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This was an unusual day out on a charter boat to say the least as those of you who read the shore fishing thread will know.
I had been asked by the WWF to take part in a film about fishing here in the NE and how I felt the proposals of the marine bill white paper would affect recreational sea anglers. Dont ask why they asked me cos I really dont know the answer but it took a little while to sink in the fact that whatever I said there is no way that one persons views would be agreed with by the estimated 2 million other sea anglers in the UK.
The purpose of the film was to get comments from 8 seperate recognised share holders in the marine enviroment...sea anglers being one of the eight. The eventual destination of the film is to be emailed to every MP, newspaper and anyone else the WWF think are involved with the future of our seas and also our chosen sport.
I asked on the shore forum if anyone was intrested in taking part for the simple reason that is the busiest forum but midweek short notice is not the best time for people and despite several positive replies we ended up with myself, stephen brown of the cleadon club and Stu Johnstone (the skipper of the boat which holds the record we would all like to have) , Frank a retired an long standing regular on Flamer 2 and the skipper John on board.
I picked the film crew up at darlington station the night before and ran them over to Hartlepool where we assumed they would get a hotel pretty easily...how wrong can you be. It was after 9.30 before they actually found a hotel with vacancies and that was in the services at Durham South. We went for a beer to discuss plans for the following day. I finally arrived home at just after midnight with everyone saying they would be there at 7 am.
After a sleepless night i collected the crew at 6am and a brief breakfast at the services we travellled to hartlepool.
7am saw us all meeting at Hartlepool marina with a good forecast and glorious sunshine. Stephen had arrived an hour early and John the skipper was on the fuel berth. We loaded the film crews gear and awaited Stu Johnsons arrival.
There was no particular script to the filming but the evening before in the pub I had commented that if we went south we have the delights of ICI Wilton and the steel works at redcar as a backdrop but further north would be far better eye candy. The producer immediately picked up on this as a comment that they had filmed in all kinds of beautifull scenery and it would be nice to have a more real world industrial background to a feature on fishing in the north east as a contrast to the footage they had previously filmed.
By 7.15 there was no sign of Stuart so it was decided to film the tackling up baiting up and generally getting ready footage while still tied up at the fuel berth whilst we were trying to get hold of Stuart. Preliminary filming was done by 8am and with no sign of Stuart we headed out to sea. The skipper said that he intended taking us north to marks that had fished well over the previous few days but the film crews plans to get and industrial backdrop meant a trip south to get the required footage. But an Offshore 105 ...as well as providing one of the most stable platforms I have ever fished off is also no plodder when it comes from getting from mark to mark so we headed south for fifteen minutes and had our first drop just north of the tees dredged channel on some curious lumps that are not on the charts but are probably some deteriorating wreck ( also a potential tope venue which is why john took me there with a veiw to the summer ahead )
Needless to say as predicted by the skipper we caught nothing but with the required footage in the can after about 15 mins we headed north to the proposed fishing marks. I should mention at this point that the film crew had to catch a train at 1pm from darlington so time was not on our side in terms of actual fishing time.
We arrived at the skippers chosen mark , down went four rods with a variety of baits and for that matter tactics. Two rods from the skipper and frank had muppets and a jigger on (traditional gear), Stephen was fishing peeler and lug and I opted for a shad on light gear. First fish was to Stephen, a small codling of about two pounds which was filmed and released. Next was a similar sized fish to baited hokeyes by Frank which ended up in the the take home bucket.
Over the next few hours we caught steadily and had about 10 fish of which five we kept. The film crew got their interviews with everyone..young and old..they did about 2 hours of filming which is to be turned into a 2 minute slot to be sent to every MP and all the papers. It isnt going to do fishing here in the NE any harm.
I would like to thank John the skipper of Flamer 11 for taking us out at no charge and providing what the film crew wanted to see whilst under the pressure of only having a few hours and no second chance to produce the goods. Hopefully what was filmed will be of benefit to all NE anglers (shore and boat) in the long term. If blatant plugs for skippers were not frowned on I would post his contact details here but google "flamer 11" as he is a skipper who works hard to get his customers fish.
After we dropped the film crew off at the marina we went back out to do some proper fishing but i will continue that later in a subsequent post.
We will be sent a copy of what was filmed and what was is to be sent to every mp in the country and I will post a link up to this when its available.
