I have spent my lifetime in the sun fishing. That is over 55 years of almost constant exposure. In my younger days I would often fish without a shirt, never wore sunscreen and didn’t like sunglasses. But as I got older I realized the danger and started putting sunscreen on before going fishing.

I like a baby sunscreen of 50 to 100 rating. It is supposed to be “tear free” and not burn your eyes, but after sweating all day it always seems to get into my eyes and burn.

In early June I fished four days in a row at Guntersville. Every day was bright and sunny , and very hot with little breeze. To make things worse I was three weeks into a 30 day round of Tetracycline – an antibiotic that makes your skin very sensitive to the sun.

I knew I had to block all the sun. At the Bassmasters Classic in Birmingham two years ago I was given something in my media pack from Dicks Sporting Goods that I had no idea what it was. It was a tube of light cloth of some kind with Dicks logo on it. my wife had seen them and told me it was a sun mask that you could wear around y our neck and pull up over your nose, cheeks chin and ears. She even showed me a couple of different ways to wear it.

Now I see lots of people wearing them but they looked hot. But at Guntersville I had to try it. And it was surprisingly cool and comfortable. I wore long nylon pants, sox, long sleeve shirt and even bought some cheap cotton gloves and cut the thumbs and first finger out so I could fish while wearing them.

As you can see in the picture above, almost no skin was exposed to the sun. Soon after that picture was taken I lost my cap. One problem with the mask is with it pulled up over your ears you don’t really feel your cap. I forgot to take it off when we made a run. So I pulled out a wide brim straw hat and wore it. In the picture below I had it on. You can see the cigarette in my mouth – I guess the caption should say “How to avoid skin cancer and get lung cancer.”

After the second day of fishing my two thumbs and fingers that were exposed were burning. By the fourth day they hurt even though I kept spraying thick white 100 rating sun screen cream on them all day.

A few days after I got home the blisters shown below were on my left hand that was exposed while holding my rod. My right hand, the one turning the reel handle, had a couple of smaller ones. I guess if I had not worn everything I had on my whole body would have been one big blister!

Bottom line – protect yourself from the sun while fishing!