The seven habits of highly effective anglers

bennygesserit · Jun 20, 2015

I have been listening to some TED Talks today while painting the Kitchen.

What do you think makes an angler more effective ( do you even want to be effective or just relax ? )

I would put them as the following

locating the fish
being stealthy
feeding the right amount
accurate casting
ringing the changes
feeding multiple swims
having the right gear

What do you think ?

peter crabtree · Jun 20, 2015

8. Fishing in the winter....

Dave Smith · Jun 20, 2015

9. Understand your topography

Derek Gibson · Jun 20, 2015

Understand your specific species. With Chub for example, being stealthy equals location. Having the right gear allows for accurate casting and being able to extract the fish from awkward swims.

So I suppose that's only two combined choices for me, plus I rarely bait a swim.

itsfishingnotcatching · Jun 20, 2015

Get lucky

Bob Hornegold · Jun 20, 2015

1/. Know the Species inside out, that you are after catching.
2/. Fish a venue that holds the Species you are after.
3/. Know where the species are likely to be at any given time of the year on the venue you are fishing.
4/. Concentrate on a method that you have confidence in and you know works.
5/. Use a bait that you have 100% faith in and you know works.
6/. Do not follow the crowd, do your own thing.
7/. Do Your Time !!

S-Kippy · Jun 20, 2015

All laudable. You can't catch fish that aren't there either to begin with or as a result of you. Pretty obvious maybe but the rest don't count for diddly if you get that wrong.

Thereafter its feeding for me,something that let's me down sometimes and the willingness to try something different when Plan A fails. I suppose that's belief....or confidence or something. I know people who seem to almost will fish onto the hook because they simply refuse to not catch.

There are one or two situations/species/locations where I'm like that but I can't do it everywhere. The truly good anglers can....or seem to. I am in awe of them.

no-one in particular · Jun 21, 2015

I'm tempted to say none of these, just go and plonk your float in any bit of water and wait, I do wonder sometimes if those that do end up catching more than all us "experts" at times, I mean we all seem to have enough blanks, lose good fish etc. Its a bit like the expert at picking horses and loses his money and the bloke who chooses his kids and aunties names comes up with the big jackpot. How often does that happen and in fishing as well. The times I have stood on a pier and the £100,s of gear is cast to the heavens without a sniff and the kid walks on, plonks his little £5 rod down and catches a huge Bass.
I am also tempted to say get a sex change because every woman I have fished with seems to pull out plenty of fish "without trying". Maybe that's a nip and tuck too far so, I think us experts aught to just carry on blanking and losing fish and keep blaming the weather, the conditions, the gods and the cat.

Tee-Cee · Jun 21, 2015

Lateral thinking, in that trying something a little bit different can produce fish. Not being lazy to change the set-up even if you've only had a couple of casts rather than ' making do ' and hoping for the best. Moving swims regardless of how long it takes to lug the gear to a new spot. Fishing as far away as possible from the ' crowd ' despite the long walk !
Have the tackle in tip top condition for the job in hand having spent the previous evening thinking about how you will fish the next day ( give or take )..Likewise the bait, which has to be spot on in quality.

All the lists above absolutely right, but in my book if you don't cover the obvious points such as fish location etc etc etc as a matter of course, then you on a loser from the off.

No, for me it's thinking outside the box, IF the standard methods don't work, and walking away from a session knowing you've done everything possible to catch.

Laziness is pretty major, though.................It's what I see so many times on the bank, normally accompanied by ' they are just not feeding today ' when all it ( might ) take is a bit of thought...

Is that seven points.....??

lambert1 · Jun 21, 2015

I pretty much agree with Tony and on reflection it sort of sums up my first trip of the season. I had planned to fish a particular swim with a particular method and bait and arrived hot and tired after a hard days work. I noticed that the wind was getting up and sure enough the quiver tip was bouncing all over the place, even close to the water. Not to put too fine a point on it I started to get the hump. What I should have done, was had a calm re-think and moved to a more sheltered swim. It was like arriving at a beach and refusing to move when the weather changed because I had paid for the deckchair! I had effectively put pressure on myself by getting everything ready for days before and totally failing to take the weather into account (in my defence it had been hot and still all week practically). Hard learned lesson, but one I will learn from. I will have a very different approach next week!

law · Jun 21, 2015

Bob Hornegold said:
1/. Know the Species inside out, that you are after catching.

