My normal coarse fishing kit is a rag bag of old and new, borrowed but never under any circumstances, blue. I own no blue gear whatsoever, it is all green, brown or black, and I suppose that says something about my fishing preferences...? However, when I was a sea angler I owned loads of blue clothing - it seemed somehow appropriate there.
Coarse Rods - Quivertip
DAM Chevron Winklepicker - an 8 foot fairy wand of a rod that I use for the smallest of small stream roach fishing. It's an old rod now, and I can't for the life of me remember how I came to own it...! A one pound roach has this rod bent double!
Shakespeare Mach 2 Wand - A pair of slender 9 foot carbon tip rods ideally suited to canal ledgering work on space limited tow paths, small stream roach fishing, and for scaring yourself half to death catching small stream specimen chub when after the aforementioned small stream roach! Has a magnificent selection of four tips, two in glass and two in carbon, and in various sensitivities all the way down to silly delicate and all the way up to manly stout. Absolutely a 'must have' rod for anyone who hates skull hauling fish and likes to wield a rod that brings respect for the fighting abilities of our smaller species. Get one, or something like it. Great fun!
Masterline John Wilson Avon Quiver - A classic 1.25 test avon rod that has safely subdued everything from big roach to near double figure barbel and river carp up to fifteen pounds. Can't imagine not having this rod in my armoury, it's that good.
Ron Thompson Godfather Avon Quiver - A ridiculously cheap price paid for a very powerful and capable pair of 1.75 test heavy Avon rods that are soft enough to handle smaller fish with some delicacy but with the poke to sudbue anything that I'm likely to encounter. Has proper spigot joints too. I use these for all my barbel, big bream, river carp and predator fishing with complete confidence.
Garbolino 'Swinton' heavy feeder - I bought this unknown quantity from cash converters for a tenner, it still had the plastic wrap on the handle and was unused. It is a powerful sharp actioned rod that is capable of throwing big weights - an out and out long distance rod is what it is and one that excels in situations where other rods fold, such as holding its own against a strong current. It was used recently to catch roach off the far bank of the Avon at Stratford across no less than 50 yards of flowing water that had the JW quiver bent right over. This beast just sat there unmoved by it all! That day it earned a place in my rod holdall...
Coarse Rods - Float
Sundridge 13ft carbon match - bought second hand along with a very nice float rod with a full cork handle by the same manufacturer that was later stolen, not a rod that I am overly fond of because of its ugly full duplon handle but perfectly capable and very good for Wallis casting off the centrepin. Currently my only dedicated float rod...
DAM 13ft carbon match - bought second hand, a nice light rod with a crisp tippy action that makes it perfect for picking up lots of line on a long trot downstream. Has subdued an acrobatic 4lb sea trout and was having little trouble with a double-figure salmon hooked just twenty minutes earlier, but the hook straightened out!
Coarse Rods - Carp and Pike
A pair of old carbon composite rods by Cormoran, a gift of hand-me-downs from my younger brother when he upgraded to something more salubrious, is all I have in the high test curve department, and even then they are only through action, 2 lb test. I use them more for bass fishing than for anything else, a use for which they are ideally suited. I have had plenty of carp on them though, and they perform particularly well at close quarters in very snaggy hook and hold swims because of the through action blanks.
Ultra-cult types would laugh their little heads off at these old oddities...!
Coarse Rods - Cane
I have two cane rods, one a really pleasant 1.25 test avon rod with high bell rings in built cane that has landed me quite a few game fish without a whimper and the other a recent acquisition that I may well modify and turn into a barbel/carp rod with its 1.75 test and through action. Both these rods are anonymous.
Coarse Reels - Fixed Spool
A pair of ABU Cardinal 104's, Rear Drag - Brand new and as yet unused. I have just acquired these and will soon put them through their paces, expecting them to give sterling service as all ABU products do - for a lifetime.
DAM QUICK Match - A funny little thing that I have never used and probably never will. I think it came with the winklepicker rod. I might give this away to a kid one day.
Shimano Hyperloop 3000 - a grey graphite reel bought from cash converters for a pittance. Perfectly servicable but utterly characterless and now rendered redundant by the far nicer ABU's mentioned above. Has become a back-up reel.
