Help Needed - Tide Details

At the early stages of planning a trip to fish the Lusitania with Mark Gannon out of Courtmacsherry early next year - he reckons that if we hit a calm spell it can produce the best fish. Some of you may be interested in joining us for the trip - if so let me know. So far, it is likely to be myself, JGF, and members of the Lough Swilly Club. More details in a minute.

Mark tells me that the best time to book would be when it coincided with slack neap tides - 1st or last quarter of the moon. No harm to him, but he'd have been as well telling me that Libran's or Virgo's would do best - I'm lost when it comes to 'neaps' - sounds like something the Scots eat with Haggis, 'slacks' - what American golfers wear, and moon phases - something vaguely to do with Pink Floyd!

Can anyone who knows a thing or two about these things find a weekend somewhere between 14th January and 14th March where these things coincide in Courtmacsherry please. I'd really appreciate it.

As for the proposed trip:

Basically fish Saturday and Sunday with Mark looking for specimen Pollock and Ling with maybe Conger thrown in as well. Since we are all Ulster-based, we propose travelling down on Friday afternoon and most likely returning Monday (though if anyone couldn't get the Monday off then they could travel back immediately following the fishing ................... me, I tend to work up a thirst!!!

Mark can arrange accomodation, so it seems an easy trip to arrange. I propose taking deposits from those going to secure the trip. The weather is the main doubt. Cold & frosty is good! Mark knows the forecast by the Thursday, so basically we have to book it, keep our fingers crossed and be prepared to go if we get the green light the day before we travel.

For the fishing that seems available I think it is worth it. It also feeds the addiction during the quiet winter months when there's nothing much doing up here.

Here's Mark's website for anyone interested:

http://angling.erin.ie/news/news.asp


Thanks again for any help.

Hi Arthur

The size of the tide is directly dependant on the moon and the sun (Don't worry about the sun for now), in simple terms full moon or new moon (No moon) means a higher tide, Spring and Neap are used to describe the state of the high tide, Spring is the larger high tide and Neap is the smallest high tide. Largest Spring tide coincides with a full and new moon and Neap tide with first and last quarters (When you can only see half the moon). The moon has a 30 day phase so there tends to be 1 full moon and 1 new moon every calendar month.
(As there are 31 days in some months it is possible to have two full moons in the same calendar month falling on the 1st and 31st of the month, this is known as a blue moon.)

Here’s a link to an on line moon calendar to give you an idea:
http://www.ameritech.net/users/paulcarl ... endar.html
Plug in the required month and year and you pick out the weekends where the first quarter or last quarter falls on or close to a weekend, this could coincide with 2 weekends per month depending on what day 1st quarter begins. Anyway dates you are looking for are:

Most suitable weekends are:
Sat 15th Jan 2005 – Last quarter on 17th
Sat 5th Mar 2005 - First Quarter on 4th

As a fallback these weekends fall roughly half way between full/new moon and first/last quarter so the high tide will be mid way between neap and spring:
Sat 5th Feb 2005 – First Quarter on 2nd
Sat 12th Feb 2005 – Last quarter on 16th

Don’t rightly know what he means by a slack neap tide, I reckon he means calm weather coinciding with a neap tide. Maybe someone else can confirm this :?:

Hi Arthur


Don’t rightly know what he means by a slack neap tide, I reckon he means calm weather coinciding with a neap tide. Maybe someone else can confirm this :?:

I guess he means when tide flow is least. This would happen aroun full or low tide. Greatest flow would be half way between full and low tide approx.

So in summary , he probably means and hour and a half or so each side of either high tide or low tide when it is a neap tide.. :?

[IDPearl]

There is a tide predictor program I use called tides.exe. The new version is jtides.exe, but it doesn't include the british isles. Don't think it is still available on the net, but I can e-mail you a copy. Send me a private message if you are interested.

Ian

Last edited by IDPearl on Tue Jul 20, 2004 1:18 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Arthur.

I just realised, the moon calindar link is for Detroit Michigan. So the dates will be out a bit :oops: I'm not sure how much, they may still be the best weekends. I'll check on the calindar at home this evening it shows when the first and last quarters are and let you know tomorrow.

Sorry, that was me.

Mark tells me that the best time to book would be when it coincided with slack neap tides

Hmmm. :?

This is exactly when I would go if I was doing a Conger trip exclusively. Less tidal movement, longer slack water period = longer time for fishng Congers.

Otherwise, I'd want to be out on the wreck when there's maximum movement in the water, which is during Spring, not neap, tides. Cod, Coalies, Ling, Pollack all feed beter when there's movement in the water, so plan your trips around Springs.

Just my opinion, y'unnerstan'. It might be that Springs there are so fierce that fishing them is tricky, not giving much time over the wreck, etc.


But I'd have my suspicions about any skipper that gave me that advice. Could it be that he knows you're a one-off booking so he's palming you off with tides he knows his regular crews won't want? :evil:

Of course it might just be my suspicous nature............. :twisted:

there is a very good website which will give you all tides months in advance for all areas of Ireland. http://www.entertainmentireland.ie
Click on weather and then enter your dates for your tides on that date.
hope this is of some help.

there is a very good website which will give you all tides months in advance for all areas of Ireland. http://www.entertainmentireland.ie
Click on weather and then enter your dates for your tides on that date.
hope this is of some help.

Just looked at this site for Galway tomorrow..... Do note that one hour must be added to quoted times for summer time. Assume this is so for other locations too.

