Drop nets

[Mattjb]

I've always had a fascination of creatures of water as long as I can remember,often spending hours messing about in rock pools as a boy.Having a daughter has made this interest even more interesting as she seems to have that same fascination! We do plenty of rookpooling but I decided to make some big dropnets from mountain bike wheel rims,fat ball feeders and some lead discs.We've caught quite a variety of creatures including at least 5 species of crab,prawns , fish etc.I either use them from the rocks,jetties or drop them from my portabote and return in 20 minutes to retrieve.These pics are of our last effort from the rocks which included edible crab,shore crabs,velvet swimmer crabs,tompot blenny and about 30 3" pout and pollock.
It's all good fun and a good way of using up some of last seasons unused baits!

[Mike J]

Try a small Pout for Bass, they love em.
Trouble is a 3incher will probably catch you a 4inch schoolie.

My own drop net has a frame from a racing bike rim (biggest available outside of a kiddy pen).

Great fun and dont those prawns taste nice

[Mattjb]

The prawns certainly do taste nice Mike, caught fresh they have a better flavour than shop bought ones, only downside is the shelling!
For prawns we usually go further up the coast and use small robust hand nets with shortened handles to make them more maneuverable around rocks and under the bladder wrack in shallow pools.I get the nets from Go Outdoors, they have small metal rectangular heads which to stop the net getting damaged I protect with fish tank air line split with a Stanley knife and zip tied on.great nets and very cheap. We've caught a couple of hundred prawns on a good day.

[Mike J]

Down my way you can buy prawn nets that are made locally to suit our sand and shingle shoreline,
They are apx 2ft across the mouth which has an aluminium leading edge for shovelling along the sand and under the floating weedline.
I always go for around 60 as thats enough for two with crusty bread or a decent Thai coconut curry.

I used to fish live prawn fished around the groynes on the flood for Bass but the damn Mullet have made it a no goer in the past couple of years.
If you've never tried an uncooked fresh prawn for Perch your missing something special, #10, once thro the tail