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).

Not my morning!

I guess that most people are familiar with the story of the little pig who always got up an hour earlier than the wolf so he could trick him and get to the food first. Well fishing can be a bit like that. I go to one particular rock ledge (there are others) where there is really only room for one angler, so you HAVE to be there first. The other morning with the tide exactly right I was up well before the crack of dawn and trudging along the shore to give it a go. I peered ahead of me into the gloom, was that a figure on the rocks? It was! B****r! Someone had beaten me to it. What to do now? No time to drive and walk to another spot, better to accept my mistake and perhaps have a dabble on my way back to the car.

I had intended fishing from the rocks with a white, EvoStix lure, so I left it on and opted to have a go on a short stretch of sandy beach where I have caught a few bass in the past. Despite a recent blow which had left the beach piled high with weed the water was relatively calm and clear (not ideal), as I left the bag on a heap of weed and made may way along the fifty metre strip of sand. I cast and retrieved as I went, more in hope than expectation. For twenty minutes or so there was no sign of anything. I picked up the odd fragment of drifting sea grass and wrack but, on the whole, it was easy fishing. I decided that it just wasn't going to be my morning and that I was unlikely to catch anything, so I set off back towards where I'd dumped the bag. Of course I couldn't resist a few chucks on the way back and suddenly I was into something. The fish was clearly a bass but not the biggest one ever. It fought gamely but was soon on the beach, photographed and returned. It always surprises me how even small bass can collapse the plastic of a weedless lure enough to hook themselves. The initial strike and force exerted in closing their little jaws must be quite powerful to release the Texposer hook. Of course, having caught something I had to have a few more casts, but there were no further bites so I picked up the bag and went home.

Later that day I had an email from my fishing pal Bill Fagg; he'd been to a different stretch of coast and landed 5 bass up to about four pounds - my mistake. Bill had also seen a few larger fish as he walked along the beach. Ah well - you can't get it right every time. On the credit side, at least I avoided Bill's struggle with the tide and waves and the soaked arm that he suffered on his way back on a rising tide. He did send me some decent pictures. Thanks Bill!

My tiddler caught almost as an afterthought.

Even small bass can really twist up a soft plastic eel, almost the entire hook is exposed.

One of bills five fish on a similar lure to mine.

Bills best, a four pounder.

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

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