Tackle Talk

Recently me and my fishing Buddys have mostly been Targeting big Perch from various venues from ponds, rivers and canals around the country and over the last couple months had some amazing results including a coupke PB's being caught!!

I thought id take a bit of time to go through some tackle that has worked for us. ill talk about some lures and also the set up i prefer to use!

Ill start with my Rod and Reel of choice, those of you who may of fished with me or have seen my reports for the LAS will know i like to use the VERY best gear i can get my mits on!! im a firm believer in using the best, there is sooooo much lure fishing gear out there at the mo! some amazing stuff but also some utter rubbish!! I religously use Shimano Reels!

My favorate for Ultra-light lures and smaller lures is the reel above. the Shimano Conquest 51GT-Ti this is the smallest Baitcaster Shimano make, and has to be seen to be believed!! only holding 65yards of 28lb braid and as you can see my 5cm Rapala shad rap is actually longer than the reel!! i have a handfull of rods which this reel cant even be screwed onto due to the reel seat being so small you cannot do the rod up to grab the reel!!

It will literally cast just a trace and i have to have 4 of the SVS breaks on to slow the spool down because its spool is so light and is to fast for my general lures. it suffers from only having a tiny handle it feels wierd when you first use the reels, almost toy-ish but due to the retrieve speed it ballences out well and after a session it does exactly what i like in a reel!! it has 10 ARB bearings and is smoother than anything iv used before. with 8lb of drag it will cope with anything you will hook in british waters! Im a Baitcaster guy but Martin and Ady both use fixed spools which is more comman for UK ultra-light and generally the way to go if you want to do this exciting style of fishing. there is plenty of quality fixed spools on the market so its a personal preffernce as to what you use. just remember some of the top end imported shimano's are mega money!! £350+ but you do get sheers quality which is hard to beat!!

Terminal tackle wise id use 20-30lb braid due to the venues i fish sometimes being fairly rough and snaggy!! matched with again 20-30lb wire trace..... you can by all means go allot lighter as i know allot of guys are fishing Ultra-light with 10lb braid and 15lb traces etc. but remember lures arent cheap nowadays and a snag is a bad way to get rid of your best lures!! plus no one wants to snap off while playing you PB pike or Perch do you......