Words by Pat Gillett.
I have added a couple of small items to my kit recently, both of which may seem a bit ‘gimmicky’, but both of which work quite well.
The first of these is a Gardner Ear-Lite. This is basically a very small torch that you wear on your ear in the same way has you would a hands free adaptor for a mobile phone. It is a tiny piece of kit that I can carry easily in a small coat pocket.
The torch doesn’t throw out has much light has most conventional head torches but I found it gave out enough light to net fish whilst on the river.
The biggest advantages it has are :
- It’s much lighter than a head torch.
- It easily swivels for different directions.
- Whilst fishing on the rivers after dark in the winter, the air temperature is very often low enough that you can see your breath. This makes a conventional head torch less effective when netting fish because your breath is rising and obstructing the light from the head torch. The torch worn on the ear negates this problem a fair bit because the torch beam comes from a lower position.
The torch is only £6.99 so even if you don’t use it a lot, it may well come in handy has a spare to carry around.
The other little bit of kit is the Berkeley Hotwire Line Cutter. This little gadget looks like it will do all that a good pair of braid scissors
will do and a lot more!
- You don’t get any fraying of braid because it ‘welds’ the braid after it has been cut.
- If like me, you like to blob your knots (to avoid slippage) whilst using fluorocarbon or some of the more modern lines then again the cutter comes in handy. Much easier than trying to use a lighter (especially if on a windy river bank), and because the filament is so small you can get much closer to the knot.
I think you could also use it for bank side repairs of any plastic items or maybe even for repairing the plastic lures that a lot of anglers use in today’s pike fishing.
The cutter retails at about £12.99, but I got a new one off e-bay for £6.00 plus p&p. It is a little bulky because it takes 2 AA batteries but is light enough not to matter.
What new little gadgets have you all added this year?
Cheers,
Pat Gillett
Regards,
Comments
Leave a comment Trackback