My favourite bass lure of 2008

• As we move swiftly into a chilly 2009, here are some thoughts on my stand out favourite bass lure of 2008. Anybody who has been following this blog will know that I have a bit of a problem when it comes to (shiny new) bass lures, but there was without doubt one single lure that stood out for me last year. Bear in mind that I am talking about a combination of what I saw caught, plus what I caught myself, for most of the time I tend to put my fishing gear down and take photos when the fish come on the feed.

• So my top bass lure of 2008 has to be the Tackle House Feed Shallow, as you can see in these photos. I saw a huge amount of good bass taken on these lures last year, and I actually managed a few myself as well !! Lures like this are not easy to track down, but you can get them from Mick at Mr. Fish. No, they are not cheap, and yes, you would be well advised to replace the (rubbish) trebles with some decent ones, but the lure kills, plain and simple. But why on earth does a company like Tackle House put such awful hooks on such a good lure ?

• There are of course many outstanding bass lures out there, and some need not cost a bomb. The continuously outstanding Maria Chase BW in holographic silver is going to keep on catching plenty of fish (get them here), and last year I really learnt a hell of a lot about modern bass fishing, and some of the tools we can use to improve our catch rates. Lures such as the various and outstanding Duo Tide Minnow and Terrif range, the Xorus Patchinko, of course the excellent Lucky Craft Flash Minnow, GunFish and Sammy (see here) are always in my lure box now, together with an expanding range of soft plastics such as the Slug-Go and the MegaBass XLayer. If you want to see a load of decent bass taken on various lures last year, there are loads of my photos here, here, here and here.

• But it was the Tackle House Feed Shallow that I saw the most bass caught on - bear in mind of course that a lot of the guys I fished with were using it a lot of the time, but there is obviously something about it. The lure casts well and fishes just below the surface at a fairly fast rate, with a stunning "side to side kind of slightly slashing" action, and this suits a lot of the bass marks I fish very well. The silvery/reflective colours are my favourites as I remain convinced that bass switch on to these colours both in bright and dull conditions. I remember one flat calm morning we fished in Ireland when nothing was happening - the sea was like glass and the clarity was almost too good, but eventually a nice fish obviously could not resist roaring out from behind a rock and smashing into my Feed Shallow. That was the only bass of the morning.

• If you have any interest in sharks and the sea, I really hope you watched the recent Natural World programme on the BBC - this was some of the most impressive great white footage that I have ever been fortunate enough to see, and the South African guy involved in the story has my utmost respect. This seriously was a hugely inspirational and stunning programme that every single person with any saltwater interest should make sure they watch. Great white sharks have always fascinated me, and they will continue to do so. If you live in the UK and missed this programme, you can watch it on the BBC iPlayer service right here. Immense in every way.

• Anyway, back at work and 2009 stretches out in front of us all - here's to the best possible year in what we all know are going to be some turbulent times. But if there is one thing to get us all through whatever happens, it has to be fishing. What else can provide such a release and a rush at the same time ? What else forces us to keep learning new stuff all the time ? Here is to a successful fishing year for us all, whatever you choose to fish for, and wherever you do it.

Back home from South Africa

• I landed at Heathrow at about 6am on Monday morning, still dressed in shorts and a t-shirt, so it was somewhat of a shock to step out into a temperature of 6 degrees !! And then on Monday night we had a proper storm come in here in Plymouth, with really strong winds and torrential rain - another lovely welcome home as I took my dog Jess for a walk at 7am Tuesday morning, fully kitted out in waterproofs. All that after having not worn more than shorts and t-shirts or tropical shirts for nearly two weeks. I know you are feeling real sympathy for me, because I am getting none here !!

