perjantai 28. joulukuuta 2012

Summary of 2012

It has been a great year for fishing pike. Here is some of the highlights from the year 2012.


Spring to summer

Spring season was a bit short because in late March my spouse gave birth to my second son. But I managed to make some trips with a float tube, few in a boat and one four days trip to Särkisalo. 
Särkisalo trip was about one month after pike spawning season which is my absolute favorite season in pike fishing: Powerful fish eager to bite flies, electric takes and warm weather. Tinsel flies worked nicely through the trip. 

Float tube trips were also good. The ugly fly was again a hit when fishing in colored water. I will introduce this fly to you in later posts. It´s a sort of a tinsel deceiver with ugly colours. 

First spring trip with float tube offered me a lesson


 I carry two rods with me. One holds floating line and second intermediate or sinking. First I fished with intermediate line a shallow bay area and had no contacts with fish, but I knew that the fish were there and the fly supposed to be just right in those conditions. So I put the same fly in the floating line and after that the day was a success. Floating line allowed me to pause the retrieve little longer which was crucial on that day.

Mid summer is my time to fly fish brown trout in mid Finland but I
made some pike trips to nearby lake with light equipment and poppers. Lot´s of fun but average size of the fish is quite small.



Autumn to winter




In September I trained a lot of casting so I had no time to fish. World championships of casting were held in Fagernes Norway. Trip was very educational in many ways and not only for casting. Judges of championships used pontoon boats and even in windy conditions they managed to hold their place in the water and they could move lot faster than a float tube. I must have one of those!

Once I got in Finland I bought a used pontoon boat and I have been very satisfied with it. Compared to a float tube it´s much quicker in the water. This allows me to move longer distances in the water. For example if water color of the inner bay is poor I can move quite fast 1-2 km closer to open sea where water color usually is better. 

Autumn included great fishing, I had no weak trips, even in poor conditions for pike fishing I was fortunate to land good pikes. Most of the time I fished with slinky baitfish, intermediate line an 8-weight rod. Best colors were Germany flag, pink-white and red-white. 

Djuza introduced me a new destination and I had many unforgettable moments there fishing with Matti. Thanks!

Lesson #2

I have thought that in pike fishing there is more important parts than fly colors that makes the pike strike. Retrieve, swim of the fly and depth for example but after fishing in the "aquarium" I have to change  my point of view:
The "aquarium" is very small bay nearby my  spouses family  summer cottage. It´s sheltered from winds by rocks and firs. Water color is very clear because it´s close to open sea and it´s about 1-3 m deep.

I landed few fishes with a red-white slinky baitfish fly before I arrived with my pontoon boat to the aquarium. I was casting about 15 m away and saw how pike was stalking about 1 m away from the fly. The pike tracked close to the boat and vanished. I changed the retrieve fast to slow and slow to fast but had only few shy takes from other pikes. 
The best and the most memorable moment was when I saw that there were two good pikes stalking the fly only about 1 m from each other but neither one did not take. It was very nerve wrecking. I tried different colors with same results until I changed the fly to a purple slinky fly. Fly color that I have had no confidence at all was now the only color that seemed to work. 
I landed 5 pikes from the aquarium and some pikes on the way home. Fly color do matter (sometimes ;). 
 


keskiviikko 12. joulukuuta 2012

Equipment failures and idiotism part one


A broken rod, leaking float tube bladder, few leader cut offs, leaking immersion suit, reel brake failure, lost slr-camera and bunch chewed flies. List contains my equipment loss from the year 2012.

Many of the gear failures could have been prevented or fixed immediately on the trip and some of my gear had a warranty repair. This post is about what could I have done better and how worked the warranties-repair services.

TFO Axiom 9 ft 8-weight 

What happened

2nd section from the top broke during casting. Hook hit the blank little bit earlier when I was casting. Nasty wind from the casting hand side changed the line direction and caused the hit. Could been easily avoided by switch over normal casts into to backhand casts.

Repair

I bought this rod as a second hand item so I was not keeping my expectations  high because the rod did not have a warranty. 1st I send email straight to manufacturer and asked about spare parts. 10 minutes later they send me a contact information to a finnish Tfo importer Campstation. Quick reply from the Campstation and the aswer was: I could buy a spare part in cost of a 25€. Excellent!

Ursuit a.w.s immersion suit

What happened

Wet socks after a fishing day in a pontoon boat. Water temperature in November was near freezing point so even a slightly damp socks causes foot cramps. 

Warranty

Warranty service from Ursuit was exemplary. I left my suit to the store from where I bought it. Store posted it to manufacturer. Ursuit tested the suit two times with compressed air and fixed it. About two weeks later from the reclamation doorbell rang and the post delivered the suit to my front door. As a cover letter I received a leak report about the suit. I had no costs at all. After warranty time the costs would be: testing 28€ and socks change 145€.