Fishing whilst sailing

Forget it.

If you have the misfortune catch anything you will end up with scales, blood and guts all over the boat.


Keep plenty of newspaper in the cockpit and, as the fish comes aboard, handle it with the paper and dispatch it right into a polythene shopping bag, paper and all.

This works fine with smaller fish up to a few pounds.

Not only does this help to keep your hads clean, the dry paper also tends to subdue the fish. The same trick was often used with eels in the old days.
 
We use two rods with 50 pound line. Different fish take different coloured lures and they change colour by season. Therefore buy three small 5/6 inches swimming lures with four
different colours - red, blue, yellow and silver, two colours in each lure is fine. The reason for small lures is big lures catch big fish, the small ones catch up to ten pounds. If you are after mackerel buy a string of feather lures.

We used to gut fish on deck, it's easier to wash off with a bucket of salt water. If you catch Tuna cut it's throat as quickly as possible and hang it to let the blood out. It gets rid of the adrenalin which makes it tough to eat. Good luck.
 
Just checked the log, last fish i caught was 2 1/2' tuna at 48 21'n, 18 57'w. Prob on a squid lure. I made a few with any old shiney stuff and a treble hook. Some people use mig welding wire as a trace. And 50 or 60Kg line. Hard to say what worked best, lure skipping on the surface a couple a waves back. That was couple years ago. No one was catching anywhere near as much as they used to. So everyone said anyway. Take some wasabi for sushi. Yummy! :)
 
I downloaded this little book. Cheap and a lot of helpful advice for a complete sea fishing beginner like me. I have no connection with the author.

For killing them I have my grandfather's priest (see fisherman's priest in Google Images if you don't know what that is). He used it for trout, but it works just as well with mackerel and is better than a winch handle.
 
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keep a bucket of salty water handy on the aft deck and deal with them there. if its too windy for the bucket to sit still probably not worth fishing.

Plenty mackerel our way on simple feathers and a bullet lead weight.

Prefer a rod to wind it in quicker but not essential.
 
FISHING

Has anyone tried this. Approx 150 mm of 22mm dia. chromed copper pipe, flatten one end and fill with lead to about 20mm from the top then flatten and cut both ends to a V shape drill a hole at the point of each V. Put a ring and a swivel at one end and a a ring and a treble hook on the other end, attach your line and you're ready to fish.
 
Has anyone tried this. Approx 150 mm of 22mm dia. chromed copper pipe, flatten one end and fill with lead to about 20mm from the top then flatten and cut both ends to a V shape drill a hole at the point of each V. Put a ring and a swivel at one end and a a ring and a treble hook on the other end, attach your line and you're ready to fish.

Yep I've got a few of them and also use them as a weight for mackerel fishing on the off chance of a Bass
 
Has anyone tried this. Approx 150 mm of 22mm dia. chromed copper pipe, flatten one end and fill with lead to about 20mm from the top then flatten and cut both ends to a V shape drill a hole at the point of each V. Put a ring and a swivel at one end and a a ring and a treble hook on the other end, attach your line and you're ready to fish.

copper and lead? Boy, you really are plumbing the depths.;)
 
>Have used paravanes with some success. The alternative is heavy weights or the lure skipping along the surface.

We never used a paravane because swimming lures have a 'chin' on them that keeps the lure below the surface and make it wiggle like a fish swimming. I can see the reason for paravanes because fish feed at different depths at diiferent times of day. For example from dawn to about 3 hours after and the 3 hours before sunset fish feed just below the surface. In the heat of the day they feed deeper and a paravane would be useful, however we we didn't want to fish at that time.
 
I downloaded this little book. Cheap and a lot of helpful advice for a complete sea fishing beginner like me. I have no connection with the author
Are you certain this is for real ? I looked at it and tried to buy, but the only way to pay is by opening a "Nochex" account, and the free "Seller" account is "not available" so you would need the paid-for "Merchant account" !!??
 
Have used paravanes with some success. The alternative is heavy weights or the lure skipping along the surface.
Here is the idea:http://www.eddystoneeel.com/PARAVANES.htm


PS some of them have a choice of off-centre attachment which takes the line away from the boat port or starboard...the choice is yours.

I would recommend one of these to keep the line down, I use and Eddystone Paravane when I am fising for mackrel, with a long trace of shiny plastic feather hooks. To avoid the blood and scales drop the fish straight into a bucket and dispatch and deal with them in there. It is only when you pull out 6 at a time does it get a bit wriggly and hooky in a deck bucket.
 
I would recommend one of these to keep the line down, I use and Eddystone Paravane when I am fising for mackrel, with a long trace of shiny plastic feather hooks. To avoid the blood and scales drop the fish straight into a bucket and dispatch and deal with them in there. It is only when you pull out 6 at a time does it get a bit wriggly and hooky in a deck bucket.

He is sailing the atlantic and hopefully what he catches will not fit in a bucket :)
 
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