Off and running for 2025 with a chunky January bass - the thrill is as great as ever!

Call me obsessive - never! - but I choose to keep a regular eye on the various factors which influence my fishing. I know that wind and swell forecasts are only forecasts and not fact, but at least it gives us a general idea of what we might expect a few days in advance. Saturday morning was looking interesting from a few days out. Moving into the afternoon, the (free) XCWeather app on my iPhone was suggesting that the wind was going to start freshening from the south east, which in turn should give my coastline a decent bit of life. I did the computing in my head and came up with a location which would give me various options on the big tide, and also if the sea had picked up a bit more than the forecast times suggested………………

Which it had, and the first section of the mark I wanted to fish was essentially unfishable. I was on my own with no mobile signal so I didn’t exactly want to end up in the drink, but my “computing” had given me the option to cover a bit of ground and end up on a little corner which often remains very fishable even when much of the mark is a bit on the hairy side. I could have easily walked away from the fishing with the amount of water rolling in on the first stretch, but it’s so much easier to cover a lot of ground these days with the fitness work I do. I had to have a look at that corner because I would not forgive myself if I didn’t make the effort.

I often go out fishing with all kinds of ideas about how I am going to approach the situation as regards lures and techniques and so on, but Saturday was a day for quite simply getting something out there which would hold in the turbulence and glorious looking tide rips created by so much water moving around. I went with the white colour J-hook Savage Gear Sandeel V2 in the 14cm/33g size. Give me white when there’s a bit of colour in the water, and I know this lure in this specific size well enough to know how it casts, “grips”, and how much I can slow it down or speed it up depending on the depth and bottom and current etc.

It was one of those situations where I definitely yelped when a bass nailed my lure no more than four rod-lengths out. When I yelp I tend to immediately look around to see if anybody is laughing at me, but with where I was fishing and how you get in there, I was very much on my own and away from any semblance of humanity. Sometimes I can’t help but think what would happen if I had another heart attack when I am fishing on my own and away from any kind of assistance and with no mobile phone signal, but I refuse to spend the rest of my life worrying about stuff like that.

When that first chunky bass of the year came to hand I was over the moon. It might have gone 4lbs I guess, and because I had some rockpools around I was able to get some basic shots of me gripping the lip of the bass in my gloved hand. I fished on for a while with no more fish, but to be honest my hands were starting to get really cold because I had got my gloves soaking wet and the wind was picking up all the time. I get various side effects from the heart attack drugs I am on for life, but I’d rather do what the medical people tell me to do and if I get things like cold hands from time to time then so be it. I’m up and running for 2025, and I notice that a number of other bass anglers are as well. It’s no surprise to hear of bass coming to lures at this time of year in Devon and Cornwall especially, but I am seeing reports of bass being caught from parts of the UK that would previously almost never have seen bass on lures at this time of year. Is it because more anglers are out there giving it a go, or is it because things continue to change? Or is it a combination of both?

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