SWAPPING SIDES
Coarse and carp tackle for sea fishingWith the summer holidays almost upon us, if you're a freshwater fisherman but taking the family to the coast, then don't forget to pack some tackle.

River float gear and 4lb line is ideal for use off piers, jetties and breakwaters targeting garfish, mackerel, small pollack and especially mullet. The trick is to get some fish scraps in a small mesh bag and hang the bag in the water while you're tackling up. Bait up a size 4 hook with a small strip of mackerel, position yourself uptide of the bag and trot the bait down through the scent trail below the bag. Trust your river instincts and you won't go far wrong. Drop hook sizes down to 8 or 10 for the mullet and take the skin of the mackerel flesh. Mullet also take bread.

Coarse tackle can be perfect for the sea

Pike or preferably carp rods make ideal bass and light ledger rods for light surf and flattie fishing in the harbours. Match it to a fixed spool carrying 250-metres of 10 to 12lb line and you have a nice sporting outfit. Surf fishing is best at night when you have the beach to yourself. Concentrate on the hour either side of low and high water for the bass. Inside the harbours, the best of the fishing is usually as the new tide starts to flood through. Tackle shops usually carry worm baits and crab, but if you're stuck look for mussels under jetties, piers and on the rocks at low water.

The "Method" feeder system works well inside harbours and estuary creeks for mullet, flatties and eels with a fish based meal mix. Maggots are as good a mullet bait in the sea as they are in the rivers for roach if you pre feed a little.

Carp rods and 8lb line make good spinning tackle. Spin off any rocky points for bass and pollack, or from breakwaters and piers for garfish and mackerel. The best spinners are silver chrome 1oz Dexter Wedge's or ABU Tobies.

Sea fishing tends to be best early morning and late evening around dawn and dusk, or a night, so you'll get the best of the fishing when the kids and missus are asleep leaving the days free to keep the family sweet.

TIPS AND TRICKS
When using a rubber eel over a wreck for pollack, coalfish and cod, if the bites are slow to come try adding a belly strip from a mackerel to the hook. This adds more movement, but more importantly natural smell to the lure and is often enough to get disinterested fish to take.

BOAT GURNARD TACTICS

Colourful Gurnard

There are three common types of gurnard in UK waters, the tub gurnard, grey gurnard and red gurnard. They are all found over clean sand and gravel, but the tub, and to a lesser extent the grey, are also found amongst broken reef ground on sand patches.

Most gurnards are taken drift fishing from relatively shallow water in less than 60-feet. Gurnards are amongst our most inquisitive fish and will come in to investigate bright colours, reflective spoons and movement, so rigs with a longish trace off a boom with beads and a chrome spoon 9-inches above the hook will always catch.

They take mainly fish baits like mackerel strip, herring or sandeel, but also worm baits especially ragworm. They have a big but bony mouth, so smaller size 1 or 1/0 short shank hooks are best with very sharp points.

The bigger tug gurnards are beautiful looking fish with bright blue edges to the massive pectoral fins and grow to 10lbs, but a 5lber is a good one. Specimen tub gurnard tend to come from the edges of wrecks on the sandbanks and from the edges of major reef structure in deep water. The best way to target these big tubs is with fluorescent yellow bodied feather rigs like Hokkeye's, but bait the hooks with mackerel for extra effective. A continuous touch bottom and lift motion of the rod tip is enough to interest and hook them.