portrush cod fest and bangor whiting 23rd&24th nov

People: just me

Duration: portrush 8pm - 1am bangor 2pm - 4pm

Tide: portrush ht 11.30pm bangor ht 4.30pm

Weather: gales and occasional rain

Bait: mack, peeler, squid and sand eel

Rigs: 3 hook flappers

Results: PORTRUSH 9 codling, 3 dab, 2 coalies, 1 whiting and a poor cod. BANGOR 21 whiting




Report: i had arranged to take aaron up to portrush to bag him a few new species, but his missus was taken into hospital to get the wee one on the way (good luck man ). so i headed on up to see what was about as i did well here 2 weeks before. i arrived to be greeted with mental winds again but at least the rain was holding off small mercys and all that. bite indication was out the window again and i just reeled in every 20 mins to see if i had a fish on. i had no worms with me so i reckoned the wee flats were out the window on this trip. i also scaled up my hook size to 2/0 to try and avoid the tiddlers in the hope of a big cod making an appearence . there was a big swell and massive rollers crashing in on the beach so i was hopeing to be lucky enough to get a silver surfer . but unfortunately none showed up on this trip . but i was'nt too downhearted as there was plenty to keep me busy . i started to get a cod a cast and ended up getting 9 the most i've ever had in the 1 session . they all fell to peeler and mack cocktails but were all stuffed full of wee sand coloured crabs no bigger than a pound coin. they must have been in gorgeing themselves full of them as the big rollers were churning up the sea bed . the biggest one was almost 30cms long and just under a pound. great to catch but still way to small for a dose of beer batter. so they all went back to fatten up a bit . i got the dabs on squid and honestly can't remember what the whiting, poor cod and coalies fell to, but it was great craic on the spinning gear. by 1am i was frozen to the bone and hit the road for home

TUESDAY 24th bangor
with a dozen or so strips of mack left over i decided to go down to bangor to mess about with the whiting . while i was setting up jonny gilbert from the site came over and introduced himself. good to finally meet you man being typical fishing nuts a 30 min conversation about all things fishy began . a real decent bloke, and i'm sure we'll meet along the coast again soon enough. when jonny headed on i got back to useing up the mack and was pulling in whiting 2 at a time . soon enough they had stripped the last bits of flesh off my last bits of mack and i was about to pull the skin off the hooks and pack away when i wondered if a chuck out with only skin on the hooks would get a few more . i always joke about these wee, fish saying they would attack a bare hook. but was made up reeling in another 5 of them before the hooks were bare and the bites stopped:D . it had started to rain heavily so i timed it well enough and headed on home. as usual, no monsters but all good fun on the spinning gear

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great session - see the wee crab your on about in the second pic!

its mad sometimes when you see the stuff fish are puking up and you wonder if your spending a bit too much time on bait presentation!!!

Rite Al thats it- what is your secret..... dynamite isnt it Another good double session mate. Good report to follow as well. I only noticed aarons post yesterday and put up a reply but it was too late.

Bet the wee man was none to impressed missing out on another couple of trips.

Well done Al two nice sessions Great to see so many
codling around , cant to get out and being able to see bites on the rod so lets hope
this wind drops away soooooon


LIFE IS FOR FISHING

Nice work Al kept busy there. Did you and Dave swap rulers?

great session Al,what if you have lug worms codling can't resist it well done mate

well done! 9 codling! that doesnt happen too often! congrats

great session - see the wee crab your on about in the second pic!
its mad sometimes when you see the stuff fish are puking up and you wonder if your spending a bit too much time on bait presentation!!!

i know brian, we're always lashing bait on with yards of bait elastic but my hands were blue that night so i just stuck on big ignorant chunks of mack and it seemed to do the trick all the codling that night were jammed full of those wee crabs. i have a packet of those berkley power bait immitation crabs at home, just wish they had of been in my box as i reckon they would have been deadly attached to the 3 hook flapper on a 3oz lead allowed to bounce around in the rollers . but i now know what the codling seem to like up there always good to know for the rest of the winter

Rite Al thats it- what is your secret..... dynamite isnt it Another good double session mate. Good report to follow as well. I only noticed aarons post yesterday and put up a reply but it was too late.
Bet the wee man was none to impressed missing out on another couple of trips.

cheers man. only secret or advice would be to spend as much time fishing as possible on a law of average you're bound to hit into something decent or out of the ordinary soon enough . but i don't need to tell you that with the session's you've been putting in lately jordan's saving himself for the weekend