• But today it is beautiful, a properly crisp, early autumn morning, with big blue skies and light winds. It is such fun to be back home with my family, for it has been a seriously hectic few weeks of being away - but this is the life we have chosen and somehow it seems to work just fine. But now that I am back, I need to spend serious time in my office and get a load of photos sorted out for magazine features. Usually I never have a load of photos stacked up, but right now I have Canada, Ireland and South Africa material waiting to be processed, and I am just beginning to shift the Irish bass fishing stuff I shot the other day. I really like being away from what I have shot for a while, and then coming back to it with a refreshed and clinical eye - we nailed some awesome stuff over there, but I can only do this because I work with good people.

• Look carefully through the spray above and you will see my mate Graham Hill banging a bass lure out. Note that he is wearing some seriously good waterproofs, the Greys Apollo stuff, check here. They have a lot of new gear out at the moment, and it is really worth taking a look at these waterproofs - we tend to need them in the UK. This is the kind of photo that you hope people are really going to pick up on, but at the same time I wonder if some people are also going to worry about it presenting fishing as being perhaps a little "extreme", when in reality Graham knows exactly what he is doing and would not put himself at risk. Well, perhaps a little bit, they are bass we are chasing after all.......

• Above is Andy Bignell fishing just as the tide starts to drop, and right before I came down the rope to join him. It's a very simple composition, designed to work perhaps across two pages (a double page spread or DPS) with text laid on top of it. We shall see. You never quite know how various designers will work with your material.

• Talking of good material, if you come across the US fishing and hunting magazine "Traveling Sportsman", check the current issue out - this magazine looks stunning and it is seriously going places. I am proud that a 10 page feature of mine is in there (pages 80 - 89), all about fly fishing for Africa's outstanding tigerfish (check some photos here), and have a look at the magazine's website right here. If you are into good looking fishing, shooting and hunting from around the world, get this magazine.

• I have also been sent a copy of one of the most impressive fishing magazines that I have ever come across, called "Fishing Wild", hailing from Australia, and the brainchild of an outstanding Aussie photographer called Col Roberts. Have a look at their website here. Take it from me, this is a publication you want to track down, and how badly does it make me want to spend some proper time in Australia ? Thanks to Col for sending me a copy - when fishing is done properly it can look out of this world, but so few people really do it properly. Fishing Wild is done properly, like the Traveling Sportsman.

• Check out a cod fishing feature of mine in the current issue of Sea Angler, on pages 50 - 55. I shot this out of Poole this summer with some great guys who seriously know their stuff on the boats.

• Here is Graham with a bass that he nailed on a soft plastic lure out in Ireland, the MegaBass XLayer - you can get them here. I have a feeling that we have so much to learn over here about using soft plastics for our fishing, and I don't mean simply dropping down various lures over wrecks and reefs for cod and pollack. I mean potentially catching some really good bass, wrasse and pollack from the shore on a wide range of soft plastic lures.

• I was speaking with Nick from Bass Lures yesterday, and he was telling me how well they had been doing recently on the Lucky Craft Wander - they caught some really good bass recently up in North Wales, and it seems to me that very few of us over here have any real experience of this particular lure. Nick was saying that it is designed to be fished at virtually any depth you want, and that you can even walk the dog with it under the water, as you would with a Sammy or GunFish on the surface. It sinks slowly and is easy to control, either with a kind of fluttering motion, or as a sub-surface kind of slider, and you can still use it over very shallow ground without fear of snagging it up. Plenty of anglers in the US rave about this lure, see here. The Bass Lures guys are all fanatical bass anglers themselves and I take what they say very seriously indeed - so yes, you guessed it, I have found another lure I am going to have to add to my ever expanding collection. I can't wait to give it a proper go. Anyway, back to the stack of photos to process.......

Back from Jersey

• I got back into Plymouth airport late yesterday afternoon - it is so cool to be arriving back at my local airport instead of the more usual Heathrow, especially when my wife and two girls are there to pick me up. It is so easy to do this trip, and when time and weather allows I have every intention to head back out to Jersey to do a load more bass related stuff, plus of course get in amongst the excellent shore and other boat fishing. There is some great stuff over there, including big blondes, tope and bream from the boats. The Channel Islands are so accessible to many of us, and trips over there can be really cheap.

