Product testing

For the first time in probably years i have gone a full week without fishing, and this has been down to getting obsessed with making soft plastic lures. I'm really enjoying it at the minute and today i finally got out to give my fruits of labour a wetting. To say it went well was an understatement, i started off by loosing a decent fish i didn't see that took on the drop while i had slack line due to the wind, even with the bow in the line i felt the pluck but i struck into slack and just felt contact at the end of the strike, not enough to set the hooks and it was off after a short while. Casting back out in the same swim saw me snag up, i pulled for all my might hoping not to loose my shad despite having a box full, the facilities at home to make endless copies and a dealer half an hour down the road to supply me with the stuff to make them. It gave way and i felt i still had my shad on, but then half way back i got another take and i struck and it was off straight away. When i lifted my shad out i realised my stinger had gone, so basically when the fish took i had no hook on!

Off to the next swim with a bit of confidence that my shad was doing the business and i was in first cast after starting the retrieve, a fish that wouldn't have made double but it was seriously fat pushing it into doubles. I was fishing with Paul who was also trying out a shad and he was in on his first cast in the same swim while i was putting mine back. Another double and another obese fish, they had really been feeding hard.

Paul had a jack and we missed a couple of takes before it was nearly time to call it a day with the light fading so it was time to go over a couple of swims again where we had missed takes. I was soon into a fish and thought it was a reasonable jack because it was whizzing all over with allot of energy, not your usual slow plodding of a big fish, i nearly got it in sight and it tore off which made me think, hang on a minute. With the slight coloured water when it came closer you could make out the shape but not enough to see it but it was a big shape!

Finally in the net and weighed on some reputable scales of Paul's (hes learnt his lesson with scales now) it came in at 21lb 8oz. I'm absolutely chuffed to bits, i could have had any lure on and probably caught it but the fact id not been out for a while and then gone out to test my lures and caught such a nice fish made it extra special.

If you really are thinking of giving soft lure making a bash get in touch with Mark at www.lurefactors.co.uk, its easier than you think! You can buy moulds already made so you can pour your own or go the full hog and design your own. The best thing is when you get that lure that catches and gives you confidence in it you can make hundreds cheap! so no worries about shops not selling them.