People Places and fish from 2013

People places and fish from 2013

People places and fish from 2013

Trying to remember–2003 to 2013

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I’ve spent the last few hours compiling a set of photographs from the collection that I have made over the last ten years whilst guiding for bass on the coast. I wanted to create an animated slide show of all ten seasons but I’ve decided just now that its an impossible task. The main reason being that having to leave out, and not include, so many magical moments would leave me feeling very unhappy and unsatisfied. It would, and never could be, complete in my mind.

Sitting here and running through the directories of photographs from each season, (>150K) which I further broke down into folders by customer visit or project, the volume of material and memories is at times overwhelming. Days and moments, fragments of time that were, and have been of such significance to me that to try and explain the depth and perhaps the meaning is simply beyond me. I had forgotten the sheer number of experiences, the learning that I have been lucky to have shared over those ten years.

I do know this though, it has been ten years of many things for me (good and bad), but when it came to bass fishing on the Wexford coast the good days, the really great days, were created by positive people who made it happen for both of us and also any of the people around us.

You made life easy with a genuine unaffected freedom of spirit and a generosity that is truly unique to the special moments of time spent fishing in good company.

If you can, or want to, remember fondly any of those days or those moments then perhaps you don’t need a slideshow in order to remind you!

Our successes have included both good and tough times, not always of course inclusive of fish. Think for a moment of Wexford, the colour of the sea and the fish, the sky and sand, the rain and the wind, the cold, the approaching wave, the sun and the taste of salt in a warm mist, the frustration, the effort, the patience, the disappointments, the take, the miss, the connection that you identified, once again the fish and the pleasure of good memories.

Thank you all very much – Jim Hendrick

A sling pack for 2014

One of my obsessions I’m afraid – this one is a must for me for a new season. Actually because of the way I’m running the business a bit differently this year a few things I’m using will be slightly different too – more later!

Wind and lots of it!

Happy Christmas

"Dogger, Rockall, Malin, Irish Sea:

Green, swift upsurges, North Atlantic flux

Conjured by that strong gale-warning voice,

Collapse into a sibilant penumbra"

 

Seamus Heaney  The Shipping forecast

Christmas birthday presents

‘He must learn that it is his business to be courteous and generous to extremes in all his encounters with his brother anglers by the waterside. He must learn that it is his business to understand as much as possible about the fish that make his sport, and to take responsibility for their perpetuation. He must learn that his pleasure is in fishing, not in killing; in the day and all its happenings rather than in a display of fish to vaunt his prowess; that his pleasure and his validity lie between himself and the God who made him, not in human approval or applause.’

Roderick L. Haig Brown – Fisherman’s Spring 1951

Little fish

THIS IS FLY DEC/JAN 2014–Issue 44

Wexford

Two hands are better than one, sometimes!

Beulah Surf Rod Specifications

•  Models: 7/8wt, 8/9wt, 9/10wt
•  Action: Light Fast Action/Fast Recovery
•  Length: 11 feet
•  Sections: 4
•  Reel Seat: Double up-locking, custom-designed & milled anodized aluminium salt resistant reel seat
•  Guides: Thin wire chrome over stainless snake guides & Alconite inserted stripping guides
•  Handle: AAA Grade Portuguese cork with custom cork burl ring highlights
•  Blank: High-gloss, Midnight Blue finish with a 52 million modulus carbon/glass scrim with IMA bias ply layup

Crafted to maximize your casting efficiency and range where distance is king and weather can be taxing, in other words the Irish coastline, the Beulah Surf Series Fly Rods are the preeminent option for coastal anglers and saltwater enthusiasts. Available in three models, the Beulah Surf Series is the result of a dedicated mission to produce two-handed rods that are not just adequate in in the surf, but refined tools that command the water in a way no ordinary Spey rod can. Simply put, the Beulah Surf Fly Rods are designed to provide anglers with easy distance.

With every feature honed to better your surf casting abilities—from the elongated grips that support overhead two-handed casting to an action that lends itself to powerful casts and big flies—the Beulah Surf Series is entirely saltwater safe and backed by a lifetime warranty. These rods take the effortless power that two handed rods provide to swing fishermen, and bring it to the overhead casting arena for a hugely efficient and rewarding experience.

