Bloodknot on-line magazine

Seems like there is a new on-line fishing magazine starting up on the net every other day. Some are very good, but sadly most are pretty dire. Bloodknot fits into the pretty good category – 100 pages of good photos, good words, overall holds interest. Just a thought, don’t rush to judge this issue by its cover. Well worth checking out.

An after thought: on page 86/87 there is a shot of a nice hefty brown being held up for the camera, the photographer being the Guide. The fish holder is lifting the fish with his hand under the fish’s stomach – this is an absolute no-no if you are going to release the fish. Read this. All Guides should know better than to let clients hold fish like this, especially when the sin is portrayed again on the very next page.

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Down and nearly out on one knee

About this time each year, most New Zealanders are looking forward to a week or three Summer holiday starting at Christmas and sweeping into the New Year.

And about this time every year I write a piece or two about safety – too many New Zealanders die in our great outdoors or on the sea.

Should follow my own advice!

Last weekend I was staying at a fishing camp on the Tauranga-Taupo River south of Taupo in the middle of the North Island. I was alone in the camp.

First day, some very hard fishing in a very low and clear river produced a few fish – so I thought I would head well upstream into the gorge area. Some business delayed my start till around mid-day.

It is probably only an hour and a half walk and wade, if you don’t stop to fish – but it took me nearly 5 hours, with numerous stops to fish to many, and very visible, fish. I was the only angler on the river.

So at around 6 pm I turned round to get ‘home’ before dark at around 8.30 pm.

I had gone only about 100m downstream when a boulder I stood on, rolled under my foot, and I dropped onto one knee, then rolled into the just above knee-deep water. As I stood up I knew instantly something was wrong with that knee, the pain literally bought tears to my eyes.

The, should be, 1.5 hour trip turned into a 4 hour, stop and start, marathon, wet and very cold, and each step in great pain.  The last hour in the jet black, no moon night, meant I was constantly tripping, meaning even more pain.

When I got back to camp I realised I was pretty bloody lucky. If the injury had been only a little worse I would not have been able to make the walk-out – and on the Tauranga-Taupo river there is no cell-phone signal.

Worse still no-one would have known where I was going on the river to fish. More worse still, it was unlikely anyone would be coming to the camp for a couple of days, to notice my absence.

All I needed to do was call someone from the camp, and tell them where I was going, and if they did not get a “Hey, I’m back” call by a certain time, to get search and rescue underway.

It is just so easy to forget  the simple little things, like a quick call to tell some-one where you are going and when you expect to be back – a memory lapse that could cost you a night or more  outdoors with a bad injury. At worst a simple lapse that could end up ruining your family and friends’ holiday, by attending your funeral.

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Fly Tying – Put a cap on the mess

One of the more irritating features of fly-tying is the mess that can be created by the cut, hacked, sliced and diced bits of fur, feather, wire, thread, and more. The mess invades the fly-tying desk and the floor. All guaranteed to create disharmony in a previously happy home.

I have tried all kinds of proprietary gizmos to capture the dross - typically expensive, invariably pretty much useless.

But I have come up with a cheap and effective demessifier, that takes seconds to make.

Grab an old baseball cap, cut off the peak, undo the clip at the back of the cap and place it around the stem of your vise. Job done.

That is it – harmony returns to your desk, floor and home. Beaut eh!

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2 new fishy quotes – something old, something new

Something old, well pretty ancient really;

Way back in quote number 306 I published a fragment of a quote in olde English invariably but inaccurately attributed to Dame Juliana Berners.

Here is the full  quote in more modern English:

"… You must not fish for covetousness or to save money, but principally for your solace and to promote the health of your body and specially of your soul. For when you go fishing you will not want others with you as they will distract you. And then you may serve God with devotion in effectively saying your customary prayers."
- Anon - "A Treatyse of Fysshynge With An Angle" – 1496

-  The early fragment (1420) was edited by Thomas Satchell (quote number 306). The later full text (often misattributed to Dame Juliana Berners) was issued by Wynken de Worde in 1496. (quote number 1007)

So there ya go – glad we cleared that little matter up.

And now for something completely different from the sharp pen of Tom Chandler over on the Trout Underground site. (Quote number 1006)

“Trout aren’t stupid. They might be brainless and lack creativity (a lot like the creators of Gilligan’s Island), but they’re survivors. And they didn’t get that way by offering themselves up as a meal for every predator that wanders by. Which, if you stop to watch most fly fishers on the water, begs the obvious question; Why don’t more fly fishers act like predators?” 

Why not indeed?

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Catch Magazine Issue 14 out now

Once again Catch Magazine features some truly amazing fishing photography from around the world, including in this issue, Spain, Cuba and little ol’ New Zealand.

Go get it here, its free, its beaut.

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Fly Fishers Inc. Issue 3 – The Jump Shot Issue is Live

This New Zealand fly fishing magazine’s third issue is now up on-line just in time for our Summer.

The ‘Jump Shot Issue’ has a bunch of cool jump shots, Chris Beech from Australia put together a cool spread on fishing for Queenfish in Northern Australia, Paul McDonald from Hamilton shares tips on landing big fish and if that's not enough there are flies from Zane Mirfin, a gear review from Gary Lyttle and a bunch of other stuff which you'll just have to check out for yourself.

This magazine is developing nicely – still a bit rough around the edges in terms of design and production values, and copy editing, but the good content standard overcomes these niggles.

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New tackle coming up in 2011

Every year the excellent MidCurrent site does a wrap up of all that is bright, shiny and new, coming up in the new year, 2011. Gives you a really good as to what will make your wallet skinny.

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