THE ULTIMATE ANGLING BUCKET LIST

Hamish Currie is the only home water charter skipper I have ever come across who actually guarantees
his clients fish. When, or if things aren't going to plan, a couple of drifts around the salmon cages usually
saves any strugglers on-board from suffering a blank and earns him a wage, the reason being that huge
shoals of coalfish have taken up residence under the nets where they wax fat on any high protein pellets
missed by the salmon which then fall through the mesh.
And when I say wax fat, that is precisely what they do. Initially, fishing with traditional soft lures on
fixed spool outfits was producing fish to double figures, which on any tackle would give more than a
good account of themselves. So much so that I was starting to have second thoughts about putting a fly
tied to a four kg tippet into the water.
IGFA rules state that fish must not be chummed up, so throwing in pellets, which we had onboard,
would reflect neither the spirit nor the legality of things. On the other hand, to get a feel for how things
might ultimately go, as an experiment, that's exactly what we did, and sure enough, a huge dark ball of
writhing coalies came up into view almost the instant they picked up on the sound of the pellets going
in, followed immediately by my fly.
But you had to be quick. Very Quick in fact. Mopping up the handful of pellets, the ball of fish was so
tight and the boats drift in the wind and tide was so great, that by the time the fly got down to depth it
was miles away from the fish.
Far better than not to feed at all and keep working the cage edges trying to interest more scattered fish
as they mooched about waiting for their next meal, which is exactly what I did.
Getting takes wasn't a problem. Holding on to them without parting the leader as I fought to steer
powerful fish from under the net and away from the anchor cables was a nightmare, and as a result, I
lost several good fish in quick succession.
I say good fish, but judging by the size of the best fish I
eventually landed, which was a little over four pounds, they
may well not all have been monsters. They just go so well.
Extremely powerful fish.
Eventually, I did start to get the better of a few down at the
lower end of the size range, which I have to confess I kept,
as at that time we were using coalfish up to around five
pounds apiece as bait for common skate, which meant I
wouldn't have to call in at Carlisle on the way up to
Lochaline to pick up a frozen supply the following spring.
As a result, the official IGFA four Kg tippet world record of
four pounds four ounces which I had weighed on a certified
scale in a grocers shop, went on to catch me a common skate
of one hundred and forty five pounds.
Associated audio interview numbers: 138.
Phill Williams, IGFA tippet record
497