• I am in serious debt to the people who went so far out their way to help me over in Jersey - a huge thanks to you all. This kind of trip just reaffirms to me just why fishing is the greatest sport on earth, for the people involved in it are without doubt the best there are. So many of the local anglers will do all they can to help visitors out. The buzz around modern bass fishing continues to grow.......

• Above is Trevor Sangan with a nice bass that he caught late on Saturday evening - the fishing really picked up big time as that tide began to push hard, and we landed a few nice bass in amongst the rocks. But we then lost the light and had to run for home. Trevor is continuing to use and abuse the Tackle House Feed Shallow lure, indeed he had it virtually welded to the end of his line over in Ireland and he continues to smash bass with it back home. What a lure - it ain't cheap, but it works. You can get hold of them here. I would not head out lure fishing now without a couple in my box, I feel that confident with them - exactly like I do with the Maria Chase BW in the holo silver colour. To have a few lures you trust implicitly really gives my confidence levels an extra kick.

• Here's a sight for the tackle junkies among you, and I include me here - a fistful of gorgeous red Tenyru rods. This brief trip visit back to Jersey really struck home to me how forward thinking a lot of these anglers are when it comes to their bass fishing. They are so close to the coast of France, and I know a lot of the bass fishing expertise over there travels across to Jersey, and the guys then mix and match it with their own fishing. It is easy to slate expensive gear as being too much when you haven't tried it, but when you start fishing with purpose designed and built bassing gear, it is a different world, and my eyes have really been opening up another notch this year.

• I bought a bunch of bass lures from Mick, including two different sizes of the Duo Tide Minnow SLD-F, and some more Tackle House Feed Shallow lures. These shallow diving minnows have different actions under the water and they can both be lethal at times. I really like ultra-shallow diving minnows for a lot of bass fishing and I also have a problem with lures - many of you are suffering with this addiction, and some of us are going to have to seek help.

• Sunday morning was like a different world - blowing a monster and lashing down with rain, but we managed to get out on the boats for a few hours in amongst the rocks where there was a bit of shelter. There was a real chop on the water and the light levels were very low, so I really fancied a popper might do the trick. It might only have been a small bass, but I nailed one on a Lucky Craft G-Splash popper right over a patch of rough ground. Trevor caught one as well, but we then ran back to port as the wind picked up even more. But within a couple of hours the sun was out and the wind had dropped down - by then though I was having to pack up and head for the airport.

• I simply would not head out bass fishing any more without a lip-grab tool for holding onto the fish. I have not been spiked once this year because I can secure this tool onto the bottom lip of the fish and then keep it nice and relaxed in the water ready for some photos. The fish stays calm and comes to no harm, I get my shots, and then the bass goes back very strongly. I use the highly efficient Berkley Pistol Trigger Grip and it works perfectly every single time. More anglers should carry something like this - bass are spiky as hell, and it makes for far easier unhooking, recovery and then releasing if you can grip the fish safely and securely.

• Here's a shot of the sun going down on the Minquiers from Friday evening - I put my rod and reel against the sky and shot a few frames just before the sun dipped below the horizon. Friday night was something seriously special and I feel so lucky to have visited a place like that. I will never forget that barbecue under the stars. Fishing and visiting wild, out of the way places really gets me going. Too much to do and too little time.

The countryside is alive and kicking

• What an incredible three days at the CLA Game Fair up at Blenheim Palace - the sheer numbers of people wandering around was staggering, indeed I heard rumours of close to 100,000 on Saturday. To see this number of people at a countryside show really does make you feel good about the future, for however hard our successive governments try to stamp all over the rural way of life, it is still very much alive, and kicking very hard indeed.

• Nick Hart and I had a blast doing our demonstrations each day, even when the sound went down on the first one and we had no choice but to shout ourselves hoarse just to be heard by the grandstand !! The response from people was fantastic, and my thanks of course to the hundreds of audience members who sat through the half hour demos, and a special thanks to our volunteers who came up and worked with us.

