Favourite fishing books

Whats your favourite five fishing books? I would have said sea angling books but there are so few of the damn things. Its hard to get decent angling books these days (same goes for mags), lots seem to be just cut & past versions have accepted angling facts.

1. Operation Sea Angler by Ladle,Casey & Glehill
Picked up a second hand copy in Derry for £5 and best book ever got. Lots of really interesting theories and knowledge and every page about sea angling! Every time i read it I'm away fishin the next evening!

2. Fishing in Wild Places by Street
Really nice book, all to do with trout and salmon but lots of it about Donegal and fishing there.

3. Hooked on Bass by Ladle & Vaughan
Best book written about the species, any time I go to Kerry or about 2 weeks before I go it gets read two or three times. Brillantly combines narrative and facts. Huge amount of shared knowledge.

4. Sea Trout Fishing by Falkus
Top book and again best on the species. Really enjoyed the chapter on fishing them in the sea and fuel my passion for sea trout fishing.

5. Freshwater Fishing by Falkus & Buller
One of my first ever fishing books. Spent hours in the thing.

Not quite making the list but good all the same would be Greer's 'Ferox Trout' and Jenkin's 'Sea Angling with the Baited Spoon'.

Pete

I did a search and it seems that Operation Sea Angler is out of print but is available online at http://www.mikeladle.com/osa.html

Paul

My favourite and most useful fishing ( sea ) book is 'Sea Fishing - Properly Explained' by Ian Ball. It is cheap, cheerful and full of good basic advice and common sense.

A useful book-finding www resource, that some may not be aware of, is Abebooks.

Contrary to Pete's statement, there are many sea fishing titles out there. Many, however, repeat the same information and are not of particular value.

Peter

PS if searching the www for sea fishing books, look for sea angling instead. More results will arise that way.

In no particular order....

The End of the Line: How Overfishing Is Changing the World and What We Eat - Charles Clover

Cod: A Biography of the Fish That Changed the World - Mark Kurlansky

Bass Fishing on Shore and Sea - John Darling

Empty Ocean - Richard Ellis

In a Perfect Ocean: The State of Fisheries and Ecosystems in the North Atlantic Ocean - Pauly & Maclean

Hooked on Bass - Ladle & Vaughan

It might look odd having 2 books on bassing in my list - considering bass in Donegal are rarer than hens teeth; but the tactics, tackle and general approach to targeting bass can easily be applied with surprisingly little modification to fishing for anything that'll take a hook. Oops, my list has run to six books, not five....

My two favourite books are:
• 'Sea Fishing - Properly Explained' by Ian Ball.
• 'Step by Step Guide To Bait and Rigs' by Sea Angler Magazine

The 1st one as it is cheap, basic and cover quite a bit. The 2nd one as I think it's a great book to show you the basics on rig making. It gets you one the way. Also some interesting stuff on bait.

-C

FYI

You may be interested to know that Burce Vaughan of Vaughan and Ladle Bass fame is now resident in Mayo... constantly ribbing him about there being no bass in Mayo! Might try to persuwade him to drop us a line here or two on improving your bass fihsing tactics and techniques...

Kieran its Alan Vaughan who wrote Hooked on bass so you've been calling him the wrong name.

1. Bob moss's The third breaker as its it gives much of the useful information in hooked on bass plus a bit more but in 56 pages

2. Sea fishing properly explained. Which I have for 20 years plus and was the first sea angling book I bought.

3. Modern sea angling. Hugh stoker. Again my copy is 20 years old and its of a much older origin but I've still to find a sea angling book to replace it.

4. Pike the practise and the passion by mick brown. Totaly un pc book which details how he fished venues without permission while hiding 20 yards from there owner.

Agree with Pete on a couple of those, (Fishing in Wild Places by Street, Sea Trout Fishing by Falkus) definitely great books. Salmon Fishing by Falkus is not quite as good as his sea trout book but not bad either. In Search of Silver is a fantastic read, a collection of stories about salmon fishing from authors around the North Atlantic, basically one evocative story after another from different countries with wild salmon.
Just got into sea angling recently and the Step by Step Guide to Rigs and Bait is excellent for someone just learning about sea fishing. Must get the bass book too...... methinks this could get more expensive than the old salmon fishing....... :o

A good book for all aspiring wreck anglers:

The Art of Wrecking - Stu Arnold.


An interesting book, a little dated on the picture side but still plenty of info and plenty food for thought.

Contains the classic on conger weighing:
"...the conger is too long for weighing by the mouth. Just put the hook of the scales into the eels rectum and lift it clear, the eel will freeze (wouldn't you), enabling you to get a reading without standing on the wheel house roof..."

'Sea Angling' and 'Inshore Boat Fishing'
- both by Tony Weldon

And modern Sea Angler Hugh Stoker. Has recipes for cooking your catch