A pair of Okuma black graphite reels that I've used and abused for years but are still perfectly servicable and running as well as they ever did. The reels are now so worn that I can hardly see see any model name or number but they are 5000 size, rear drag, non-freespool carp type reels. They have been fully immersed in salt water and caked in mud from the estuaries of Essex and then left in that state for a whole year in a hot airing cupboard before going back into service without ever being cleaned. They have never let me down and just keep going and going. Currently used for barbel and carp fishing.
Coarse Reels - Centre pin
Okuma Aventa Pro - A lovely modern reel that has been a privilege to own. Cannot imagine life without this reel. Handles everything, wallis casts like dream and trots perfectly. What else can I say but get one for yourself!
Coarse Reels - Multiplier
ABU Black Max bait casting reel - A nice little multiplier that I haven't used very much, but should use more often. It's waiting to find itself!
Coarse Tackle - Miscellaneous
Salter Brecknell Model 15 brass spring balance - four pounds in one ounce increments. I love this old fashioned precision spring balance bought with roach and dace in mind. Tactile and attractive looking, goes well in a landing net and reel style trophy shot of big fish.
Two landing nets by Korum - One is the specimen barbel net with latex mesh at 30 inches and the second the 24 inch Midi Specimen net with freeflow mesh. Both are spoon shaped nets with solid aluminium frames and solid spreader block, both have performed exceptionally well and look as good as new. The landing net handle is also a Korum production, a ten foot three section lightweight carbon affair, the short top section designed to allow the angler to remove the net easily from the handle. All good kit.
Korum two rod Quiver and tackle bag - Both have served me for the last couple of years and suit my roaming approach very well. My only complaint is that the cheap soft plastic shoulder pad on the tackle bag carrying strap wore through very quickly and is now in tatters - it will soon need replacing.
Kelly Kettle
Just get one! These are brilliant things that boil a pint of water with the barest minimum of the very kinds of readily available fuel, such as old reed stems, dried grasses, twigs and debris found on the bank. Just load the base with as much fuel as it will take, push a lighter or match flame into one of the holes in the base and then feed the flames through the chimney with more fuel as it burns. Perfect fresh brews are infinitely better than anything out of a flask.
Sea Rods - Beach
An ABU prototype three-piece beachcaster - a glorious beast of a rod that never went into production.
Way back in 2001 I joined a sea fishing forum and started a thread asking if anyone knew of a travel beachcaster of any substance, because I wanted a proper rod to sling over my shoulder and go out fishing by motorbike. There were none suitable for purpose on the market (plenty now) excepting the usual trashy telescopic rods, but an ABU main dealer down south said that he had an ABU prototype rod with a busted ring that he'd been sent for field testing that I could have for nothing...! How could I refuse such an offer?
It duly arrived by post and I unwrapped this fabulous slim three piece wonder in high modulus carbon. The butt section is almost impossible to put any kind of bend into unless you put it across the knee and pull with both hands. Fully assembled it was thirteen feet of sheer power, easily out gunning all my other beach rods. The broken ring had a good frame but the lining was missing so I took the mid section along to the local tackle shop and chose a few rings that looked a near fit, pushed the linings out and pushed the best into place, where it has been ever since.
I doubt if I have ever had cause to fully compress the rod having never taken it on the field for a thorough thrashing, but on the beach it handles any weight and any bait combination you care to ask it to propel. I don't think 'test curve' is meaningful when it comes to measuring such a rod's power, nor do I think 'casting weight' is that useful either. With this rod and others like it the rating should be in 'bollocks' for you need to muster all the bollocks you can (Neil McKellow has eleven...) to perform a full blown pendulum cast, a cast which turns the otherwise innocent fishing rod into a lethal weapon capable of felling an errant elephant.
An ABU Esprit 12 foot beachcaster - fixed spool. A lovely intermediate beach rod with a very responsive tip ideal for the smaller and less aggressive biting species. Has brought a lot of fish to the beach and will serve for ever.
Sea Reels - Multiplier
ABU Ambassadeur 6500 C3 - As with all of the historic Ambassadeur range of reels, a marvel of engineering that has not changed very much in either style or content in over 60 years. It's amazing to think that a reel that was designed so long ago not only looks the same as it ever did, but still looks as modern as it ever did!
This is the cheapest of the 6500 range but with these reels that does not mean less quality, just less features such as magnetic braking and what have you, features that quite frankly I just don't need. Mine had a level wind as new, which was removed when I teamed it up with the aforementioned ABU three piece rod and realised that the mechanism was seriously hampering the enormous distances the rod wanted to cast. A truly brilliant reel.
More soon...
