Greystones south beach

People: Myself and Codswollop

Duration: approx. 19:30 - 12:30

Tide: high at approx. 21:00

Weather: Dull. Overcast. Mild. Windy later on.

Bait: Mackerel. Mackerel with lug juice.

Rigs: 5 ft. long with two 2ft. hook snoods. Size 2/0 hooks. 5oz weights.

Results: 4 dogfish and 2 tiny flounder


Report:

The fish seemed to start biting at dusk. Casting distance was about 50 to 60 yards. The flounder were taken on the mackerel with the lug juice. There were shoals of mackerel chasing fry onto the beach. The mackerel were jumping out of the water to catch them. I had no mackerel gear with me. There were two other guys with spinners and feathers catching them. It was funny to see these guys chasing the shoal up and down the beach as it moved around. It worked though.

Was out there last night myself,and caught 40 Mackerel from around 8.30 until it got dark,there were schoals of them chasing the fry as you said,most of the fry ended up on the beach,good fun though,I was catching 2's and 3's with every cast,even caught a nice codling,about 2lb,while I had 2 mackerel on aswell :lol: ,threw him back too, kept about 10 mackerel for the dinner table and threw the rest back.I also heard there was alot caught on the pier during the week.
After dark caught alot of doggies,a few small flounder,some more small codling,a couple of whiting,good size too and a nice pollack about 1.5 lb.Overall a great night's fishing,reminded me of the good old days on Greystones beach :)

Sounds like you had a great session Richie. Fair play to you. Nice to see you putting most of your fish back too. You deserved your luck.

Regards,
John D

Richie, were you fishing off the beach itself and if so whereabouts.

Cheers
Murch

richie07- Congrats. on the good session .

I note you returned most of the mackerel you caught.
There is an interesting thread under the conservation section of this web-site headed "mackerel catch and release."
It seems to say that if you handle mackerel at all they will die within 30 hours of putting them back as their skin is irreversibly damaged.
I certainly never knew that before and thought I was being good by returning them - I guess if I catch mackerel in future I may as well keep them - or better still I'll stop fishing as soon as I have all I need.

Murch- Yeah,fishing off the beach,just before the stream,maybe 30 yards back towards the town,I think they were being caught all along the beach though as lads closer to the town were catching them too. I'd seen a few Mackerel caught here before but nowhere near the amount that have been caught recently around the area.I'm gonna get down again later in the week to see if it's still happening.Very underrated fish the Mackerel,fantastic sport on light tackle.
Monkey,I read that recently about the mackerel too so I was prepared :D ..I also read that if you wet your hands before handling them no damage is caused,so hopefully mine have learned their lesson and are still swimming.
Cheers,Richie.

Wetting your hands before touching ANY fish is essential - you have to remember these are cold blooded creatures and when your warm-blooded flesh touches them it BURNS!!!! I learned this in a touristy type sea-park place I used to work in in Spain.

A lot of people would use a wet cloth or rag to handle fish before returning them to the water.

Very interesting stuff monkey and Irish_Shamrock.
Thanks for the insight.
Cheers,
John D