• I spent most of my time in and around the Fisherman's Village, and it was great to meet so many different people who kindly came up to me and said they enjoyed the TV programmes of mine - firstly it staggers me that people are still prepared to sit through them (my thanks), and secondly, the fact that half hour shows of me wittering on in a high state of excitement does not drive people completely demented has to be some kind of bonus.

• What really made my three days was the number of kids and female viewers who came up to me - anybody who knows me knows how embarrassed I get at being "recognised" by the people who watch the shows, but on the other hand I am so honoured that people enjoy what we do. The fact that so many female anglers and kids told me they loved the programmes left me brimming with pride that our little shows can give off such a good vibe to such different audiences.

• I did get a chance to see some other parts of the Game Fair, and as always is was utter class - so many things to see and buy, and such a good feeling about the whole show. Great weather (seriously cooking on Saturday), loads to do, but not enough time. I am already looking forward to next year.

• For people like me who work in the sport fishing industry, the Game Fair is also a good chance to see lots of different people and talk shop. A lot of fun is had when the crowds clear out in the early evening and the people working there can wind down a bit. There were some sore heads on the Saturday and Sunday mornings................

• The Bass Lures guys were doing a roaring trade with their demonstration tank and their Slug-Go and Lucky Craft lures - well done for coming along to what too many people wrongly perceive as a being game fishing only thing. We all went out for supper on Saturday night (thanks guys, I owe you), and they were in a slight state of shock at how well it had all been going. I am so glad a company like this had the guts to come along and prove that something really different could work so well at the Game Fair. I was unsure how they would do, but their success at the show has made me sit up and take even more notice of this explosion in bass fishing interest currently going on.

• You would not believe the number of people who wanted to talk about bass fishing, from the sea, fly and coarse fishing worlds, in equal numbers it seemed - there is an increasingly loud revolution going on, and the companies at the forefront of modern bass fishing in the UK really deserve a great degree of respect. I did a forum on Saturday morning with John Bailey and John Wilson, on the subject of UK saltwater fly fishing, and of course the main topic was the bass - where, how, why etc., and we had a packed audience. It seems that everybody wants to be a part of it.

• My friends at Aardvark McLeod and The Latin American Fishing Company had stands next to each other, and they were all saying how well it was going, with fantastic interest from all kinds of punters in fishing around the world. Selling this kind of overseas fishing takes great dedication and passion, all done with a great degree of approachability, and these two companies have exactly what it takes. If you want access to the best fishing this world has to offer, come and talk to these two companies - I work with people I like and trust, and who offer the kind of attitude I go about my work with.

• The Hardy Greys stand was smothered with interested punters seemingly every minute of every day, and the retailer stands were reporting a roaring trade going on. So where was the credit crunch this weekend ? We had a fantastic barbecue at the Hardy stand on the Friday night (huge thanks and credit to Steve and Lucy, you both deserve medals !!), and the guys were all buzzing at the amount of interest in their huge range of fishing gear.

• Anyway, I got back home to Plymouth yesterday, and now it is eyes down in my office to get a load of photos processed and fishing features done for various magazines. I am really pleased to be here for a while now and spend some time with my family - I might even sneak out for some plugging later this week as well !!

• A couple of friends, Rob Yorke and Mark Bryce, have been nailing some good rays recently off the shore, including blondes to over 16lbs, small eyeds to nearly 12lbs, and some spotteds to over 6lbs - nice fishing guys, but then they seriously know their stuff. Great to hear that the fishing is switching on so well around here.

Thank you Paul

• I spent yesterday morning with Paul and his mate Mark up in north Wales, plugging for bass - but the fishing was completely secondary to the real reason we were there. Back in February, a young angler called Alan Wright was tragically taken by the sea while out enjoying the sport we all love (see the original post here), and I was asked if a day's fishing with me could be auctioned to try and raise some money for the family left behind. See here for the original details.

