My gear

As I'm not catching many fish at the moment (any in fact..) I thought I would post a quick run down of the gear I use for my piking.

Rods:

My main rods are a pair of Wychwood 'Rogue pike' 12ft 3lb test curve items which have probably been the best item of tackle I have bought since taking up the sport.

They cost me £50 each around 5 years ago and have been 100% reliable from the word go. They are hardly state of the art being composite carbon blanks and own-brand rings and real seat but they are just so strong and for the price have a great action and can be used for close range or ditance fishing.

I paid £100 for a Grey's specimen rod which would have bent rings after every fishing trip - the Wychwoods just take all manner of abuse and are still going strong after five years.

I really like the short, straight-through handle and the very heavy duty line rings - for the money they really are very good rods.

 

Whychwood Rogue Pike rod

Reels:

What can I say...? It has to be Shimano baitrunners - I've been through a few models but ended up on these as I prefer the classic look - they are the GTE-C versions with five ball bearings plus one roller bearing. The reel includes 2 forged aluminium spools as well.

I'm currently using Shimano's Tribal camo line as well (15lb) which is proving very good. It has 40% less stretch than standard mono.

 Shimano Baitrunner GTE-C

Bite indication:

I'm a bit old-school with this one as my fishing buddy Martin bought me a pair of Efgeeco Super XL's when I first got into piking and to be honest I have never needed anything else. Personally I can't see the benefit in spending hundreds of pounds on bite alarms when they all essentially do the same thing. Mine have never missed a run and, even though they only have tone and volume controlls you can change the sensitivity by replacing the internal light sensor rotor with a different one (which is kept in the alarm body).

Sure, not the prettiest alarms on the market but they do the job!

 

Old-School Super XL optonic

Landing net:

I went for a Wychwood net having been pleased with their rods. It's a perfectly functional landing net (42") but it's a bit on the heavy side even though it was advertised as a full carbon handle and frame - I'm not convinced, I recon it must be composite because I have held a high-end full carbon net and it is a lot lighter than mine.

All the same it's perfectly fine for my fishing and I'm not too bothered about the weight - us pike anglers are real men you know, not like these jessy carp guy's... :o)

Wychwood specemin net (42")

Float rig:

Here's my basic float/leger rig that I use for most of my pike fishing. It's a great rig because it's very adaptable - you can nail a bait to the bottom or fish under depth and trot a bait down a stretch of river.

I prefer the 'stubby slider' floats as they seem to resist flow to some extent when you are bottom fishing on a river but they are also quite boyant which helps when trotting a bait.

I use Fox carbo-flex 30lb wire and Fox size 6 trebles - In my experience carbo flex lasts about five times longer than regular wire trace.

 

Float/leger rig (Fox stubby slider)

Please feel free to leave any comments about all this - I'd be interested to hear what gear/rigs you are using...

Dave

Images taken with Sony Ericsson W995 8.1 megapixel