Who writes this

Jean-Benoit Buisson

Every page on FishVerdict is written and signed by one named person. This page explains where the judgements come from, lists what the author is not, and gives an address for corrections.

How this began

It started with four characters printed above a rod handle. A test curve — 3,00 lbs — read by almost everybody as a statement about the fish a rod can land rather than about the rod. It is nothing of the kind. That figure is the weight needed to pull the tip through ninety degrees, measured on a bench; it describes a casting load and a lead weight, and a lighter rod will land the same fish more often at forty metres than a heavier one will at eighty. Once that gap is visible, the same shape turns up across every shelf. Breaking strains quoted without the diameter they belong to. Reel sizes sold as a quality ladder when they describe a spool capacity. Depth ranges for a cheap sounder quoted without the water they were measured in. And most pages answering these questions look identical: a ranked list, a score, a button, and not one figure a reader could hold against the maker's own sheet.

The second problem arrives after the carton is opened. This tackle is bought on a headline and kept or returned on a fitment. A 25 g lure for a rod rated 3–14 g. A 4/0 jig head in a 6 cm soft body. A fly line two classes away from the rod it was bought for. A rod rest whose thread meets no bank stick you own. A boat holder sized for a 19–25 mm rail on a gunwale thicker than that. A pack of soft bodies with no heads to fish them on. None of that is on the front of the carton, and each one decides whether the purchase was worth making.

So the site does the tedious part. It reads what manufacturers and standards bodies publish, confirms each reference market by market, and writes down the line that settles the question — a test curve next to the fact that it describes a casting load and not a fish, a casting weight next to the lures it will and will not throw, a diameter next to the breaking strain it belongs with, a reel size next to the metres of line it actually holds — and it states plainly when a figure was never published. That last habit matters more than it sounds: a great deal of the disappointment on these shelves comes from a number nobody printed, or one printed without the condition that gives it meaning.

Every published page has a working file behind it for that shelf: the single dimension a purchase turns on, each point where a manual and a sales page contradict one another, which fittings tie an owner to one maker for everything bought afterwards, what a figure means when it turns up without its condition, and the particular mistake that shelf invites. The site is those files, sorted and written out, in five languages — the same questions get asked in French, German, Spanish and Italian, and answered worse in most of them.

The write-ups, counted by the build and not by me

Nothing below is kept by hand. It comes back out of the catalogue at every build, one line per published page, growing and shrinking on its own as a shelf opens or a reference disappears. What it records is what has been written up — which, put without dressing it up, is not the same thing as what is leaning against anybody’s wall.

Three lessons that cost me money

The figure printed in the biggest type is almost never the one a purchase turns on. A rod is sold on its length when the casting weight decides which lures it can throw. A reel is sold on its bearing count when the size decides how much of your line fits on it. A landing net is sold on its handle when the mesh decides whether the fish keeps its slime coat. A sounder is sold on its screen when the presence of GPS decides whether a depth reading can ever be found again.

Keeping tackle fishable costs more, over its life, than getting it home ever did. A reel whose spare spool was dropped from the spares list has a service life set by that list. A steel trace that kinks is a trace thrown away; a titanium one is a trace kept for a season. A rod belongs to a casting weight for the rest of its life, and that choice sets what every lure bought after it can be.

And whatever you finally judge it by is usually nowhere on the specification sheet: whether the bail still closes square in its fourth season, whether a bite alarm survived one night of rain, whether a rubberised net still holds its shape after forty trips folded, and whether the part that fails first will still be listed on the day it fails.

What I am not

I am not a guide, a casting instructor, a fishery manager, a rod builder or a certification body. I hold no qualification in any of those fields, I have never worked for a manufacturer, an importer or a tackle shop, and nothing on this site leans on a professional title. A page here describes a product — its dimensions, its declared figures, any standard it cites — and stops there. In particular, every length, casting weight, test curve, line diameter, breaking strain, reel size, gear ratio, hook size, feeder weight, newton rating, piece count, stated load and mass on this site is reported from the manufacturer, with its unit as published and its source named, and never derived by me. Where a maker gives a figure together with the condition it was taken under, the page credits both to that maker and keeps them together, and nothing here is called warmer, stronger or safer than anything else on the strength of a specification sheet.

This site is not a manual and not training. For the licence and the close season that govern where and when a line may be in the water, for the servicing an automatic lifejacket assumes, for what may never be repaired at home, and for the standards a product cites, it points to the maker's instructions, to the authority that sets the rule and to the body behind the standard, rather than paraphrasing them. Two statements are repeated rather than assumed. a published value and the condition it was taken under are a single thing in two halves, and no page here prints one half alone; each carries the value, its unit and the maker who put it in writing. And second, no buoyancy aid, no lifejacket, no wading belt and no boat holder is described here as making anything safe. A page carries the figure a maker published and the condition attached to it; everything beyond that is settled by the instructions in the box, by the standard printed on the label, and by the day itself.

A name under a page proves nothing, and nothing here asks to be believed on the strength of one. Every judgement shows its grounds on the page that makes it, and the method in full is set out under how a family arrives at its order.

Five rules every page here is held to

No figure appears without its source beside it — a datasheet, a manual, the marking moulded into the shell, a named standard, or what owners agree on after a season on the water.
Nothing is filled in to make a table look complete — not a price, not a reference, not a dimension. Where a maker published nothing, the row stays empty and the page says so in words.
Every reference is confirmed market by market before publication. Where a model is not on sale where you are, the button runs a search there rather than opening a listing that has gone.
Where the cheaper option is the right one, the page says so — and where the right answer is re-tying two metres of leader, wetting the mat before the fish touches it or a second spool rather than any purchase at all, it says that instead.
No family is ordered around whichever number is printed largest, and where this year’s model is hard to tell from last year’s, the page says that as well.

What misreading one of these figures costs

This tackle is sold on numbers that state one thing and are read as another, and the gap usually surfaces on the first morning of the trip. A test curve stands where a size of fish is assumed. A casting weight stands where a distance is assumed. A reel size stands where a quality ranking is assumed. Meanwhile the things everybody treats as afterthoughts — a hook point checked on a thumbnail, a leader re-tied after a session over gravel, a float loaded until only its tip shows, a net wetted before it is used — repeatedly decide whether the day worked.

A great deal of what matters on these shelves costs nothing to learn and fits in one sentence: a published figure records what a maker was prepared to print about its own product, and promises nothing at all about the person who will use it. Most of the rest is the same kind of thing. Reading a line diameter and its breaking strain as one figure rather than two. Carrying one spare spool of heavier line for the afternoon the wind gets up. Checking a casting weight before buying a lure. Loading a float until only its tip shows. Sites that exist to shift equipment walk straight past all of that. It is not walked past here.

Sending a correction

Point at something that is wrong and it gets corrected, with the date of the correction left on the page for anyone to check. Write to [email protected].

Jean-Benoit Buisson · FishVerdict · Montrollet, France