Gemini Alpha Bait Clips

[Jeri]

Hi  Ricardo, Mike & Tom,

For 'Apricot fish', you just wash the fish after filleting, then lightly coat the flesh side with the jam – but cover it all, the trick is then to put it in the griller cage, and over th high heat of the coals, caramelise the sugar in the jam – to effectively seal the 'open' side of the fish – locking in all the juices.  STOP DRIBBLING ON YOUR KEYBOARD!!!!!

Did this recipe one night while on a camping and fishing trip with a load of very Afrikaner guys, who basically eat meat, meat and more meat. The comments after the meal was completely cleaned out – bones sucked and all, was 'why had I not done the cooking before?' They all started sceptics firstly about an Englishman cooking, and secondly eating fish – that night it was fresh Bluefish.

For the various localities – Bass would be a good fish for those around the British Isles, and Corvima for Ricardo, all very similar to our Kob.

Mike, the locals down here on the coast of Namibia have cured that problem of poor weather, as we have strong winds and obviously cold temperatures at night – so they moved the BBQ (Braii) indoors, every house has one, with a neat design of chimney that sucks all the smoke out, you can have a BBQ anytime. The chimney system has a rotating cowl design, so that it swings round to the wind and creates the draw for the fire, and pulls all the smoke up the chimney – very civilised. A friend that visited was so impressed that he took measurements and photos do build one in his house in the New Forest, the idea of BBQs any day of the year was just too much for him.

The locals all have very open plan living and kitchen areas, so when you entertain with friends, the braii is a central part of the event, where some or all of the meal is cooked over the open fire. It harks back to the very earliest travellers in southern Africa, trekking and cooking over open wood fires. There are obviously thousands or recipes for this style of cooking, 99% involve meat, but the nice adaption is the fish.

Tom, see that you are in 'the north', we spent many years worth of holidays down in Union Hall, with a friend that lives there, chasing Albacore, and eventually after 13 years of trying, he was the lucky chap, to be the first angler to 'intentionally' catch an Albacore in Irish waters – a guy called Colin Barnes, an expat Englishman – still lives down there I think, doing Whale and Dolphin trips. Unfortunately lost touch with him over the years. A great guy, very knowledgeable about all things fishing, a good friend of Peter Collins of the Irish Tourist Board – Angling section. Happy birthday.

Ricardo sorry to hijack your thread – its amazing what happens when folks start talking fishing?


Cheers from dark Africa – the sun has gone down,


Jeri

[Jerseymic]

Hi Jeri,

Thanks for the detailed instructions. As we live right on the coast here in Mevagissey Cornwall, we also get stong winds, but unfortunately we don't have room in the bungalow for the bbq, so I will have to design and build some sort of structure outside. The ideal soultion here would be a three sided structure with a roof on a turntable so you could always face the wind, perhaps a bit ambitious but who knows! When I do it I want to get it right as bbq is my favourite way of cooking, summer or winter.

A little bit of humour, although it didn't seem funny at the time. A few year back, a New Zealand friend, over a few beers started talking about a 'Hangi'. The idea got more appealing as the beer flowed. So we waited until the weather was supposed to be set fair and dug a large pit in our garden, ready for the next days feast. On waking the next morning, the wonderful Cornish weather had changed and the pit was full of water! To this day I have still not experienced 'Hangi' style food!!

Mike

[Fish-aholic]

Hi Steve,
            Sut ydych chi heddiw? ,I think that instead of the plastic tube,burn the edge with a lighter and press against a knife blade you can use a  stainless steel or even aluminum tube rivet



http://www.alibaba.com/product-gs/283168721/Aluminum_Brass_tube_rivet.html


Richard

From a burning hot Buenos Aires

PS:Your pulley rig is very interesting

Hi Richard,

Nice touch with the Welsh. To Answer; Buenas Gracias!  

Checked the link you supplied and they look good. When I find the time to make some, I'll let you know how the homemade alpha bait clips work out.

As for my Pulley rig, I will try and post a few pics to show you. Might make a mini pulley rig of about 8 inches, purely so the scale of the rig can fit into the pictures. They are normally tied no longer than 35 inches for my type of fishing.


Hi Jeri,

Fair play to you for upping sticks and starting a new life in Africa - best of all - doing what you love doing! Homage to you!

"I got 'rained on' the first time in 8 years back in October" - If you came back to the UK, you'd probably have your very own little rain cloud hovering above your head; purely to catch up on your drought  

Great fishing you had, too. People are either blanking or catching whiting and dabs here at the moment. Very poor showing of cod this year, though, a few lunker cod have been caught off the shore. My mate had a 23lb shore caught cod just before New years. His mate had a 7lb bass in the same sesh. Biggest cod off the shore I've heard of this season, and caught yesterday, is a 28lb'er.
Oh and the bass record was broken last year with a 19lb13oz fish. Could of been a 20lb'er if it hadn't reguritated it's last meal.

The snow didn't stick after all. We had rain again, but today was dry and cold!


A belated Happy Birthday to Tom!

Cheers all,

Steve.

[buitrechico]

Hi Steve,
            I've already built some homemade Alpha bait clips using aluminum tube rivets(20 mm x 3mm x 2mm hole diameter), 1,3 mm gauge wire (10 mm short leg, 23 mm long leg), 45 grades angle.An approximate copy of genuine Gemini Alpha bait clips, because I don't know exactly the components size.I had to mill the aluminum tubes to eliminate some cutting edge.Built a rig as shown in the Gemini pictures (two beads/1 crimp).Used two cigarette lighter springs (they look as the Gemini SRT springs) for the main line rig /snood attachement (to absorb line snood stretching at the beggining of the cast).Tube hole diameter and 1,3 mm gauge wire admit line diameter up till 0.60 mm for smooth sliding ( 0.70 obviously gets stuck) Sliding the tube by hand ,the hook was released everytime. I've got a doubt about the sliding tension,if too tight, bait hook may remain clipped when rig hits the water,by the other hand, if too loose, bait hook may release during flight ( tube sliding in the air).Hope using this tube size it'll be ok. Of course, the only way to eliminate any doubt is to go fishing and see what happens (as I told you ,I have to wait until February).I also made some as shown in the video you supplied.The fast links were ok(25 mm long,5 mm wide,same 1,3 mm gauge wire).Same tube rivet size.Built a rig and seems to work ok as the other I mentioned before.Unfortunately my camera is broken and I can't post some pics

Cheers

Richard

From a still burning hot Buenos Aires

[hrogers]

DIY for bait clips - It's not really rocket science
You need a hollow tube - I used a plastic tube that was on a lollipop - And a paper clip
Paper clip goes thru the tube - make a double loop on top of the paper clip can use a tooth pick or anything similar -main Line goes x3 thru
To adjust is simple loosen the last loop hold it open and the clip can slide up and down till were needed
here is 2 photos of the clip for bait casting