Peter.

Tides...

Had an extraordinary conversation with a scuba diver (dive master so he knows his stuff) and he persuaded me that slack water does not necessarily coincide with high or low water and that it can vary by as much as three hours (!) depending on the location. I always knew there was a weird phenomenon around the SE corner where the tide running up the Irish sea and down it from scotland met and cancelled each other out resulting in all sorts of odd tides, currents and movements but to find these on the west coast (mayo) was a shocker. I would strongly recommend that you get in contact with a local scuba club, maybe UCC, as they will be able to put you straight on this. Commercial divers would be ideal but I am not sure if there are many such outfits in Ireland. I have an old client in Castlefreke in West Cork who I might contact as they are submarine engineers (they repair oil equipment, don't make subs :wink: )

FWIW...

Thanks for the help all - much appreciated.

I've just checked the tides for previous specimens down there and they do seem to coincide with slack tides.


Which kinda brings me back to my original request - can anyone tell me the weekends in the first quarter of 2005 when there are slack, neap tides in the area? I cannot seem to get any tide tables to go that far forward.

Thanks

Arthur

Hi Arthur,

Theres tide tables in your IFSA tide table book with adjustments for Cobh for 2005. This should be close enough.

Donagh

Hi Arthur,

Theres tide tables in your IFSA tide table book with adjustments for Cobh for 2005. This should be close enough.

Donagh

After all that - the diary is sitting here beside my computer all the time!!!

Thanks Donagh.



.................... Right, thinking out loud here and hoping for some confirmation - I'm looking for a weekend in the middle of January through to the middle of March. I think I am looking for a small high tide coinciding with the middle of the fishing trip. Assuming the fishing trip leaves at around 9a.m. and returns around 4p.m., then a small high tide around 12:30p.m. would be perfect.

The best dates I can find are on Saturday and Sunday, the 5th & 6th March. I estimate high tide to be around 12:15p.m. on the Saturday and 1:45 on the Sunday. The heights of the tides are 3.26m and 3.35m on a scale from about 3.1m to 4.3m.

Can anyone confirm if I am right or have I missed anything?

Cheers.

Yeah, I think you've found what you're been looking for there.

But I still reckon I'm right about fishing being better on springs, rather that neaps! :D

Yeah, I think you've found what you're been looking for there.

But I still reckon I'm right about fishing being better on springs, rather that neaps! :D

I would have normally agreed with you Tanglerat, however after you posted your warning I went back to Mark Gannons site and looked back at when they were catching specimen fish and it mentions a few times that they were caught over his preferred neap tides!

Odd that isn't it.

Here's a link to his site:

http://angling.erin.ie/news/news.asp

Regards,

Arthur

Found this on one of the sea-fishing website mentioning Ling and small neap tides in the same paragraph....

Ling, though adapted to feed and swim in a fast tide flow, are not stupid and realise that working hard for food minimises it's caloric value. As a general rule, they feed best during smaller neap tides through and either side of the slack water periods of low and high water. Occasionally they will feed during a running tide, but the feeding spell is often very short and probably induced by passing food being available to trigger feeding in the first place.

Here's a quote straight from Mark Gannon's website:

16/04/2004 Specimen ling

Hi ,The weather during Easter Week off Courtmacsherry was ideal for wrecking with slack tides and calm seas,good fishing was had on most of the days with Sunday the 15th the best day with Ling of 42.5lbs for Billy Broughal,Ling of 36lbs for Ian Murphy,Ling of 31.5lbs for Pat Condon and Ling of 25lbs for Niall O Sullivan the other anglers from the Carigaline and District angling Club landed several other ling to the 20lb mark.On Sat the 14th while on an exploration trip for Turbot a Specimen Whiting of 3.1 lbs was caught by Pat Craven,Happy Easter to all

Arthurg,
Nice to see you travelling down to this neck of the woods. I can't believe that more guys don't fish with Mark Gannon given his record. The ground he is fishing is superb.
I reckon the big boats don't like the big tides as you can have problems drifting (wind with big tide or wind against big tide). It is also a bitch to anchor accurately in wind against tide conditions, whatever the size of boat (us small boat people don't worry about big tides when drifting).
I know you are at the mercy of the weather next year but you must impress on Mark that your crew are experienced anglers. If the weather is right it would be nice to be hitting the wrecks which are over 20miles out. The more consistent specimens are caught here. Offer a few quid more for a further trip out if the weather permits, as the expense of these trips is considerable compared with a trip to the Luisitania which is relatively close in. Think coalies.....big coalies!!!!!!!

Cheers,
Jim

Arthurg,
Nice to see you travelling down to this neck of the woods. I can't believe that more guys don't fish with Mark Gannon given his record. The ground he is fishing is superb.
I reckon the big boats don't like the big tides as you can have problems drifting (wind with big tide or wind against big tide). It is also a bitch to anchor accurately in wind against tide conditions, whatever the size of boat (us small boat people don't worry about big tides when drifting).
I know you are at the mercy of the weather next year but you must impress on Mark that your crew are experienced anglers. If the weather is right it would be nice to be hitting the wrecks which are over 20miles out. The more consistent specimens are caught here. Offer a few quid more for a further trip out if the weather permits, as the expense of these trips is considerable compared with a trip to the Luisitania which is relatively close in. Think coalies.....big coalies!!!!!!!

Cheers,
Jim