GPSguru

Nah, that will be the absolute last option when all the drugs have been tried and failed ! Most folk that have a bag are crohn’s suffers, or have ulcerative colitis north of the sigmon colon. My issues are in the sigmon coln and south of it. TBH, I am not very keen on that option so will do my best to avoid it.

So very, very true 🤣

A rod is quite a personal choice and even though you can get the feel of a rod in a shop, you don't really know if it will suit you until it is used in anger. So yeah, I can fully understand that you prefer the Ugly's.

I use the Kenzaki's which are a very similar blank. Lovely rods and the action is quite soft with a good sensitivity for feeling bites, but then goes down to a lot of power in the butt section. Daiwa certainly make very good boat rods.

Today was the lull before the storm, with very strong winds forecast for the next few days. Yesterday the sea was 1.5m @ 4secs and the forecast was for it to slowly flatten overnight and 0.3m @ 5secs today with the wind veering NW - WNW. Well, for a change, the forecast was correct, at 6:00am I checked the local wavebuoy and the sea was 0.53m @ 4.9secs, also the trend was a flattening sea, so we were good to go. It was going to be a morning trip as I had grandad school run duties in the afternoon. My crew was James (Brother in Law) and we launched at 08:00am. I decided to head to the 9Nm wreck that has fished well for me on the last few trips. We made pretty quick time out to the wreck into a 0.5m @4sec head sea at a steady 22knts. Just a rolling swell with no white tops and very little wind. Once on the wreck James went with a pearl white shad and I stuck with the slow jigs. Soon we were both into jumbo pout, every drift was jumbo pout and nothing else ! Mid morning we were joined by another local boat (Endeavour 500) from Torquay who also found the pout, so he quickly disappeared in the direction of the 'Clay Boat' (a 12Nm wreck). James and I decided to stick it out as we only had a couple of hours to spare. A little later a commercial appeared (who I know quite well) and he was surprised that the wreck was fishless. He soon disappeared in the direction of '3 in a row' which is another wreck on the 9 mile line. My take on it is that the wreck had been 'fished out' during the weekend and early part of the week by the commercials. What is needed is a bit of rough weather for a few days and the fish will return. The tally for the day was 17 jumbo pout, so not great, but also not a blank. Pout suffer badly from Barotrauma, so they almost never go back down. James made me smile when he pointed out that even the seagulls weren't eating them, we saw a gull pick one up and spit it out ! We came back in at 13:00, the sea was very flat, and we had a good run at 30knts plus. At about 4 miles out, we were treated to a spectacular display of BFT, which we stopped to watch for a few minutes. It is a long time since I have seen bait fish coming out of the water by 3 or 4 feet followed by a f'off big BFT. Using the bino's, the baitfish looked like a white fish, so maybe Pilchard or herring. The BFT's were in the 300 - 500lb class. TBH, it was a lovely morning to be out there and the total trip was 23Nm. No pics , as there was really nothing of interest because pout don't count ! There is always next time ..................

A centre consol boat is a lot easier !

Ah, you need a subtracting minus rig for that ............🤣

Sorted ...........😉

The only hook that I would expect to straighten like that would be a fine wire Aberdeen ! Drop me a PM Mike, and we can sort something out 👍

I thought it looked like you were wearing well for 74 !

The Zuk has the dubious name of the 'Alka-Seltzer' engine in the UK ..............

Happy birthday Nick, I am slowly catching you up !

Looks a bit that way 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🙄🙄 #dozyoldgit#

Slimy snakes and dogfish don't count 🤣🤣🤣, well done to @JonC for leading the way with a real fish 👍

Yes, but it is a long way off yet. I was talking to the chairman of the ATA ( Angling Trades Association) who is also tied up with CEFAS. Also they are concerned about the pollock stocks and may bring in similar rules like we have for the Bass.

Unlucky Andy, ...... BTW, dogs and snakes don't count 🤣 Good effort, and like you say, the sea was flat enough to be a hooligan ! 👍

Yeah, it is in the front crew seat locker, also the net was right beside me, but I was just being lazy and the fish won 🙄🤣

We have a run of Cuttle and Squid in the autumn / early winter when they come inshore to spawn. You need to be careful of the ink as it is a bastid to get off. We normally annoy them in the landing net to fire off the ink, and then dump them straight into a covered bucket.

Another nice day for fishing, which in November cant be overlooked ! Launched at 08:00 (ish) and decided to go back the wreck that had given me the Bass earlier in the week. The sea was flat and I soon arrived on the 9Nm mile wreck at about 08:20 and the place looked like a boat park ! Word soon gets around when a mark fishes well and there were 7 rod/line commercials drifting the wreck. I decided to muscle my way in and in the next hour had 2 Pollock which were about 3 – 4lb. One of the commercials was using 8 rods when drifting the wreck, and I didn’t see him catch. This sort of crowding over a mark is not my style of fishing as you have to be very aware of what is going on around you, and all boats drift differently, so it is all too easy to get way too close to another boat. This is OK if 2 of you are fishing, but difficult when solo, because you need eyes in the back of your head. I decided to move out to a 12Nm wreck and luckily there was only one other boat. This wreck has been reported as fishing very poor, so I wasn’t expecting a lot. Almost every drift produced a jumbo pout (probably 2lb) and not a lot else, however, late in the morning I hooked into a decent Bass of about 4lb. After a spirited fight the Bass was alongside the boat and instead of using the net, I just manually lifted the fish using the line, and it promptly fell off and was gone ! Came back in at 13:00 and the sea was very flat, so I couldn’t resist giving the throttle a good poke forward. The boat picked up speed really quick to 41knts against the spring tide with about 700rpm remaining before the throttle was wide open, but then I ran out of balls and settled for a 35knt cruise. A decent trip of 29Nm, which resulted in 2 Pollock, way too many Pout, and a dropped 4lb (ish) Bass A screen shot at 40knts 4lb (ish) Pollock

This is interesting, I found these instructional / product testing vids on the Temple Reef website.

Here, the only place we find any sizeable Cod is on the wrecks, but they are not a targetted fish. Pollock, Bass, and Ling are the main quarry, and the occasional JD is a superb bonus.

Just ordered my Xmas present from the wife, a Temple Reef Gravitate MK3 ........ one just cant have too many rods !

I can't understand the fascination for Cod, it is just a light coloured lethargic Pollock with a beard .......... 🙄