Itching to go 'Crabbin'

A warm welcome to this weeks blog update and as promised in last weeks blog it is only going to be a quick update rather than a full blog.  I had planned to update the blog on Friday night but i did not get back from our family holiday in Cornwall till 8pm on Friday so it was a quick sleep before heading out very early on Saturday for a much needed fishing fix on the River Dee, more on this weekends fishing in this Fridays update,

I did take delivery of the product that i will be reviewing in the week before i left for Cornwall and i am pleased to announce it is called the Minke Fishing tool.  It is a tool that is used to tie hooks to main line and also trim of any loose ends.  It is a product that only got launched while i was on holiday so i am really excited to have been asked to review this tool and i cant wait to make a start on that this week, look out for more on this item on the blog in the coming weeks.

I did have a last minute urge before we left on Friday to go fishing and i managed to winkle a Friday afternoon off from work.  As time was of the essence it could only be a quick few hours on the local Bridgewater canal, in fact it was the same swim i fished the previous week when we stopped off on the way home form the River Dee.

I have to say it was an enjoyable evening on the canal with plenty of bites and in typical canal fashion i never knew what the next fish was going to be as the pendulum of both fish size and fish species swung from bite to bite.  The crowning glory of the session would have to be the nice bream but i was equally as impressed with the amount of "billy" perch i caught which really wet my appetite for what it could produce come winter time as in my opinion where there are good numbers of small perch there is almost certainly mum and dad lurking in the near by reeds just waiting to be coaxed out by a big fat juicy lob worm.

The final net went just over 9lb and the end and considering how noisy it was on the banks with boats, walkers and joggers i was more than made up with the final net of fish and left for my holidays a happy angler.

Itching To Go 'Crabbin'

I was really tempted to take a rod with me on our holiday but i decided against it as i felt i just needed to break away from the whole mindset of actually going fishing for a week, but as all anglers who are addicted to this never ending search for the holy grail know it was never going to be the case and by the Tuesday i was clucking bit time, i needed a fishy fix :-). I toyed with the idea of going on a 4 hour wreck fishing trip but the more i thought about it i just wasn't feeling it i decided to do a pastime that holds so many happy memories for me from holidays as a kid and that was to go Crabbing!

Now anyone who has tried this knows just how fascinating it is and believe me if you have kids and you want to keep them quiet for not only a few hours but a few days get them a crabbing kit as the time just flies by as you tentatively retrieve your bait to see if any feisty crabs have latched onto your bait.  

Now i have to admit i have been out of the crabbing scene for quite some years now so i was more than i little rusty but i felt i had equipped myself well, armed with 5000mm line down to a french boom to a small section of 100lb mono and a size 2 hook i felt i was more than prepared for my battle with Sebastian's mates.  Now i don't often give many tips out on my blog and i certainly don't like giving any crabbing tips out as we all know a good crabber holds his crabbing secrets close to his chest but i have decided to go public with mine and here it is............BACON!!  God help any pigs that may ever find themselves in our seas, the crabs go mad for the streaky slithers.

So there i was on Padstow Harbour surrounded by hordes of children on the top of their crabbin game, i was not alone though as amongst these crabbing elites was a few more of us old school adults, sorry i rephrase that "Dads teaching their kids crabbing" wink wink.

Ready to wet a crabbing line.

Well all i can say is i have seriously lost my touch as time and time again the crabs kept falling off the line as soon as they left the water!! I felt like i was past it and too old for this crabbing game, it was official crabbing is a young man's game, past it!.  I did however notice one schoolboy error i had made and it was my lack of keeping up with the times as it seems crabbing technology had moved on since my day.  i felt as if i was sat there with a cane rod and a Mitchell reel while all around me my competitors where armed with bite alarms and carbon fibre rods as my eyes where drawn to the nets these whipper snappers where using where the bait sits inside a dropper net so when the crab takes the bait you lift enclosing the crab inside and with that i admitted defeat and exited the harbour.

Alas on reflection i guess i should be happy that the nearest i got to catching crabs in Cornwall was the ones waiting to be cooked in Rick Steins Fish and Chip shop where my trusty Gilly treated me to a moral boosting fish and chip dinner so i guess every cloud has a silver lining.

There will be more on the holiday and this weeks fishing in next weeks update so till then i leave you with a picture of one of the funniest names i have ever seen for a restaurant, i give you Senor Dicks.

Tight crabbing lines

Danny