These are not switch rods or spey rods or rods adapted with a kit they are true overhead DH rods designed for saltwater fly fishing and casting

And the Line Specifications

Beulah's all new Serum is a Specialty Surf Taper Fly Line.  It is the answer to the Salt Water DH Fly Fisherman’s prayers.  With the Serum you get Faster Pickup, Quicker Rod Load, an Interchangeable Tip, 130′ Total Length, and a Taper that turns over big bulky flies like they are #2 crabs.  The Serum Line matched with one of the Surf Rods completes the recipe for long accurate delivery of your fly to the fish that like to stay, “just far enough away”.

The Beulah Serum Specialty Surf Taper is a fully integrated shooting head designed for distance casting with interchangeable tips.  Match it to the Surf Rods above and you have a dream combination for easy saltwater fly casting.

The short and condensed head loads the rod quickly and shoots an extreme length of line.  Each line comes with an 11’ interchangeable, loop to loop, Intermediate Beulah Tip, tapered to positively transfer casting energy from the head to the fly.  This head/tip system is ideal to fish from beach or boat, for species that require long casts with medium to large flies. The looped Beulah tip system gives you one line with the ability to fish a variety water depth. The Serum line comes with line ID, and has 35lb core tensile strength and 130 foot overall length including the tip.

So whether you like to swing, overhead in the surf, or cast big flies with little effort these combinations provide the key – contact me at any time for more details.

regards Jim

The 140 tonne accident

From the Irish examiner 04/12/2014

Dear Sir

The internet is alive with reports of a massive haul of mullet  estimated at 140 tonnes a mile south of the cork coast by herring trawlers . Such a huge shoal of migratory mullet will likely have included thousands of protected bass also . While there is nothing illegal or indeed even intentional maybe, in this reported  haul it is in my opinion, a sad event and indicative of inappropriate exploitation of  our marine resources . It will have a major impact on numbers of mullet and bass in our Co.Cork harbours and estuaries next year , on  species such as otter, porpoises etc. that depend on them and the tourist industry. I appeal to our ministers to introduce a reasonable commercial-free fishing  zone around our coastline to protect our wildlife and young fish and to create a modern inshore coast guard  to protect our marine ecosystem.

Save Our Seas ! 

sincerely…..

__________________________________________________________________

There doesn’t appear to be any denial in relation to the accident even though the following extrapolation is extraordinary in its contemplation it must be close to a reasonable extract derived from the following numbers below

The average size of mullet caught during the CSBF 2013 was - 2.62lb, lets call that 1.2kg

1 tonne = 835 Mullet
140 tonnes = 116,900 Mullet

Mullet and bass are sociable so there must have been as stated above an associated impact on the protected population of bass. The internet was in fact NOT alive to the impact or an expression of outrage, one person did absorb a lot of flack so…

__________________________________________________________________

What does 140 tonnes convert to?

800 Dolphins or

62,000 White fronted geese or

400,000 Red squirrels or

1,000 Common seals or

17,500 Otters or

13,000 Swans or

35,000 Golden Eagles or

40,000 Atlantic salmon or

140,000 Pine martens or, in other words, a very serious accident impacting seriously on a national natural resource.

An autumn to remember

golden treasure VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

Christmas street

Unwinding–a short film by Carl Dixon

Just to be out there–a plan that kinda came together!

I felt it was going to happen way back around the 18th November and to a large extent it did and is still. Its still out there. I had planned to work out an article yesterday and today for Fly Fishing & Fly Tying with David. Unfortunately the real world is getting in the way a lot at the moment and the wolves have to be kept from the door so today was a no and we didn’t complete the article.

Speaking of doors the fly I am fishing with at the moment is, I feel, about to open one door another bit, don’t get me wrong there’s nothing revolutionary about it and after all there is nothing new in fly fishing, but what I could do with it yesterday just enhanced another aspect of bass on the fly VERY successfully. More of this later.

Thanks to David for the support, craic, and general good time! We saw fish hunt, we saw fish follow, we had hits and we had misses and we had long periods of inactivity. We didn’t have any big fish – but would I rather be anywhere else than where I was yesterday morning and afternoon – No I don’t think so.

Its not too often you can get these conditions running into early December on the Wexford coast

AND There’s another chance this week yet and under the current timings I think I'm going to have to try and take it. More juggling and out come the bigger flies, shorter leaders and the #9 lines.

I think I’ll stay on home ground though and fingers crossed – but its going to be exciting and I cant wait.

Its the start of a new promise – more fly fishing and time for Jim Hendrick for a while.