Catch fish with Mike Ladle.

Catch Fish with
Mike Ladle

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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 (and better) pollack.

Well at last the weather has improved a bit. After catching a couple of tiny pollack the other morning I was encouraged to go again. The alarm went off at 03:30 so I dragged myself out of bed and drove down to the coast. I was just in time to see the first light in the eastern sky as I made my first cast with the fly rod. For ten minutes or so there was nothing doing so I picked up the spinning rod and switched to the wedge+plastic eel set up that had produced fish on the previous trip. Immediately I had a reasonable bite and landed a pollack. Typically it was small (although several times bigger than the previous ones) but it was encouraging so I kept on flogging.

After that it was a little while before I had another bite This one was much better and the fish grounded me in the kelp (typical pollack) for a few seconds before I was able to drag it from it's layer and bring it to the shore. It was about one-and-a-half pounds, a pretty good fish for the stretch I was fishing. On the next cast I hooked something that fought harder but before I could see what it was it had come unstuck. It was either a bigger pollack or (perhaps more likely in view of the way it fought) a modest bass. Another nice pollack followed and before I packed in I'd landed five pollack and missed a fair few bites. Nothing spectacular but things are certainly on the up and up.

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

The first

This one took while it was still pretty dark.

-- the second.

Like all the others it was hooked on the small dropper.

-- the last.

This was my final fish about ten minutes before I left.