Duration: 18.30 - 00.00
Tide: Incoming to full
Weather:Fine, warm, then showers last hour
Bait: Rag, lug, frozen mack, re-frozen mack
, peelerRigs: Pulleys & Flappers
Results:
Me : 1 Bass, 3 Flounder
Brian : 10 fish - (not quite sure how many of what ?!), inc dogs, flounder, (1) whiting, (1) rockling
Report: After a poor days/nights fishing down in Wexford yesterday and with the good weather I had decided to put Sundays demons behind me, so after a quick call to Brian we decided to get out quite early in the hope of maybe a plaice or too before dark. After a bit of discussion on the journey south we had decided to give the North beach at Greystones a shot, as neither of us had fished it before and with all the construction work going on around the harbour making access to the beach difficult we felt the fish wouldnt have been under much angling pressure recently.
Arrived (after a lengthly walk) and set up at the bottom (nearest) end of the beach, close to the harbour, looked a nice spot and a fairly steep beach, sand mixed with shingle, but not much surf as such, but it still looked quite promising.
We were set up in no time, both fishing a flapper from 50/60 yards inwards and a pulley at distance. I noticed a few taps on the distance rod, reeled in to find myself snagged.....but pulled it free, bait gone. I suspected crabs had been at it. Rebaited and cast back out. Retrieved the flapper next, to find I was snagged and lost the rig. The only other flapper I had in the box had extremely long snoods (made up by accident), nearly 5ft
, but anyhow decided it would do whilst I atleast made up a flapper with more sensible snood lengths.Fishing was proving to be slow, with both of us encountering snags anywhere from 30-120 yards, so after I had lost 3 rigs to snags, we chose to move a little further up the beach. This seemed to help. I had just finished making my new 3 hook flapper, when I said to Brian (jokingly), I better reel in and see what I've caught......to both our shock I had a flounder on the flapper with 5 ft snoods
Well atleast we were off the mark, it had been slow to that point but this gave us renewed optimisum.
Brian was next in then with another flounder., hopes raised even more as it was now coming into darkness
It slowed down again then, until Brian caught a lovely rockling around the 40cm mark, maybe 45cm even, which we think was a 5 bearded, but neither of us were absolutely certain. Any help from the lads on this one would be great, but please excuse the poor quality close up photos which are probably no help at all
Anyway a cracking sized rockling whatever type is was. Welldone Brian, not too often you get one over on me 
, but nice for you to be outfishing me, makes a pleasant change..........but wait..................As we were stood chatting by Brians tripod, we heard my tripod crash to the ground, and after a quick 30 yard sprint I arrived in the nick of time as my flapper rod was being dragged up the beach and out to sea
Managed to get a hold of the rod, to find it tangled around my 2nd rod, but did manage to feel a good pull out of the fish which lucky was hooked, still on, and giving a good scrap. My first though was Bassssssssss
, and as I got him in the suds and beached him, I was right, lovely condition fish. Didnt have a measuring tape out with us last night, but Brians rod has a measuring guide on its butt section, so we knew he was easily over sized. Measured him at home this morning and he came in at 51cm, weighing 3lb 15oz (gutted), so I presume he'd have been around 4 1/4 pound pre-gutting.The bass had taken a strip of re-frozen mack on a size 4 hook on the 3 hook flapper, which was fished around 5/10 yards out. Nicely lip hooked aswell.
It kinda made the night for me and I'd have been satisfied if I didnt catch anything else really as it had been a slow night upto that point. I did however manage another 3 flounder over the next few hours, but as the tide reached full the fishing in close really died off.
Brian was kept busy with bites on the distance rod, missing a good few bites (maybe crabs
), dropped a few fish also and did get a decent whiting and a few dogs, he also added a few flounder to his overall tally on the flapper including a double shot. The size of the whiting seems to have really improved just lately.Brian had a great bite late on, it knocked his tripod over, but the fish didnt connect and Brian was unsure which rod the bite had been on
but alas the fish didnt return.One last decent bit of action for Brian, he got a good take on the distance rod, the rig seemed snagged, he managed to pull it free, got a good bit of pull of the fish for a short while, then the fish went to ground, pulled him free again, then snagged again....unfortunately while trying to haul the fish out, the rig gave way and he snapped off, Brian thinks given the rough ground on the beach it was likely to be a conger, and that sure would have made his night.
Took the cheeky route back to the car, commando style under the security fencing through the construction site, back out under the security fencing right next to the car, took 20 minutes off the walk home easy......happy days
All in all not a bad nights fishing, would definately like to try the beach again as I'm sure it has potential, but maybe need a bit more surf and try a bit further up the beach next time.
