Wind and current when offshore drifting

[paullee]

Hi all, I have a question for you guys regarding wind against current. I was offshore in 60m this morning when a 10-15knot south wester kicked in off tweed. I was about 13 km offshore catching a couple of squire by floating pillies down and reversing up on them to get to them to the bottom.
Once it picked up it was very hard to fish. Both the bait and boat were moving in to the wind but even when I reversed I couldn’t catch up with the bait which made it hard to fish. It was doing my head in and got a bit lumpy so I moved in closer then went home. So I assume this means the current was heading sw and the wind was coming from the sw but the current was stronger than the wind so I ended up with the above situation?Apologies if this makes no sense or is a stupid question I’m just trying to better understand the affect of wind vs current when offshore drifting.
cheers....Paul

[Any_Weather]

Hi Paulee, mate in this situation, I think fishing with a para anchor is best. It works with the current to reduce the winds effect. To be honest, unless there is absolutely zero wind, I fish with a para anchor whenever I am drift fishing. I find it holds the boat straight so if more than one person is fishing, lines are not tangling as the boat doesn’t spin around.
I hope this makes some sense?

Cheers
Lee


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[stevej]

Any boat I have a para anchor even in the dams
currently have two minnkota ones but probably not strong enough for offshore work

just got to be-careful with placement as easy enough to get water rolling over the rear as I found out one day

[paullee]

Hi guys I tried a sea anchor on my last drift and allthough it probably held me straight it didn’t necessarily slow the drift.. the fact that I couldn’t reverse when it was out made it worse if anything. I guess my post was more about the fact I had a constant 15 knots in my face and I was drifting into it instead of my canopy acting like a sail and drifting with it. The current won on the day.
cheers

[Dignity]

That must have been one hell of a current to overcome a 10 to 15 knot breeze. In a case like that a drougue would only work if you hung it off the bow. Often the drogue hung from the stern would just keep collapsing in those conditions. I usually just give up and go home.