Old Dog, New Tricks!

I was in my den the other morning tying some new leaders when a sudden thought struck me.  I don’t call them traces anymore, I call them leaders.  Why the new word?  Have I suddenly become Americanised?  Has three years living in the Caribbean altered my way of thinking, even my language? Well, on reflection, the truth is that it has.  I started thinking of how my approach to fishing and my techniques and ideas have changed since those far off days when Sue and I stood on the bank of the Upper Thurne throwing Jitterbugs, Crazy Crawlers and my favourite Top Prop at dear old Esox at dawn in mid June before work.

I have learned a lot, that’s for sure. Probably my first lesson was to lighten up my tackle.  Very often my rods in particular were heavier than need be.  I noticed that Americans coming to our resort fished much lighter than their British counterparts. I’m not talking about 4lb line or silliness like that (it IS silly) but light spinning rods, say the next weight up from ultralite.  These, as I now realise, will handle double figure fish, even many hard fighting warm water marine species. And you get a lot more bang for your buck, and the fight need not be much extended, so no real damage to the fish.  Looking back, I can remember many one sided captures where my tackle was just too powerful.

And just in case you think I am implying that Americans are better, more skilful anglers, let me say that we still have much to learn from the Americans on lure fishing in freshwater. If however, you compare American and British angling in general, the average British angler is far, far more versatile than the average American angler. Most freshwater anglers in the US use one or two techniques (primarily lure fishing with soft plastic worms or conventional hard baits). In Britain, anglers bait fish for carp, trot rivers for chub, hemp fish for roach, use long poles, deadbait and lure fish for pike,  perch, zander etc, I could go on, but I digress.

Then to the question of knots. Up to my teens I had always relied on the loop over loop, and the blood knot came when I got involved in tying my own hooks in my match fishing days, and then nothing new until the advent of braided lines which completely took over my lure fishing.  At that point the Palomar knot had to be added to my knot collection.  Now after years of braided “traces’ I have converted to single strand steel wire, and a new knot (if you can call it that) has become necessary.  The Haywire Twist, a version of which we had always recommended for use on our QED trace wire.  Suddenly I find I really need this knot for my leader tying.

So what else has changed? Well after many years I have been driven to the inescapable conclusion that out here at any rate, a live mullet will out catch any lure I care to use in a given situation.  This is of course not the whole story, which is why I used the word “out catch” not “out fish”.  Lure fishing remains by far my personal preference.  A big copper spoon stopping dead half way across a river; or an explosion of spray as a top water lure gets nailed cannot be beaten in my humble opinion.  These days it is the tarpon or snook doing the nailing rather than the pike, but the principal is the same.

I sometimes ask myself why my ideas have changed.  Well let’s be honest, you could hardly run a lure selling company and argue live bait was better could you?  I suppose the moral argument is there against using live fish, but the bigger argument for me would be the damage to fish stocks using half pound roach (or, perish the thought, crucian carp) livebaits (sorry Mr Crabtree, but there it is).

I think this really does revolve around the precious nature of dwindling British freshwater fish stocks.  The same does not apply to fish stocks down here in the Caribbean.  One does not wish to be complacent however.  I can remember 100lb catches of cod off the beaches at Lowestoft fifty years, so I know the risks.  Times have changed.

But thankfully we still have huge shoals of all sorts of bait fish so the few we take for bait are not missed.  However the shoal of baby permit which live around our dock are DEFINITELY off limits!

Of course one of the biggest changes for many British anglers finding themselves living in the Caribbean is the conversion from primarily shore based fishing to boat fishing.  For me, this is a story in itself. 

If I had learnt to drive a car all those years ago the way I have learnt to run a boat over the past three years, I would not have made it into my twenties.  But you have to learn, and if you do, it is a welcome addition to your fishing experience!  Certainly I use my boat to take me places, but sometimes also as a fishing platform.  Lately I have experimented with kayaks which are great fun.  It is however extremely disconcerting to hook a big fish, put pressure on it, and then discover that the kayak is moving with the fish towards the nearest mangrove branch despite the bend in your rod. The thought of a mini anchor had not occurred to me!  The big plus is that you can sneak in to very shallow water and stalk fish. The added plus of course is that you see a lot more of the wild life when you move silently than when you have a roaring outboard behind you.

So those are a few of the things I have learnt.

What haven’t I learned?  Well I still refuse to use the Bimini knot despite many attempt by friends to convert me (my toes are for walking on, and have no place in knot tying),  I still carry several hundred lures on my boat, most of which never see the light of day, and of course I still don’t sharpen my hooks often enough.  So this old dog still has plenty to learn….

To come and fish at Chris and Sue Harris’s Carribbean  retreat, Steppingstones, visit www.steppingstonesbelize.com.  Mention World Sea Fishing, and get a fantastic discount on accommodation rates.