Pole Anglers

I like fishing with a pole. Especially on a canal for decent roach. That's what pole fishing is all about.

Trouble is, many now are trying to catch big hard fighting fish with poles, this I think is wrong. One day you will see dear old Bob Nudd all set up for Atlantic Tarpon with his 22 metre ?45,000 pole with number 145 elastic.

First bite and the top three sections disappear into the briny in 1/2 a secind flat, thats about 5000 quid down the drain!!

Some poles around cost more than the money I spent on my new car. I just cannot see the value in 16 metres of carbon tube, no matter what it says in the ad about it being light and stiff.

?300.00 is the most that you need to spend on any pole.

Ron,

Like yourself, I really enjoy a good day pole fishing on venues where there is an abundance of small(ish) silver fish. Sadly, with the advent of the commercial carp "holes" these venues are now few and far between.

I bought my first pole quite a few years ago when I started match fishing, but soon began the "upgrade" trail looking for longer, lighter and stiffer poles.
In the end I settled on a Milo 10-10 which I still use today, although my original purchase included 4 top 4's I am now down to 2 top 4's having been broken on one, and another which fell to a large Carp on a CAC lake when the elastic bottomed and the top 3 went sailing out into the lake!

Whilst the prices of poles (and rods to a great extent) range from "cheap" to downright "mortgage worthy" I believe that it is a simple case of what you can afford you buy, and that which you can not afford remains a day dream for the future.

I doubt that I could justify the 2,500 pounds spent on the 10-10 but at the time of purchase, I didn't need to justofy it to anyone, not even myself.
Take, for example Avon style rods.
Now, an affordable JW type of rod costs less than 75 pounds. At the same time a Bob James Avon twin top is more like 250 pounds.
Another example being a decent 12/13 feet Barbel rod. I have seen adverts for good looking rods, with excellent reviews for around 125 pounds. Compare this to a Carbotec "weapon" at around 400 pounds and the spec' is likely to be very similar, and yet Carbotec sell lots of rods.

In the final analysis I suppose that it is a case of "horses for courses" and affordability, just like cars, houses and other major purchases.

That said, I was pleased to see some years ago when the World Championships put a moritorium on poles being no longer than 14.5m, having been to a few World Champs (as a spectator I hasten to add) where the less fortunate Countries were trying to compete with very old 9m poles.

Finally, with the loss of Milo from the Keenets "stable" is there anyone out there who can point me towards a Milo stockist where i might be able to replace a few top 4's?

One thing I cannot understand is the advent of what are called "Margin Poles", designed to fish close in.

What on earth is wrong with a fishing rod??

Anyone out there who can answer this?

If I had a margin pole, I'd use it to fish up against a feature like a overhanging bush or lily pads. With a pole you can put yout bait under the bush or right close to the lillies, whereas with a rod it might be impossible to cast your tackle there.

Also at the end of the day, pole fishing is easier for some folk. What could be more simple than a length of carbon with line attached to the end?

And what if a fighting fit double figure wild carp decides to take off at 30 feet per second a distance of 60 yards?

What ever happened to roach poles??
Are they now whips?

Fishing for silver fish on a pole has to be the best day's entertainment known. A tench or two just adds the cream.

However, I can't see for the life of me how the pole manufacturers justify such a heafty price. Even at ?300 it still provides a healthy profit margin.

What is a whip anyway? could it be that at ?40 for 6m of carbon it's short pole in disguise!

Ron,

what exactly is wrong with fishing for large fish on the pole? I agree with Peter and his points of the ammount of money nessecary to spend on a pole. I might add that my pole is a shimano 1100, 11 metres and it was second hand and cost me ?90. I hardly use it now, but in certain situations they are invaluble and have put some very good fish on the bank that I would never have hooked/landed on a running line. A margin pole is used for catching mainly carp out of the margines as quickly as possible, i.e. in a match situation. Its advantages over a rod and line are it is much easier to place a bait, you can use a pole pot or similar to feed in a very tight area and they can be much quicker to use than a rod and line. There are proably more advantages which I dont know as I dont have a margin pole and I doubt I ever will have one. Having said that its each to their own and if someone wants to catch carp from the margines all day thats absolutely fine by me, for a start it leaves me more pegs to chose from on the Trent (although some may arguee that more people fishing is what the Trent needs.)

Fred in answer to your question, all poles were known as roach poles when poles first came on the market as the majority of the time they were used to catch roach, with the progression in technology it is now possible to catch bigger fish on the pole so now any fish can be fished for with them hence the roach bit has been dropped.

Mark the difference between a pole and a whip is that a pole is elasticted and a whip has a solid carbon flic tipand is used for catching only small fish as it relies on the soft action of the flic tip to absob the fight of the fish for catching a large bag of small fish at close range a whip is far superior to a elasticated pole. Indeed some speciallist whip fishermen will have several whips set up at the same time with varying stiffeness of flick tips to suit different sizes of fish, say 1/2oz - 1oz and then 1oz - 2oz and 2oz up to maybee 4-5 oz.

Paul

Have a look at this site, click on the articles link and open the 7th article down, entitled, Barbel on the (shock horror)
Pole!! As I said, each to their own.

http://www.barbel.co.uk/

I used my 40 odd year old LERC Spiralglass roach pole on Sunday, as a whip!

Ron,
I dont know you personally and I respect your opinions(here comes the but). My opinions on pole fishing are completely opposite of yours and I would suggest you are wrong on every point you raise.
It would take far to much text to convince you.So I offer you the opportunity to maybe modify your stance.
Contact me and I will arrange a session with you my son Andrew and myself.
Regards Steve.

