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Bank tramp or tackle tart?

Neil Blood

Neil Blood

Senior Member
Another recent thread got me thinking…..

Are you a bank tramp or tackle tart? Some friends take the pee out of me, as my tackle is always clean on arrival. I also have friends who are proper cavemen, when on the river bank, with their tackle is a right filthy/manky state.

When I get home after a session and the next day, it takes 15 minutes to fill a bowl with hot soapy water and give everything a wipe down. I have well used rods and reels, some of which are around 20 years old and they are still in A1 condition, which is handy for resale options too! Also my Trevor West Double T weigh sling, even goes through the washing machine at the end of every season (that must be getting on for 20 years old too!) 😁

Look after your gear and it looks after you 👍🏻

I just can’t get my head around why some people, totally abuse their gear?
 
Neil Blood said:
Another recent thread got me thinking…..

Are you a bank tramp or tackle tart? Some friends take the pee out of me, as my tackle is always clean on arrival. I also have friends who are proper cavemen, when on the river bank, with their tackle is a right filthy/manky state.

When I get home after a session and the next day, it takes 15 minutes to fill a bowl with hot soapy water and give everything a wipe down. I have well used rods and reels, some of which are around 20 years old and they are still in A1 condition, which is handy for resale options too! Also my Trevor West Double T weigh sling, even goes through the washing machine at the end of every season (that must be getting on for 20 years old too!) 😁

Look after your gear and it looks after you 👍🏻

I just can’t get my head around why some people, totally abuse their gear?
Click to expand...
Yeah I am fastidious about my gear too, don't mind getting filthy but it gets cleaned.
 
Definitely a tart! Rods are kept clean, reels are wiped and sometimes I strip line in the garden with my distance sticks and give it a clean and check it. (Also it takes out any twisting) If the bank conditions have been muddy and wet my landing net poles are taken apart and cleaned/dried, landing nets get washed in a bucket and dried as does my unhooking cradle…. Got a bit more time than some of you as I’m retired but have always looked after my gear.
 
Rods and reels get wiped/washed down after almost every use. The consequence of that is that I own well used rods that are between 10 and 30 years old that angling acquaintances regularly ask whether they are new rods. I tend to look after my gear well and get a lot of use out of my favourite rods and reels, even if it doesn't look like it.
 
Years gone by I was most certainly a tramp, and a scruffy and lazy one at that, I would fish most week days and had little enough time left for family and home. Invariably the tackle was a victim to this and was not helped in that I used to throw it all in the garage after each session, just picking through the pile for what I needed for each outing. The sticks would get a wash every few weeks or so but my reels would be fortunate to see a cloth or even a drop of oil before the end of March.
I have paid the iron price for that neglect though, after a long period of not fishing at all (a decade+) with everything fishing related just bundled into a pile in the corner of the garage and completely forgotten about. At the back end of July, I decided to sort it all out for my return to the bank. All my winter/wet gear was ruined, partly rot and the rest being colonized by mice, rodents whatever for their nests. The luggage and nets fared little better with most of it having to be taken to the tip, funnily enough though most of the old DoubleT gear actually survived, even the weighted landing net (the only net to still be usable). The stuff lost near brought me to tears and swore to myself that I would not ever return to those bad habits.
After spending some time sorting it all out and giving it the proper love and attention it warranted, I have found myself giving it all a wipe down after each session and properly packing it all away neatly rather than just slinging it haphazard into the rucksack as of old. If I am not fishing the next day I now find myself spending a couple hours cleaning organizing and repacking it all in readiness for the next outing.
I like the new me, the gear loves the new me and the car smells like a car still
 
Tramp.

I never wash rods/reels except saltwater ones. Maybe once in the Close Season. Some rods stay made up for years….

After a trip I put wet nets/slings etc (I wish) out to dry and recycle unused bait into the freezer. But that is about it.

when I actually fish I look disorganised too, but that it now partly deliberate. When I seriously carp fished my OCD mates used to take the p… out of my slapdash un level and unmatched rods Etc. Now I actually try and look like that.

That mentality now extends to selling some of my fancy gear and replacing it with cheaper stuff and/or still using old stuff that works eg 25 year old Shimano reels.
 
Brilliant thread! I am not obsessive about cleaning, but my gear is kept in fairly good condition. However, my fishing mate is unreal and I don't know how he does it. We will fish from muddy bankside swims. Everything I use, clothing, rods, rod bags, umbrella all get caked in mud. Meanwhile, he gets back to the car and everything is pristine! A little bit of mud on the bottom of his wellies and that's it! I can't figure it out. He has a car which looks like it has just been delivered from the showroom, even after driving across a field! Bizarre
 
I really don't get this 'gear cleaning' lark. Ok these days I fish less than 100 times a year but the only time I remember cleaning either a rod or reel is after sea fishing (used to be into bass) or when I'm putting something up for sale. I mean, rods and reels are made to be weatherproof /showerproof. Most of my rods are made up (in quivers), they're never cleaned or serviced (most of the reels are old Shimmys so....), I've never ever had a reel or rod problem (as far as I remember, except I hated OC reels). And if I ever did give my gear a wipe over I'm sure it'd be almost as good as new. They are made to withstand the elements!
N.b..I do hang my nets up to dry, and store all my gear in dry, frost free conditions.
 
I always take 3 or 4 old tea towels with me on a session. Banksticks, landing net handle and rods if needed get a quick wipe down before going back into the quiver, chair legs and feet get wipe down before going in the car - thats about it. Towels straight in the washing machine when I'm home and all bait tubs rinsed. That's about it, only takes a few mins if that.

Brolly/shelter always taken out of sleeve and semi-opened and left to dry properly when home. Nothing worse than a smelly mildewed brolly!

I am fastidious about changing my line though and respool regularly through the season - although as I never put more than 100 yards on before the backing it's not a big job or expense.
 
Richard Isaacs said:
I don’t think it’s something that is going to be “got”
It’s not really what I would describe as an opinion or definitely not a fact it’s a personality.
Click to expand...
Maybe we need to have a thread related to alternative meanings for the ‘OCD‘ achronym….

obsessive cleaning disorder…..

No offence meant to anybody suffering with real OCD; although there are a few on here with ‘reel’ OCD.
 
We have a little group of 4 and we regularly discuss fishing on our little syndicate stretch of the river.
It is perfectly divided down the middle regarding how we maintain our gear. Me n @Terry Harman are quite ocd with things. We pack up methodically and clean as we do and it has to be right.
The other two literally drop kick the lot into a bag and it’s slung in the shed. Neither way is right or wrong but very much 2 ends of the spectrum.

These two are animals mind. Cracks me up because we are walking back to the cars and they have their rods on the shoulder just whacking all the branches of the overhanging trees rather than drop the rods down where the trees are low
Bless ‘em 😂
 
I’m a bit of a tart… In the autumn / winter I take a cordless jet wash to give my box a blast down before it goes back in the truck (just to get the bulk of the mud off). It uses the same batteries as my groundbait drill which is useful.

As I fish matches i tend to completely empty out my carryall and holdall and repack the following week whatever feeders / floats / rods / hooklength boxes etc. I’m likely to need based on the venue and conditions I’m going to.

I suppose if you’re picking your peg and fishing the same pellet feeder / bomb & meat style everytime then it’s a bit easier to be a bank tramp.
 
I have to wash and dry my rods and reels as any condensation or moisture will wreak havoc on the air tight cabinets I store them in.

Also the LEV system I have installed in the garage to extract any pellet or bream-laden net fumes causes an almost hypnotic/slight hum white-noise effect that helps both my family and surrounding neighbours get a good nights sleep.
 
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