Yakass Home
Kings, currents and numbers
- Category: Technique & strategies
- Published on Wednesday, 27 January 2010 17:26
- Written by Dan
Since my last entry ages ago I've been fishing a lot. The water has been really patchy with only a couple of kilometres making the difference between warmer mackerel water and cooler shark water. Still no luck on the 2010 mackerel but I've enjoyed some great fun kingie sessions.
Today would have been one of them but the current was pushing against me at around two knots. This was quite manageable but in the space of five minutes at the reef, I sent out a quick live yakka, landed this 6kg kingie and promptly packed my gear ready for the downwind paddle back to the launch site.
For readers of Fishing World Magazine, the February issue sports a piece on paddle fitness written by yours truly. Horrendous currents like the four knot speedway early this month are the primary reason I cited big margins for the amount of body conditioning required for open water kayak anglers. Some days at sea are extremely difficult and paddle fitness and stamina make a huge difference to your personal safety.
If you're new to open water yak fishing, the following formula could be a starting point and show's you how to mathematically calculate the amount of energy reserves you might need as a handy buffer in open waters. Of course, I accept no responsibility or liability for the use/misuse of this information and always maintain that other factors such as personal health, paddle/pedal fitness, swell, current and weather conditions as well as stamina are all key considerations for all offshore kayakers.
Distance to Reef = 2km
4km return trip
Multiply 4km x 3 = 12km
Multiply 12 x 6.5km/h (average paddle speed)
Total = 78 minutes
This formula basically says: If you are unable to maintain a constant paddle or pedal speed of 6.5km/h in protected waters for 78 minutes you might not be giving yourself enough leeway in case of fast currents or changes in wind speed or direction when traveling to and from the reef which is located 2km away. This formula doesn't factor in the time or energy wasted while fishing either.
To give you an indication as to how fast the East Australia Current can be, I went out for a New Years paddle with two other highly experienced yak anglers. One kilometre from the main pinnacle we experienced very slow going. As we reached a marker buoy it was sitting horizontal in a raging current that pushed 4 knots. Neither the Hobie with Mirage Drive or us two paddle yakkers could find the time to get a bait in the water and at times the GPS showed speeds of 0 to 0.5km/h against the stream on a non stop, high energy paddle/ pedal stroke. Being suckers for punishment, we resisted for a good fifteen minutes to see if we could manage dropping a bait. Finally my Hobie mate Stu got a yakka down but pulled the pin immediately because the act of fishing overcomplicated what was already a technically difficult kayaking experience.
2 hours ago
