Catch Fish with
Mike Ladle

Information Page

SEA FISHING

For anyone unfamiliar with the site always check the FRESHWATER, SALTWATER and TACK-TICS pages. The Saltwater page now extends back as a record of over several years of (mostly) sea fishing and may be a useful guide as to when to fish. The Freshwater stuff is also up to date now. I keep adding to both. These pages are effectively my diary and the latest will usually be about fishing in the previous day or two. As you see I also add the odd piece from my friends and correspondents if I've not been doing much. The Tactics pages which are chiefly 'how I do it' plus a bit of science are also updated regularly and (I think) worth a read (the earlier ones are mostly tackle and 'how to do it' stuff).

More fish.

I'm shattered! It's not that I've fished for long spells or walked particularly long distances but I went early morning then evening on two days running. In fact I need to go back to a time a little earlier than my stint. My pals Stve Pitts and Steve Hill were down in Dorset for a couple of days and they wanted to go fishing. Things had been a bit slow, the tides weren't much cop and the wind was all wrong so we opted to try for pollack in the early morning. I made the fatal error of wearing my wellies instead of the chest waders and when we got down to our chosen ledge there was quite a surf running. My pals (sensible fellows) were fine but within minutes I was soaked, cold and miserable. I took a few pictures while dawn broke and the two Steves caught smallish pollack.

It was a few days later when I had an email from my fishing mate Rob. In essence he said that there were loads of maggot-feeding mullet about on the Friday evening and he'd managed a couple of bass on a plug - the best one was four pounds and the other was tiny. I decided to meet Rob the following morning for a go after the bass in a different spot. Lots of other anglers had the same idea and, to cut a long story short, Rob and I had a couple of schoolies. Better than nothing!

That evening I opted to try and find the mullet shoals. As it turned out I had several miles of beach to myself and again I made a mistake. After a long trudge looking for mullet and finding nothing I dumped the fly rod and the rest of my gear (bag, coats, fly rod, etc.) on the cobbles and walked a bit further with just the spinning rod. I'd gone perhaps a couple of hundred metres when there they were, mullet galore. My mistake was in not returning to pick up the fly gear. I stuck to spinning a weighted Redgill for the next two hours and managed only six small bass.

That evening Ben rang and suggested an early morning foray after bass again. Of course I couldn't resist so the following morning Ben and another pal, Anthony, and myself were down there flogging away in the gloom. This time the luck was on my side. Ben had one bass and I managed three but all the other early risers on the beach (8 or 9 of them) blanked.

That evening Nigel, Rob and myself tramped all the way to the mullet spot but nobody had told the mullet we were coming. Conditions (apart from the absence of fish) were identical to the previous two days. Nigel managed one tiny bass, the mullet didn't turn up and that was that. We left Rob still fishing and hoping as the sun went down. He was still flogging away when we lost sight of him so perhaps the fish eventually turned up. I await his email with interest.

If you have any comments or questions about fish, methods, tactics or 'what have you!' get in touch with me by sending an E-MAIL to - docladle@hotmail.com

Steve Pitts.

Steve Hill.

A pollack.

- and another.

Sunrise.

Bass.

Anthony.

Bass again.