• Paul's generosity in bidding for this time with me blew me away, and we managed to get together yesterday to spend a few hours fishing. Paul's mate Mark took us out to an awesome looking bass spot somewhere in north Wales, and the fact that we landed three bass means nothing really when you think about the pain that Alan's family are still going through now, and the extreme kindness of Paul to bid so much money that I hope will help them out in some small way. You are a gentleman sir, and I am honoured to have fished with you and Mark. The photo above is of Paul casting a bass plug out - it makes my day to meet somebody who is so passionate about their fishing.

• Above is Paul on the right, with Mark on the left. Thanks guys for your time, and thanks Paul for your generosity. Any time you are down my way, please make sure you get in touch and I can show you a bit of my coastline.

• I then drove for six hours to get back home to my family - what a stunning place north and mid Wales is, and to be perfectly honest, I feel somewhat ignorant that these couple of days were my first ever in this fantastic part of the world. It was fantastic to see my family again, but tempered with that joy is the sad fact that Alan's family will never see him walk through their front door again. Fishing is the best sport in the world, but spending time around the unpredictability of nature can bring about the odd tragedy. Please play it safe.

• On Monday, I spent the day up on Anglesey with the guys behind the new company Bass Lures (just how pretty is Anglesey ?) - Nick and Bob are responsible for bringing in the awesome soft plastic Slug-Go lures into the UK, and they are also now the UK agents for some of the finest fishing lures ever made, Lucky Craft. Who in bass fishing has not used or heard of the Sammy, the GunFish or the Flash Minnow ? The amount of bass these things have caught and continue to catch is scary.....

• Check out the Bass Lures website here. You can see Nick and Bob at the CLA Game Fair this weekend, where they will have an enormous tank for demonstrating their various lures and specialist techniques. Above is a rigged Slug-Go lure - there is no way I can describe how awesome these lures look when they are fished, and for the kinds of bass marks we all fish over, they are perfect. On Monday we spent some time out fishing, and I saw bass caught on the Slug-Go - they go mad for it !! A really big fish was also sadly lost on a Lucky Craft GunFish - this lure is lethal, and it was incredible to watch as bass would come at it. It is the noise of a surfacing bass that gets you every time.

• The top lure you can see above is the Lucky Craft GunFish, and the bottom one is of course the Sammy - both slay bass big time. The GunFish in particular is a favourite surface lure of many bass anglers, for it remains very stable even when there is a fair bit of chop to the water. Both lures cast extremely well and I always carry them in my lure box when I am out fishing.

• You can get these lures online here, direct from Bass Lures, or alternatively look at places like Veals Mail Order and Mr. Fish over in Jersey. Be very wary of any cheap imitations of these lures that you might find out there, for they do not work like the originals, and they are constructed very poorly indeed. It is so worth paying the proper price for some of the most successful lures ever made..............and you should see some of the other lures these guys are playing around with, they look lethal. I tell you, this lure thing is a bad addiction !!

• I will be using some of the Lucky Craft and Slug-Go lures during my demonstrations at the CLA Game Fair this weekend - I hope to see some of you there, the weather forecast looks good at the moment and it is a blast of an event.

• I hear from Graham that the Jersey lads caught a bunch more bass on the Monday, at the same place we all fished together on the Sunday morning. Once again the fish were out sunbathing, and they tell me that there were also some seriously huge mullet swimming around, estimated to be around the 14lb mark !!!! The problem is that I have bass on the brain over in south east Ireland, but one day soon I am going to take my mullet gear and have a proper go for the masses of fish we keep seeing all the time. What a place.

• Thank you again Paul - what a gent.

First light bass trip

• I sneaked out yesterday morning at 4am for a plugging session with a friend over in Cornwall, to coincide with the last part of the flood tide. But when we got down there, conditions did not look half as good as the forecast had promised. There was a nice bit of sea running though, to put some "life" into the water, so Andy and I gave it a proper go for a few hours.

