If you follow my ‘scribblings’ either on this blog or on my own website (South Devon Bass Guide here) then you’ll have an awareness of just how highly I rate the needlefish lures.

Forced

For a while now, the fantastic, deadly, bespoke and handmade Jim’s Needlefish lures (in the 15g, 18g and 20g guises) have been my go to ‘needle’ whereby I have utilised them chiefly in very shallow water (1-4ft) covering flat (ish) expanses of reef with certain features set amongst it and in relatively calm and clear sea conditions.

Over the course of the summer and indeed into the autumn, I have on occasion been forced to attach an alternative model for two reasons. Firstly, by virtue of the ground (snag strewn) my clients and I are using the Jim’s lures mean that we lose a fair few - and at times my own stocks are alarmingly low. I believe the Man who builds them (Mr James Lanfear) cannot build them quick enough before anglers, fishing tackle shops and online stores (and me!) are banging on his door asking for more. Furthermore, even though a high proportion of my clients now bring their own, if I’ve been guiding three anglers at the same time I might not always have had enough to go around as it were.

Secondly,during and following the brief interludes of strong winds and increased swells that we’ve experienced the Jim’s Needlefish have occasionally been too light to a) maintain contact with in a fierce crosswind (meaning they have effectively glided too high in the water column and actually ended up on the surface or b) they’ve been tossed around in the surf or more especially when and where the waves are turning onto a shingle beach (a zone in which bass love to hunt of course).

Useful

Step forward the Super Strike Needlefish that I originally purchased out of curiosity and because I was out of Jim’s! If you aren’t already aware, many of these and similar lure types are used extensively along the Atlantic coast of the United States where anglers launch them extreme distances out into a teeming cauldron of breaking surf for the cousin of our European Sea Bass - the Atlantic Striped Bass.

Weighing 28g and measuring 14cm they are still within the casting weight range (CWR) of my 8’ 6” 10-30g Major Craft Skyroad, yet that additional 8-13g over a Jim’s makes a difference from a casting perspective when you are faced with a strong breeze in the form of a headwind or crosswind. What’s more, their additional density means that they sink quicker, but rather usefully, they remain deeper within the overall water column and maintain their stability all the way to the shoreline even in rough sea conditions.

It’s not huge, but this client’s bass proved to me (following a similar-sized fish that I landed a few evenings previous to this from the same mark) that the Super Strike ‘N’ Fish deserved a place in my armoury.

Catches

Now, I’m not about to tell you that they have transformed my lure fishing, however, in the conditions mentioned above they have most definitely served a specific purpose - which as I regularly emphasise, means it will inevitably keep its place in my lure box. The colour that I originally purchased (I now have a black and purple version too) was the cream/white or ‘bone’ pattern, and this is the one that my clients and I have caught bass on in darkness, albeit small ones, from venues ranging from steep shingle beaches with deeper water present to a moderate surf over a clean sandy seabed in only 1m of water.

The main differences between the Super Strike Needlefish and the Jim’s is the sink rate (that is more rapid in the former) and the angle at which it descends - with the Jim’s sinking horizontally (level sinking, although he does build tail weighted versions) whereas the Super Strike plummets ‘bottom first.’ Additionally, unlike the Jim’s that navigates the shallows in a very straight trajectory and is in all likelihood silhouetted above the bass and closer to the surface on a steady retrieve (that I believe is part of the secret to their consistent ability to attract a greater average size of bass) the Super Strike possesses a slight ‘wobble’ when retrieved and has to be cranked slightly quicker to keep it high in the water column.

This bass had no problem whatsoever in tracking down the cream coloured, delicately wobbling yet straight moving Super Strike Needlefish in exceptionally murky conditions (at night obviously).

In summary, it is very early days in regards to my use of this ‘substitute’ needlefish and I’d love to know if anglers utilising them more regularly use them, like me, in deeper, rougher seas. Finally, and of note, is that the largest bass I’ve seen caught on one so far (at only around 3½lb) was taken on a very dark night, when the sea was rough and ‘coloured up’ and ‘clogged up’ with weed fragments... That a bass was able to ‘home in’ on it in those conditions has definitely got my attention..