Who can remember the first time they went fishing,and their fist fishing rod and reel?

My first rod was a 9ft Cane rod with a greenhart top section,the reel was a base metal fly reel with a ratchet.
I was 11 years old,and the rod and reel was a birthday present.
My first fishing trip was to two ponds out in the fields about a mile away.
The ponds were called the Apple and Pear.
I caught 4 Perch.The maggot tin was aluminium,and a sparrow perched on it and was pecking away at my maggots.
The reel wasn't actually a fly reel,I had to pull loops of the line down between a couple of the lower rod rings to gain enough line to cast out.
(1956)

wicker creel, knotted mesh keepnet, porcupine quill, lead shot in all sizes,
the stolen fortnight, intrepid black prince reel, tank ariel rod, thick black water proofs - oh the days!

Notbad wrote:

wicker creel, knotted mesh keepnet, porcupine quill,  lead shot in all sizes,
the stolen fortnight, intrepid black prince reel, tank ariel rod, thick black water proofs - oh the days!

I always wanted a Tank aerial,but never managed to get one.
I had an ex army cape,you had to pull it apart before you put it on because the waterproofing was sticky.

VALVEBOUNCE wrote:

Notbad wrote:

wicker creel, knotted mesh keepnet, porcupine quill,  lead shot in all sizes,
the stolen fortnight, intrepid black prince reel, tank ariel rod, thick black water proofs - oh the days!

I always wanted a Tank aerial,but never managed to get one.
I had an ex army cape,you had to pull it apart before you put it on because the waterproofing was sticky.

The first rod of my own was a Milbro coarse rod, glass construction, a dull orange colour, I think it was 10' 6".
It got used for everything!

I shall gather my geriatric wits and try to remember a long time ago.
My first attempts were when I was very young, we had a 4 foot square open fronted brick shelter over a perpetual spring at the bottom of our garden which was an emergency water supply in drought times for the area. In later years I built a dam about 50 yards down stream that gave me a pool 50 yards by about 10 yards and 2 feet deep, a number of rafts were built some more successful than others, and many times my school friends were taken home wearing borrowed dry clothes.
One dry year I drained the pool and started to dig out years of accumulated leaf litter and found an area paved with flat limestone where horses and carts could turn around when collecting water, which explained the overgrown track by our house that led down to the spring.
Among the pebbles and in cracks in the wall were a number of millers thumb fish all of about 2 to 3 inches long.
My top of the line gear was a bent pin and a short length of Mums sewing cotton.
I spent many frustrated hours trying to get them to bite, and it was probably some time before I worked out that a worm on the pin increased my catch rate from zero.
You have to understand that there was no one in our family that knew anything about fishing, so it was down to sheer instinct and much trial and error.
Tea time, more tomorrow

Not far from where I lived there was a working cotton mill,there were two connecting lodges where they kept the water for cooling purposes.
The warm water came back out of the mill down a slow graded chute.
Someone had put Carp and Goldfish in the lodges,and the place was heaving with them.Five or six of us would walk down there after tea on summer nights,with a cane with a bit of precious nylon line with a bent straight pin on it,the bait was a dot of squeezed bread on the pin,treated with aniseed.When the white dot of the bread disappeared from sight,you had a fish on.
Times were hard after the war,things were in short supply but we got round it.
I cringe when I see this modern generation throw stuff away

Colwyn Bay pier when I was 8 in 1957, a 7ft cane rod and a centre pin reel, there were pin whiting around then as well and I'm still catching them.

squidward wrote:

Colwyn Bay pier when I was 8 in 1957, a 7ft cane rod and a centre pin reel, there were pin whiting around then as well and I'm still catching them.

I wonder if the whitings were relations of those you caught? 

For sea fishing, I bought one of those tank aerial kits advertised in the Eagle kids magazine, I soon found trying casting in a field that the top of the 3 pieces a solid steel wire was too heavy and flexible , I cannot remember whether I drastically shortened it or used something lighter from an old freshwater rod, a Penn Seaboy overhead reel. Venue was Bangor pier on a day trip with my parents, did not catch any fish, but had some great birds nests. This is where my patience skills were honed and I learnt that slowly and carefully undid better than pulling at random.

The Eagle comic with the Mekon,was Dan Dare in the same comic?
After pushing nearly 70 yrs I can't remember (that's my excuse anyway)

Commando comic books were my favourite.

Back to fishing, before the annual weeks holiday on the coast, balsa wood and peasticks were bought from the hardware store and sea floats carved, a wire loop made from a paperclip whipped on for the line to be looped through and
model making Humbrol paint applied.

6lb bs line ( probably not strong enough!) replaced the line on our coarse reels. ( We had no idea that Low tide fishing was a thing)

A seaside holiday would include a trip to Woolworths for some Winfield brand mackerel spinners in Toby and Koster patterns and maybe a card of weedless spoons in the hope that we could beat the kelp.

VALVEBOUNCE wrote:

The Eagle comic with the Mekon,was Dan Dare in the same comic?
After pushing nearly 70 yrs I can't remember (that's my excuse anyway)

According to Wikipedia the Mekon, arch enemy of Dan Dare first appeared in issue number 30.

Looking up the origins
of The Eagle was quite interesting!

and how about this for a spot of home mechanics,

Nice one,I remember Dan dare on the bbc when Tv's first came out.
His rocket ship had a sparkler as the flame at the back.
I worked for GEC putting signs up many moons ago,and the manager was the spitting image of the Mekon.

My first rod was given to me by a friend of the family that we use to visit I think it was a sea rod if there was such a thing then, if I remember right it was solid wood butt with a cane top piece the top piece was as thick as my little finger at that age and weighed a ton, I must of been about 8 or 9. No one in my family know anything about fishing and we lived a 100 miles from the nearest sea with only a push bike so I decided to go to a lake not far away that charged a shilling a day called Pattsall Park (now a golf course and trout fishing). First I went to the shop in the village that sold a bit of fishing gear run by Mrs Stringer and spent my pocket money on a reel ( black bakerlite centre pin) and some line to fill it hooks (large) and a float that was red on top and green underneath and shine with a stick that went down the middle it was about the size of a golf ball. Home again to dig some large lug worms all about 6” long. Next morning up early and off paid my shilling and settled down on the bank about 10 or so paces away from an old gent also fishing. I spent all day there without even a bit with the old gent watching on, when it was time to go home he got up and walked to me and said “ you will never catch anything with that lot lad”, he then gave me some quill floats told me something about maggots and hook sizes. I will always be grateful to that gent he set me on the right road and I never saw him again. I struggled along with this for sometime and saved my pocket money got Christmas and birthday money and bought a Spitcane spinning rod about 10’ 6” with a Michelin fixed spool reel and a wicker fishing basket that I could sit on this did me for years and was used for everything one rod did all.

That was the 'good old days'KD.
Great memories.
Nice post.