• There were loads of small bits of weed in the water which made plugging a bit tricky, for half the time we would pick up a bit on the retrieve, and then that kills the action of the lures. But it was more than fishable. I love being out early in the morning when nobody else is around, it is such a special time of the day.

• Andy caught this bass below on a Maria Angel Kiss lure in the blue colour (see here for them), and he also got hit a couple of times. Another bass also came clean out of the water to try and grab the lure right at his feet, but missed it !! This fish came fairly early on, so we both thought that a few more fish might show themselves......

• I had a nice bass of about 3lbs follow my lure right in to my feet, only to turn away and never show itself again. Of course I would have loved to catch it, but I also get a hell of a kick out of actually seeing these awesome fish in the water. How hard did I try and will that fish onto my lure ??!! I am sure you can imagine the expletives that were ejected over the choppy water when the fish didn't hit my lure - I need to grow up a bit, but fishing gets me terribly overexcited. I was using an Aurora Mackerel coloured Lucky Craft Flash Minnow in an effort to get down a little bit deeper than the Maria Chase BW goes. I also caught a small pollack on the Flash Minnow - I am getting good at nailing small pollack on the bass lures. But not so good at nailing the bass at the moment !! Still, it's always very cool to see one caught.

• What a stunning day today, perfect for going to the beach with the kids, my wife and of course my dog Jess. I can not for one second understand why some petty-minded local councils ban dogs from some of the beaches around here in south Devon, so we go to places where Jess can run around chasing seagulls and basically having a blast. Strikes me that if we do not stand up for ourselves, we are all going to be banned from having any fun or taking any normal risks in this country, in case it gets in the way of health and safety issues. And then we'll all get priced out anyway with the scary increases in the cost of living. Nothing like a Saturday morning rant..............

First bass of the year - small but beautiful

• I managed to get few hours in plugging yesterday afternoon before I needed to be back to babysit my two daughters for the evening, and it turned out to be a blast. Just me, my sheepdog Jess and a deserted coastline, with the strong NE wind off our backs and what seemed like fairly good conditions. I knew something was looking up when the first rock I waded to had a nice, perhaps 4-5lb bass rooting around just behind it - but the fish saw me and promptly legged it !! You simply can not put a value on decent polarised sunglasses, and I wear what I believe are the best on the market today, Maui Jim. It was flat calm and the water was verging on being almost too clear (weeks of east winds), but when a proper sized pollack turned on my Maria Chase BW (check the lure here) right at the edge of the rocks and showed me that big, predator eye, I reckoned my luck might be in. I then had numerous follows from plenty of other, smaller pollack, plus a small bass, before moving to another set of rocks close by and landing three small pollack. Together they might have struggled to reach 1.5lbs, but at least there was plenty of life around.

• About two hours after low water I went and snagged my Maria Chase up properly and lost it, so I re-tied a short 30lb Varivas fluorocarbon leader on and picked out another great shallow-diving minnow, the Lucky Craft Flash Minnow. I really like this lure, but it dives a little deeper than the Maria and I had to retrieve for the most part with my rod held high to get it closer to the surface. I also reckon it works better with a slower retrieve than I use for the Maria. But it worked......

• The bass you see above is my first this year on a lure, and although it might be "slightly" on the small side (!!), I could not be happier to see one - seriously overjoyed in fact. A typical smash into the lure typifies these magnificent fish. It went back fine after a few photos taken with the aid of this great little tool, the Berkley TEC Pistol Trigger Grip. I picked it up in the US a few weeks ago, principally to enable me to at least get a few photos of fish I might happen to catch when I am fishing on my own. It is designed for gripping a fish like a bass for unhooking - no harm comes to the fish and no more will you end up with spike and cut marks all over your hands. It sits in a little holster on your belt and I would not be without it now.

