Sheet lightning on White Strand, Mayo 8.5.2016

Cobyeire proved to be the only person willing to travel up to Mayo to have a crack at the storm beaches in daylight. Sean and a few others baled...

So we headed up to Emagh Point to find a lone woman and her dog sunbathing in the rocks and it was flat calm, a one foot swell, and the beach littered in weed. Not promising. As we drove past Carrowniskey, it was looking just as dull. This 20 C stuff and sunshine does stuff for the landscape but it flattened the swells...

In the end we continued on to White Strand, hoping there might be a bit of a swell and perhaps a sea trout bouncing around on the incoming tide. HW due @ 8 and with big high water of just shy of 5 metres we felt it might be worth the slog. A few signs would be worthwhile Mayo Co Co - missed the damn turn again!

Anyhow landed, after wading over the river (knees) and moved out to a spot just south of the old boat wreck.
Beach had a fair bit of kelp on it. Tide was well out at this stage, beautiful sunshine and a warm SE breeze coming in at our backs...

Corbyeire being the competition angler had a rig up and cast before you could say Jaysus and was working on his second rod. He was using sandeel, black lug and the dodgiest looking mackerel I have seen in a while, whereas yours truly was using Lidl's finest mackerel. I don't know what it is about how Lidl treat or store it but its so firm even after several refreezings that the skin stay tough and you never need to use shirring elastic on it. That said, I'm not sure it as oily as regular caught mackerel..

Subtlety is not my style so on went 125 grams and out went a three hook flapper featuring three strips of belly on 2/0s. Short blood loop snoods. No swivels...



With all the weed in the incoming tables, I had the rods up as high as I could (not very) whereas Corbyeire decided to keep his low hoping a pyramid would keep the baits out beyond the weed. As I was tackling up the triplex (for the rays at distance don't you know!) my rod stand reeled over. Foot. Or something like that..

Picked it all up, checked the line, nothing doing... back to the Triplex. C is checking for a bite, so having launched the a running leger (also 2/0 but with a lump of mack) a long way out - love the Affinity Ste C, its added 40 metres to my casts easily and that's before I get some lessons - I check my own inshore rod and feel a bit of weight. The rod's a Vega a flattie rod and its very sensitive, so I haul in and sure enough there's a nice 25 cm turbot attached to the middle hook. Get in!



Brian comes over and performs the surgery - very neat unhooking out the gills - and I remove the hook from the blood loop which makes releasing the fish even easier. Its only now as I write this that I remember I have 100 x 2/0 circle hooks at home... but not one on a single trace!

Good start I thinks, the old mack belly does the trick.

C reckons its the biggest turbot he's seen in yonks - but I've had bigger on this beach so we head back, rebait, cast out and have four rods fishing, three in close, one far out. Some lads are duck hunting or crow scalding behind us near the lakes. As we look around there is a massive thunderstorm over Connemara giving it a good soaking.

The turbot and flounder bites fail to show. We're fishing into a lovely suite of tables, three foot swell running in, not too much weed, and into tide marked ground, ideal for flounder. C takes to scratching and twitching his 4s loaded with all the different baits in and eventually lands a small flounder. And I mean small... we have a discussion about hook size, his 4s versus my 2/0s, and that illustrates the competition angler at work. I used to scratch with small hooks but just cant be bothered now!

Ok, its a counter... just!



Sky behinds to darken behind us. The lads with the shotguns are banging away at Lord know what! And the wind begins to pick up. Ripped and torn purple clouds are everywhere and a wall of grey has enveloped the mountains behind us. Suddenly there's a flash and several more and distant thunder rolls around and it grows in intensity. Sheet lightning all around us now and the rain is pelting down. Flashes going off in all directions, front, back, sides... Waves are flattened, you can see them coming from the far horizon. We sit it out on a hump of sand dunes, having retreated back with the tides, still trying to winkle a fish out of the first three tables.



Nothing doing. The storm is raking it down, smashing down the sea to a series of little more than ripples. Eventually it clears and I am soaked through even with the waterproofs. Eventually Brian lands another decent flounder, again in from the suds and amid the weeds.

Well, I say decent.... we're talking low 20s again. Still its a fish which is more than I've been getting... several small twitches but nothing doing. It's just too bright and especially with the storm gone and blue sky showing up again... We continue to fish the mark right up to high water, which is half a metre shy of the litter on the beach. Just goes to show you what a change in wind direction will do...