I would have agreed with you on that one once upon a time. But now, that's right down my list.

Prime example- as we all 'know', tench feed on the bottom. So one lake I fish that's all I did. Had the odd one, but nothing big. 2-3lb. I knew there was bigger in there- I'd seen up to 9lb on the bank.
After a couple of seasons and more small ones, I watched someone else tench bashing as they were casting. They were fishing 2ft deep (the lake is 7ft).
I asked the guy, who told me that all of the bigger fish stay in the upper layers.
As soon as I shallowed up, I saw a 6lb fish.

Bob Hornegold · Jun 22, 2015

law said:
I would have agreed with you on that one once upon a time. But now, that's right down my list.

Prime example- as we all 'know', tench feed on the bottom. So one lake I fish that's all I did. Had the odd one, but nothing big. 2-3lb. I knew there was bigger in there- I'd seen up to 9lb on the bank.
After a couple of seasons and more small ones, I watched someone else tench bashing as they were casting. They were fishing 2ft deep (the lake is 7ft).
I asked the guy, who told me that all of the bigger fish stay in the upper layers.
As soon as I shallowed up, I saw a 6lb fish.

Well Law, you obviously did not know the species inside out or you would have know to fish at 2ft below the surface, not on the bottom ?

Bob

Keith M · Jun 22, 2015

As Walker said the three most important things are:

1. Location, 2. Location and 3. Location.

Followed closely by Stealth, Presentation (of both hookbait and feed); and Confidence.

If you can present an acceptable bait to a fish without the fish being aware of you or of something wrong in your presentation then you are half way there.
And if you are confident then you won't be changing your baits and methods when you don't always need to; and you will always be expecting a bite and therefore you'll always be alert; rather than thinking that the fish are not feeding or you don't have the right bait and virtually giving up.

Keith

Derek Gibson · Jun 23, 2015

Those fundamentals are as relevant today as they were when Walker first penned them over fifty years ago, and JW Martin even earlier, sometime in the 1880s.

Tackle ''may'' have improved but the basic principles remain the same. Locate the fish, don't spook them, present the right bait using the right tackle for the situation, and results should follow.

We do however have a distinct advantage over the likes of JW Martin, at least on the smaller rivers, and that is ''Polarised'' glasses. These are indispensible for the exploring angler.

Bob Hornegold · Jun 23, 2015

Derek and Keith are of course correct, but location can be difficult in the depth of Winter when a River or Canal is in Flood !!

You have to do your homework long before those condition occur and go on past experience.

As an example the Chub were extremely hard to find on the Lea last year, you had to on what you had found in previous years.

Do your time and try all the spots you had tried in previous years, it turned out that the Chub (3 different 8s) were in the section above those I had tickets to fish !!

Lesson learned :wh

Bob

Tee-Cee · Jun 23, 2015

....but isn't what makes angling so frustrating, yet exciting and challenging ?

Take the last couple of days; Yesterday I fished for roach from 5.30 in the rain and heavy cloud. I sat under the umbrella the whole time in a swim normally a no-no as it's bathed in sunshine and caught 30+ good roach.
Today, same lake and a carp of 6lbs first cast that raced around another swim for a while and wrecked it so I moved to another swim, but the same thing happened ( a lost carp and smashed tackle ) so I returned to yesterdays swim as the light cloud seemed set in for the day. Wrong guess, as the sun came out and I needed to move again to find a shaded swim with the outside chance of a few more fish. The mental note book came into play and away I went.

This involved two trips to move the gear to the other side of the lake ( 30 mins total ) but I did find more fish - nothing special, but well worth it........So, a bit of effort, a bit of knowledge of where the fish might be, a bit of lugging and it was all came good in the end...

On my way home I passed a couple on anglers sprawled in chairs taking in the sunshine......but no fish !!

laguna · Jun 24, 2015

The seven habits of highly effective anglers?

Locate
Feed
Adapt
Persist
Invent
Move
Repeat

no-one in particular · Jun 24, 2015

Tee-Cee said:
....

On my way home I passed a couple on anglers sprawled in chairs taking in the sunshine......but no fish !!

I didn't know fishing magic were having a fish in?

Tee-Cee · Jun 24, 2015

That'll be Gerry, then...............

no-one in particular · Jun 24, 2015

Tee-Cee said:
That'll be Gerry, then..............................

Holding a master class in the art !

The seven habits of highly effective anglers

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