Peeler crab is my go-to winter bait for rays. When the water cools and the rays move in close, nothing matches that sweet, oily scent and the soft, yielding texture of a well-prepared peeler. The trick is not just buying good crab, but handling it properly from freezer to hook so it stays supple...
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How-To Guides
Why I map exit corridors before the tide takes the shoreI’ve had a few too...
How-To Guides
Winter in Wales brings cold water, clear tides and hungry cod pushing into bays...
How-To Guides
When I started fishing tidal ledges along the Welsh coast I lost more than a...
How-To Guides
I used to assume that heavier leads automatically meant farther casts from...
When I started fishing tidal ledges along the Welsh coast I lost more than a few rigs to sudden blowouts: the kind that yank your sinker into the surf, tangle your trace around submerged rocks, or send your bait ripping across the sand. Over the...
I used to assume that heavier leads automatically meant farther casts from pebble beaches. After a few seasons of re-tuning rigs and breaking more plugs than I cared to count, I swapped to a 30g sliding bomb paired with a 6ft trace and the change...
I’ll cut straight to it: if you want to trigger estuary bass under marina lights with soft plastics you need two things to line up — the right tide and the right light window — and then you must present your lure like a wounded baitfish. Over...
I’ve lost count of the times I’ve watched a bait roll helplessly along a tidal ledge, or seen it snagged on the next swell because my sinker was either too light to hold or so heavy it bounced the bait into the weed. Getting sinker weight right...
I’ve spent more mornings than I can count standing on Welsh cobbles, watching terns spiral and sea foam gather along a line that seemed to hum with life. Over the years I learned to read those small signs — bird behaviour, foam lines, a ripple...
I won't pretend there's a single magic trick to pull double-figure rays off slippery tidal ledges — but after a few seasons of stubborn dawns, soaked waders and the odd ecstatic shout when a big shoulder rolls at the surface, I've learned a...
I always get a buzz when the harbour lights start to bleed into the water — there’s something about that contrast between artificial glow and moving tide that turns a quiet spot into a pollack magnet. Over the years I’ve learned one simple...
I spend a lot of spring mornings standing on low, wind-scoured sandbanks, watching the tide line for rolling bass and trying to place a lure where the fish will meet it. For several seasons I’ve relied on a Daiwa Saltiga 5500 to turn those long,...
I fish harbours at night more than I admit to my smartphone’s location history. There’s something addictive about the way pollack light up under quay lamps, how a single glow stick makes the water read like a topographic map of current and...
There are mornings when the estuary mouth looks like someone flipped a coin and the sea chose "empty": flat water, no bait flicks, and that sinking feeling that today's session is going to be a long, cold lesson in patience. This particular morning,...