West Clare marks 15-22 sept

People:
My dad and me

Duration:
15-22 september

Tide:
Various

Weather:
Various!

Bait:
mackerel, squid, sandeel

Rigs:
feathers, paternosters, clipped down, 3/0-4/0 hooks

Results:
mackerel, dogs, huss, rays (thornback, smalleyed and ??), pollack, conger, scad. No pouting, hurray!!!

Report:
Our biannual fishing trip to westclare. fantastic fishing and people, great holiday! we fished most days during the week, at various marks. see below.

Castle point; feathering for mackerel for bait. as always, an exhilerating (?) place to fish. mackerel were always there when we needed them!

Poulnasherry; fished it 3 times, cos it was that good! always over low water (1 hour down, 2 hrs up) 1st time, 5 dogs and 2 huss, just a bit bigger (and stronger) than the dogs, 2nd time had two nice rays 4lb and 5lb, and loads of dogs. one of the rays was a thornie, the other looked very different, with less thorns and a single large dark spot on each wing. Any ideas what it was? 3rd time, just dogs. great fishing, but the tide forced us to move.

Carrigaholt beach; dogs and a nice small eyed ray about 7lb or so for my dad on sandeel at the top of the tide.

Carrigaholt pier; 2 thornbacks, one 7lber, the other 2lb or so. loads of small Pollack and scad on light gear down the side and a huge spider crab on mackerel meant for conger! lost something big that bit clean through my 35lb trace...

Cappa rocks; 1 nice conger, pushing 10lb. v snaggy though.

went coarse fishing in east clare too, catching the usual suspects!

All in all a great holiday. Aided greatly by the excellent advice of Michael Bourke and his great bait and the advice gained from the lovely people of this site. Thanks all.

Chris

Nice fishing Chris!
Have you a pic of the 'odd' ray?
I concentrated on the rock fishing and had lots of Ballan Wrasse at Bridges of Ross and Baltard on hard back crab and limpet - best was 4 1/2 lbs. My brother had a 5 lbs. Bass on a Jensen Tobis at Rinevella Bay.

Sounds like a cuckoo ray...

Could have been a thornback ,we got loads of them in clifden with single black spots on each wing ,oddly some of them had black noses as well ,maybe a localised variation ?

Nice fishing Chris!
Have you a pic of the 'odd' ray?
I concentrated on the rock fishing and had lots of Ballan Wrasse at Bridges of Ross and Baltard on hard back crab and limpet - best was 4 1/2 lbs. My brother had a 5 lbs. Bass on a Jensen Tobis at Rinevella Bay.

Will wrasse be around for much longer Ross? I have yet to catch one. This being my first season giving this sea angling a propper go and I have got most of my targets, just wrasse and bass to go befoe I give the winter stuff a shot. I find this forum extremly helpful any hints will do.

I have taken wrasse from the West Coast of Clare right up to first week in November depending on the weather. If we get a long cold snap they move out deep.
If you want to get your Wrasse and Bass pm me to meet.
Bass fishing has picked up in the last week around Carrigaholt.
Jensen Tobis seems to do the business!
We get Bass here right through the winter.
Don't forget to Login!

Having looked at pictures on the net, Im fairly sure it was a thornback with different markings, rather than a cuckoo ray. It was a lots less thorny than the others we caught, hence the confusion. The rest of them were armed like porcupines! Anyone else notice regional variations in how spiny thornbacks are? Any theories as to why?

Good luck all, cant wait for our next trip, back to catching undersized pout and whiting for now, I guess...

Chris

Don't forget to Login!

or change my username to 'guest' :wink:

I will do that if I get a chance in the next week or two Ross thanks!

David

i hate you all......i leave ye alone for two weeks, and everyone starts catching fish......Bill my apologies, this is my first time logging on in ages so sorry for not responding to your pm, the odds of me being able to go fishing midweek over ther next 3 months are slim to nothing! but i intend heading down this friday night to empty the house, and have one last piss up in kilkee, so i should be around all day saturday if you're up to nothing better?...

Patrick

Patrick,
I never pass up a chance to fish! Give me a buzz fri/sat.
Good luck with the studies! Think off all the Euros and all the fish awaiting you and you with a degree in your tackle bag!!!!!!!!
Best wishes,
Bill