Well done Al two nice sessions Great to see so many
codling around , cant to get out and being able to see bites on the rod so lets hope
this wind drops away soooooon
LIFE IS FOR FISHING

thanks ger. i ditched the beach rods & tripod and just brought the 5ft spinning rod instead. when it's blowing a gale you usually get better bite detection with the rod being in your hand but i was slightly optimistic as i was facing 45mph winds stood out in the open unsheltered but it dose'nt have to spoil your fishing, just alter your tactics a bit

Nice work Al kept busy there. Did you and Dave swap rulers?

cheers man. a bit of an embarrising story with that man i got one for dave and ordered another for fishface. i forgot to lift my one and fishface's one on my last trip down the east coast. when i got back i discovered our dog had turned the 2 of them and a bag of boat booms into chew toys now sakuma uk have told me they are'nt making them any more so i got onto parker angling supplies (who distrubited them) and they told me they have no more left and my only chance of getting one would be from any tackle retailers who have any in back stock. so if anyone knows of any tackle shops who still have some of the sakuma sea measures with the national federation of sea anglers minimum retention sizes printed on them could you please let me know. i think i saw one in the pics of someones report here recently, so any help would be greatly appreciated

great session Al,what if you have lug worms codling can't resist it well done mate

you read my mind . gonna get out on the next set of good low tides and fill the fridge with rag and blow & black lug i can keep roughly 200 alive for around 14 days at a time. not that they ever get to stay that long as we get through them at some rate with all the fishing we do . it would be frightening to sit down and work out what we would be spending on worms during a year if we were'nt out digging them ourselves

well done! 9 codling! that doesnt happen too often! congrats

thanks chris. it's the most i've ever had in one session just a pity none of them were worth taking home a third of the weight of a cod is in his head, so generally anything under 2lb just gets put straight back in as they're only starting to make a comeback no sense in taking a half dozen fish just to get one good fillet out of them

Another 2 good Sesh's Mate, Keep her lit!

Nice one Al

Nice busy sessions Al, well done.I did the same with a piece of mack one night to see how many whiting i could get on it before it disappeared,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,answer was 6

well done AL lad , thats some haul again .

Great fishing again - you are certainly getting the fishing in at the moment and getting excellent results. I wish I could say the same - 3 fish out of five sessions in the last couple of weeks - I hope the weather calms down soon - this time last year I was catching plenty of bass off the West Waterford and East Cork beaches in quite calm conditions - the sea is just too wild at the moment.

Great sessions again Al, well done Looking forward to getting out some night next week before I take my travel rod to Fuerteventura for a week!

well done al,see your still as keen as always 9 codling nice catch!

nice going

Another 2 good Sesh's Mate, Keep her lit!

cheers drew. we'll have to arrange a wee meet at donaghadee or millisle soon

Nice one Al

cheers colin, just wish this weather would break for a bit

Nice busy sessions Al, well done.I did the same with a piece of mack one night to see how many whiting i could get on it before it disappeared,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,answer was 6

they're ferocious wee biters for all the size of them. they gotta be the leming of the fish world even when you up the hook size to a 3/0 to try to avoid them,,, they still manage to impale themselves while attacking a piece of bait that's the same size as themselves

well done AL lad , thats some haul again .

thanks man. just goes to show you can get rewarded well enough as long as you're willing to brave the elements

Great fishing again - you are certainly getting the fishing in at the moment and getting excellent results. I wish I could say the same - 3 fish out of five sessions in the last couple of weeks - I hope the weather calms down soon - this time last year I was catching plenty of Bass off the West Waterford and East Cork beaches in quite calm conditions - the sea is just too wild at the moment.

thanks frank. thankfully a lot of the marks that we fish are starting to get good numbers of wee codling showing at them when it's blowing a gale. seems to put off other species but at least the codling keep us busy just hope they manage to avoid the nets and tiddler munchers long enough to grow up and put a bit of weight on .

Great sessions again Al, well done Looking forward to getting out some night next week before I take my travel rod to Fuerteventura for a week!

thanks fenton. i'm heading out again on monday night to bangor or donaghadee if you fancy a run out man gonna try and get dawsey away from the uni text books and get him out again for a bit he has'nt been out terrorizing the fish for a few weeks now

well done al,see your still as keen as always 9 codling nice catch!

thanks noel, it's the most i've ever had in the one session . besides if the weather gets too rough at that mark you can make a strategic withdrawl to the car for a bit to warm up and still watch the rods

nice going

cheers taz, i'll try that mark again when it's less windy and go back armed with lug be interesting to see what results i get then