With winter fast approaching I decided to target Perch with the target being a fish over 3lb. After watching a few YouTube videos I decided to try and achieve this by lure fishing, namely drop shot fishing. This was something I had never tried so didn’t want to spend a small fortune on kit for a fishing style I may not get on with or like.
I set myself a budget of around the £100 mark to get a rod reel and all the other stuff I required and headed to St Ives Tackle to get kitted out. Once in the shop I looked at a few rods and decided on a Fox warrior 225 at 2.25m and a weight rating between 5-20g with a nice split cork handle. It looked good and the tip seemed quite responsive and had red tip whippings so you can see and bites or taps on the lure and at a reasonable £39.99 seemed ideal to start out with.
I then had to choose a reel and looked at a few suitable for this style of fishing and eventually settled on the Okuma Ceymar CXT-30 which felt well built , had a nice smooth front drag and comes with 2 spools all for less than £40.00.
I spooled the reel up with some 6kg jig braid, selected some small rubber shads, hooks, weights and fluorocarbon. It was now time to test the new set up.
The rod has performed well and you feel most of the bites although a bit stiff for small perch I have found it means you can use it for light spinners and normal lure light lure work .
The rod casts well and is also responsive when fishing directly under the tip. I have had loads of perch from a few ounces up to 3 lb 6 oz and pike to around 8 lb. The rod has coped very well and I have always felt in control of all the fish I have hooked.
The reel casts well and the front drag is excellent, responsive and the perfect size for this style of fishing.I have now used this set up for over 3 months a few times a week on fen drains and various rivers. The reel is still smooth after landing loads of fish and the rod still looks great and is performing well.
Both have proved to be great for starting out drop shot fishing on a budget and I would recommend them to anyone looking at wanting to give this style of fishing a go.
Tight lines.
Simon Irvine
