How to play and land a fish from a boat
Play and land a fish from a boat safely
1 Always make sure you have everything in position before setting off. The landing net needs to be facing the pointy end and you need a decent cradle-style unhooking mat in the bottom of the boat. Also take a spare landing net pole if you have one.
2 Slowly pull yourself out with the rod by pumping and winding until you reach the weeded or snagged fish, you need very little pressure to move a boat but it takes a minute or so to start moving. Once you have momentum it’s easy to keep going.
3 Aways pull from the same direction, preferably straight off the front of the boat and never use side strain. A boat is so easy to propel on water that side strain will only make you spin uncontrollably.
4 Stay sitting or kneeling whenever possible, just face the front and keep your body weight low as this will stop you rocking or capsizing.
5 Try to never have slack line at any point; the stretch you have already put in the line will cause it to spin around the rod tip as soon as it goes slack.
6 If you do need to put the rod down to free a weeded fish, check the tip is not tangled and then hold the line just above the water and slide the spare pole down into the weed, levering it up and breaking off lumps of weed as you go.
7 Most of the time the fish will not be where the line first goes into the weed and as you free the line it will ping up and go off in the direction of the fish, be ready to grab the rod as soon as it does.
8 Take your time and don’t panic, it’s an entirely different set of rules when you’re out there with the fish, you have less leverage as the boat can move whereas the bank doesn’t.
9 If possible try to tie off against an island or the bank once the fish is moving again, this will help prevent him from just dragging you from one weedbed to another.
10 Once he is in the net, just bite the line and collapse the net, lifting the whole lot into the boat. Taking the rod apart is also a good idea as you can easily snap a protruding rod tip as you struggle ashore with the fish.
