I wanted to start out this year the way I mean to continue it though and get a post done, as the title says this is going to be a recap on my years fishing as well as at the end I'm going to set myself a few goals for next year.
To start out with I thought I'd go with something I write about quite a lot on here and go through my LRF fishing. I started out strong this year as far as species was concerned but unfortunately didn't reach my goal of 20 for the year though.
So in the end I managed 12 not bad and 4 better that 2016 so I'm happy enough with how I got on. The Species are as follows:
Shanny (common Blenny)
Common Goby
Black Goby
Sand Goby
Corkwing Wrasse
Scorpion Fish
Sand Smelt
Ballan Wrasse
Tompot Blenny
Bass
Goldsinny Wrasse
Rock Goby.
I had a whole lot of fun this year searching these little guys out down the Quay, next year though there is going to be changes to my sea fishing and how I'm going to be working it but I will explain more at the end.
Moving on then and onto another goal I set myself at the end of last year, this goal was for Carp fishing and was to catch 5 fish of 20lb and over, once again it was another one I started out strong after a early spring trip to Todber Manor with Mark my ever trusty fishing partner.
We went there for a 48 hour session we had booked about 3 weeks prior, so we had a lot a good preparation time before the trip and this was something I made sure I used to the fullest, rig tying, preparing baits with glugs, prepping spod mixes and doing a whole load of research on the lake itself. Day 1 seen me bank 2 fish of 20lb so an excellent start to my years goal, I managed another 4 fish that trip but the next best being 18lb and a few oz.
One notable thing that did happen on the Todber trip was that Mark managed to join me as a proud member of the 20 club, I could not have been more happy for him and that also means this year we are both on level pegging trying to join the 30 club!
This goal though took a very unexpected turn for the worse when we went back to our campaign water from a few years ago to find out it had been Ottered, so unfortunately for a while we have had to say goodbye to the White Lake and 2018 will see us looking for a new water to call home for the year!
We do have 1 or 2 in mind but its going to take a bit of research into the waters before a decision is made. One thing Mark and myself have been doing a lot again is match fishing, This is something I have really enjoyed in 2017 and I am super excited to see what this year brings.
Together we fished countless open matches at Whitemoor Lakes, Joined and fished the Orchards Lakes Club League and we are 3 matches into a 6 match silvers series held over the 2 venues. I have spent a lot of time looking into upgrading kit and things for next year I have made the move from the Maver 13m pole i was using to buying a 16m Daiwa Connoisseur G50, this was a bit of an investment and one that I had to think a lot about, (as well a begging the Mrs) No in all honesty my other half has always been nothing but supportive of me in everything I do and she is going to play a big part this year!
Whilst match fishing I accomplished one of the goals set for myself, during one of the league matches at Orchards I landed a nice 2lb Barbel, this was a species I have not caught before but visually are one of my favorites and 2017 was the year I wanted to catch and admire one.
I thought I could not have been happier with the days fishing and even turned to the guy on the next peg over and told him 'If I finished dead last I would still be happy with the day' turns out though I finished 2nd in section and picked up a few quid as well so I did get better!
After this though I started to spend a lot of time looking into how to target Barbel and Chub on the river, my specimen fishing really got put aside due to everything else that was going on. By this time I was getting ready to move home and work was up and down where shift patterns were concerned so didnt have much time for fishing, I started heading to Throop and Longham which are both close to home and quite well known stretches of the Dorset Stour.
I decided to target Chub to start with so looked into baits and tactics, I decided to make my own cheese paste and fish that, I got out for 3 sessions until now as the weather has been awful, one thing that is changing though is my bait and tackle approach thanks to an announcement I will make I little further into this post.
I targeted Dace a little earlier in the year but only managed a couple and nothing of a great size, in fact the only one I caught that I was proud of I had forgotten my scales so will be out after these again at some point early next river season!
Lastly before I move on to a couple of announcements I am planning on doing a whole lot more Lure fishing again going into the Spring and Summer, time to make the other guys in the Lure Nuts family proud! My personal bests for Pike and Perch stand at 15lb and 1lb 13oz respectively and this IS something I will be bettering this year!
Ok so now onto the announcements firstly I'm very proud to say that 2017 seen me become a blogger and angler as part of Dino floats, this one I believe I may have mentioned to a few people before but wanted to make it official in a post!
The latest one however and one I have not mentioned to anyone as of yet is I am now a member of Team Pallatrax, this is a company with great forward thinking, some great innovative products as well as being extremely environmentally aware and their products reflect this!
You can find links to both of the companies web pages on the right had side of this blog, simply click the images.
So moving onto goals for 2018:
SEA FISHING:
This is something I am changing as I want to expand my search for species, I will now be classing all sea fishing as just that, LRF, Boat trips (not done one before but hoping to do at least 3 this year) and beach fishing will all come under the same search for me now. This year the goal will be the same as last years failed target so once again I'm chasing 20 species.
SPECIMEN FISHING:
I am setting myself a few different targets this year where specimen fishing is concerned, I would love to catch my first river Barbel and also to beat my Chub PB of 2lb 8oz, I want to officially set a Dace PB, I also have personal bests for most species but non are especially great so I want to break 3 of them as a rounded goal! I wont list them as there is numerous different ones.
CARP FISHING:
This is one I have looked at trying to set myself but at the moment without having a target water in mind I am having trouble doing anything where this is concerned, I will set some once we have decided on a water to target.
LURE FISHING:
As mentioned before I want to beat my Pike and Perch lure caught personal bests, I also want my 1st lure caught Chub and Zander, these are something I'm hoping to do on group meets with the Lure Nuts guys, a group of people I like to call family.
FATHER SON FISHING:
This is something I thought I would add in this year as he is now wanting to come fishing with me more and more. These goals he set for himself. He wants 5 salt water species, also he wants to get himself in the angling times magazine 10 times (on the kingfisher pages) and finally his Carp personal best is 8lb and he wants to land a double this year.
Thank you all very much for reading, I know I have said before I am going to be writing more often, but this year I mean it, THESE POSTS WILL BE WEEKLY and that my friends is a promise!
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