Nobody reapplies sunscreen properly on a boat. Not with wet hands, not at the end of a drift, not when the bite is on. That single fact is the whole argument for wearing your sun protection instead of spreading it on.
Two hours, and that is the optimistic number
Sunscreen is tested at two milligrams per square centimetre of skin, which is far more than anyone actually applies. Most people put on somewhere between a quarter and half of that, so a bottle rated SPF 30 is doing closer to SPF 10 by the time it is on you.
Then it starts coming off. Sweat, spray, a hand in the livewell, a towel, the shoulder strap of a life jacket. Two hours is the reapplication window on the label and it assumes you are on a beach chair, not running twenty miles into a chop.
A shirt does not have a reapplication window
UPF is a fabric rating. UPF 50+ means roughly one fiftieth of ultraviolet light reaches the skin underneath, about 98 percent blocked, and it blocks the same amount in hour seven as it did in hour one.
The catch is that not all long sleeves are sun protection. A plain cotton t-shirt tests around UPF 5, and drops further when it gets wet, because water fills the gaps in the weave. Wearing sleeves is not the same as wearing a rating.
Where anglers actually burn
The back of the neck, the ears, the backs of the hands and the tops of the feet. Every one of them is a spot that either gets missed or gets rubbed off first, and the neck and ears also catch light bouncing straight up off the water.
A hood covers the first two without you thinking about it, which is why our shirts are hooded rather than plain crew. Sun gloves handle the third.
What we actually do
Hooded UPF 50+ shirt on at the ramp, gloves in reach before your hands are wet, hat on the whole time. Sunscreen still goes on the face and the parts the shirt does not reach, because the point is not that sunscreen is useless. The point is that it is the layer you should be relying on least.
The short version
- Put the shirt on before you launch, not when you start burning.
- Keep gloves somewhere you can reach with wet hands.
- Sunscreen the face, ears and any gap the shirt leaves.
- Rinse the salt out at the end of the day so the fabric lasts.
Gear for it. Have a look at the Fishy Performance Hoodie, what UPF 50+ actually means or sun gloves.