• I also saw a big wrasse follow my lure right in to my feet before I caught the bass, and after I moved to another finger of rock and hooked the bass, on virtually the next cast I caught this one you can see above. Around 3.5lbs I reckon, it was great fun on this Tenryu plugging rod and it put up a typical wrasse kind of scrap. It had stunning markings and went back fine. I love these fish and I am really pleased to have nailed one on the plug where I was fishing. On a Bank Holiday weekend, I saw nobody - amazing. To have that kind of good looking water to myself was a real treat.

• That was it, I had to head back home and take on the babysitting duties so that my wife could go out on the razzle. How badly would I have loved to stay on fishing, but I could not even get any mobile phone reception to try and call and tell a little lie about my car breaking down or something like that !! Not that the thought has ever entered my head...........

• Below is the lure that did the business, the Lucky Craft Flash Minnow. It does cast a little better than the Maria and it "rolls" incredibly seductively through the water - I like having different options in my lure box. I just have to remember to slow down on the retrieve when using the Flash Minnow.

• The more I am using this stunning Tenryu Red Dragon Express plugging rod, the more I can see just how advanced a fishing rod it is for this kind of bassing. You can see my initial review of it here, and my views have not changed at all. It is the single best plugging rod I have ever picked up, and I feel totally confident of getting the upper hand on any bass that might come my way (setting myself up for a fall I know !!). But I do know that I am working my lures effectively from the moment they hit the water.

• And as for this Varivias braid I am using - wow !! Yes, it costs more than most others, but it is sublime to fish with. The bright green Avani Sea Bass Braid in 23lb is awesome to use, and I love the colour, but the Avani Sea Bass Max Power PE in 20lb is a class apart. I just wish they did it in a really hi-vis colour like yellow or orange (hint, hint). I have yet to find another braid that feels like this - you will not believe how thin and easy casting it is. I used a different Varivas 8-strand braid out in the Florida Keys the other day and it did great, so I guess I am sold on the merits of this stuff. I know you can get both the Varivas braids I am raving about here. If you are seriously into your lure fishing, you will no doubt be prepared to pay to get the best.

Check out this bass lure

• I have recently got hold of this bass lure above, backed up by reports of some stunning bass catches over in Jersey last year from the guys who were using it. It is amazing to see just where surface fishing for bass is headed, when lures like this make it so easy and effective. If you are fishing rocky, weedy, shallow to medium depth ground and want to cover a lot of water, you really should have a look at this lure. Better still, team it up with a proper plugging rod like my new Tenryu and you have the ultimate set up.

• Called the Patchinko II, and made by Xorus, it casts like a bullet. Seriously, I have rarely come across a surface lure that cuts through the wind so well. The Lucky Craft Sammy and GunFish are excellent casting lures as well, but this Patchinko II has the edge. You can cover a serious amount of water with it, and that can only be a good thing.

• Like all good things in life, specialist lures like this can be tricky to get hold of, but I know you can order them here. It is worth tracking this one down. The great thing about surface lures is that you so rarely lose them, unless that is you are fishing for monster golden dorado that take huge delight in relieving me of my favourite Halco poppers. See the photos here.

• So how does this Patchinko II lure work ? In my mind it is close to an ultra-modern version of an established favourite, the Yo-Zuri Mag Popper - a kind of hybrid walk the dog/popper lure. It is closest in action to the Lucky Craft GunFish I reckon, whereby it "walks" seductively across the surface and also spits water out in front with that in-turned mouth. And this one really walks big time. Whereas the Sammy is best suited to calm conditions and tends to get knocked about when it is a little choppy, lures like this Patchinko II and the GunFish are that extra bit more stable.

• Using a lure like this really is a perfect example of when a specialist plugging rod like the new Tenryu that I have here comes into its own (check out my rod review here). Such a fast, powerful action to a rod gives you instant pick-up on a lure like this, and it means that however far you cast it, the moment you snap that bail arm over and begin the retrieve, the lure is working properly. You hardly have to move the rod tip to get this Patchinko II lure doing its stuff across the surface, and in my mind that has made the purchase of this kind of modern bass plugging rod more than worthwhile. Covering more water effectively is the key.

