VINGLING FOR SANDEEL
You don't need a net to catch sandeels. You can vingle for them.

A vingler is a long blade, often fashion from an old carving knife, ground down at the sharp end to form a curled hook shape. These were commonly used in the West Country estuaries, and also along the west Wales coast, but have almost been forgotten now. It is though, especially in practiced hands, a very effective way to gather a few sandeels for a ray or bass trip.

First off, you need to find the sandeels. Typical areas are on the edges of estuary gullies and sandbanks, or the sides of sandy sea pools at the mouth of the estuary. Look for sand that is wet and just slightly loose. Sandeels aren't found in hard compacted sand. They bury themselves a couple of inches below the surface for protection.

The knack with the Vingler is to stand in front of your chosen bank or incline and start by holding the Vingler at arms length, put the hook shape in to the sand and now draw the hand back slowly but firmly keeping the end of the Vingler working about 2-inches or so deep. Work all the way to the waters edge.

When you come across a sandeel hidden in the sand, you'll suddenly feel more tension on the blade as you draw it towards you. This is because the sandeel is caught crossways inside the hook. Keep drawing the blade towards you, but lift it upwards to pull the sandeel to the surface. As you see the sandeel, be quick and grab it with the spare hand, as they will rebury themselves immediately. It pays to wear a thick gardening type glove on the grabbing hand as you can catch poisonous lesser weever fish this way too.

The best way of keeping sandeels while you Vingle is in a container with holes in that can be tied to your waist and dragged in the water behind you. I use a bait bucket I picked up in The States, but anything that stops the sandeels escaping but has small seep holes water can flow through is fine.

You can also use a garden fork to catch sandeel, just by working the fork through the top few inches of sand turning it to one side. This better with two of you though, one on the fork and the other grabbing the sandeels.

You can also sometimes force sandeels to the surface by twisting your feet in the soft sand side to side. This makes the water come to the surface and brings the sandeel s with it. Again having someone to grab them immediately they appear minimises losses.

TIPS & TRICKS
Plastic butt cups on rod rests tend to harden and become brittle with age, then inevitably break. However you can replace these cheaply and effectively with aerosol can tops.

It's just a case of finding a couple of caps 2-inches wide and roughly the same deep. Drill out the old bolt that held the old butt cap in place. Drill a small hole in the aerosol cap to take the new bolt, and bolt the aerosol cap to the butt cup bar and the repair is a good 'un. I also drill a couple of tiny holes in the base of the aerosol cap to stop the cap filling with water.

You can strengthen the aerosol caps if you think it necessary by wrapping them with PVC insulating tape. I made this repair on my rod rest a couple of years ago and it's still as good as new.

BOAT SMALL-EYED RAY TACTICS
Small-eyed ray are just starting to show now from marks inside the Bristol Channel, especially the Welsh side, off Cornwall and from marks around The Solent and the Isle of Wight.

Small-eyed's like clean sand and gravely ground, but are invariably found pretty close to rocks, reefs and cliffs close inshore. They favour areas of rising banks and are best targeted on this ground by drift fishing. Go for a sliding boom and fish a long 6-foot flowing trace of 30lb mono ending in size 3/0 Aberdeen or Mustad Viking pattern. Two hooks, one positioned 3-feet away from the bottom hook on a short 9-inch snood works well. You can add small chrome spoons and coloured beads as attractors just in front of the lower hook, which can induce more takes.

If you're fishing the Bristol Channel marks uptide fishing is the favourite method. Use a normal sliding or fixed uptide rig with 5-foot trace positioned just above the lead link to keep the trace and bait right on the seabed. Stick to just one hook on for uptiding. It can also pay to use just a plain lead either side of slack water and use the current to trot the bait down the incline of banks and in to the gutters below the banks to locate the ray laying in the sand.

Top baits are whole sandeel, long thin strips of mackerel, strips of squid and ragworm with some tail left free to wriggle as the bait moves in the tide. Small-eyed ray often fall to anglers fishing rag baits for plaice at this time. Also try cocktails of mackerel tipped with a strip of squid.