Viking Lars | Saturday, 7 November 2020
I needed a set of shooting heads for my 5-wt, which is the rod I use the most when floating (pontoon or float tube). My current set of sinking heads is at least 10 years old (and probably more) and three out of four were cracking in the coating. They were an odd bunch, collected, cut and spliced from various lines over a longer period. They worked very well, but since they all needed replacing, I ordered a Scientific Anglers standard shooting head, a 7-wt. Just one to see how they fit. They're 30-feet, which is OK and I would be OK cutting a little off, adding to it harder.
Right out of the box they weight was good, so I ordered three more, so I have intermediate, sink 2, sink 4 and sink 6- All of them lines I use both for trout in lakes and in the sea for sea trout, sea bass, mackerel, cod etc.
It's not so much for the distance as it is for the ability to change density within a matter of minutes. I usually fish a monofilament shooting line behind the heads, mainly because of reduced water resistance (=more depth, faster) and for the sink 6, I acutally have the running line of an old sink 6 WF-line attached for even more depth. Works fantastic. What I hadn't considered was the prospect of doing 8 loops. But I'll do a few today and then just continue doing them one of two at a time.
Fishing sinking lines from boats, tubes or pontoons is really great fun and actually much more technical than most imagine. If you're the type who cast out, lets the line sink and retrieve you're missing out on a lot. There are so many aspects of which the way you handle your boat or craft is just one (but an extremely important one). I believe it was in the summer of 2004 I visited Paul and we had a shoot out. I met a very, very nice gentleman, Pete Sutton, there and we got on really well. He was close freinds with now sadly deceased Steve Parton, but as a surprise gift, some weeks after returning home, I received a copy of Steve Parton's book, "The Modern Fundamentals of Boat Fishing and Float Tubing" from Pete. There's an inscription from Pete as well as from Steve. That book is a fountain of knowlegde from one of the top-anglers in the UK. I can only say: Read it! (ISBN 0-9538198-1-7). As I've said before, if these are the fundamentals, I simply wouldnøt understand a word of the "Advanced Boat Fishing Techniques". There is so much more to sinking line fishing than just casting out and counting down your line.
Let me just finish with a re-cap of the casting practice I really intensified this summer. My distance is improving, slowly, but surely and I definitely won't win any competitions anytime soon, but I probably wouldn't embarras myself completely either. I'm working on consistency and and well-controlled cast rather than distance-distance-distance, going for a really small improvements at a time instead.
Even if I set out with distance practice in mind, I've found myself practicing precision more and more. It's just more fun and I'm in no way doing this for a living, so I do what I find the most fun :-). Precision is coming along nicely.
I went out last weekend with a tape measure to check where I was if I were to put a bid into the PULD-competition. I'll try and concentrate on that drill and see if I can get in a decent distance and then film it.
Have a great weekend!
Lars