Cheers
Dave
I had been asked by the WWF to take part in a film about fishing here in the NE and how I felt the proposals of the marine bill white paper would affect recreational sea anglers. Dont ask why they asked me cos I really dont know the answer but it took a little while to sink in the fact that whatever I said there is no way that one persons views would be agreed with by the estimated 2 million other sea anglers in the UK.
The purpose of the film was to get comments from 8 seperate recognised share holders in the marine enviroment...sea anglers being one of the eight. The eventual destination of the film is to be emailed to every MP, newspaper and anyone else the WWF think are involved with the future of our seas and also our chosen sport.
I asked on the shore forum if anyone was intrested in taking part for the simple reason that is the busiest forum but midweek short notice is not the best time for people and despite several positive replies we ended up with myself, stephen brown of the cleadon club and Stu Johnstone (the skipper of the boat which holds the record we would all like to have) , Frank a retired an long standing regular on Flamer 2 and the skipper John on board.
I picked the film crew up at darlington station the night before and ran them over to Hartlepool where we assumed they would get a hotel pretty easily...how wrong can you be. It was after 9.30 before they actually found a hotel with vacancies and that was in the services at Durham South. We went for a beer to discuss plans for the following day. I finally arrived home at just after midnight with everyone saying they would be there at 7 am.
After a sleepless night i collected the crew at 6am and a brief breakfast at the services we travellled to hartlepool.
7am saw us all meeting at Hartlepool marina with a good forecast and glorious sunshine. Stephen had arrived an hour early and John the skipper was on the fuel berth. We loaded the film crews gear and awaited Stu Johnsons arrival.
There was no particular script to the filming but the evening before in the pub I had commented that if we went south we have the delights of ICI Wilton and the steel works at redcar as a backdrop but further north would be far better eye candy. The producer immediately picked up on this as a comment that they had filmed in all kinds of beautifull scenery and it would be nice to have a more real world industrial background to a feature on fishing in the north east as a contrast to the footage they had previously filmed.
By 7.15 there was no sign of Stuart so it was decided to film the tackling up baiting up and generally getting ready footage while still tied up at the fuel berth whilst we were trying to get hold of Stuart. Preliminary filming was done by 8am and with no sign of Stuart we headed out to sea. The skipper said that he intended taking us north to marks that had fished well over the previous few days but the film crews plans to get and industrial backdrop meant a trip south to get the required footage. But an Offshore 105 ...as well as providing one of the most stable platforms I have ever fished off is also no plodder when it comes from getting from mark to mark so we headed south for fifteen minutes and had our first drop just north of the tees dredged channel on some curious lumps that are not on the charts but are probably some deteriorating wreck ( also a potential tope venue which is why john took me there with a veiw to the summer ahead )
Needless to say as predicted by the skipper we caught nothing but with the required footage in the can after about 15 mins we headed north to the proposed fishing marks. I should mention at this point that the film crew had to catch a train at 1pm from darlington so time was not on our side in terms of actual fishing time.
We arrived at the skippers chosen mark , down went four rods with a variety of baits and for that matter tactics. Two rods from the skipper and frank had muppets and a jigger on (traditional gear), Stephen was fishing peeler and lug and I opted for a shad on light gear. First fish was to Stephen, a small codling of about two pounds which was filmed and released. Next was a similar sized fish to baited hokeyes by Frank which ended up in the the take home bucket.
Over the next few hours we caught steadily and had about 10 fish of which five we kept. The film crew got their interviews with everyone..young and old..they did about 2 hours of filming which is to be turned into a 2 minute slot to be sent to every MP and all the papers. It isnt going to do fishing here in the NE any harm.
I would like to thank John the skipper of Flamer 11 for taking us out at no charge and providing what the film crew wanted to see whilst under the pressure of only having a few hours and no second chance to produce the goods. Hopefully what was filmed will be of benefit to all NE anglers (shore and boat) in the long term. If blatant plugs for skippers were not frowned on I would post his contact details here but google "flamer 11" as he is a skipper who works hard to get his customers fish.
After we dropped the film crew off at the marina we went back out to do some proper fishing but i will continue that later in a subsequent post.
We will be sent a copy of what was filmed and what was is to be sent to every mp in the country and I will post a link up to this when its available.
Cheers
Dave
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