DerekD Posted January 13, 2022 Share Posted January 13, 2022 (edited) Hi All, I got diagnosed with Covid yesterday. None of the major symptoms (sore throat, loss of smell or taste, running nose, etc) and about all I am feeling is sleepy (which could be just me and the muggy conditions). I've been told to self isolate at home for 7 days and am using some of this time to work on some other articles I've had in mind for several months. When preparing the the topic of effective casting I reached out for some help with the videos but also played around with the camera gear and really nice zoom lenses I already own. I've seen several excellent videos on working topwater lures like the Sugapen but as they are mostly done with a GoPro or similar they don't show what is happening at the working end of the outfit. Essentially it is what is referred to as a walk the dog type retrieve with the lure skipping left, right, left, right and with some pauses thrown in. The rod tip is being worked in really short sharp pulses and then a stuttering wind between the flicks to take up the slack. Almost shake the hand rather than flick or twitch the hand. It will take a few goes and it will be tiring on the hand the first few times as the tendency is to stiffen up the hand. Get into the habit of relaxing your hand as you work the lure. My mate Ollie was on the camera for this one as we were working out the capabilities of the equipment. This video shows me working a Sugapen. If chasing bream I'll use longer pauses but I hope you get the idea. https://youtu.be/WY9CBQ61pDQ Regards, Derek Edited January 13, 2022 by DerekD 7 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Little_Flatty Posted January 13, 2022 Share Posted January 13, 2022 Thanks Derek, Here’s to a quick recovery and a busy isolation period, ideally filled with work on articles for us to read! Looking forward to reading them! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
big Neil Posted January 13, 2022 Share Posted January 13, 2022 What self respecting fish wouldn't want to jump all over that presentation? Well done Derek and Ollie. bn Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mrsswordfisherman Posted January 14, 2022 Share Posted January 14, 2022 Thanks for all your hard work here for raiders and guests @DerekD Many people now are covid positive. It is the way all over the world now. Glad your symptoms are mild and hope your isolation passes quickly! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rebel Posted January 15, 2022 Share Posted January 15, 2022 Great post. Thank you. Get better soon. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DerekD Posted January 15, 2022 Author Share Posted January 15, 2022 14 hours ago, mrsswordfisherman said: Thanks for all your hard work here for raiders and guests @DerekD Many people now are covid positive. It is the way all over the world now. Glad your symptoms are mild and hope your isolation passes quickly! 37 minutes ago, Rebel said: Great post. Thank you. Get better soon. Thank you @mrsswordfisherman and @Rebel Still no major symptoms and the intermittent naps have been a semi guilty pleasure. Minor issue is that on the downside the Department of Health are not consistent about the day to stop isolating. Test came back positive at 7am on Wednesday the 12th. Their website says 7 days self isolation if there are no more symptoms. Which I'd take to mean I could head out on Wednesday the 19th. The separate notice they sent me says isolate from the 12th to the 20th (the Thursday) but then the interpretation of to the 20th could mean midnight at the end of the 19th or including the 20th. We see the same with double demerit points as the to includes the actual final day mentioned. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mrsswordfisherman Posted January 15, 2022 Share Posted January 15, 2022 5 hours ago, DerekD said: Thank you @mrsswordfisherman and @Rebel Still no major symptoms and the intermittent naps have been a semi guilty pleasure. Minor issue is that on the downside the Department of Health are not consistent about the day to stop isolating. Test came back positive at 7am on Wednesday the 12th. Their website says 7 days self isolation if there are no more symptoms. Which I'd take to mean I could head out on Wednesday the 19th. The separate notice they sent me says isolate from the 12th to the 20th (the Thursday) but then the interpretation of to the 20th could mean midnight at the end of the 19th or including the 20th. We see the same with double demerit points as the to includes the actual final day mentioned. The covid Medical Clearance Certificate from NSW Health gives you the dates you need to isolate from and to. That is your legal document to show NSW Health, NSW Police or your employer. What are the dates on your Medical Clearance cert @DerekD? It could be 8 days depending on time of test. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DerekD Posted January 15, 2022 Author Share Posted January 15, 2022 (edited) 2 hours ago, mrsswordfisherman said: The covid Medical Clearance Certificate from NSW Health gives you the dates you need to isolate from and to. That is your legal document to show NSW Health, NSW Police or your employer. What are the dates on your Medical Clearance cert @DerekD? It could be 8 days depending on time of test. Hi M.S. it specifically states "This notice confirms that you were required to self-isolate from 12-01-2022 to 20-01-2022 under the Public Health (COVID-19 Self-Isolation) Order (No 4) 2021". My confusion is with the interpretation of the word to. For example, I can bring someone to their front door and that implies I haven't crossed the threshold but have taken it right to the edge. Using this line of logic it means that I am allowed to leave my place say 1 minute after midnight at the end of Wednesday the 19th of January. This would also line up with the Department of health's advised 7 days isolation from Wednesday the 12th (when I tested positive at about 7am as part of company testing procedure) to Wednesday the 19th. I also logged the R.A.T. test that morning as part of the new rule change. My counter-example is that demerit points for the Christmas break were to Monday the 3rd of January but in this case it also included the whole of Monday as it were a public holiday. If I look at this example the day I can actually leave (assuming is that there are no symptoms which to date there have not been) is as the date and time ticks over to Friday the 21st. I've got a telecon with company HR next week. Currently their interpretation is that the 7 days starts from the date and time of the positive R.A.T. test. What will probably happen is (even though we are an essential industry and my normal place of work is the site) that I'll suggest I work from home for several additional days and then return to site on the 21st which will get around most of the confusion. I think the department of health statement needs to have a line "up to and including...". I'm genuinely not trying to be a smart@rse or keyboard warrior on this which is why the interpretation is causing me agitation. I'm pretty sure some court cases have been lost on the interpretation of one word. For some interesting side reading, there is an example of a US$10 million case lost for the sake of a single comma: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-03-21/the-case-of-the-$13-million-comma/8372956 Sincerely, Derek PS. I think we need a simple one word which could be used in place of to which would define if it is to the edge of something or inclusive of something. Kind of like "et al". PPS. I found a follow up to the missing comma story: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/09/us/oxford-comma-maine.html Edited January 15, 2022 by DerekD Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mrsswordfisherman Posted January 15, 2022 Share Posted January 15, 2022 @DerekD they would have sent you sms text with numbers to call for info. Give them a call and they may clarify for you. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Subtropic Posted January 16, 2022 Share Posted January 16, 2022 Hi Derek, Firstly I hope you get better soon and hopefully it’s a very mild case. Secondly thanks for the video. I have been trying to master this technique with limited success. Does lure size have any affect? I tried it today with an Austackle Joey. This lure just didn’t want to play. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blaxland Posted January 16, 2022 Share Posted January 16, 2022 Nice DerekD I have found sugar pens to be deadly but the hooks are not so great and when I upgraded the hooks they seemed less affective. could be just bad luck will keep trying. (target surface kings) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DerekD Posted January 16, 2022 Author Share Posted January 16, 2022 12 minutes ago, Subtropic said: Hi Derek, Firstly I hope you get better soon and hopefully it’s a very mild case. Secondly thanks for the video. I have been trying to master this technique with limited success. Does lure size have any affect? I tried it today with an Austackle Joey. This lure just didn’t want to play. Hi Subtropic. When you say you have been trying to master this with limited success are you talking about achieving the motion in the video link or getting the fish to hit it? Two slightly different problems with a solution to each. BTW size has an impact and brands too to a lesser degree. For example it is harder with the 58mm lures because they have a tendency to go subsurface rather than walk the dog. Stay away from those for the time being. Once you have clarified then I think I will be able to help you further as I've seen similar issues for each person I've helped learn this and usually it is the same problem. Regards, Derek Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Subtropic Posted January 16, 2022 Share Posted January 16, 2022 27 minutes ago, DerekD said: Hi Subtropic. When you say you have been trying to master this with limited success are you talking about achieving the motion in the video link or getting the fish to hit it? Two slightly different problems with a solution to each. BTW size has an impact and brands too to a lesser degree. For example it is harder with the 58mm lures because they have a tendency to go subsurface rather than walk the dog. Stay away from those for the time being. Once you have clarified then I think I will be able to help you further as I've seen similar issues for each person I've helped learn this and usually it is the same problem. Regards, Derek Achieving the motion. My light spinning setup is a 1-3kg rod with 6lb. braid. I experimented today and used 10lb mono as a leader. I normally used fluorocarbon. The Austackle Joey is 60mm so would fall into the category you mentioned. Regards Grant Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DerekD Posted January 16, 2022 Author Share Posted January 16, 2022 (edited) 2 hours ago, Subtropic said: Achieving the motion. My light spinning setup is a 1-3kg rod with 6lb. braid. I experimented today and used 10lb mono as a leader. I normally used fluorocarbon. The Austackle Joey is 60mm so would fall into the category you mentioned. Regards Grant Hi again, While it would be easier in person and I could check if I could get the motion desired out of your lure I'll trust to the fact I can get pretty well any lure in this size walking the dog in this way and and usually with a pretty tight motion. Where I usually see the problem is that people can't get the twitches tight and sharp enough because they have a tendency to move the rod like for a soft plastic. They pivot the rod via the wrist. Watch this excellent video from Sandflats Fishing Australia as reference for further discussion and in particular watch what he is doing with his wrist. You can see the walk the dog motion at the end of the video. This is NOT what we actually want to be doing for the small versions. The lure he is using is a 120mm sugapen so it is a lot more forgiving than the smaller ones we are now discussing. First and critical point is after every twitch we need to create the slack which allows the lure to swing to one side. We also need to get a little bit of slack back so the next twitch pulls the lure back towards the centre and when the tension comes off the line the momentum allows the lure to swing over to the other side and then repeat for the backwards and forwards. That much I am pretty sure you have worked out for yourself. This is the part that is going to mess with your head. Do not pivot the rod through the wrist. This creates angular moment and say a 1° to 2° movement of the hand may result in a 10 to 15cm movement of the rod tip. This then has the result of dragging the lure forward rather than creating the small pulses we require. I want to to shake (not pivot) your hand from side to side say 2cm like your hand is suffering tremors. This will reduce the distance travelled by the rod tip for each pulse to also a few cm. The pulses have to be in a direction so the rod loads up the line and transmits the motion to the lure before creating/allowing slack. It is this short sharp pulsing which creates the tight walk the dog twitches you see in my video. Include this with a stuttery wind on the pauses The first three or four sessions trying this your hand will get tired as you will want to tense up the muscles. Once you learn to relax the muscles involved it get easier and easier. Regards, Derek Edited January 16, 2022 by DerekD 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Subtropic Posted January 16, 2022 Share Posted January 16, 2022 Thanks so much Derek, really appreciate the effort you put into the response. I am going to digest this and put into practice soon. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mike Sydney Posted January 17, 2022 Share Posted January 17, 2022 16 hours ago, DerekD said: I want to to shake (not pivot) your hand from side to side say 2cm like your hand is suffering tremors. I think that technique is called “Marty McFly-fishing”…🤭 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sea Ranger Posted January 17, 2022 Share Posted January 17, 2022 Hope you are feeling better soon Derek. We will chase some Kingies then! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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