Nothing doing.

I've started lobbing the "long" bait in short, since going long is landing me in pretty much the same depth of water now. Not as much as a nibble. It being May now, we're another hour or two to wait for dusk. We fish the turn, C changes to a long snood cast still with 4s and every bait known to a flounder but nothing is happening. The odd rain shower blows in, the storm is still lighting up the sky, well out to sea on Inishbofin and north as far as Achill. C's mate blanked on Keel yesterday.

As darkness approaches, I'm getting increasingly cold and miserable. This reminds me of a notorious competition we had on Glassilaun beach. I had one fish that day too.

So we hang on in the hope that dusk will improve our chances, but the surf has collapsed down to barely a foot high. When several of my casts are brought in for rebaiting with lots of weed attached, I'm thinking I've had enough. The river should be ford-able now given we're a good hour and a half past HW. Brian reckons he's gonna try for a but longer but I'm tackling down, and by 10 pm its time to go through (waist deep) the river, surging out to sea in a nasty current. Still at least I can see the car park!

Brian decided to stay on and try for another hour, hoping full darkness would bring a chance in fortune. It didn't!

Two flounder and a turbot. Better than a blank... but not by much. TBH I think these beaches need to be fished in full darkness. That's all folks.

I think I'll move onto the rock hopping especially if the sand eels show in any numbers in the next few weeks...

Tight lines (you wish!)

Cracking report, that storm looked nasty! I'm heading up to the West in August, house is right beside Enniscrone pier in Sligo. What would I catch around there?

Epic report, pity the fishing wasn't up to the same standard as your writing

Good reading nice report. Looks a lovely spot

Cracking report, that storm looked nasty! I'm heading up to the West in August, house is right beside Enniscrone pier in Sligo. What would I catch around there?

Enniscrone beach - near the harbour, you get flats and the odd sea trout.
Enniscrone beach - near the Moy, lots of sea trout, the odd flattie and rumours of large bass eating the sea trout. Maybe a salmon too. Get a licence. It's patrolled.
Enniscrone pier - very tidal. Mack, small Pollack, small coalfish on the flood. Rockling and small flats on the sand/mud. Some congers apparently.
Enniscrone pier - rocks to the north/east - rough ground fishing for the usual suspects including wrasse in season.

To be honest, its not the best mark. The stamp of fish tends to be poor enough.
The pier gets filled with mackerel bashers as the tide comes in, especially in August! Try these guides, albeit the information may be a bit dated for some of them...

http://www.sea-angling-ireland.org/shore%20-%20sligo.htm
http://www.sea-angling-ireland.org/shore%20-%20mayo%203.htm

Thanks! I wanted to know as the pier is literally 20 metres from my holiday home, it'd take me 30 seconds to get there!

Sent from my HTC Desire 620 using Tapatalk

Well done on the Turbot Kieran. I recken hes got the edge on your last one no??

Emlagh is a "hoor" of spot for kelp I lost a tip to it a few years back.

Turbot hunting is on the cards. It produces them in good weather to

There was a photo in Doug's shop in Westport of a painted ray (which he mis-identified regularly in conversation!) and the alignment of islands in the background always signalled that it came off Emlagh. It has a deep channel on the north side, next to the rocks, so I'd like to fish it but ideally when there's a bit of a swell and less kelp!

I'm thinking of heading north on the next trip, there should be some good Pollack and Wrasse showing up now in north Mayo. Hiking boots required if you are interested...

Great report Kieran-you really painted a picture there! Hard luck on the fishing but at least you got a few fish. That Corbyeire lad never throws out a mackerel!

There was a photo in Doug's shop in Westport of a painted ray (which he mis-identified regularly in conversation!) and the alignment of islands in the background always signalled that it came off Emlagh. It has a deep channel on the north side, next to the rocks, so I'd like to fish it but ideally when there's a bit of a swell and less kelp!

I'm thinking of heading north on the next trip, there should be some good Pollack and Wrasse showing up now in north Mayo. Hiking boots required if you are interested...

Sounds good Kieran I need to get a good pair of hiking boots. Travel light and lure fish or bring the whole set up?

lure fishing, maybe with light weight or float options for wrasse and the like...

Epic report Kieran - really got a sense of the days fishing (or lack thereof)
the storm was fantastic to be immersed in, some experience

further east in lacken yesterday the fishing was rubbish still