Many years ago I spent a few seasons pole fishing. This was in the early days of the technique when pole fishing meant "speed fishing" using a rig that was the same length as the pole allowing you to quickly swing a fish to hand and shake it off a barbless hook into your keepnet. It was good fun and produced some large catches.
Nowerdays, things have gotten out of hand with enormous poles with 6" of line on the end. Pole fishing has become slow and cumbersome and most pole fishermen seem to think that you cant catch fish 10" out from the bank.

Many pole fishermen actually consider bigger fish to be a nuisance in pools because they have difficulty in landing them on a pole that is being fished light (or even heavy in some cases)

I'm not knocking poles, just their use in wholly innapropriate circumstances. After all, I wouldnt go fishing for silvers using a carp rod and 12lb line and I wouldnt fish 30' out unless there was an absolute need to.

One of the fisheries I visit contains a variety of fish from small silvers, to large carp ( as nature intenteded ) and matches are held on the water each weekend in the summer. A point has now been reached with pole fishing that they are complaining to the organisers that there are too many big fish in the lake and they are getting broken too often during matches. Further to this, caught weights of large fish are capped in matches so as not to give an unfair advantage to anyone catching a biggy.

For gods sake, where is this sport heading to when big fish are ignored in preference to tiddlers.

Fine, if the biggys aint available or feeding then get the pole out but dont spoil things for rod and reel by trying to disadvantage them.

Tony,

I know exactly where you are coming from.

Match anglers do not really want big fish. What they do want in actually fact is a water containing lots of small to medium sized fish that can be caught in quantity that will test the skills of anglers in terms of speed fishing. I have spoken to many match anglers in my life and although there are exceptions, this is quite true.

The ideal match water would be full of 2 to 5 ounce roach, bite a chuck. Even a net sized fish is too big, they want to swing them in by hand, hundreds of them if possible.

A big fish is actually a nuisance, it takes time to play and often breaks the light tackle of the match angler after he has played it awhile. Watch a group of match anglers on the Trent. Sooner or later one of them will hook a barbel on his spiderweb tackle that decides to head off 60 yeards downstream. The angler downstream of the guy who hooks it won't generally shift and the angler who has hooked the barbel curses and swears at the top of his voice because he cannot get up and follow the fish. Part of match fishing rules I think.

I know because I have heard them.

I have seen smaller barbel, those that were landed on fine tackle, thrown up the bank in disgust. I have even heard anglers say that the Trent is "polluted" with barbel.

Unfortunately a vast number of coarse anglers are match fishermen. They make up the bulk of many angling clubs who still have rights on many rivers. There is no doubt in my mind that some of these anglers are actually killing barbel and big chub, just as they are killing pike!

I found three barbel of about 4 lbs each dead, on the bank, at a popular stretch of the river Trent last year.

Many match anglers actually hate big fish hunters. They hate to see a big barbel or other specimen fish caught by a specialist angler and being returned carefully to the water.

I returned a 9 pounder to the Trent last year in view of several match anglers and one of them comments that he would clonk such fish on the head if he got the chance.

What I am getting at is that there seems to be a great rift between some match anglers and the specimen hunting fraternity. This is a very great shame.

A couple of years ago I returned a nice zander back to the Fourty Foot. Two match anglers who saw me catch the fish nearly went beserk!

How can we solve this problem when all anglers need to stand together?

Over to you.

Thanks for your comments Ray.

I personally have no beef with pole anglers in general, in fact I see it as a usefull technique. I no longer pole fish as I now prefer using my 18' match rod Bohemian style when conditions demand it.

Being snapped by a big fish on a pole is part of the game, just like being pestered by tiddlers nibbling your bait when fishing for bigger stuff. I dont ever remember chucking small roach onto the bank because of their nuisance value.

I do have a beef with match organisers though. I am fortunate enough to be able to fish when and where I want, but many pleasure ( another dirty word ) anglers only get the chance to fish at weekends. So why oh why do match organisers insist on closed pools for matches. The poor bloke in the street can't even get onto his local water because they have matches all weekend and although there are often spare pegs after the draw, you cant fish em.

This leads to frustration and anger with many anglers and guess who gets the blame...the match angler with his pole.

I think match angling has a lot to answer for in this sport, turning anglers into fishing machines, pitting angler against angler instead of angler against fish and taking (for me anyway) much of the pleasure of fishing away.

Its not so much the cost of the poles now day's its the cost of the replacement sections should you ever need to replace a broken or lost section. UNBELIVABLE!!!!!!

Margin Poles can be pretty effective. The Carp being caught during the festival in Cypruss are up to about 3Ibs on average on one lake, but they fight like fury. On the Margin Pole with the correct elastic etc, the can be hooked and in the net in seconds,,,, you would not be able to do that with a running line.

surely the fights what fishings about though?

Nah, if that was the case, why improve the gear all the time, why all the technology? Why all the wonder baits? Its just about fun.

Dave, I prefer to hoik 'em.

Murray, I'll bet I could put any 3lb carp on the bank in seconds, with a rod and reel!

I've done it with rainbow trout and they can outfight any carp, size for size, any day.

I personally like to play a fish out before landing it.

1. its more fun

2. its kinder to the fish

3. why waste the moment hauling them in with one hand whilst chucking 20' of carbon into the bushes with the other.

just back from a cracking day's fishing...70ish Lbs of carp...smallest..4lb biggest 13ish.
Now what size knicker elastic would I need for that lot.

As for sophisticated baits and tackle, they were ALL caught on float with bread.