Is there anywhere worth fishing in Winter

What are the prospects of catching from a boat in the heart of winter ?

normally most boats are out of the water from kind of now on up here though over recent years fishing has been good out of red bay and ballycastle for skate, spurdog, rays etc.

my boat now out of portnablagh but considering bringing it home to newtownards and maybe trying to put it in the odd day from bangor and trying the wrecks in belfast lough. anyone this direction give me a shout as i could do with a couple of crew(and help with launching/retriving).

mark.

Plenty of fish around in the winter, its more a matter of getting settled enough weather to get out to them.

Pete

What about the East coast, does anybody know if anything can be caught along here? I'll have my boat available over the winter and was wondering what to target?

Look at what the commercials land all winter: Cod, haddock, spurdog, pollock, coalfish. Usual flats. Like Pete says, it's all there, getting a day fit to fish with anything less than a 50 foot boat is the trick...

We have often taken charters from Kimore through the winter when the weather has allowed us to. Generally you will get a good deal from the charter boys. And, we have always successfully pulled in plenty of cod

my boat now out of portnablagh but considering bringing it home to newtownards and maybe trying to put it in the odd day from bangor and trying the wrecks in belfast lough. anyone this direction give me a shout as i could do with a couple of crew(and help with launching/retriving).

mark.

Give us a Shout Phenwick, b0ogaloo would probably be interested in Exploring some wrecks around the area with ya, Think He gets his boat quite Soon, May be out in the Wee Red bay, So we'll give you a wave... 8)

Yep deffo

I've bought it .... although I can't go and get it until the 21st of November
I got a Hardy Fishing 24 with extended wheel house .... should be fun towing it :) but its the nicest boat i've looked at .... and boy can it move .
Its currently lying in Aberdeen . Went over last weekend to check it out , just what ive been looking for ...a fast fisher with a little bit of comfort .
So expect a million and one questions on the boats section once I get it home.


b0ogaloo

Gents having checked the forum for a while as away at work.
With regards to winter we did a few trips out last jan/feb and march from Lough Swilly. Had some great fishing over the Laurentic, Big pollack and loads of coalies. It was cold though and we kept the trips pretty short. The pollack fishing is vastly superior to anything on the laurentic in summer. The only problem is there is nothing else, if you don't get as far a s th wreck its not worth it with nothing on the ground. We took two boats each time as well for security reasons, floatation suits a must for the cold. Will be doing a few trips this Jan/Feb to for the same.
We where broken of a few times with fish on as the lines came up, when i mentionted this to a few people they said it could well have been a shark feeding on the wreck. Happened three times on one session and once on another. Fish on and bringing in as normal when all of a sudden the rod doubles over and snap!
The weather is the biggy of course, we went out during high pressure systems, frosty mornings with no wind though still a bit of a swell on out a bit. All in all good fishing and i certainly will be fishing through this weinter too. There must be cod out there too??
Tight tlines
Paul

could well have been big seals out on the wrecks, have had that problem out of culdaff and downiings a few times. the worst i have seen it happen was out of downings around december/ january a couple of years back on the wrecks, you almost always got the smaller coalies up ok but the seals tended to have a taste for the bigger pollack!sometimes you got them minus their bellies or worse still, you didnt get anything at all back! then he would have popped his head above the surface and almost laughed at you! :evil:

Could well have been seals Phil - I've seen them out there quite a lot. Give the salmon netters hell around the mouth of the Lough. I wopuld agree though we got a lot of fish up and once inparticular was definitly a good fish that was taken.
I prefer to think it was a great big Porgie though! Wishful thinking perhaps.
Cheers
Paul

Paul,
If your going out on the Swilly this winter drop us an email. Have a boat there but still getting to know the lough.

Pete

Pete will do, its always nice having company out there in winter. I am away at work until 20th Decemebr and hopefully will get some trips in around christmas if weather OK.
Have you been out recently? Anything doing?
Will be in touch.
Cheers
Paul

nothing to say they arent sharks paul, guess theres only one way to find out????!!!! :wink: