would you feel confident using that old braid on fish 3 or more times the line class, with drags set close to its rating.

Ive been very happy with suffix 131 and have yet to change any of it from the reels Ive been using it on in the past 2 1/2 years. It seems expensive but given I would only get 3-6 months before replacing power prop or J braid its now become cheaper long term than those. The best thing is with this 13 strand line is the pleasure in using the stuff, its silky smooth and gives me confidence its not at the end of its life and about to break like I always felt with those other popular braids. I believe there are some new equally good and slightly cheaper Japanese braids out now, so when this does eventually need replacing I will give one a try. Shimano ocea 8 has been going strong for about 4 years on one of my heavy tackle outfits and handled tuna and marlin without fault.

Oh no, this is going to be a long thread!!!!

I use a cannon stx downrigger to drop old fish frames either to the bottom or what ever depth I want my burley to be. I made up these baskets from chicken pen wire and used concrete in the bottoms. The small basket on the left has an open front so I can run a bolt up through the concrete to hold a GoPro to film what ever checks the bait out. Had to make the small one shorter so it would stay the right way once it hit bottom. I loose the odd basket to sharks, especially wobbegong (big dogfish). What I like is the fact these may drift back in the tide on the way down but once they hit bottom I pull them in a touch which puts them directly under the boat. Once under the boat I can see them extremely well on the sounder, as well as fish that come to check it out, if sharks turn up I can pull it from the water. The cannon stx down rigger has a breaking mechanism which works like a fishing reel drag, so I can normally get the basket back even when they get munched. The baskets can be made to suit what every type of bait you want to put in them, if you have cod and pollack frames, simply make them to suit bigger frames. Im sure this would attract fish in the UK as much as they do here. If you have a rough old bait freeze you can simply leave the baskets in the freezer and keep adding fish offal to them when ever you have some.

Was that what he sent!!!!!....thought he was sending pic's from a freshwater fishing session where he was using maggots as bate!!!!

Been busy chaps, also good to have a detox from social media for while.

Just rigging up a new gun for more underwater hunting for this year. Might sell my boat and do without, which is proving a hard decision to make.

Last day of the year and my daughter managed to get three sessions in. Two from the boat ended with plenty of reef species and a little mako on light spin gear. An evening trip up in the mountain streams resulted with good catches of bass buffing lures off the surface in the dark. looks like tomorrow will be pretty blowy so not sure yet where to wet a line. Tight lines lads, hope you all have some cracking catches in 2022.