waterfoor pier red bay

me and my mate

Time 8pm-11.30pm

Tide: high around 9.30pm

Weather: cold and calm, got rain and wind picked up rightly after 9pm.

bait: mackrel, mussels and razor fish.

Results: 2 doggies to mackrel, 1 tiny dab i think, 2 tiny whiting. lost something decent :(

fished the pier tonight for a while. mussel seemed to be the top bait, every cast within minutes the rod was going crazy! couldnt seem to hook anything though so im assuming they were just small whiting or something stripping the bait.
Finally hooked into something decent got it right to the pier and just out of the water, leader knot caught the eye and the fish got off!!! Looked like a codling or big whiting around the 2lb mark.
A few casts later got 2 brilliant bites, brought it in to find a crab attached to my bait, certainly wasnt the crab biting!!!!!!

not a bad night over all as the weather turned bad the bites appeared to get better, but still couldnt hook anything. was originally using 2/0 hooks dropped down to size 1 and still didnt do :(

first time using mussel as a bait seems good but extremely soft. might try putting some into a finger bandage sort of thing and tie both end so its enclosed in a mesh bag basically, would make it a lot easier to hook and stop the little feckers from picking it to bits.

probably coalies mate if they are about and you are using mussel cant resist it.

try scaling your hook size down further to 2's or 4's, that way you may well find out what the bites are from.these size of hooks should still land anything you are likely to catch here.
if your mussel are extremely soft try boiling them just a little before hand only to the point that it tightens them a little tho, this will inevitably take a little of the juice from them but whip it onto your hooks on a spare trace with a few wraps of light bait elastic, then you may place them in a small tray/container of peeler crab oil for a few minutes to replenish some vital fish attracting juices.
the bay must to full of small fish at the minute cos at a recent open on waterfoot beach i used a sensitive tipped rod and braid on the reel, after dark ,as soon as baits hit the bottom the tip started bouncing.it took size 4 and 2 hooks to get the most of the fish hooked though. to stop them stripping the hooks i used a plain lead and about every minute reeled in a few feet of line to pull the bait away from them, then if you got a bite from something better let it stay there a minute or two and see how things develop.
good luck

put the mussels into boiling water until shells start to open then put into cold water to cool and harden up,deshell and freeze spaced out on a saucer or peice of glass to stop them sticking together when frozen .
chip them of glass after 24hrs and bag up in 20's ready to go.
rab

cheers for the tip maybe gonna get out bait hunting over the weekend,
i got the mussel from belfast angling supplies. seemed to be plenty juicy so im assuming they were shelled straight into the bag. Not bad for only a couple of quid :D

just need to find some lug now cant really get time/or know where to dig it

If in Belfast, have a look in the Asia Supermarket on the Ormeau Road - just beside the Lagan Bridge. They do packs of frozen squid dead cheap, also trays of anchovies and bags of frozen whelks etc. I load up every time I'm in there.