Some fishermen are born to fish. They love all species and exude enthusiasm as they fish for anything, anywhere, any time. The joy for these enthusiasts is in the catching and appreciation of each new fish encountered.
Such a born-to-fish angler is passionate Frenchman, former fishing guide and now US-based lure maker, Patrick Sebile. I caught up with Sebile yesterday during his three day visit to Sydney. He’d spent Saturday of last weekend fishing the Harbour with Fisho writer Sami Omari in fairly trying, windy conditions, to account for a scattering of local species that had lifted his lures’ total species caught tally. As of yesterday morning Sebile’s lures had caught well over 600 species.
As we motored out of the Harbour to fish some offshore reefs he told me he calls the US home, a country Sebile lures now currently enjoy their biggest market share. Sebile says the Russian market is now his company’s second largest; he explained that Russians love fishing but their market had previously consisted mostly of cheap locally made lures.
There are 26 lures in the company’s range now, each with numerous colour and size variations that make the different options available now at around 1400. Sebile is responsible for the innovative design of his lures, which has seen them win awards at prestigious tackle shows such as ICAST and EFFTEX and elite largemouth bass tournaments in the US. He is involved in every aspect of his lures’ designs from the body shape, internals and the terminal components. He says he is forever thinking about and designing new lures, the latest being plastics worms and shads.
I’d rate Sebile as one of the keenest fishos I’ve ever met. He often talks of his joy of “the surprise” element of fishing – not knowing if your next fish is a trophy or the one after that …
He told us in his thick French accent that he’d started out as a fishing guide, eventually owning three lodges in exotic destinations such as Morocco, the African west coast and the Ivory Coast. He went on to sell his lodges and amongst some former clients he found investors willing to help him follow his dream of going into lure making. That was in 2006. Since then he says his company has sold more than four million lures internationally.
Sebile is open about how lucky he is to work in a career that is clearly his passion. He travels the world catching different fish on his lures – he’s fished in more than 60 countries – and he clearly loves it. His Sydney visit is part of a six-week down under sojourn for Sebile, who spent a week with his Australian distributor Damon Olson of Nomad Sportfishing. Fisho regulars will know of Nomad Sportfishing from the incredible charters Olson’s team runs out of the Coral Sea, specialising in catching monster GTs, wahoo and more. Sebile doesn’t hesitate to rate the Nomad set-up as about as good as any he’s experienced. Catching a 55kg GT on one of his own Stick Shadds no doubt helped for this opinion …
We fished over some popular Sydney snapper grounds yesterday using Sebile Flatt Shads. Having seen our sole gold Flatt Shad account for a snapper at Coffs Harbour during a very quiet fishing day I was keen to see how the innovative lipless vibrating crankbaits worked. You fish them much like a vibe – it’s allowed to sink and regular lifts and draws on the rod get it vibrating nicely. Sebile reckons they can be trolled effectively also.
Sami scored a nice little pannie keeper early, on a greeny gold 66mm Flatt Shad. We were fishing in around 20m of water over reefy ground. Patrick was consistently catching everything but snapper – he amassed numerous sergeant bakers, wrasse, goatfish, cods and some colourful reefies fish we’d never seen before. He counted each new species with enthusiam, ie “Six hundred and eighteen!” It was refreshing to see someone delight in catching fish many locals would probably just curse.
During one drift near a favoured waypoint a reasonable sounding of fish and bait had us inspired. After a couple of drifts over it we were still hopeful of scoring a nice red for Sebile.
The water was cold but the calm conditions were conducive to drift fishing. Sebile’s softbaits – rigged Carolina or Texas style – scored plenty of interest from reef dwellers, which bit the tails off a few.
One fishy looking sounding finally brought the action we’d hoped for. Sami was still fishing the gold/green 66mm Flatt Shad when it met with solid resistance on the way down. The crunch and ensuing bent rod and wailing drag told the story of a solid fish motoring for the bottom. Cries of, “This was what we came for!” were verified by violent headshakes wrenching at the bent rod.
Sami asked for the net which brought a laugh as I saw he still had his tiny “butterfly net” on board. We eventually saw colour down deep – red – the right colour! The fish eventually circled close to the surface and we saw its size for the first time. It was a Sydney red of a size we were used to seeing up Coffs Harbour way. It was 6kgs if a gram. It swam towards the butterfly net and I scooped it in, just, the fish’s broad tail poking well out and waving in the air. We’d done it.And Sami had scored his PB snapper.
Patrick Sebile has another day of Sydney fishing. He’s hoping species No.621 will be a Sydney jew or mulloway as he correctly calls them. After that Australia’s bass and barra are in the lure maker’s sights. When we dropped Sebile off at a dock in Pyrmont he was planning a short rest before wandering the Harbour shore to throw more of his lures around. Fish number 622 clearly wasn’t far away.
It had been a pleasure to meet someone with such an infectious passion for fishing and lure making.
For info on Sebile lures check out Sami Omari’s story in August Fishing World or go to www.sebile.com.au
