Donegal Bay, 18th/19th July, New Mark

[johnwest]

Wednesday. Good weather, in particular the light winds, invited a day or two afloat but when I arrived at the slip I met a local man I have got to know over the years who had just come in as it was a bit rough for his (admittedly small) open boat. Looking out to sea, a few white horses were indeed visible but I had travelled a long way so had to at least give it a go. The wind was indeed stronger than the 5-6mph forecast and also more westerly giving no protection but it was within the capabilities of both my boat and myself. First stop produced no mackerel from what has now been officially removed from my mackerel hotspot list but I got enough pollack to provide some bait. Off to the sand then for some drifting for rays, hopefully. The fishing was slow with three extensive drifts producing only 2 modest thornbacks and 5 dogfish. By now the sea, with wind against tide, was quite uncomfortable with the boat bouncing around in the short, steep waves; lumpy and bumpy makes me grumpy so I headed out to deeper water to fish some rough ground. This provided plenty of fish but quantity definitely over-ruled quality, a steady stream of pollack to 2.5lb, coalfish, pouting, poorcod, male and female cuckoo wrasse and a small ling (for the species list!) came to the boat and when a shoal of fish showed in mid-water on the fishfinder, the feathers produced 3 mackerel and a small launce. Plenty of fresh bait but too late in the day. Fans of Auf Wiedersehn, Pet may remember Moxy and his bottle of rotgut wine; “Don’t think much of this red wine, I’ll be glad when I’ve had enough!”. After almost 8 hours of bouncing around I too was glad to have had enough.
Thursday. Today’s forecast gave slightly stronger “breezes” from a s.westerly direction so after yesterday’s gentle breeze I decided to launch from the south side of the bay for a more comfortable day. I also wanted to try a new mark as I had heard that the “occasional ray could be caught from the shore” and hoped this would translate into greater numbers from the boat just offshore. I headed for deep water first and feathered for mackerel and was rewarded fairly quickly. One drop produced 3 mackerel, the next drop gave 2 and the next gave 1. Having worked out the mathematical sequence, I wasted no further time jigging for nothing and headed off to bait fish. First drift over sand in about 55-60 ft produced 2 tub gurnard, 2 dogfish and 2 dabs, I was thinking of renaming the boat The Ark as the species were coming aboard 2x2. No target rays however so I headed inshore to about 25ft of water and soon met with success. Another 2 tubs along with 1 doggie and 5 dabs, none big but very plump, were interspersed with 7 thornies to 6lbs and 2 lively spotty rays. A good return for a new mark and I will certainly call again. Some of the local seagulls were either desperate and starving or just downright brazen; having just sliced both fillets of a large mackerel into bait strips, I went into the cuddy for the towel and turned round to see 2 gulls eating every scrap of bait from the board. At the end of the day one of them actually took a whole mackerel from my hand. No wonder they think nothing of stealing people’s ice creams and chips!
Nothing exceptional over the two days but enough fish to keep busy and a total of 12 different species beats sitting in the house watching the grass not grow.

[johnwest]

The mandatory extra pics....

[chuckaroo]

Nice wee report Paddy, makes ye want to get out and at it. A lot of fish and plenty of species, some nice thorniest there! Looks great fun
Those gulls look almost resident on that boat, lol. Fat b’s. “Lumpy and grumpy” and “gutrot” an all that, very good

Must email you a document I found on my computer the other day, about species of ray

[chuckaroo]

"Key to the Marine and
Freshwater Fishes of
Britain and Ireland"

attached.

Was just looking at that final thornie in your pics there, interesting markings. Was wondering if it was any of the lesser-seen other species of ray in our waters. Don't think it is though. Probably is a thornie all right..

EDIT. the file won't attach here, it is too big
but here is a link to it: http://www.topfisher.eu/wp-content/uplo ... ressed.pdf (page 65 onwards)

Think that we have been down this road before, that you have already probably seen this document, but I was just thinking that of all the ray caught surely one of these lesser-seen species are bound to pop up at some stage...
Anybody else seen any of there rarer species??

[pajo]

Great report Johnwest as always. Nice fishing, nice fish and nice photos!

I don't think I've ever seen Moxy, mackerel and mathematics on the same page before!