Do you ever think about how efficient the clothing and accessories that we use for our fishing are these days, and how easy it is to move around and regulate temperature etc.?
Okay, so us more southern based anglers aren’t nearly as tough as you lot living north of the M4 motorway with your arctic conditions and strange wildlife, but I was out fishing yesterday and it was bloody freezing - and is my way, I got to thinking. I was obviously carrying a lure rod with a spinning reel on it, and on my left side sits my HPA Chest Pack with two of those washable lure boxes which are so easy to get at. Those items are a given for me whenever I go out fishing, and so is a waterproof rucksack which happens to be the Savage Gear WP Rollup Rucksack 40L and which is really rather good but if I get my way I am going to make it even better. In that rucksack is some Fuji camera gear, leader material, a few Breakaway Mini Link lure clips, some spare Savage Gear 6/0 Weedless Corkscrew hooks, and then such items as sunglasses, reading glasses for tying knots (never used to need them!), some sort of hat, possibly some gloves because we are a bit softer down here, a waterproof jacket, possibly an extra layer of clothing during the colder months, my Epic Berlingo car keys, and whatever flask of hot drink or water I want. As I said, all those items are a given for any fishing session…………….
This was some December bass fishing, but very much not yesterday and the filthy weather I got!
Now it’s not as if my waterproof rucksack is desperately heavy, but sometimes I am carrying a fair bit of camera gear and the extra weight can add up. Fuji mirrorless cameras and lenses may be a bit smaller and lighter than the Nikon DSLR gear I used to use all the time, but it still doesn’t mean that I want to have all that gear sitting in a rucksack on my back when I am actually fishing. If I can I will put my rucksack down somewhere where it isn’t going to get washed in and where I can easily find it again if I go wandering. What got me thinking yesterday was how cold it was but how easily I could still move around and fish (blank) effectively whilst wearing what I needed to wear to stay warm and dry as the weather did what it could to make life difficult. As lure anglers who need to move around and who are not bound to a sort of fishing basecamp, I think of myself as a sort of self-contained unit. What I need to fish is on me as such - my lures are at my side, and I only need to go back to my rucksack for camera gear, a hot or cold drink, or to grab the bag for moving on.
Scierra Insulated Body Suit
Many years ago I accepted that a decent pair of breathable waders was an unavoidable cost of my fishing. What I wear under my waders depends on what temperatures I think I will come across, and whilst I am still using the brilliant Under Armour Cold Gear leggings and compression tops for the majority of my colder weather fishing, when it’s particularly cold at night or I know I will be doing a lot of wading like yesterday, I use one of the Scierra Thermo Body Suits (the new version is the Scierra Insulated Body Suit) with the Under Armour top underneath because the Scierra thing is sleeveless. As with my waders, the waterproof jackets I know and trust the most are made by the fly fishing brand Vision, and with the rain and cold wind yesterday it goes without saying that I was wearing a jacket. You northerners would probably have been fishing in shorts and a t-shirt yesterday, but not me here in the softer south. Hell, I also had a hat and lightweight thermal buff thing on, and I even had to wear some lightweight gloves which are some old Rapala neoprene half-finger ones which I think are the previous generation of these Rapala ones here.
This might sound like a lot of stuff to wear when you’re fishing, but if you come from bait fishing like I do then it’s chalk and cheese compared to what I used to wear to keep warm next to a static beachcaster or two. I guess things are a bit different in that world as well as more modern materials have helped, and we know more about layering up and so on. I was wearing breathable chest waders more and more as lure fishing for bass started to take over from my bait fishing, but even trussed up against that weather yesterday I never felt remotely restricted, and I didn’t get cold at all. I was about thigh to waist deep in the water for most of the session as I moved around to try and find better clarity, and at times I would turn away from the fresh north west wind when the rain was at its worst - but I was completely dry and plenty warm enough. The actual fishing might have been a bit of a bust, but I learnt a bit more about where I was fishing and how I might approach it in the future, and not once did I feel remotely restricted when casting or walking or wading.
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