Jerry Rogers

It was Uncle David who started it, fishing for trout and tench in the small lakes and rivers near home. For his tenth birthday another uncle bought Jerry his first bass rod and started teaching him everything he knew. Their first trip together, off the beach at Gwithian, produced seven bass. That was that.

Years of shore bass and a spell fly fishing followed, but it was his first boat and the Manacles Reef that really set the course. Jerry learned to fish the reef the hard way, with patience and a lot of blank days, and those are the skills he most enjoys passing on now.

He then went commercial, moved to Padstow and fished there for eight years, mostly for bass, until porbeagle sharks got under his skin. He hung the bass rods up for three years to concentrate on them and took 38 in his best season. His first, a 150lb male, took the best part of an hour and is still the one he remembers.

When bluefin tuna returned to Cornish waters Jerry was one of the skippers invited on to the CHART tagging programme, and he has fished every season since. He finished second in the UK's first Bluefin Tuna Catch and Release Championship out of Falmouth, and sees the fishery as a lifeline for the coast, bringing trade to restaurants, pubs and B&Bs through what used to be the quiet months.

Charlie Garland runs the deck on tuna days. Between the two of them nobody gets left standing around.