• The Jersey guys tell me that when bass hit this Patchinko II lure, they nail it big time, so there is obviously something a bit special about it. I can see myself using this one a lot over the summer and autumn. I did hear from my mate Graham Hill over in Ireland that he had three nice bass on a Lucky Craft GunFish just before their close season kicked in on May 15th. I also hear that he is currently going up the wall with frustration, and they are only a few days into the close season !! Still, it's a good thing and I respect the Irish authorities a huge amount for implementing a thing like that.

• And as for frustration, tell me about it !! Photographing pike on the fly was cancelled for Monday, for various tedious reasons, and then today I was meant to be out with Malcolm Jones on his charter boat. But while the sun might be shining, we very annoyingly have fresh east winds that are making things very difficult. Yes, you guessed, another day cancelled. I am known for my lack of patience, and this is testing it somewhat !! Still, at least I am out with Nick Hart tomorrow to photograph some west country river fly fishing. If we get a meteor shower that destroys the river between now and tomorrow, I might just scream......

• Still, to calm you down, put the new CD from Belphegor into your stereo and crank it up to the max. Any album with the glorious title of "Bondage Goat Zombie" deserves a listen (where do they get these album names from ??!!), but this is seriously good extreme metal. Check it out here. The soothing sound of the first crushing track is calming me down no end. I could almost forget the fresh east wind blowing outside.

Patience, patience......

• Like many anglers I am sure, this waiting for the bass to turn up properly is quite frankly doing my head in. Bearing in mind that I have come to "real" bass fishing fairly late in my fishing life, for the last few years I have been playing a serious amount of catch-up. Without a doubt I credit my good friend Graham Hill over in Ireland for really moving me over into obsessing about light tackle fishing for bass, and for that I am forever in his debt. Check out a load of photos of Graham fishing perhaps the most productive coastline there is for bass, click here. I am seriously considering moving over there for a couple of years to try and work this bass addiction out of my system - I never thought bass fishing would get to me like it has done, but it has. And I blame Graham !!

• But I first came across "modern" bass fishing techniques over in Jersey some years ago now. I had been out taking photographs and that is when I first came across the lure you can see above - the Lucky Craft Sammy, one of the most successful surface "walk the dog" type lures there is. Still the biggest lure caught bass I have ever seen caught was taken on that particular photography trip over to Jersey, and the angler I was with nailed a bass of perhaps 12lbs on a Sammy. He was a hell of a good bass angler. You seriously have to get some of these lures for your own bass fishing - use them in shallow water when it is nice and calm and work the rod tip and reel slowly to get this thing walking from side to side. The Sammy tends to get knocked off balance when it is choppy, but it is perfect for calm conditions. They cast like a bullet and enable you to really cover a lot of water. "Walking the dog" takes a bit of practise, but it is pretty easy to do. Nothing beats any kind of fish nailing you on the surface.

• Fishing for me is all about a mixture of fun and work, but over the years I have learnt how to manage my desire to fish all the time with my need to get photos and material for my work. The fact that I love photography as much as I love fishing really helps, and the real secret to nailing proper photos is knowing when not to fish. OK, so I can't get to fish all the time, but the trade off for me is that I get to work right in amongst the best sport in the world, and I would not have it any other way. There are plenty of photos of the kinds of fishing I work around here.

• But this still does not get away from the fact that I am wanting to spend too much time wandering "my" coastline looking for bass. Sure, there are harder fighting fish out there, and there are fish that grow plenty bigger, but the bass is the one chance we UK sea anglers have to scale down, get mobile and fish with ultra-modern lure fishing tackle and techniques. I realise that I have a vast amount to learn about lure fishing, and increasingly I am looking to places like Japan, France and the USA for information. Again, this is a mix of work and pleasure for me - I want to learn, and I need to learn.

• And now we have howling east winds for the next few days down here - hardly the kind of weather to get out on the coast and play with some more lures. Plus I am on my own this weekend with my two girls as my wife is off to London for a hen weekend - help !!